"How's the kid?"
They went out together, while awaiting dinner, to see the new setter
puppy in the woodshed.
"Named him yet?" asked Orde.
"Duke," said Bobby.
Orde surveyed the animal gravely.
"Seems like a good name," said he.
After dinner the two adjourned to the library, where they sat
together in the "big chair," and Bobby, squirmed a little sidewise
in order the better to see, watched the smoke from his father's
cigar as it eddied and curled in the air.
"Tell a story," he commanded finally.
"Well," acquiesced Orde, "there was once a man who had a cow--"
"Once upon a time," corrected Bobby.
He listened for a moment or so.
"I don't like that story," he then announced. "Tell the story about
the bears."
"But this is a new story," protested Orde, "and you've heard about
the bears so many times."
"Bears," insisted Bobby.
"Well, once upon a time there were three bears--a big bear and a
middle-sized bear and a little bear--" began Orde obediently.
Bobby, with a sigh of rapture and content, curled up in a snug, warm
little ball. The twilight darkened.
"Blind-man's holiday!" warned Carroll behind them so suddenly that
they both jumped. "And the sand man's been at somebody, I know!"
She bore him away to bed.
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