Whole book · 21 sections
Transcriber’s Note:
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.
Published simultaneously in the United States, Great Britain, Canada, and British Possessions
After they were both comfortably seated on the swinger and settled down for their long ride, the Imp was presently seized with the wildest excitement, which first startled and then amused the little boy. The more the swinger swung, the more loud and boisterous became the Imp’s extraordinary conduct.
But in less than a minute everything seemed to the little boy to be growing dreamy and hazy. He did not know where he was; he simply knew that he was sitting on something and holding on and moving at a terrific rate. He remembered being carried past the big parlour, and seeing the piano which looked all shadowy and strange, as if it were covered with thick dust. He recognized the hat-rack, as he flew by, and the silver plate which held the calling cards seemed to be whizzing round like a pin wheel. He did not know whether the clock had suddenly grown large enough to accommodate its tumultuous swinger, or whether the swinger had given up its usual duties altogether, and was running away as fast as it could. In short he did not know anything except that he was sitting opposite his singular friend, who had risen 35and was giving an acrobatic performance on the opposite side of the long stem—apparently without the smallest regard for the danger which attended his reckless actions.
Suddenly he began to sing and dance, and the song, as nearly as the little boy could make it out, was as follows. It amused him greatly, for it seemed to be curiously fitted to the motions which, of course, cannot be given here.
“There!” said the Imp, as he resumed his seat on the swinging ball, “now I feel better! I was locked up in that musty clock for an hour before I met you, without a particle of fresh air. Now I feel better! I’m a great believer in exercise, and they say dancing is the greatest exercise in the world. I once knew a boy about your age who had St. Vitus’ Dance, and they thought there was no hope for him, but I said, ‘This is a disease and a cure all in one; let him dance; it’s good exercise.’ And he did, and he cured himself of dancing simply by dancing. The more he danced, the less he danced, until he was well altogether.”
“Wasn’t that a little strange?” asked the little boy; “you say he is well now?”
“Perfectly; he is a clock maker. I know him personally.”
There was a long pause after this, and then the little boy asked,
“Shall I meet the Duke of Limabean?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” said the Imp. “I’ll show you his country-place when we get past the frontier. He married the Countess of Corn, you know. Their beautiful place at Succotash is visited by all tourists. There! Look close, and look out, don’t fall! You see that row of hills over there? Those 39are the Tockerlore Mountains. They form the frontier of the land. There used to be a fence there instead, but Father Time happened to see those mountains at a bargain sale and he thought they’d be better.”
“What?” said the little boy.
“I say there used to be a fence there instead.”
“Did you say that the king bought the mountains?”
“Why, yes, you don’t suppose he got them for nothing, do you?”
“I never heard of a person buying a range of mountains!”
“Did you ever hear of any one getting a range of mountains for nothing?”
“N-no, I can’t say I did.”
40“Well, then!”
“But what was the use of buying the mountains for a frontier when they were already there?”
“I didn’t say they were already there.”
There was a pause after this retort, and the little boy looked at his friend curiously. He then unfastened the belt of his Russian suit, and fixed it so that it went around the long stem.
“They have straps like this to hold you on merry-go-rounds; don’t you think this is a good idea?”
“Excellent,” said the Imp.
“May I ask another question?” said the little boy.
“Certainly; what is it?”
“Where were the mountains before the king bought them?”
“At the bargain sale.”
“And you mean to say that some one carried them there?”
“Why, certainly; you don’t suppose they walked there, do you? That is a strange question.”
“How far was the bargain sale?” asked the little boy.
“About two miles; at the five and ten cent store.”
“And the mountains were bought there?”
“Yes, delivered C. O. D.”
“Tockerlore is a kind of magic place, where they have fairies and magic wands, isn’t it?”
41“Why, do you think there is anything strange in a range of mountains not walking two miles of their own accord?”
“Oh, I didn’t expect them to walk!” said the little boy.
“Yes, you did, and you seemed to doubt that the king bought them—as if he would have stolen them!”
“Oh, I never thought that!” said the little boy. “I truly didn’t. I thought it was strange that—well, I don’t understand it, that’s all.”
The Imp looked at him in a quizzical way, and then said,
“What a queer child you are!” And that was all the conversation which took place until the strange mountains loomed up in full view before the boy’s eyes. But he had made a resolution not to express any surprise at anything he saw, for the Imp didn’t seem to see things in his way, and was very touchy.
As they approached nearer and nearer to the mighty hills, the little boy could distinguish living figures seated upon the rocks and ledges all about, and twanging little harps. They were very small—these figures—and they seemed to be singing an anthem, or something of the sort, which the little boy couldn’t make out. But he hesitated to ask any question concerning them and their business for fear of getting into a dispute.
42“There!” said the Imp, finally; “those are His Majesty’s Minstrels on guard at the mountains.”
“To keep them from running away?” asked the boy.
“To keep what from running away?”
“The mountains.”
“Now, don’t be absurd,” said the Imp, “do you hear that song they’re singing? That’s the national hymn. How beautiful it is. Just listen!”
They were now close upon a mighty canyon which ran between two great hills and formed a gateway into the mystic land.
The scented breeze wafted the voices of the tiny singers in the little boy’s direction, and he was struck with consternation on hearing the words of the national song.
As they passed into the great canyon which lay between the two high mountains, they could hear the echo of the minstrels’ song, farther and farther away in the distance,
and so on, until it died away altogether, and they realized that they were in the Land of Tockerlore.
50“Wait a minute!” said the little boy. “Did you say that the road was once alive! Or didn’t you say that?”
“Yes, I did, and you shouldn’t interrupt.
“There, now what is it?”
“Well, I thought it seemed funny that—I didn’t see how a road—Well, nothing.”
“Go on,” said the Imp, “I’m listening.”
“Well, would you mind telling me about how the road was alive—if it wouldn’t be too much trouble?”
“Oh, there’s an old legend they tell in Minutel—I’ve no doubt you’ll hear it; we’ll ask when we get there. Minutel is a queer little place, full of folk-lore. Those gardens I spoke of are called the Fields of Fragrant Flowers; they are a reservoir.”
“A what?”
“A reservoir, supplying fragrance to the whole kingdom. The delightful scent from the flowers is carried through pipes into Tickerleen and the smaller places. You’ll notice the little registers in the streets which open and close. Just see how beautiful the view is now—look over there—”
“And that means, in plain language, that we’ve missed it! And there won’t be another till that gets back, for there’s only one train. There, that’s the last you’ll see of it, for it’s gone behind the mountains. It’ll be in Chymerline before you and I get to Minutel. Now, step down this way.”
“That’s too bad,” said the little boy, as he stepped 52down, “but we can wait in Minutel, can’t we? We’ll want to see the village anyway, I suppose.”
“Yes, but I don’t know how long we’ll have to wait. Minutel is an old-fashioned place, filled with queer, old hours,—Pilgrim hours, and Puritan hours, and that sort; there’s not much to do there unless you want to listen to their prosy chaff.”
“Oh, I’ve heard about the Pilgrims landing on Plymouth Rock, and I like stories of that kind,” said the boy. “Do you suppose the hour is there who saw them land?”
“Yes, I suppose so—Look out, don’t fall!”
“Is the train usually on time?” asked the little boy.
“Yes, always,—except once I believe it lost three minutes, but the engineer got them back again.”
“Made them up, you mean?”
“No, he lost them somewhere between Snooze and Tickerleen, so he advertised in the Tickerleen papers and some one who had picked them up returned them.”
“What!” said the little boy, standing stark still 53and staring at the Imp. “Do you mean that those minutes were brought back to him?”
“Yes; what a curious little boy you are! You seem to think that nobody is honest. First Father Time is suspected of stealing mountains. Then you seem to be surprised that there is a single person in the whole great city of Tickerleen honourable enough to return three little golden minutes which he knew didn’t belong to him!”
“It isn’t that,” said the little boy, as they picked their way along down into the valley from the rocky ledge, “but it seems so funny—oh, well, I suppose things are different here.”
Soon they found themselves on level ground and hastened across some wide meadow land where they found a part of the road they had seen from the hill, and falling into it they saw at once how it led out of the valley up into Minutel, which was on the side of a mountain, not very far up.
“Wasn’t that a funny song?” said the little boy, as he trudged along up the winding road, watching the ground beneath him lest it should come to life again and shake him off. “I don’t think I ever heard such an odd song; it was meant to be funny, wasn’t it?”
“What song was that?”
“The song the minstrels were singing as we came in.”
54“I thought it was beautiful and stirring,” said the Imp.
“I thought it was funny about the ships being tied to the barnyard door.”
“O-oh, I don’t know, I suppose they must be tied somewhere; it’s just a matter of taste.”
“And the cod-fish coming out of his hole in the rain!”
“Yes,” said the Imp, “I’ll admit that was rather strange.”
“I’m glad that you agree with me at last,” said the little boy, “for I was beginning to think that nothing would ever seem strange to you.”
“Yes, that was strange,” said the Imp, “I can’t understand it.”
“And the cod liver oil part—the bowl of cod liver oil, you know. I thought that was odd.”
“Yes,” said the Imp, “that was the queerest part.”
“Ha, ha!” laughed the little boy.
“Very strange!” said the Imp.
The little boy seemed to be quite encouraged that he and his guide had come to an agreement about something at last, and he laughed uproariously as he thought over the rest of the minstrels’ song.
“The idea of his taking cod liver oil for his health and then coming out in the rain!” said the Imp. “I should think that he would have had better sense; that was a strange thing to do, I’ll admit.”
55The little boy’s face became very serious again as he heard this, and a look of disappointment was plainly visible in his big eyes.
“I didn’t mean that his coming out was strange, but his having a hole; I thought that was queer.”
The Imp stopped in the middle of the road, and looked at the little boy in utter astonishment. The poor little fellow was quite uncomfortable at being so sternly scrutinized, but he could only stand still too, and wait. Then the Imp spoke very slowly as if he wanted to make sure that the little boy understood every word,
“If you were taking medicine in such a quantity as that cod-fish—that is, if you were taking a whole bowl of something for your health—I ask you if you would come out in a rain storm. Now answer!”
“No, I wouldn’t, but—”
“No, you wouldn’t, of course you wouldn’t! Then it was strange for him to come out and do it, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was, but—”
“There is no ‘but’ about it; it was a foolhardy and absurd thing to do, and it was strange, as you said yourself.”
The little boy was about to speak when he changed his mind and decided that it was of no use. But he resolved to ask Father Time a few questions if His 56Majesty was willing to give him an audience when they got to the royal city.
Soon they reached the Fields of Fragrant Flowers, which were just outside of the village. Many little imps were here, roaming about amid a veritable forest of fragrant plants, and fanning the air into large funnels which rose here and there among the flowers, and which looked like the pipes the little boy had seen on the big ocean liner on which his parents had taken him abroad, and which he had been told were for the purpose of carrying air down into the staterooms below.
They sat on the fence a while to rest and watch the imps who were wandering here and there and 57fanning vigorously. Now and then a head would peer up from the clustering plants and take a peep at the little boy and then disappear again. Finally the little fellow noticed that many of the imps were stopping their work and joining a group where an animated conversation seemed to be going on. He watched them eagerly, supposing that something queer must have happened, and that perhaps one of them had been too stubborn to admit its queerness, and the rest were arguing with him. At last, to his great surprise, one of the little imps came running through the flowers till he almost reached the fence, where he stood and beckoned to the little boy to come inside.
“Shall I go?” said the little boy.
“Certainly,” said his friend, “they won’t hurt you.”
“I suppose they must have been talking about me; don’t you think so?” said the child.
“I shouldn’t be surprised,” responded his guide. “You’d better go in and see what they want.”
