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Page 4
"Will you give me a lump of sugar?" he asked in a sharp, hard little voice--
a voice immature and yet, somehow, not young.
Winterbourne glanced at the small table near him, on which his coffee
service rested, and saw that several morsels of sugar remained.
"Yes, you may take one," he answered; "but I don't think sugar
is good for little boys."
This little boy stepped forward and carefully selected three of
the coveted fragments, two of which he buried in the pocket of
his knickerbockers, depositing the other as promptly in another place.
He poked his alpenstock, lance-fashion, into Winterbourne's bench
and tried to crack the lump of sugar with his teeth.
"Oh, blazes; it's har-r-d!" he exclaimed, pronouncing the adjective
in a peculiar manner.
Winterbourne had immediately perceived that he might
have the honor of claiming him as a fellow countryman.
"Take care you don't hurt your teeth," he said, paternally.
"I haven't got any teeth to hurt. They have all come out.
I have only got seven teeth. My mother counted them last night,
and one came out right afterward. She said she'd slap me
if any more came out. I can't help it. It's this old Europe.
It's the climate that makes them come out. In America they
didn't come out. It's these hotels."
Winterbourne was much amused. "If you eat three lumps of sugar,
your mother will certainly slap you," he said.
"She's got to give me some candy, then," rejoined his young interlocutor.
"I can't get any candy here--any American candy. American candy's
the best candy."
"And are American little boys the best little boys?" asked Winterbourne.
"I don't know. I'm an American boy," said the child.
"I see you are one of the best!" laughed Winterbourne.
"Are you an American man?" pursued this vivacious infant.
And then, on Winterbourne's affirmative reply--"American men
are the best," he declared.
His companion thanked him for the compliment, and the child,
who had now got astride of his alpenstock, stood looking
about him, while he attacked a second lump of sugar.
Winterbourne wondered if he himself had been like this in his infancy,
for he had been brought to Europe at about this age.
"Here comes my sister!" cried the child in a moment.
"She's an American girl."
Winterbourne looked along the path and saw a beautiful
young lady advancing. "American girls are the best girls,"
he said cheerfully to his young companion.
"My sister ain't the best!" the child declared.
"She's always blowing at me."
"I imagine that is your fault, not hers," said Winterbourne.
The young lady meanwhile had drawn near. She was dressed in white muslin,
with a hundred frills and flounces, and knots of pale-colored ribbon.
She was bareheaded, but she balanced in her hand a large parasol,
with a deep border of embroidery; and she was strikingly, admirably pretty.
"How pretty they are!" thought Winterbourne, straightening himself
in his seat, as if he were prepared to rise.
The young lady paused in front of his bench, near the parapet of the garden,
which overlooked the lake. The little boy had now converted his alpenstock
into a vaulting pole, by the aid of which he was springing about in the gravel
and kicking it up not a little.
"Randolph," said the young lady, "what ARE you doing?"
"I'm going up the Alps," replied Randolph. "This is the way!"
And he gave another little jump, scattering the pebbles
about Winterbourne's ears.
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