"Oh, let it come out," said Polly. "Two of mine did."
"No," said Peter. "I shall pull it. You pulled one of yours with your
fingers. I shall do that."
But the loose tooth would not come out.
"It will not pull," said Peter. "I shall put a string on it. I shall tie
the end of the string to the door. Then I shall shut the door hard. It
will pull my tooth. You did that."
"Yes," said Polly. "That was fun. But I know a better way now. I will
show it to you."
She took a flatiron. She tied a string to it. She set it on the kitchen
table. Then she tied the other end of the string to Peter's loose tooth.
She said, "This string is too short to reach the floor. You push the
flatiron off the table. It will fall down and jerk out your tooth."
"Shall I now?" asked Peter.
"Yes, now."
So Peter pushed the flatiron. But Polly had not been right. The string
was too long. It reached to the floor.
Down went the flatiron, bang! It landed on the edge of Peter's boot. It
landed on the edge of Peter's toe, too. It hurt him, but not much. And
the tooth did not come out.
"Oh! Oh!" cried Peter. "It hurt my foot, it hurt my foot! It didn't pull
out my tooth at all." And he started to jump up and down.
The very first jump surprised him. Something pulled at his mouth and
then seemed to let go.
It was the string around his tooth. He had jumped up far enough to pull
the tooth out himself.
How Polly did laugh when she saw this!
Peter cried, "It's out, it's out! We have found a new way! I found it!"
And he got down on the floor to pick up his tooth.
"I am going to save it to plant in my garden," he said.
"To plant!" said Polly. "What for?"
"So I shall have more," said Peter.
Then Polly laughed again. She ran to tell mother about Peter's garden.