The little boy jumped down from the fence and hastened through the flowers till he reached the Imp, who, he now saw, was smaller than his travelling companion, but whose fan was perfectly gigantic. He wore a badge which said “Municipal Fragrance Department,” with a number underneath the words.
“What is it you want?” asked the little boy.
“Come back here; we want to speak with you,” 58said the Imp. So the little boy followed him back to the corner where the rest of the Municipal Fragrance Department workers were standing.
“How do you do?” said one of them.
“I’m very well,” said the little boy, “except my eyes hurt me. What do you want to see me about?”
“Where do you come from—the earth?”
“Yes, I’m here to see the Land of Tockerlore.”
“Who is your friend?”
“His name is Three O’clock. He invited me; wasn’t it all right?”
“Oh, yes, there are a good many Three O’clocks here; one comes about every day. Have you seen anything strange, unusual?”
The little boy looked back toward the fence to make sure his friend could not overhear the conversation. There was no danger of this, however, for his friendly guide was swinging his legs and singing a boisterous song about what an unpleasant thing school was.
“He’s very prejudiced against schools,” said the little boy. “I don’t know why, I’m sure. No, I haven’t seen anything so very strange, but he tells me strange things. I don’t know what to think of them; I don’t want to be impolite with him.”
“No, certainly not,” said the group, “you are quite right.”
“What did I tell you?” said one imp.
59“I thought he wouldn’t understand,” said another.
“Didn’t I say we ought to set him right?” said a third.
“It is just as I suspected,” observed a fourth. “There ought to be some one out on the frontier to inform visitors; they get all confused before they’re in the land. I’m glad we called him in,” and he looked about at the others as if he thought they ought to thank him for his thoughtfulness.
“My dear little boy,” said one of the imps, “there is nothing strange about Tockerlore, but the Earth, where you come from, is a queer place. Consequently, when you come here things appear strange when they really are not so. Scarcely a week passes but some visitor goes by here—invited, I suppose, by a friendly hour—and we always notice how surprised he seems to be. Now if you will just let me pin this flower on your blouse, it will set you right until you get to Tickerleen, where you won’t need it. They have so much fragrance there from the pipes that you won’t need any flower, but Minutel has no municipal supply, and only gets what fragrance the free air supplies, and that isn’t much. Now run along—you 60came up through the Snooze Valley from the frontier, didn’t you?”
“Yes, was that the Snooze Valley?” said the child.
“That was the Snooze Valley. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye,” said the little boy, “and I thank you—I really thank you very much if it will make me see things right.”
The imps all nodded as he ran away, and as he and his friend proceeded along the road, he turned and saw that they were all at work again, fanning with all their might and main. He explained to the Imp what they had done, and the Imp seemed to think it was a good idea.
“I only hope it will work,” said he, “for you are the strangest child I ever knew.”
65“You see,” said the Imp, drawing the little boy aside, “he is inclined to be perfectly honest; he doesn’t want to have you stop here and then be dissatisfied.”
“Is he an hour?” asked the little boy.
“Certainly, every imp you meet here is an hour. Just look on his badge and you’ll see what hour he is; Fourth of July, 1776, 4 P. M.—That was the day the Declaration of Independence was signed, wasn’t it? He ought to have some interesting things to tell.”
Then the Imp walked back to the counter where the innkeeper was standing, and said:
“Pardon me, good host, I interrupted you; you were telling us about your house, I believe. Pray continue.”
Several times during the host’s narrative the Imp glanced in the direction of his young friend to see whether the little fellow appeared surprised at anything he heard. The child gave no signs, however, to indicate that he had any doubt as to the perfect accuracy of the tale, in which he was deeply interested, being visibly affected toward the end, when his eyes were filled with tears. The Imp concluded that the flower was working splendidly, and making the little boy quite sensible in his way of seeing things.
After a moment or two of meditation into which all three had fallen when the story was finished, the little boy said,
“That Wollerp did a fine thing for the country, didn’t he?”
“Yes, indeed,” said the host, “and it was appreciated, too. As you go through Chymerline you’ll notice a monument on the village green; the road goes right past it. It was put there by the road commissioners in honour of the noble martyr who saved them the 84trouble of doing their duty. You see, people used to try to follow the curious windings of the neck, just for fun, until it got to be a kind of national game. Expeditions started out continually, until finally ‘Hunting the Head’ became a perfect fad. They had little wollerps with long necks to play with indoors, and they’d tangle the necks up on dining tables, and then try to follow them with little pointers until they came to the end. Of course, all this travelling outside made a beaten track, and the track developed into a path, and the path into a road, and the road into this beautiful endless highway which is the pride of the Kingdom and the delight of tourists.
“I remember the day I first got here. It was the afternoon of the Fourth of July, 1776, and everyone was saying a little poem. Some had gone crazy trying to learn to say it. I didn’t know what it meant until I heard the old road legend. This is how it went:—
“Don’t you think we’d better have dinner?” asked the host, rising. “It’s long past time.”
The little boy did think so, and had thought so for an hour or more, so he answered that he was perfectly agreeable, and they all went into the dining-room where they were soon seated before a steaming tankard of frizzled strikers with daybreak sauce.
“When is it going to be night?” asked the little boy, as they finished. For he knew they must have been in Tockerlore for sometime, and yet it was neither darker nor lighter than when they had passed the frontier.
“Why, it’s night now, I suppose,” said the landlord, “it’s never dark here, you know; the light always remains as you see it now. Would you like to go to bed?”
“If you don’t mind,” said the little boy.
86“Mind! Why, certainly I don’t mind. You’ve no objection to your friend’s sitting up with me a while, have you?”
“Oh, certainly not, not at all, but would someone be good enough to help me undo the buttons? I don’t want to trouble you, but you know I always have nurse to help me when I go to bed.”
So they both fell to and helped him undo the buttons, and then the host showed him to his room. He felt a little homesick as he curled himself up in the strange bed, and wished that he had his Teddy bear to talk with and tell things to. However, as he couldn’t do that, he did the next best thing, and talked to himself, which, as even grown up people know, is one of the greatest pleasures in the whole world.
“If that Imp were only fond of school and knew something about history; if he really cared for them, how nice it would be, for I suppose he’ll stay here all the rest of his life. I don’t suppose he ever had a governess to tell him things—it isn’t his fault. How many things Father Time must know! Just to think how that landlord saw the Declaration of Independence signed, maybe! I wonder if it was signed after lunch. I think the host’s badge said 4 P. M. Anyway, if he didn’t see it signed he saw some of the excitement after it was signed. Maybe he saw Benjamin Franklin. I wonder if he’ll tell about it while I’m asleep. I wonder what that place was where the young Imp had to go 87back; I suppose they all laughed at him when they saw him come walking in. It served him right; he was too sure. I wonder what that Nickub—that Nickuber—I wonder what that name was.” But while he tried to think of it he fell fast asleep.
When he awoke he knew it must be morning, for he heard voices in the yard beneath his window. There seemed to be several voices and all of them were very loud and angry in tone. Some were saying, “No, he didn’t!” Others were calling, “Yes, he did!” And still others were exclaiming, “Don’t you believe a word of it.” Then all the voices would be heard together in excited argument, and it sounded as if the owners of these voices might resort to blows at any minute if the matter under discussion were not settled very soon. Finally the little boy heard someone shout,
“Go on with what you were saying.”
“I intend to,” another voice answered.
“If it’s the truth, we want to hear it.”
“You’re going to hear it.”
“He’d better look out!”
“Who had?”
“You had.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you.”
“Don’t you believe in free speech?”
“Not that kind.”
“Go on, tell the rest of it.”
88“We’d like to see you do it!”
“You’ll hear me do it.”
“He knows what he’s talking about.”
“He thinks he does, anyway.”
“Go on, tell it!”
“Where did I leave off—oh, I know—
At this the little boy, who had risen and begun to dress, threw open the window and gazed on the assemblage below. On the fence sat his friend, Mr. Three O’clock, swinging his legs and laughing uproariously 89as if the disclosure which had just been made pleased him greatly. There were several little imps about the yard, all in colonial costume, some standing, others sitting, and in the centre stood the imp who had experienced such difficulty in telling his story. He had on a ragged Continental uniform, and his badge said “June 15, 1775. 2 P. M.” Altogether, he was very defiant looking and out of patience.
“Good morning,” said the little boy.
“How do you do,” said the Continental Imp.
“I am very well, thank you; what is the trouble?”
“No trouble at all; who are you?”
“I’m a little boy visiting Minutel. May I ask you what the quarrelling was about? Did you say someone told a whopper?”
“That’s exactly what I said.”
“You ought not to say it unless you’re sure it’s true. May I ask who you said it about: who it was 90that told the whopper? It wasn’t my friend, was it?”
“No.”
“May I ask who it was?”
“You may; it was George Washington.”
The little boy started. “Oh, that is a dreadful thing to say about George Washington. I’m sure that George Washington never told a whopper; you know all the school books—”
“Now you see how much good the school books are!” said Mr. Three O’clock, from the fence. “Ha, ha, ha!”
The little boy gave an indignant look at his hilarious friend, for it was no laughing matter, and continued his conversation with the Continental Imp.
“How do you know he told a whopper?”
“I heard him.”
“With your own ears?”
“Yes, whose ears do you suppose I heard him with?”
The little boy felt to make sure his flower was safely fastened in his buttonhole, for he did not know what 91the conversation might lead to, and he wanted to be perfectly reasonable.
“I beg your pardon,” said he, “but are you sure it was a w-h-o-p-p-e-r?” He was gaping as he said this, and it stretched the word out a little.
“Positive,” said the Continental Imp.
“Perhaps it was a small whopper?”
“There is no such thing.”
“Or a middle-sized one?”
“No such thing.”
“Oh, I’m sure there must be some mistake, for I’m sure that a wh-a-a-a-aap-” and he gaped so that he couldn’t finish the word. “Just wait a minute,” said he, “and I’ll come down there.”
In less than a minute the little boy came out into the yard arranging the belt of his Russian suit.
“I have couldn’t all the didn’ts that I buttoned, but I didn’t the couldn’ts that I didn’t when I buttoned the didn’ts,” said he, “and I hope you will excuse me.”
“Go back to bed,” said Mr. Three O’clock, “you’re not awake yet.”
“I am awake,” said the little boy.
“He said he couldn’t the didn’ts,” observed one imp.
“No, he didn’t, he said he didn’t the buttons that he couldn’t,” said another.
“He said he buttoned the couldn’ts when he didn’t,” called a third.
92“I didn’t,” said the little boy, “how could I?”
“Well, how could you didn’t if you couldn’t?”
“He said he buttoned the didn’ts.”
“He didn’t.”
“He said he couldn’t the didn’ts that he buttoned when he didn’t the buttons—what did you say?”
“Now wait a minute,” said the little boy. “How easily you get into a quarrel! I will tell you just what I said. I said that I buttoned all the buttons that I could button, but that I didn’t button the buttons that I couldn’t button. There!”
“Talk about whoppers!” said the Continental Imp. “Well, now what is it you want to know? Let’s get through with it.”
“I want,” said the little boy, “to know when George Washington told a whopper.”
“On the 15th of June, 1775, at 2 P. M., just after they made him commander of the army.”
“Would you mind telling me what the whopper was? You know all the stories say that George Washington couldn’t—”
“Oh, yes,” said the Continental Imp, smiling at Mr. Three O’clock, “we understand, of course, that George Washington couldn’t if he didn’t and that if he didn’t—”
“He didn’t,” shouted the little boy, stamping his foot. “What was the whopper?”
“He said, right in my hearing,” said the Continental 93Imp, “that he wasn’t fit for the exalted position. There!”
