Part 53

"Apple pies," said the Lady. Like a handful of black tissue paper she crumpled up suddenly in her chair. Her shoulders shook and shook. The sound she made was like a sob going down and a laugh coming up. "I'm not crying," she said, "because it's so hard--but b--because the idea is so f--funny."

"F--F--Funny?" said our Uncle Peter. "It's preposterous! It's gro--tesque! It's--it's fantastic!"

He began to walk very fast from the book-case to the window and from the window back to the book-case again. It wasn't till he'd stubbed his toe twice on a toy Ferris Wheel that the twinkle came back to his eyes.

"Carol!" he said. "Ruthy!--In consideration of the reduced circumstances in which this very pleasant Lady finds herself don't you think that you could afford to offer her a reduced price on the dog,--your original profit on the deal being as noted $49.50?"

The Lady jumped to her feet.

"Oh no--no--no!" she said. "Not for a moment! Fifty dollars is what I offered! And fifty dollars it shall be! All dogs I'm sure are worth fifty dollars. Especially if they don't sleep! Why all the other dogs that people brought me did nothing except sleep! On my sofas! In my chairs! Under my tables! Night or day you couldn't drop even so much as a handkerchief on the floor that one or the other of them didn't camp right down and go to sleep on it! Oh, no--no--no," protested the Lady, "whatever my faults, a bargain is a bargain and----"

"Whatever your faults, my dear Madam," said our Uncle Peter, "they are essentially feminine and therefore enchanting! It is only when ladies ape the faults of men that men resent the same!--Your extravagant indulgency--" he bowed towards the toys--"your absolute innocence of all business guile--" he bowed towards Tiger Lily--"nerves strung so exquisitely that the slightest--the slightest--"

The Lady shivered her clothes like a black frost.

"It was advice that I was looking for, not compliments," she said.

"Oh ho!" said Uncle Peter. "I'm infinitely more adept with advice than I am with compliments!"

The Lady looked a little bit surprised. She frowned.

"It's my little boy that I want advice about," she said. "What IS the best thing I can do for him?"

Our Uncle Peter looked at the ceiling. He looked at the rug. He looked at the pictures on the wall. But it seemed to satisfy him most to look at the Lady's face.

"U--m--m," he said. "U--m--mmmm.--That isn't an easy question to answer unless you're willing first to answer a question of mine."

"Ask any question you want to," said the Lady.

"U--m--m," said our Uncle Peter all over again. "U--m--m--Um--m--m--U--m--m. It takes a great deal of patience," said our Uncle Peter, "to bring up a little boy.--Unless every time he's naughty you can say to yourself 'Well, even so--think what a good man his Father grew to be!'----Or every time he's good you're fair enough to admit that 'Even his naughty Father was once as nice as this!'"----All the twinkle went suddenly out of our Uncle Peter's eyes. It left them looking narrow. He made a quick glance at Carol. He made a quick glance at me. He seemed very pleased that we were so busy looking at a map of Bermuda. He stepped a little nearer to the Lady. His voice sounded funny. "Were you--were you very fond of the little boy's Father?" he said.

The Lady's face went blazing like a flame out of her black clothes. It was like a white flame that it went blazing. Her eyes looked screaming.

"How dare you?" she said. "You have no business!--What if I was?--What if I wasn't?" All the scream in her eyes fell down her throat into a whisper. "Suppose--Suppose--I--WASN'T?" she whispered.

"Then indeed I CAN give you advice," said our Uncle Peter.

The Lady reached out a hand to the book-case to make herself more steady.

"What--what is it?" she said.

Our Uncle Peter looked funnier and funnier. It wasn't like Christmas that he looked. Nor Fourth of July. Nor even like when we've got the mumps or the measles. It was like Easter Sunday that he looked! There was no twinkle in it. Nor any smoke. Nor even paper dolls. But just SHININGNESS! His voice was all SHININGNESS too!--If it hadn't been you never could have heard it 'cause he made his words so little.

"It's almost a year now," he said, "since our eyes first met.--You've tried your best to hide from me--but you couldn't do it.--Fate had other ideas in mind.--A chance encounter on the street,--that day on the ferry boat,--your funny little dog-advertisement in the paper?"

Quite suddenly our Uncle Peter straightened up like a soldier and spoke right out loud again.

"About your little boy," he said, "my advice about your little boy?--It being indeed so well-nigh impossible, Madam, for a woman to bring up a little boy very successfully unless--she did love his Father,--my advice to you is that without the slightest unnecessary delay you proceed to get him a Father whom you COULD love!"

Whereupon, as people always say in books, our Uncle Peter turned upon his heel and started for the door.

The Lady swooned into her chair.

Our Uncle Peter had to get a glass of water to un-swoon her.