"Then," said Alice, "there is something written with lead-pencil inside
both the jugs. I wish I hadn't. I would rather you didn't read it. I
didn't know it would be a nice old gentleman like you would find it. I
thought it would be the younger gentleman with the thin legs and the
narrow smile."
"Mr. Turnbull." The President seemed to recognize the description
unerringly. "Well, well--boys will be boys--girls, I mean. I won't be
angry. Look at all the 'jugs' and see if you can find yours."
Alice did--and the next one she looked at she said, "This is one"--and
two jugs further on she said, "This is the other."
"Well," the President said, "these are certainly the specimens which I
obtained yesterday. If your uncle will call on me I will return them to
him. But it's a disappointment. Yes. I think you must let me look
inside."
He did. And at the first one he said nothing. At the second he laughed.
"Well, well," he said, "we can't expect old heads on young shoulders.
You're not the first who went forth to shear and returned shorn. Nor, it
appears, am I. Next time you have a Sale of Antiquities, take care that
you yourself are not 'sold.' Good-day to you, my dear. Don't let the
incident prey on your mind," he said to Alice. "Bless your heart, I was
a boy once myself, unlikely as you may think it. Good-bye."
* * * * *
We were in time to see the pigs bought, after all.
I asked Alice what on earth it was she'd scribbled inside the beastly
jugs, and she owned that just to make the lark complete she had written
"Sucks" in one of the jugs, and "Sold again, silly," in the other.
[Illustration: "'I THINK YOU MUST LET ME LOOK INSIDE'"]
But we know well enough who it was that was sold. And if ever we have
any Antiquities to tea again, they sha'n't find so much as a Greek
waistcoat button if we can help it.
Unless it's the President, for he did not behave at all badly. For a man
of his age I think he behaved exceedingly well. Oswald can picture a
very different scene having been enacted over those rotten pots if the
President had been an otherwise sort of man.
But that picture is not pleasing, so Oswald will not distress you by
drawing it for you. You can most likely do it easily for yourself.