“Well?” said the little boy.
“Well, he was, that’s all,” replied the Continental Imp.
“You mean,” said the little boy, “that you think that was a whopper?”
“Well, it certainly wasn’t true, was it?”
“N-no, perhaps not, but he—well, it wasn’t a whopper.”
“He said he wasn’t fit for the position when he was, and he said he couldn’t win the war, and he did.”
Here the Continental Imp looked toward Mr. Three O’clock, who was still sitting on the fence, and said,
“What do you think about that?”
“Do I understand you to say that George Washington said he wouldn’t win the war?” asked Mr. Three O’clock.
“Yes.”
“Well, then, I think that, as a gentleman, he should have kept his word.”
“That is perfectly ridiculous!” said the little boy. “If he hadn’t won the war there wouldn’t be any America, and if there wasn’t any America there wouldn’t be any Tockerlore, and where would you all be, I’d like to know?”
“You don’t think Tockerlore is in America, do you?” asked one.
94“Where is it, then?”
“It’s right here where Father Time put it.”
“He didn’t,” said the little boy, whose patience was almost exhausted.
“He tried to button it here when he couldn’t, so he didn’t!” roared the Continental Imp.
“He couldn’t,” said the little boy, white with rage.
“Well, then, if he couldn’t, he probably didn’t!” yelled Mr. Three O’clock.
“He didn’t, he couldn’t!” screamed the little boy, quite beside himself. “And if I say he didn’t, he couldn’t, and don’t say that he couldn’t when he buttoned the couldn’ts to the didn’ts, if he didn’t the couldn’ts when the buttons didn’t—!!!”
“Come to breakfast!” called the genial host, standing in the doorway and smiling broadly at the little boy. So they all scampered in to the dining-room, where a large platter of delicate little second hands (done, of course, to a turn), with delicious eight day gravy, was awaiting them.
“Yes, indeed,” said the host, as he wiped his mouth, and folded his calendar-page napkin, “yes, indeed, they seldom spared the rod in those good old days in your world. That’s why the children grew up so good, I suppose, and that is probably why the good old cooking was so much better than the cooking of to-day. Such mashings as the potatoes and turnips got, such unmerciful beatings as the poor little eggs had to undergo; it’s no wonder that few eggs were bad! And how they used to whip the cream—no wonder it was good; if you were whipped as much as this cream was, you’d be good; they whipped it till it was white in the face.”
“I am good,” said the little boy. “Did you say that in Minutel they do the same things they used to do when they lived in the world?”
“Don’t you be afraid,” said the Continental Imp. “They’ll not hurt you.”
100“No indeed,” said Mr. Three O’clock, as they all rose, “we’ll stay together and protect ourselves.”
“By the way,” said the Continental Imp, “do you know, I believe I’ll run up to Tickerleen when you go; it’s too slow and old-fashioned for me here. I wonder if you’d have any objection to my going along?”
By this time, they had come out of the house and were looking about them to determine which way they would go. The host said he would lock up the inn for the day and join them. The other imps, whom the kindly landlord had invited to breakfast out of the goodness of his heart, scampered off about their business, and the little boy, the host, the Continental Imp, and Mr. Three O’clock proceeded leisurely along the road.
All through the beautiful little village of Minutel were the houses where the old-fashioned hours lived. They were queer houses with domes, and from a distance they looked like so many alarm clocks with the alarm bells up on top. There was a low, drowsy ticking in the air all the time which the little boy couldn’t locate. He heard it clearly enough, yet it seemed 101to be far away—or rather, it seemed to be all about, like the very breeze. Every now and then the church bell would chime, which the little boy fancied to be a clock striking the hour, and he pictured to himself the village of Minutel as a huge clock with the church bell as a striker to notify each hour when it was time to get out, just as the real striker did on the real clock.
The host and the Continental Imp pointed out to the newly arrived pair the homes of the principal hours. The little boy was interested to see the house where the hour lived who saw the Pilgrim Fathers land, and also the hour which had the pleasure of witnessing the arrival of Columbus on the shores of the western world. He also gazed for sometime at the house where the host told him the hour resided which had seen George Washington chop down the cherry tree.
“That hour,” said the Continental Imp, “is the greatest bore in Minutel; he’s always telling what he saw, and nobody cares anything about it.”
“You know all about it, I suppose,” said the little boy.
“Yes, I know all about it; he claims that George Washington never told a lie simply on the strength of his having told the truth on one particular occasion when he was a little boy. I don’t deny that he told the truth about the cherry tree, but I do say that on the 15th of June, 1775, I heard him tell a whop—”
“Stop!” said the little boy.
102“per. There!”
“I wish you wouldn’t say that,” said the little boy, “because I don’t consider that that was a whopper.”
“Yes, it was,” said Mr. Three O’clock, “and I agree with our Continental friend here that the hour you’re speaking of—that Cherry Tree Hour—is a bore.”
“How do you know he’s a bore when you’ve never met him?” said the little boy.
At this Mr. Three O’clock turned very white and seemed quite uncomfortable.
“I don’t see how you know anything about this land, anyway,” persisted the little boy. “You’ve never been here before.”
“Yes, how is that?” asked the Continental Imp; “of course, you’re right, but I don’t see how you know that you’re right.”
“My understanding,” said the host, “is that you just arrived—it seems rather unusual—have you any explanation?”
There was a pause after this, and Mr. Three O’clock looked very confused. Finally he looked all about him, and said, “Shh-h!”
“What is it?” asked the little boy.
“He said, ‘Shh-h,’” said the host.
“I know he did,” said the Continental Imp.
“There is a mystery about my life,” said Mr. Three O’clock, speaking in an impressive whisper, 103“a mystery which I cannot reveal. But under my light and airy nature, there is a burden on my soul. Do not force me to reveal it!”
“I am sure you may confide in me,” said the little boy. “What is the trouble? You seemed so free and happy when you came out of the clock. I hope—Oh, I hope that you have never done anything wrong!”
“Alas!” said Mr. Three O’clock, “I am not what you think I am—I have a past!”
“Have you it with you?” asked the Continental Imp.
“Suppose you let us see it,” said the host.
“Tell us all about it,” said the little boy, soothingly, “and then you will feel better. Maybe you are not as bad as you think you are. Tell us, anyway.”
“I suppose I might as well,” sighed poor little Mr. Three O’clock, “for Father Time’s secretary, Old Calendar, will only find it out when I apply for my date badge, and the whole thing will be made public. They have a great system; they say the red tape in the government offices is longer and more tangled than the Wollerp’s neck! Try not to think ill of me, and as we walk along I’ll tell you my sad tale.”
They all looked very grave as they paced along in silence and waited for the culprit to begin. The poor little imp who had recently danced and laughed so happily experienced a great deal of difficulty in starting and several times began with, “’Twas in a little district—” 104and had to break off again. Finally he succeeded in conquering his feelings, and told the following extraordinary tale:
“We understand,” said the host, “don’t try to finish.”
“There’s only one syllable more, and I want to s-s-s-ay it!” said the poor, little Imp, “it’s lore. There!”
There was a moment of silence after this pitiful narrative, during which the poor, little Imp turned away 108and wept copiously. They all respected his feelings, and no one spoke until his little fit of sorrow and remorse had passed, when he faced about and began to put away a little chamois handkerchief which had been the receptacle of his tears.
“It was a pen-wipe-ipe-ipe-ipe-er,” said he, trying in vain to control himself. “I picked it up-up-p-p after the little boys had gone out, and I have kept it ever since as a bub-bub-bb-bub-b-bub—”
“He means a memento,” said the host.
“No, he doesn’t,” said the Continental Imp, “he’s trying to say something that begins with ‘bub.’”
“As a bub-bub-bub-b-bub-b-b—” cried the poor little Imp.
“Perhaps he means to say memento,” suggested the little boy. “You know, if you try to say memento when you’re crying hard, you will say it through your nose and it will sound like ‘bubento.’”
“No, I think he means bubble,” said the host.
“As a bub-bub-ba-ba-a-dge of my shame!” said the poor little Imp, at last.
“Well, it wasn’t memento,” said the Continental Imp.
“No, and it wasn’t bubble either,” said the little boy, and then, turning to his little friend, he said,
“Don’t feel so bad; I am sure you didn’t mean to do anything wrong. You must cheer up and be happy again just as you were on the journey here.”
109“I wouldn’t worry,” said the Continental Imp. “You were just a little fast, that’s all. There are many human beings worse than you and faster than you too who get credit. Take George Washington—look at that whop—”
“Don’t, please,” said the little boy.
“per,” said the Continental Imp.
“Yes,” said poor little Three O’clock, “but that whop-op-op-op-p—”
“Don’t,” said the little boy. “There isn’t any use in talking about that now. Tell us how you happened to get back to the world again.”
“Remorse!” said the poor little Imp. “I applied for my date badge at Old Calendar’s office, but they were suspicious—said I arrived too soon—and wouldn’t give it to me. So I wandered about the land, an outcast, for an hour without a badge is always looked on with discredit. Other hours asked me what I had seen and I could not tell them. ‘Begone!’ they would then say, ‘thou idle hour that saw no deed accomplished, no duty done, no heroism performed in the great world; where hast thou been?’ Wherever I went I was stared at and shamed and shunned. I heard the hours tell what they had seen, but had nothing to tell myself. You see, our lives in the world are short; each one has but sixty minutes in which to build his character, and therefore a whole life may be ruined by one bad deed. You know, an hour’s standing here 110depends on what he has seen during his working life. In my wanderings I met the glorious hour that watched Abraham Lincoln sign the paper which freed the slaves.
“‘Ah,’ said I, without thinking, ‘I, too, freed some slaves.’ And then he asked me how, and I told him by a wrong I had committed, and this got about and I was asked to leave Chymerline, where I had met him. Then, I dared not look behind me, for I always saw hundreds of long, thin Minute Hands pointing at me and reminding me of my crime. Alas, how dearly was the liberty of those little boys purchased! At last, weary and lonely and penitent, I sought the frontier, succeeded in passing the minstrel guards, and found my way back into the world. I never went to the little country town again, but wandered into the great city and succeeded in getting into the big, handsome clock in your father’s house. I found, to my delight, that the clock had once lost an hour, and I resolved to make that hour up and come forth again unstained and having done my duty. That is the story of my sad life.”
“You see,” said the little boy, seriously, 111“all that came from your disliking school so—I noticed that fact when I first met you. But come, try to forget all about it now and we will walk along.”
The little boy had meant to ask a few questions about how the big hall clock had become slow, and how it could be put right again in the manner described, but he thought it would be wiser to change the subject altogether, as his little friend seemed to be feeling so sorrowful. So he began to ask who the various little alarm-clock houses belonged to, and was especially interested to hear of all the wonderful and famous things which their little occupants had once seen. Each appeared to have seen just one thing, and the little boy was informed that each hour usually made a practice of telling his own particular story and never got tired of repeating it. He was on the point of asking if each hour knew of all the things which had happened all over the world at that particular time, but he saw at once that this question might lead to a very complicated explanation, and would probably result in a quarrel, which he always dreaded.
“Surely,” said he, to himself, “an hour which saw Columbus land could well afford to go without knowing anything else.”
The Continental Imp explained to him how many hours who arrived on particularly auspicious days, and who had seen exceptionally great things, were swelled 112up with importance, like the host, who had arrived on the Fourth of July, 1776, and had undoubtedly seen Benjamin Franklin, who was very much in evidence on that day.
