Family -- Juvenile fiction; Sisters -- Juvenile fiction
"So that's where all Shirley's toys have gone to!" Rosemary tried to
speak severely, but she ended by laughing. "Shirley has been missing
her playthings, one after the other," Rosemary explained to the boys.
"And we thought she took them outdoors to play with and forgot where
she left them."
"After supper to-night," said Sarah, calmly ignoring this disclosure,
"I'll give an exhibition in the barn."
CHAPTER XVII
WILLING AND OBLIGING
Sarah was as good as her word. She not only assembled the entire
Rainbow Hill family in the barn that evening and put Bony through his
paces, but she continued to give "exhibitions" whenever and wherever
she could assemble an audience of one or more. Eventually she took
Bony over to the Gay farm and delighted the children there who thought
he was absolutely the most clever pig they had ever seen and Sarah the
most wonderful trainer.
The fame of Bony spread abroad and gradually Sarah's family grew
accustomed to having a horse and wagon drive in, usually with a couple
of empty milk cans rattling around in the back showing that the driver
was on his way home from the daily trip to the creamery; and to hearing
a knock at the door, followed by a voice asking, "Is the little girl
in--the one with the pig?"
Answered in the affirmative, the inevitable request would be: "Do you
think she would mind letting me see him do tricks? They tell me, down
to the creamery" (or at the store or the postoffice) "that he is sure a
smart pig."
These requests pleased Sarah immensely. She, would sally forth
importantly and rout Bony out of his comfortable box, present him as
one would introduce a famous artist and put him through his program.
The audience never failed to be pleased and grateful and to be generous
with praises. Warren declared that there was small danger of Bony ever
forgetting his accomplishments for hardly a day passed that he wasn't
"billed to appear."
But before Bony attained this place in the limelight, Doctor Hugh and
Jack Welles arrived for their promised two weeks' visit and vacation.
Even her marvelous pig could not hope to compete with these arrivals
and Sarah's interest in Bony slackened slightly though she kept him
rigorously in training.
The doctor and Jack came in the former's car. It was difficult to say
whose disappointment was keenest when Jack announced that he intended
to sleep at the bungalow and eat at Mr. Hildreth's table--Mrs. Willis,
Winnie and Rosemary were equally dismayed.
"Jack dear, I thought of course you'd live with us," protested Mrs.
Willis. "You know we'll love to have you and I'm afraid you won't be
comfortable at the bungalow."
"It won't be any kind of a vacation for you," declared Rosemary.
"You'll have to get up at five o'clock because they have breakfast at
six; and Mrs. Hildreth won't let you put a book or a paper out of
place--Richard says so."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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