So they ambled along, through the pleasant, hazy village until soon they came upon a sheet of water which was very rough and which, the host said, was called the Hour Glass Lake because it consisted really of two sheets of water joined together by a little strait through which the water ran, so that the whole thing had not a little the appearance of an hour-glass with the sand running through it. The road ran straight down to the banks of the water and the little boy could see how it came right down to the shore on the opposite side also. He thought how it marked the aimless wanderings of the poor, lost Wollerp while he was hunting for himself, and he wondered if the lake was there then, and if so, how the poor little creature had crossed it.
Down at the shore was a curious boat which looked like the long box of a hall clock, and into this they all stepped for a row over to the other side. The little boy tried to talk as they rowed him across the lake, but the water was so rough that he could not talk properly, and he held on with all his might as the little craft rose and fell on the tumultuous waves.
“Do you suppose,” said he, “that we shall be able 113to start for Tickerleen in the morning? I want very much to
“That,” said the host, “is the station where you’ll take the train for Tickerleen in the morning. Hello, there seems to be a crowd there; there must be something the matter! Row a little faster, and we’ll see what the trouble is! They seem to be all reading the bulletin.”
So the Continental Imp and Mr. Three O’clock, who were rowing, made haste, and soon the party had 114landed and were hastening up the road in the direction of a queer, little cottage building with a roof and doors like a cuckoo clock, and about which fully a hundred imps were congregated, all talking in a most excited fashion. When they got a little nearer they could see that upon the outer wall hung a large placard, with a heading which said,
and it was evidently the information on this sheet which had created all the excitement.
“What do you suppose it can be?” asked the little boy.
“News from the capital. I suppose the old Duke is at it again,” said the Continental Imp.
“I don’t understand,” said the little boy.
“Why, it’s the Mainspring’s local bulletin,” said the host. “The Mainspring can’t run down, you know—ha, ha, ha—so they have the news sent up by the errorgraph.”
They hastened on as fast as they could to the little building, and sure enough, there stood a cuckoo in the doorway, calling,
and the crowd was all excitement.
115“Isn’t it dreadful!” some were saying.
“Things must be in a pretty state at court,” others observed.
“She shouldn’t have left it for the king to do; she should have stayed at home and done it herself,” one persisted.
The party elbowed their way right down to the front of the crowd, as newcomers are expected to do, till they reached a position where the words of the bulletin were quite legible.
“Read it,” said Mr. Three O’clock. So the host, who was a little to the front, read the following startling announcement.
Instantly when the host finished reading the little boy felt in his buttonhole for his wonderful flower, and then gave one despairing cry—for it was gone. He looked all about on the ground, but it was nowhere to be seen. He had evidently dropped it from the boat while leaning over the edge in his fit of sea sickness.
“Will you please read that bulletin again?” he said to the host, and the host read it again, very slowly and carefully. Then the little boy looked again for his treasured flower, but it had disappeared, and he was all bewildered and confused. Meanwhile, his three companions were discussing the news from Tickerleen with great earnestness.
117“Of course,” said the Continental Imp, “if the Queen goes out sleighing, leaving the soups unflavoured, why, many will use buns, that’s obvious. There’s more or less flavouring in a bun, you know.”
“It’s a natural consequence,” said the host. “Take my own soups, for instance—”
“Why, certainly,” said Mr. Three O’clock. “I don’t blame the King at all, but it’s awful to think of his dying that way; he probably was about to get some of the lard for flavouring. I don’t believe he meant to kill himself. You couldn’t make me think so!”
The little boy listened to this conversation with an expression of great wonder, for, to be sure, the news from the capitol was unusual.
“What do you think about it?” asked Mr. Three O’clock.
“Isn’t it unusual?” said the little boy.
“Certainly,” answered his friend, “most extras are unusual in the news they give. You don’t suppose things like this happen every day, do you? This is dreadful—dreadful!”
“Do you think it really happened?” asked the little boy, whereupon a dozen imps turned and stared at him with contempt.
“Happened!” said Mr. Three O’clock. “Why, of course, it happened! Do you think the Mainspring lies?”
“It seems to me,” said the little boy, in the host’s 118ear, “that it is just a little—well, just a little bit crazy, you know; but, of course, I may be mistaken. I wish I had my flower!”
“Crazy?” said the host. “But wait! There goes an imp up the ladder again! See there, he’s crossing out that first line. It was a mistake, after all! Now see what he puts in its place.”
“You see,” said the little boy, as he watched the Imp on the ladder, drawing a line through the first announcement. “I knew it must be wrong. Now he’s going to correct it, and it will be sensible.”
“Wait!” said Mr. Three O’clock.
“Watch!” said several others.
“See there!” said the little boy. “He has put something in place of it. Now it will be all right. Will you read it, Mr. Host, please?”
The dextrous little imp came down the ladder and disappeared into the Errorgraph Office in the station, and the host read aloud:
“That is crazy!” said the little boy. “It’s perfectly crazy and I know it is. The Queen wouldn’t—she couldn’t—”
119“She couldn’t and she wouldn’t and she didn’t!” laughed the Continental Imp.
“She buttoned the didn’ts to the—Oh, see there!” called Mr. Three O’clock. “He’s coming out to change it again, maybe. There he goes up the ladder!”
“Good,” said the little boy. “He’ll get it right at last.”
The little bulletin imp came dancing down the ladder and the little boy, with a merry, hopeful face, turned to his good friend, the host, and said:
“Now he’s fixed it so that it’s all right. Would you mind reading it just this once more?”
So the host read, in a loud and very serious voice:
This was too much for the poor little boy. His hand went unconsciously to his buttonhole in one last desperate hope of finding his precious flower, and then, with a piercing shriek and a long gasp, he reeled and fell fainting to the ground, his hat blowing off and landing a foot or so from his outstretched form, so that he presented the appearance of an enormous exclamation mark.
So they all started over again with great earnestness and enthusiasm, and sang so fast that the little boy had a good deal of difficulty in following what they sang.
“I have changed my mind,” said the little boy, “I don’t want to go in there.”
“Oh, they won’t hurt you,” said the host.
“No, I know they won’t,” said the little boy, “because I won’t give them a chance; I’ll stay outside.”
“Don’t you believe in spanking?” asked the host.
“I don’t believe in spanking me,” said the little boy.
“Have you never been spanked?”
“No, never!”
“Then you don’t know what you’ve missed.”
“Oh, yes, I know what I missed! I wanted to miss it.”
“There they go again,” said the host. “Let us walk right in; your two friends are in there.”
The little boy gave his hand rather reluctantly to his 130good friend, and the two walked into the room from which the threatening and anything but pleasant sound had emanated.
And such a looking room as it was! The Continental Imp was there in full glory, and so was Mr. Three O’clock, who was making himself very much at home withal, considering that he was a new arrival in the village and a stranger to the old-fashioned set. There must have been as many as twenty or thirty old-fashioned imps, each one wearing a badge with a date, and they were all breathing heavily and seemed to be very much exhausted. And the appearance of the room was frightful!
“If Nurse could only see this,” said the little boy to himself, “she would never complain of my nursery again! I never saw such a litter!”
The floor indeed was simply covered with words which had been spilled and scattered about in singing.
“They have been trying to sing too fast,” said the little boy, whispering in the host’s ear. “Did you ever see anything like this!”
“It looks as if the dictionary were on a picnic, doesn’t it?” said the host. “See those ‘chances’ over there! Be careful not to step on these!”
The members of the old-fashioned club stood staring at the little boy, and the little boy stood staring on the floor. Meanwhile, his two friends, the Continental Imp and Mr. Three O’clock, came up and asked him 131if he was feeling quite himself again, and why he had been overcome so at the railroad station. But the little boy could not take his eyes from the floor. He had heard of people being slovenly with food, and he knew how careless he often was about his own toys, but he had never before seen such untidiness caused by loose words.
“It is all because,” thought he, “they tried to use too many words at once, and tried to sing them too fast. They ought to have tin trays to sing on!”
The more he looked, the more amazed he became, for the floor appeared something like this:
132“I hope you will excuse the appearance of things,” said one of the hours, stepping up. “I’m not accustomed to such untidiness myself, but we were singing of the good old days, and I’m afraid we lost all control of ourselves. Won’t you be seated?”
“Are you an hour?” asked the little boy.
“Yes, indeed, I am; I’m the hour that saw the Boston Tea Party—saw all the—”
“Wait a minute,” said another. “I’m the hour that saw the battle of—”
“And I’m the hour that saw Cornwallis surrender at Yorktown!”
“And I’m the hour that saw John Alden carry Myles Standish’s proposal to Priscilla.”
And so all the hours gathered about him, clamouring to tell what they knew, and it was fully ten minutes before the little boy could get an opportunity to speak. As soon as he could he asked what the words all over the floor meant.
“Oh, that’s a verse,” said one of the hours. “We can’t bother to pick it up now.”
“I should like to know what the verse is,” said the little boy. “I’m going to Tickerleen to-morrow.”
“Well, then,” said the hour who had first addressed him, “I’ll tell you what we’ll do. When we get these words all picked up, we’ll put them together the way they ought to go to make the verse and send it to Tickerleen. You must leave your address.”
133“Is the verse about spanking?” asked the little boy.
“Yes, indeed, that was a spanking chorus, you know. It has to be sung fast to be realistic. It ought to sound like the dear, old-fashioned spankings—”
“Let us talk about something else,” said the little boy. “I—I don’t like to talk about spankings. I wonder if any of you hours knew Benjamin Franklin. You know he lived in those old days, and I once heard a story about him—”
“Benjamin Franklin!” said half a dozen imps. “Certainly; we all saw him at different times.”
“Isn’t that wonderful!” said the little boy. “Could any of you tell me about him?”
“Certainly,” said one of the hours. “I’ll tell you what I know about him. He was a great sluggard, you know.”
“What?” said the little boy.
“Just listen,” said the hour, “and I’ll say you a little poem I wrote.”
So they all sat down and the hour who had volunteered to give the little boy some information about Benjamin Franklin, told the following story.
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Mr. Three O’clock. “That’s pretty good! Tells people to get up early so as to be healthy and wealthy and wise, and then sleeps all day! 135Now you see how much truth there is in the school books!”
“Ha, ha, ha!” said the Continental Imp. “You’ll have to excuse me for laughing so, but I never knew that Benjamin Franklin was so much like George Washington! So Benjamin Franklin was in the habit of lying too—”
“He was in the habit of lying down,” said the hour who had recited the verses.
“Well, it’s the same thing,” said the Continental Imp.
The little boy was very anxious to change the subject, for he did not like the freedom with which these great historical characters were talked about, and as for the poem,—he thought it was disgraceful.
“Can’t you sing one of the old-fashioned songs?” he said to the Continental Imp, whereupon that gay little hour took out his Continental handkerchief, and raising his little hand to his eye, wiped away a briny Continental tear.
“I cannot,” said he.
“Try,” said the little boy.
There was a moment of silence while they all waited, until finally, seeing that all eyes were upon him, the little Continental Imp began,
“Don’t try to sing, then,” said the little boy, “if it makes you feel so bad.” But the Imp raised his hand, as if to command silence, and continued,
“Take mine,” said the host.
“Here’s mine; you’re welcome to it,” said Mr. Three O’clock. And in an instant a dozen handkerchiefs which looked like pages torn from calendars were offered to him. But he motioned again for silence and proceeded in a broken voice.
137“I don’t see why you want to try it, then,” observed the host.
“No one is insisting, you know,” said another imp.
“Of course,” said the little boy, “I’d like to hear a good, old-fashioned song—the kind they sang in 1775—if there is nothing about spanking or George Washington in it?”
“Who said anything about spanking George Washington?” called a bold, little imp, stepping forward, in a very indignant and independent manner, to where the little boy stood. This imp wore a hat covered with cherry blossoms, and carried a hatchet in his belt.
“I didn’t!” said the little boy.
“You did,” said the indignant imp. “And he was never spanked! Never in his life! I heard his father refuse to spank him when he chopped down the cherry tree and—”
“Put him out!” called a voice.
“He’s a bore and a nuisance!” cried another.
“Throw him out! He’s at it again! He ought never to have been allowed in here!”
And with this the little imp who had seen George Washington chop down the cherry tree was picked up by a half a dozen members of the old-fashioned club, and thrown out of the window, to the utter astonishment 138of the little boy, and to the perfect delight of the Continental Imp, who now continued,
“I am very sorry I asked you to sing,” said the little boy. “I really am! I had no idea—”
“What?” said the host.
“Besides what?” asked the little boy.
“Yes?”
“What?”
“Well, what was the need of all that fuss, then?” said the host. There was more or less indignation on the part of the other hours as well, who felt that the Continental Imp had been playing a trick on them, but soon the whole party fell into conversation and the little boy listened in rapt attention to the stories which the various imps told. It seemed quite wonderful that he should actually be sitting right among the old hours who had seen so many famous things, and who talked about them just as if they were every-day occurrences. It wasn’t like history books at all, and before long he began to feel that all the famous men who looked so severe and forbidding on pages of the school books which his brother brought home each day, and which his nurse sometimes read to him, were after all nothing but common men, and he even began to suspect that some of the books were wrong. He listened, spell-bound, to the story of the Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, told by an eye-witness, and laughed out loud 140at hearing how Mistress Priscilla got her feet wet trying to step from Plymouth Rock, and how John Alden made fun of her.
He learned that Benjamin Franklin was not such a terrible person, after all, but was simply a jolly, old gentleman who was very fond of making jokes. He heard about the landing of Columbus, and was surprised to hear that the great discoverer and his little band of followers had not all struck attitudes and performed a tableau as soon as they got on dry land, as if they were going to have their pictures taken.
He was a little shocked at learning that Henry Hudson, whose bold, romantic face, in its high, ruffled stock, he had so much admired, was really nothing but a little, round, fat Dutchman with a red nose. He found that George Washington was a real man who used to chat pleasantly and pat little boys on the head just as any other man might do who was not the father of a country. And he was particularly astonished to know that when Washington crossed the Delaware in the night, he had not stood in the bow of the boat holding a flag, as he is represented in all the pictures, but had sat comfortably down, while one of his kind soldiers performed this duty for him.
All these things were very hard to believe until the little boy became accustomed to them. He was especially amazed to hear that nobody had ever been burned as a witch in America, for all the books and stories 141which he had heard about the Salem witches said distinctly that the poor people who were thought to be witches were burned. He now learned from eye witnesses that they had been hung instead, and that most of the history writers had made a dreadful mistake about it. He learned that Captain John Smith not only had great courage, but that he had a fine imagination as well, and that the Pocahontas incident probably took place only in the captain’s mind—where any number of interesting things happened. Before very long all the old Puritans and Pilgrims began to seem very real, and the Indians began to seem real too and much better than he had ever supposed they were. In fact, he began to think that the shrewd Yankees, with their tall, thin hats and their solemn faces, were really very unfair to the red men, and that they often cheated the poor savages and drove very sharp bargains. He could scarcely believe his ears when he was told that one of these Puritans, who came to America because Europe was so wicked, gave an Indian two glass beads and a bottle of medicine for three hundred acres of land, and it was very shocking to know that the boys used to jeer and make fun of William Penn’s hat.
In fact, the little boy spent a most enjoyable evening among the old-fashioned hours, hearing about the things they had seen and asking them questions. When the time came to go, he thanked the good old hours who had been so perfectly free and candid for a “most enjoyable 142treat,” which were the words his mother had told him to say when he went to a little neighbour’s birthday party. He and his three friends, the host, the Continental Imp and Mr. Three O’clock, then made their way back to the inn, where they sat about the fire eating cold ticklets and discussing plans for the morrow.
They all tried very hard to persuade the kindly host to go to Tickerleen with them on the morning train, and he finally yielded to their arguments and said that he would accompany them on their visit to the capital city.
“And now,” said the kindly landlord “it is time to wind you up.” So they all rose and the host accompanied the little boy to his room, where he actually did wind the little fellow very comfortably up in a soft quilt, with Roman numerals worked all over it, and then betaking himself to his own apartment was soon fast asleep.
Early in the morning the host closed his inn and the four travellers hastened to the railroad station by a different road from that which they had taken the day before, for the little boy was anxious not to cross the tumultuous lake again. When they got within sight of the Cuckoo Clock Station, they noticed that the train was in and that the crowd was much larger and more excited than it had been the day before. Imps were flying here and there with their date badges blowing in the breeze, and all seemed bustle and confusion.
The little boy was very much interested in examining the train which seemed to consist of little cars made from hall clocks, with a clock-work engine in front. He was just trying to determine how he should accommodate himself in one of these cars for the long ride, when he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder, and looking around, he saw the host standing at his elbow.
“What is it?” asked the little boy.
“Look at the bulletin; it has been corrected. This is dreadful news! Much more serious than we supposed yesterday!” said the host.
The little boy, who had been very much engrossed in 146his examination of the curious train, turned about and walked over with the host to the spot where the crowd was standing. As soon as his eyes fell upon the bulletin, he gave a shout of joy, for the whole thing had been changed.
“Don’t faint!” said the Continental Imp, rushing up to him.
“What’s the matter now?” said Mr. Three O’clock.
“There is nothing the matter,” said the little boy, “but, ha, ha, ha! They’ve changed it just as I knew they’d have to, and you see I was right yesterday!”
“There is nothing to laugh about,” said the host.
“Have you read it?” said Mr. Three O’clock, addressing the little boy.
“No, I haven’t,” said the little fellow. “I was laughing at its being all changed. Will one of you please read it, because you can read it better, you know?”
So the good host, who was deeply concerned about this corrected information from the capitol, read the revised bulletin, which appeared as follows:
“What does it all mean?” asked the little boy, when the host had finished reading. “I think it is sensible enough now, but just what does it mean?”
“What does it mean?” shouted the Continental Imp. “Why, it means that the old Duke of Procrastination 148is threatening the kingdom of Father Time, and that the poor King—but wait! See there!”
They all looked at the bulletin, to which the Errorgraph Imp from the Cuckoo Clock Station was adding another item.
read the host, in a reassuring tone.
“Then the kingdom is not lost!” shouted the Continental Imp, drawing his sword.
“And I, who heard a famous whop—”
“Stop!” screamed the little boy.
“Will fight to save the country’s pop!” continued the Continental Imp.
“That is no way to speak of Father Time!” said the little boy.
“Well, if you don’t let me say whopper,” said the Continental Imp, “how can I say popper? It’s your own fault.”
“Come,” said the kindly host. “It is not a time for quarrelling. You will have to stop saying unpleasant things about General Washington if the boy doesn’t like it. Washington was the father of his country, you know, and he got the best of the—”
149“Yes, and Father Time got the best of him, didn’t he?” said Mr. Three O’clock, who was always inclined to take sides with the Continental Imp.
“Never mind that now,” said the host. “The fact that stares us in the face is that Father Time, our beloved sovereign, and the mightiest king that ever wielded a scythe or a sceptre, is threatened by Procrastination and that we, his subjects and dependents, are called upon to defend his throne!”
“I suppose,” said Mr. Three O’clock, addressing the little boy, “that you had better go home and not be mixed up in this civil war. What say you?”
But the little boy did not answer, for he was thinking. He was thinking what his mother would say if the news were brought to her that he had fallen fighting in the army of Father Time. Then he thought of how he had once heard Procrastination spoken of as a thief, and how if this wicked old rebel were to gain control, all the clocks in the world would become slow and there would be no depending on them. Then he thought of something else, and meanwhile the crowd began to move toward the waiting train.
“Come,” said the host. “You had better let your friend, Mr. Three O’clock, take you to the frontier, and you can go home on the pendulum alone. Then he can follow us to the city, for we shall all join the army, of course.”
But the little boy was silent, and they all waited. 150Suddenly he looked up, and for the first time since they had known him, there were tears in his eyes.
“I think I will go with you and help,” he said. “Maybe I can’t do much, but I can help a little. Father Time was once very good to my mother, and I want to see him and thank him and help him so that I can tell her when I go home. Do you mind if I go with you?”
“All aboard for Chymerline, Snooze, and the Royal City!” called an imp, and at this there was a great rush for the train.
“Come on,” said some.
“Hurry up,” said others.
“Step right in,” said the guard.
And in less than another minute, the little clock-work train, loaded with sturdy volunteers from good, old-fashioned Minutel, and carrying in its foremost car the little boy, the host, the Continental Imp and Mr. Three O’clock, went whizzing through the beautiful, rolling country, following in its rapid course the road which marked the aimless wanderings of the poor Wollerp, ticking steadily the while, and ringing its drowsy bell occasionally like the old hall clock in the little boy’s home.
“Tickerleen Mainspring! All the latest news from the Duke’s camp! Get the Alarm! Here’s the Alarm! Ye-e-e-e-extra! Ye-e-e-e-extra! Royal City Dial! Get the Dial! Here’s the Mainspring! Here’s the Dial! Here’s the Alarm, Mister!”
“Goodness gracious!” said the little boy, as he stood in the Tickerleen station with his three friends. “I never saw anything like this! Please give me a chance to stretch myself after that long ride.”
“Tickerleen Dial! Tickerleen Mainspring! Daily Alarm!” shouted a score of grimy-faced little imps, unheedful of his request.
“Tick—”
“Get away!” said Mr. Three O’clock. “He doesn’t want to be bothered with you; get away!”
“Who is he?” asked one of the news imps of Mr. Three O’clock.
“He’s a little boy from the Earth, visiting—” but that was all he had a chance to say. The news that a little boy from the Earth was visiting Tickerleen spread like wildfire, and in less than a minute the little fellow 170was the centre of a wild, scrambling crowd of imps which actually filled the large cuckoo-clock station to its utmost capacity. They crowded and pushed and elbowed as if the poor little boy were the old Duke Procrastinate himself descending upon the royal city, or maybe the Duke of Limabean, or some other famous Tockerlorish celebrity. And how they talked and yelled and contradicted each other in their anxiety to tell the startled little boy all that they knew!
“I’m the hour that saw Julius Cæsar killed!”
“I’m the hour that saw Charles the First beheaded!”
“That’s nothing! I saw the French Revolution!”
“No, you didn’t! You only saw a part of it!”
“Well, I saw the worst part of it!”
“I saw Shakespeare!”
“I saw William Tell!”
“I saw them building the pyramids!”
“Who? Shakespeare and William Tell?”
“No, the Egyptians!”
“Well, why didn’t you say so?”
“I saw Napoleon drink a cup of tea!”
“Wonderful!”
“I’m the hour just before William the Conqueror landed!”
“I’m the hour just after he landed!”
“I’m the second hour just before he landed!”
“I’m the hour that came before that one!”
“I saw Socrates drink poison!”
171“So did I!”
“That’s not true! One of you is wrong!”
“No, we’re not. He began to drink it at one minute before three and finished one minute after three. I saw it just as I was coming in!”
“And I saw it just before I went out!”
“I’m the hour that saw—”
Suddenly, the Continental Imp, who had been holding himself in with the greatest difficulty, stalked boldly into the crowd, shouting at the top of his voice,
“I’m the hour that heard George Washington tell a Whopper!”
“Please don’t!” said the little boy.
“Let’s get out of here,” suggested the kindly host.
“This reminds me of the day the Declaration of Independence was signed—I never saw such excitement.”
It was with the greatest difficulty that the four visitors made their way out of the beautiful Cuckoo-Clock Station, for a large crowd of hours followed them to the very door shouting about what they had seen in the little boy’s ear until he was nearly deaf with the noise. But the surprise which he had just experienced was nothing to the one which awaited him when they reached the outside of the station, for scarcely had they stepped out into the beautiful, soft gray, perfumed atmosphere when Mr. Three O’clock gave a sudden start, and shrieked,
“The pies!”
172And then holding his little hand before him as children are taught to do when they speak pieces in school, he said,
As soon as he had finished, the good host, who had been looking admiringly on the vast array of pastry which appeared on every hand, began,
173Scarcely had he spoken the last word when the Continental Imp, who would not be outdone, stepped forward, and drawing his sword as if he intended to carve the pies for himself and friends, said, in a tremendous voice,
“Stop!” said the little boy, trembling with excitement.
“What’s the matter?” asked the Continental Imp.
“A great deal is the matter,” said the little boy. “I know what was coming; shop and flop and stop and hop all rhyme with whop! You were going to say something about George Washington’s telling a whop—”
174“I was merely going to ask you,” said the Continental Imp, contemptuously,
“Stop!” shrieked the little boy, stamping his foot.
“I will not!” said the Imp. “I am a Continental Hour, and I believe in life, liberty, and saying what you please.”
“And tell them that I heard a wh—”
“Stop!” screamed the little boy again.
“And tell them that I heard a wh—”
“Stop!”
“—isk broom was very good to get the custard off after it is dry. There!”
“Now, you see, you were too hasty,” said Mr. Three O’clock to the little boy. “Let’s go away from here; we’ll be surrounded by famous hours again if we don’t look out!”
So they made their way up the street, walking very carefully on the edges of the crusts, and keeping clear of the custard. The boy wondered a little why they used custard pies for paving the streets, and ventured to ask Mr. Three O’clock about it.
“Don’t you like custard pies?” asked his friend.
“Certainly,” said the little boy.
“Well, then,” answered his friend. “What would you have them use? Mince?”
“No,” said the little boy, “but—”
“There isn’t any ‘but’ about it. You admit yourself that custard pies are very nice.”
The little boy thought it would be of no use to press the argument, nor was it necessary, for soon he began to feel that the beautiful, fragrant air was affecting him strangely. It came up out of little registers here and there in the streets, which looked like the open work crust on cranberry pies, being all crisscrossed with nice, white pie crust. As they picked their way along, the little boy saw many strange things—things which he could not explain nor understand—yet they did not seem queer to him now. He very soon became accustomed to the custard pie streets and thought they were 176splendid. He saw houses in the shapes of all sorts of clocks,—hall clocks, alarm clocks, cuckoo clocks, mantel piece clocks, boudoir clocks,—but even this did not seem strange. “What a fine house a clock makes!” he would say to himself.
So they picked their way along through the streets of the royal city until they came in sight of a beautiful park surrounded by a picket fence made of pretty hour hands, and in the centre stood a magnificent marble clock, much larger than the little boy’s own home—and as for beauty, there was no comparison!
The gate posts which supported the dazzling gate in this picket fence of hour hands, surrounding the fairy park, were in the form of tremendous clock keys, and the gate, itself, which was of solid gold, was enamelled with thirty-one numbers in little squares, so as to present the appearance of an enormous monthly page from some giant calendar. As they drew nearer to the beautiful park, the little boy could see more distinctly the gorgeous marble clock edifice which stood towering in the centre, and which was approached by a beautiful path of fine, red hour-glass sand, bordered with century plants. All through this fairy park stood bronze statues here and there, similar in design to those ornaments which are often seen on large clocks, and on the enormous marble edifice itself stood a huge hour-glass, of glittering gold. As the party drew still nearer, the little boy could see that there was no face in the clock, 177but that the large opening was used for the main doorway and was approached by a series of wide, marble steps.
They picked their way along the pie crusts very carefully, and soon passed through the gateway of the park where the little boy noticed several soldier-imps, of the famous National Guard, each one armed with a golden table spoon, just as Mr. Three O’clock had described them in his hilarious song.
“Why do they carry table spoons?” whispered the little boy.
178“Sh! to eat the enemy with,” replied Mr. Three O’clock.
This explanation would have seemed very queer to the little boy a while before, but now it did not appear in the least strange. The more he breathed of the fragrant air, the more perfectly natural did everything about him seem to be.
They made their way through the fairy park unmolested, and ascended the steps of the great marble clock. There was no doubt at all in the little fellow’s mind that this was the royal palace, and such indeed it was. He felt a little nervous at the thought that he was actually going to meet Father Time face to face, and had some misgiving lest the mighty king would be so enraged at his presumption as to cut his head off with the imperial scythe. But it was too late now to turn back; they were right on the steps of the royal palace, and surely that, of all places, was no place to stand and think. But he did linger a moment outside the massive circular doorway to examine the numbers and designs which were carved in the beautiful, white marble.
Some of the marble blocks had the number “60” graven in them, others the number “24,” and still others, the number “365.” But the thing which interested him most was a long, golden rope hanging from the door, which on closer inspection he saw to be wrought into the shape of a lamb’s tail.
179“Just give that three shakes, will you?” said the host, as the little boy was examining it.
The little boy did so, and instantly the large door opened and they entered the palace of the king.
“Step lively, please,” said a guard who stood in the spacious hall.
“Is he an hour that saw a policeman?” whispered the little boy to Mr. Three O’clock.
“I don’t know who he is or what he saw, but he sounds like a car conductor, doesn’t he?” answered his friend.
They walked along the hall until they reached an open door leading into a beautifully decorated room with a throne, where a large crowd of hours was standing. They entered and the little boy became interested in reading the badges of the various Hour-Imps. They seemed to bear all the famous dates of history, though he recognized only a very few. Some of them bore the letters “B. C.” and, of course, the little fellow knew that the wearer of these badges had actually seen things which took place before the time when Christ lived. They had scarcely been in the room a minute when the little boy noticed that all eyes were upon him. Then some one asked him who he was.
“I am a little boy from the Earth—” but that is all 180he had a chance to say. Instantly there was a scramble to get near him and scores of voices were raised for his especial benefit. Modern hours, ancient hours, Dark Ages hours, hours that had seen good things, and bad things, and great things, and little things, all clustered about, yelling their life stories into the little boy’s ear, much to the amusement of his three friends. And the hours did not respect each other either; far from it! An hour who had seen King Solomon take a walk was jostled about and finally knocked down by a half dozen of modern and mediæval hours who had no respect for age. It made no difference what famous thing an hour might have seen, they treated each other all alike, for every one seemed the equal of every one else, except those who had nothing to tell, and most of those were with the old Duke Procrastinate, who, the little boy learned, was encamped outside the city, waiting for a good opportunity to descend on the imperial palace.
While they were thus clustering about the little boy and making a dreadful noise with their shouting, a voice called, “Silence!” And in an instant not a sound could be heard. The guard who had spoken waited patiently for a minute, and then walked on tip-toe over toward the wall where a little metal contrivance hung, and, putting his ear to it, listened attentively.
“What is he doing?” asked the little boy.
“He’s trying the stillometer,” said the host.
181“The what?” asked the little fellow.
“Sh! the stillometer.”
“What’s it for?”
“To see how quiet it is.”
“Can’t he tell without that?”
“Oh, he can in a general way, but not exactly, not with accuracy,” answered the host. “You see, there’s a piece of felt on the bottom of the instrument, and when he presses that little button the pin falls, and if he hears the pin fall—”
“The King! The King!” called several voices, and in another instant every hour in the room was on his knees, except one who remained standing to unfurl a large flag. The little boy was very much impressed with this beautiful display of patriotism and homage, though he trembled visibly at the thought of seeing the great ruler. Suddenly the assemblage began to sing.
182As soon as the singing ceased, a procession of tiny imps marched into the room and took their places about the royal throne.
“Are they hours?” asked the little boy, of the host, who stood nearest him.
“Sh!” said the host. “No, they are not hours; they are jiffies. The King will enter presently.”
Scarcely had he said the words when the principal jiffy shouted in a shrill voice,
“His Imperial Highness, the Monarch of Monarchs!”
“All hail!” cried the hours, and there was another little pause, after which the head jiffy pulled aside a curtain and said, in an impressive voice,
and scarcely had he uttered the last word when a little, wizened, old gentleman, wearing a long, white beard and a white robe, and carrying a magnificent golden scythe, toddled into the room with a quick, short step, 183smiling pleasantly through his deep wrinkles to right and left, and ascended the throne with the agility of a boy. He had a funny twinkle in his eye, had old Father Time, as if he enjoyed playing jokes on people, and seeing them confused and perturbed. He had a firm mouth, also, had old Father Time, as if he were not in the habit of changing his mind, and were accustomed to demanding his rights and having his own way. The little boy did not dare to open his lips nor to move an inch to ask any questions, but he thought to himself that the mighty King, considering his age and fame, was very kindly looking, and he wondered if he was any relation to Santa Claus.
“Well, well, well, to be sure, to be sure; this is very gratifying,” said the King, as he seated himself, arranging his robes, and handing his golden scythe to the nearest jiffy in attendance. “And I wish I had a few moments to listen to your applause, but tide and myself, as you all know, cannot wait, and the clock goes right on while you are applauding. Now, who is this, pray?”
The little boy trembled very much as he realized that the great King was speaking of him, but there was nothing to do but step right up to the throne, for that seemed to be what His Majesty expected. So he walked right up and said, bravely,
“I am a little boy from the World.”
“Ah yes, to be sure,” said His Majesty. “They don’t like me very well there.”
184“I like you, Your Majesty,” said the little boy.
“Well, that’s very nice, isn’t it,” said the King, “and I like little boys, too.” He was about to say more when suddenly the door opened, and an attendant rushed in and kneeling before the throne, said,
“Your Majesty, the Duke approaches the city!”
“At last!” said the King, with a smile. “Let every hour take his post then, and be ready.”
It was perfectly evident that precious moments were never allowed to be wasted at the royal court. There was no discussing the startling news, no waiting, and planning, and suggesting, and giving and taking of orders; nothing but an immediate obedience to the King’s wish. No one asked any questions, no one hesitated, but every hour-imp in the room filed through the doorway, and even the little jiffy pages marched out, leaving the mighty King all alone, save for the presence of the little boy. As the little fellow watched the crowd of subjects surging through the door to take their allotted places in defence of the Royal Palace, he noticed his three friends among them. His first thought was to run after them, but something made him feel as if he must wait in the throne room. He saw the genial host, of whom he had grown so fond, passing out, followed by little Mr. Three O’clock, who in turn, was followed by the Continental Imp, who had drawn his Continental sword, and was talking in a very animated way to several hours who were clustering about him as 185he stalked through the door. They seemed to be all listening to the Continental Imp with the greatest attention, and the last word the little boy heard as the door closed was the full word “Whopper,” and he knew that his little friend was telling his new acquaintances the dreadful story about George Washington.
When they were all gone, the little boy glanced in the direction of the throne, and saw that His Majesty was getting ready to leave the room himself. The little fellow did not know what he had better do. He had remained, hoping to speak privately with the mighty King of kings, but now that the opportunity was at hand, he was afraid. He looked toward the door, then toward the throne, and then toward the door again, and then toward the imperial scythe, which was now hanging on the wall, as if he feared that the King might chop his head off with it if he dared to speak uninvited in the royal presence. Then he remembered how the King had said that he was not accustomed to waiting for anything, and he decided that if he were going to speak at all he had better do it at once. So he approached very quietly, and as he did so, he noticed that His Majesty was smiling and settling down in his great chair as though willing to listen. There was a long lock of white hair hanging down over the King’s forehead which interested the little boy a great deal.
“I wonder if that can be his forelock which people are always taking him by—if I thought it would be all 186right I would pull it, for there is no use of standing here like this and doing nothing.” So after hesitating a little he approached very respectfully and gave old Father Time’s forelock a good pull. The mighty monarch started and the little boy was very much frightened at what he had done, until Father Time said good naturedly, “Don’t be afraid, little man, that is what it is for, to be sure—I keep it there to encourage promptness, you know. Now what can I do for you, little man? Take a seat down there on that step and let me hear what you have to say, for soon I shall be passing—in fact I’m passing now, so be quick.”
The little boy lost no time, but began in a very low and respectful tone:
The King, who had listened with great good humour as the little fellow sat on the top step of the royal throne, bent down until his aged face was very near to that of the little boy, and said, slowly,
“I guess that is because you conquer so many people in my world, isn’t it?” asked the little boy, timidly.
“I am always very good to little boys,” said the great monarch, “and to many grown people too, but it always makes me angry to be snubbed, as I am in your world, no matter where I go. People deny my presence right to my face; they tell their friends they have never seen me when they’ve known me well for years. They even get wigs and things to try to disguise themselves so that I will not know them, and I a king!”
“I am very sorry,” said the little boy, “that people in 192my world are so impolite. I should think they would like you.”
“Well, they generally do for a while when they’re young, but it doesn’t last long; they just make a convenience of me, you know,—or try to. I once knew a young man who wanted me to help him on to twenty-one years so that he could have a fortune, and my, wasn’t he pleasant! Invited me right in and got suggestions from me, urged me on, told me I wasn’t fast enough for him, grew whiskers,—bah! Then, when he got to be a fine, elderly gentleman, I called on him one day to talk about old times, and what did he do?”
“I don’t know—I really don’t.”
“Why, he didn’t even recognize me—or said he didn’t! Wouldn’t have anything to do with me!”
“What did you do with him?” asked the little boy.
“Do with him? I just gave him the gout to remember me by, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Look out, don’t get too near that scythe!”
“And girls?” said the little boy.
“Yes, it’s the same with girls, only worse; all like me and want me to help them get to be young ladies; then begin to snub me!”
“I am really very sorry,” said the little boy, “that you are not popular.”
“Popular! Well, I should think I’m not! But I don’t care!”
193“You don’t think that I am so unkind, do you?” said the little boy, anxiously.
“No, indeed I don’t,” answered the King, in a kindly manner. “And I suppose you’re going to stay a while with us, eh?”
“I must go home sometime,” said the little boy.
“That’s too bad, for I should like to have you stay right here, but you’ll stay a while at least, and give me an opportunity to show you that in Tockerlore we know how to be polite and hospitable. Now, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do; I’m going to give you a position—just a temporary position, you know—of high honour. How would you like that?”
“I would like it,” said the little boy.
“Very well, then, I want you to go out and visit the old Duke Procrastinate’s camp as a spy, and find out just what he really means to do, and come back and tell me. These newspapers—well, you can’t believe a word they say. The Mainspring says one thing, and the Alarm rings with another, and so on. Now, I want to know whether the old Duke really intends to do anything or not, and I want you to go and find out, and come back here and let me know; do you understand?”
The little boy knew perfectly well that there was no time to stand and talk about it, that the King was in a hurry, and that he would have to make up his mind at once. Then, besides, he remembered how kind the great King had been to his mother, and how badly 194treated the kindly monarch was whenever he came to the world. He felt very much ashamed of the people who had treated old Father Time with such neglect and disdain, and he felt that now was his chance to help repay the good King for all his kindness, especially to his own dear mother. So he answered that he would go to the Duke’s camp, and the King told him to be off. He meant to ask for a few directions, but seeing that His Majesty was in a great hurry, he decided to find his way to the old Duke’s camp as best he could.
As he passed out through the big circular doorway, he paused a moment, wondering where his three friends were, when suddenly an imp came running up to him, and said, all out of breath,
“Are you the little boy from the World?”
“Yes,” said the little fellow. “What is it?”
“Here is a letter for you,” said the imp, “which came in care of the Royal Palace: it comes from Minutel.”
The little boy thanked him, and taking the letter, opened it, and read,
“Dear little boy from the World:“We hope you will excuse us for the delay, but in picking up the words to the verse, some were lost and very hard to find, as they had been kicked all about. This is the way they are supposed to go.
195“We hope you are enjoying yourself at Tickerleen. If your friend, Mr. Three O’clock, is with you, please tell him that there is a Mr. Nine O’clock here who says that school is a very fine place, particularly for little boys, and he wants to fight a duel with your friend. Here are the words properly arranged,
“Every second week,In the days antique,They would hold a public flogging on the chance,chance,chance,“Of preventing crime,By a stroke in time,And a timely little spanking in advance,vance,vance.”
“Well,” said the little boy, as he put the letter from Minutel into his pocket, and hurried out of the palace, “I am glad they got the verse picked up and put together at last, though I don’t just like what it says. I shouldn’t like to have lived in those days; it’s bad enough to spank at all without doing it beforehand! But it was very kind of the old-fashioned hours to pick up the verse and send it to me.”
He was pausing on the palace steps trying to locate the gate through which he and his friends had entered, 196intending to go out the same way and hasten to the old Duke’s camp.
But suddenly he noticed that the road did not lie as it had lain when he entered. It was now all wound up tight like a mainspring, with a little minute hand fence separating the coils from each other.
“I suppose I will have to begin right here at the palace,” said he, “and go round and round and round and round until I come to the gate, and there may be miles and miles before I get to it! It’s too bad, but there’s no help for it. I suppose they’ve been winding up the city on account of the war.”
This, indeed, seemed the only way to get out except to take a short cut by climbing over no end of fences and running the risk of being stopped by the jiffies who were sitting here and there on the minute hand posts or swinging on the chain. So he stepped into the road and began to run as fast as he could, inscribing a wider circle each time he went around, and getting farther and farther away from the palace in the centre all the time.
“Oh, dear, how dizzy I am getting!” said he, after he had run around several times. “I can hardly see where I am going. I feel like a top!”
“How do you know how a top feels?” called one of the jiffies, as he passed. “Step lively, please, and don’t talk so much!”
197After a time, the little fellow, quite giddy, began to slacken his speed a little, for he felt that he could not go on at that rate.
“Step lively, please!” said a jiffy, as the little boy went past, and the poor little fellow started in again with all his might and main.
“If they wind this road up any tighter,” said he, breathing heavily, “I’ll be squeezed to death, and—”
“Step lively, please!” called a jiffy, and the poor little fellow, panting for breath, started around again at full speed.
“I simply can’t keep this up,” he said to himself, finally. “I shall have to go slower; I don’t believe I’m half way to the gate, and I think there must be enough of this road—”
“Step lively, please!” called another jiffy, and the poor little fellow started and hastened on. He was now so dizzy that he could hardly stand up, but he ran along and round and round and round as fast as his little legs would carry him. As he looked across the road, he could see the large gate not far away, but this made no difference, for there were, it seemed to him, miles and miles of road wound up ahead of him. On, on, on he ran until finally, quite exhausted, he went reeling headlong into one of the minute hand posts.
“Step lively, please,” said a jiffy who was sitting on the adjoining post. “Father Time permits no delays, you know; come, step lively!”
198The little boy dared not disobey, so he let go of the post, and went staggering round again, though he scarcely knew what he was doing.
“Step lively, please,” he heard every now and then, though each time he heard it, it was less distinct. First it sounded like, “Ste—li—e-ease;” then it sounded like, “Ste—li-e-e-e-e-e—” until finally he ceased to hear it altogether. And still he went spinning round and round and round. He was going so fast now and knew so little about what he was doing that he could not have stopped even if he had dared. On, on, on, and round, round, round, he went until at length he came reeling and staggering through the great gateway.
“Here’s your chance!” called a quick, high-pitched voice, as he reached wildly for one of the gate posts, caught it and went wheeling about. The poor little fellow could only stare for a moment, and then say, “Wha-a-a-a-t?”
“I say, here’s your chance,” said a little, wiry man about a foot high who had evidently been standing in the road at the entrance to the royal park.
“Chance to what?” inquired the little boy, when he was able to speak.
“What’s the matter with you?” piped the small man, indignantly. “Here’s your chance, I say.”
199“My chance?” said the little boy.
“Well, it isn’t mine,” said the little man, with rather a sarcastic air. “If it isn’t yours I don’t know how you came by it; you certainly dropped it.”
“I dropped it?” said the little boy.
“Yes, you dropped it; what’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing, only how could I drop a chance?”
“Did you never drop a hint?”
“Yes,” said the little boy, “but—”
“No ‘but’ about it; it’s a question of telling the truth, that’s all,” said the little man, in a rage. “I don’t care what you drop!”
“Suppose we drop the subject,” said the little boy, “but wait, I beg your pardon!” The little fellow, suddenly recollecting, began to fumble in his pocket, and pulling out the paper from Minutel, began to study it carefully.
“Yes,” said he, finally, “you are right; I have lost my last ‘chance’; I had three, and I have lost my ‘antique’ and I have lost a ‘week.’”
“You had better not let that get to the king! Weeks are precious things here.”
“And I’ve lost a ‘second’; I’ve lost the ‘second week,’” said the little boy. “There’s not much left; I’ve lost ‘time,’ and let me see—yes, I ought to have a ‘flogging.’”
“Perhaps you will be able to find your treasures,” said the little man, “if you will go back over the road 200again; your antique and your week and your second; as for the flogging, I suppose I could accommodate you with that if you really feel so—”
“You needn’t trouble,” said the little boy. “What is your name?”
“Say it.”
“I don’t know it,” said the little boy.
“Every one knows it,” roared the little man.
“I am not every one,” shouted the little boy.
“I will tell you before you can say it,” yelled the little man.
“I suppose you will,” said the little boy, “for I don’t know it.”
“You must learn to say it quick,” said the little man. “It’s Jack Robinson; you’ve heard of me, I guess. People do things faster than they can say my name, you know.”
The little boy studied him very carefully, and then said,
“Are you any relation to Boo?”
“He’s my brother. Listen.
“I’ve often heard of doing things quicker than one 201can say Boo,” said the little boy, “and I think I’ve heard of you too,—but more especially of your brother.”
“He’s home—sick,” said the little man, who talked very rapidly.
“Oh, that is too bad! What is the matter with him?”
“He was struck—struck with a thought. He was coming through Calendar Row and it struck him in the brain. He fainted before he could say his own name.”
“He is not in any danger, is he?” asked the little boy, seriously.
“Well, that’s hard to say,” answered Jack Robinson. “They can’t seem to get the thought out of his brain; it stayed there, you know. And then he’s so impatient—expects to get well quicker than he can say his name.”
The little boy took several stimulating whiffs of the magical air, for he was becoming a little puzzled.
“Do either you or your brother know the famous Duke Procrastinate?”
“No, he has no use for us—says our names are too short, especially my brother’s; he never used our names. I’m on my way to the palace now to see if the King wants me. He might want to go after the Duke quicker than he could say ‘Jack Robinson,’ you know, and he’d like to have me on the spot. I always encourage haste, you know. Ha, ha, ha!”
“I guess your brother is better for making people act 202quickly than you are; he has such a very short name,” said the little boy.
“Yes, he had it made to order—it just suits the purpose. He wanted one that could be said quickly, and that had a nice, soft sound. So he offered a prize for the best suggestion and the Duke of Limabean sent in ‘Boo,’ and my brother accepted it before he could say it; he didn’t know what it was until afterwards.”
“Is the Duke of Limabean an hour?”
“Well, not exactly, he’s an association of hours, you know; he’s a day. All the hours from one day got together and said, ‘Let’s organize and be somebody.’ So they did, and he’s the result.”
“Why do they call him the Duke of Limabean?”
“Because he stalks about so. Did you see the Queen?”
“No,” said the little boy.
“She’s ill, you know,” ran on the little man.
“Seriously ill?”
“Well, rather—yes. She was standing on ceremonies, fell off, and broke her word and one of her resolutions.”
“Her word?” said the little boy. “Could one do that by falling?”
“Well, that would depend on how one fell and what one fell into.”
203“Yes, I suppose so,” said the little boy, thoughtfully. “What did the queen fall into?”
“She fell into a deep sleep; a hundred yards deep, I think it was, and when they fished her out, her word was broken. They said she would have fallen right to the bottom, but she reached a conclusion about half way down and clung to it. When they got her out, she let the resolution go, but kept her broken word.”
“Kept her word after she broke it? Wasn’t it droll about her breaking her word that way—just a little odd?”
“No,” said the little man, rapidly. “Didn’t you drop some words? Of course, you did, and some of them may be broken. I must be off now. Good-bye.” And he was gone before the little boy could say Jack Robinson.
“Do you know who he reminds me of?” said the little boy to himself. He asked the question several times without receiving an answer (he was still a little dizzy from his run), and then realizing how impolite it was not to reply to a perfectly civil question, he said,
“No, who does he remind you of?”
“Why, he reminds me just a little of Mr. Three O’clock,” he answered. And then recollecting his errand he walked quickly out of the great gateway of the Palace Park, saying Jack Robinson and Boo as he ran along in order to encourage himself to speed as rapidly as possible.
The little boy had been standing behind a tree not far away from the camp listening to these bits of advice. But suddenly realizing that, as a representative of old Father Time, he should allow not a single precious moment to escape, he advanced from his place of concealment and walked toward the spot where the Duke and his army were resting.
“It is rather funny,” said he, as he walked along. “I don’t know just what to do when I get there. They will see at once that I’m not an Imp-hour and, of course, they’ll wonder who I am. I don’t just like to tell them I’m a spy; it might annoy them. Perhaps they’ll hang me like Nathan Hale; I wish I could meet the hour that saw them hang Nathan Hale!”
By this time he had almost reached the camp. There was no fragrance in the breeze now, for he was quite a distance from the city, and he began to wonder a little whether the old Duke, himself, were some disreputable hour with a questionable record. Things began to seem a little odd again. “But I am glad,” thought he, “that Mr. Three O’clock is not here to explain things, for he would only make them worse.”
213He was now close enough to see the Hour-imps very plainly, and he walked bravely toward the camp resolved to get the information that Father Time had sent him for and to carry it back to the King, even if he were killed while at the Duke’s camp. Then he realized that he couldn’t exactly do that. “But anyway,” thought he, “if they decide to kill me they might not be in a hurry about it. They might put it off from day to day and I could escape.”
So he came nearer and nearer, until finally he found himself pushing through the tall grass amid which the Army of Procrastination was gathered. He marched boldly past hammocks and steamer chairs, from which the Hour-imps stared at him, until he reached the beautiful, soft-cushioned Morris chair in which the mighty Duke was reclining. The renowned leader of the Army of Procrastination had on a spotless nightcap, and carried a polished, brass warming-pan in his belt. His feet were raised, in order that he might recline with the greater comfort, and rested upon an hour-glass which had no sand in it. He was, perhaps, a trifle larger than the hours who made up his loyal 214following, but otherwise he was a perfect Hour-imp in appearance, with a face like the face of a clock, his two little twinkling eyes representing the two holes in which the key is placed to wind the clock.
“How do you do?” said the little boy.
“I’m very well, thank you,” said the Duke of Procrastination.
“I suppose you wonder who I am,” said the little boy.
“I haven’t had time to wonder,” drawled the Duke. “Could you wait a little?”
“Certainly,” said the little boy, “but I don’t want to trouble you.”
“Not at all,” replied the Duke. “I’m in no hurry. Won’t you sit down?”
“Thank you,” said the little boy. “I am just a little tired from walking through the long grass.”
“Yes,” said the Duke, smiling. “We always let the grass grow under our feet, you know. Now, I believe I am beginning to wonder just a little who you are—suppose you tell me. Or would you rather wait until later?”
By this time a number of curious imps had left their resting places and came yawning and straggling toward the Duke’s chair for a better inspection of the strange visitor. Some of them sat down in the long grass, others leaned against trees, and all listened, as the little fellow said,
215“I am a little boy from the World—from Tickerleen, and I’d like to know when you’re coming to attack the city, if you wouldn’t mind telling me.”
“You represent one of the Tickerleen papers, I suppose,” said the Duke, eying him critically.
“No, I don’t; I’m just visiting Tickerleen from the World, if you must know; and His Majesty sent me here to find out what you are going to do. I hope you are not displeased. You know, Father Time is fond of little boys.”
“Oh, yes, but he’ll go back on you some day—when you need him most. He never thinks of any one but himself,” replied the Duke. “But I’m not displeased with you; oh, dear, no, not at all; you’re welcome.”
“Well, then,” said the little fellow, “would you mind telling me—”
“No, not to-day,” said the duke. “To-morrow morning, if all goes well, I will issue a statement, and you are welcome to stay here and make yourself at home until then.”
There was nothing for the little boy to do but to wait, for he saw that the Duke was inflexible. So he spent the rest of the day chatting pleasantly with the Duke’s hours, and asking them what they had seen in the World. Nearly every one of them said that nothing whatever of interest had happened during his time of duty in the World. A good many of them came from the Dark Ages when nothing had taken place to amount to anything, 216anyway. Altogether, they were an uninteresting and tedious set compared with the hours of Minutel, and the little boy was very glad when the next day came and he was told that the Duke was about to deliver his proclamation before the entire army. It was quite late in the afternoon when the proclamation was actually read by the Duke, for he had put off the reading eleven times during the day. At last, he appeared before his assembled troops, and the little boy, who had secured a very good position in front, listened with great attention to the proclamation, which was as follows:
The last words which the Duke uttered before he sat down were the words, “We’ll wait till the weather is clear,” the remainder being a response from his trusty followers who always cheered him and nodded approvingly when he spoke, frequently to the extent of voicing their sentiments whenever the Duke paused for a moment.
When the reading of the proclamation was finished, the hours betook themselves to their various resting places, where they gathered in little groups to talk over the proclamation and to praise the wisdom and thoughtfulness of the great Duke. But the little boy was very much disappointed, and bewildered withal, for it had seemed to him that the weather was almost ideal.
“I think I had better stay,” he said to himself, “for a day or two, at least, and see what they will do.” So he busied himself in talking with the various hours and in trying to find an hour who had seen some great historical event, but the only one he met who was at all interesting was a drowsy looking imp who said he had seen Rip Van Winkle go to sleep—or some one that looked very much like Rip Van Winkle, at any rate.
One day went by—two days went by—three days went by—but the army did not move. Finally at the end of seven days, it was rumored about that the Duke intended to deliver another and very important proclamation 222on the following day. There was a great deal of whispering among the hours who were in close touch with the Duke, and the little boy noticed that many of the imps were getting their belongings together as if preparing to start away. No one seemed to know what the proclamation was going to be, but there was a general expectation that it would be in connection with some important move. When the next day came, the entire army, including the little boy, gathered in the usual place to hear the Duke, but the renowned head of the army did not appear. The next day at the same time they assembled again, and this time it was given out that the Duke was very sorry but that the importance of what he had to say made it necessary for him to give more time to its preparation. The troops were ordered to make ready to start at two or three hours’ notice and to assemble the following morning to hear the proclamation. The little boy began to feel very nervous, for he knew, of course, that they were going to march against the King at last, and he did not know whether he ought to hasten at once to Tickerleen or to wait for the proclamation and make sure of his information. He decided that he would wait.
On the following morning there was great excitement in the camp. Every imp which came to join the throng that waited outside the Duke’s headquarters was armed with a warming-pan and seemed ready to start right away. And so the crowd increased and waited for the 223mighty Duke Procrastinate to appear. The little boy was in a fever of excitement. Finally, after much waiting, the great leader, with his warming-pan highly polished and his nightcap freshly laundered and highly starched, appeared upon the platform amid deafening cheers. He had a gallant, soldierly air about him as he glanced around at his faithful followers, as if he had accomplished wonderful deeds and thought the applause was no more than his due. The little boy was so nervous as he stood waiting that he could hardly keep still. He thought it a little strange that the Duke should be willing for him to hear the proclamation and then go and tell the King. “But I suppose,” said he to himself, “that he doesn’t really believe I’ll get there first.”
When the shouting began to die away, the renowned Duke raised his hand to command perfect silence, and stepping forward with a martial air, he said impressively,
“My brave and loyal followers,
“What are they going to do?” asked the little boy, in great surprise, of the imp who stood nearest him.
“Do!” answered the imp. “Why, we’re going home to Snooze! Hurrah! Hurrah!”
“Hurrah! Hu-u-rra-ah!” yawned several other imps, throwing their night-caps into the air. “The King has the land, but we have the reason! Hurrah! Hurrah!” And in less than a minute the camp was all bustle and confusion.
But the little boy did not wait. He had seen enough precious moments wasted already, and he stalked out of the camp and bent his steps toward the capital city. He was old enough to know that people who put things off from day to day end by never doing them at all. “And I suppose,” thought he, “that it is the same with imps that have once been hours in the world; it is the same everywhere.” He was beginning to see now how foolish it is to endeavour to get the best of old Father Time, and he wondered as he went along why so many sensible people really try to do it.
“I shall tell the King,” said he, as he trudged along the path where the poor little Wollerperleck had once 230wandered in search of himself, “I shall tell the King that those who are always putting things off and waiting, who are always going to do things, really never do them at all; that is what I shall tell him! Then I will hunt up my three friends, and as soon as they have been mustered out, I will go back with them to Minutel and then start home on the first swinger.”
So he trudged boldly on, like the sturdy little fellow that he was, until he saw far ahead of him the tower on the outskirts of the city where he had paused to rest. On he trudged, keeping his big eyes on the tower as he came closer and closer to it, and hurrying as fast as he could.
“There are probably soldiers in it,” said he, “and I will stop there and tell them the news, and then go straight on to Tickerleen.”
On, on he trudged, until finally he stopped short and looked quite perplexed.
“It is a very funny thing,” said he, “that the nearer I get to that tower, the smaller it grows; ’most always it’s the other way. Yet I can see it plainer all the time. I can see something moving in that round, white window up at the top. I guess it’s the soldiers.”
So he marched straight along until finally he was very near to the tower.
“I didn’t notice it before,” he thought, “but it’s just like all the other buildings and houses here. It’s in the shape of a clock, I do believe!”
He stalked boldly toward the door and tripped over something and gave it a kick in his anxiety to enter and see the soldiers. It went tumbling away to one side of him and left his path clear. Then going straight up to the door, he began to knock and, receiving no answer, he banged and kicked on the space beside it, calling,
“Come down! Come down! I have wonderful news! I’m going to Tickerleen. Stop drilling up there and come down! The old Duke has gone back to Snooze—he made a speech. Come down! I’m going to tell the King. I can’t wait here!”
He was still calling and trying to get in, when suddenly he heard a door open. But it was not the one which he was trying to enter.
“Gracious me!” said a pleasant and familiar voice. “What are you trying to do to the clock, little man? Stop the pendulum?”
232The little boy rubbed his sleepy eyes; then he looked around, and stood staring.
For it was only the governess!
