"Indeed, I will not!" cried Jacko, thinking it was the burglar fox, but
he happened to look back, and he saw that it was a kind old gentleman
squirrel, who was perched on the stump, eating a butternut.
"I just thought you might be hungry, and would like some chestnuts,"
went on the squirrel. "I have more than I need. Help yourself to a
handful."
"Thank you, I will," said Jacko, so he took some chestnuts for himself,
and some for his brother Jumpo. Then Jacko hurried on, as it was getting
darker, and on the way he ate some of the chestnuts. And, whether it was
because he was frightened, or because he was so busy eating the
chestnuts and throwing away the shells, I can't say for sure--at any
rate poor Jacko was soon lost in the woods, with night coming on, and he
couldn't find the right path.
It wasn't because Jacko didn't look for the path home that he couldn't
find it; no, indeed, for he searched as hard as ever a monkey boy could.
But that path stayed lost.
"Oh, dear! What shall I do?" said the red monkey finally. "I'm afraid
I'll have to stay in these woods forever, and never see my mamma or papa
or brother Jumpo again! Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"
Then he put his hand in his pocket, and he happened to feel a box of
matches. Finding them gave him an idea.
"I'll just make a little camp fire," he said. "Then, if I have to stay
in the woods all night I'll be warm. And perhaps my papa and brother
will come to search for me, and they can tell where I am by the light of
the fire. I'll build one."
It didn't take the monkey boy long to gather up some sticks and make a
fire, and soon it was blazing merrily, while he sat down in front of it,
on a flat stone, and looked at the flames. Then he thought of something
else.
"Roast chestnuts! Why not?" he exclaimed. "I'm hungry and they will be
just the thing for my supper."
So he took some of the chestnuts the squirrel had given him, and put
them in the hot ashes to roast. Well, the nuts were almost ready to eat,
after they had cooled a bit, when, all of a sudden, something reached
around Jacko's neck from the darkness behind him, and a voice cried out:
"Ah, ha! This time I've got you sure! I thought I'd find something for
my supper if I came out, and I have!"
Jacko turned around and saw that the savage wolf had hold of him.
"Oh, please let me go!" cried the poor monkey boy. He struggled to get
loose, but couldn't.
"Indeed I'll not let you go!" snarled the wolf. "I'm going to sit down
by your fire, and get warm, and then I'll carry you off to my den."
Well, Jacko felt dreadfully on hearing that. But just you wait and see
what happens, if you please.
All of a sudden, just as the wolf was getting ready to carry the monkey
boy off to his den, the chestnuts in the fire began bursting and popping
from the heat.
"Bang-bang!" they went, like fire-crackers. My! what a noise they made
as they exploded.
"Oh, I'm shot! I'm hit! Some one is shooting guns at me! Oh, please,
don't kill me! I'll be good! I won't eat Jacko! I was only fooling!"
cried the wolf, in a great fright.
"Bang-bang!" went more chestnuts, and some of them hit the wolf in the
eye. Then he gave three and a half howls, let go of Jacko and ran off in
the woods as fast as he could go.
Then Jacko heard a great shouting, and up rushed his papa and his
brother Jumpo, who had been looking all over for him. They heard the
bursting chestnuts and they hurried toward the sound, finding the lost
monkey boy just in time. They soon showed him the way home, and so the
wolf didn't have any supper that night, and everybody said Jacko was a
very brave little monkey chap, and I think so myself; don't you?
Now in case a little pig with a curly tail doesn't take my red necktie
to wear to the picnic and make the angle worm laugh and turn a
somersault, I'll tell you next about the Kinkytails making money.
STORY XVI
THE KINKYTAILS MAKE MONEY
"Mamma, would you please buy us an automobile?" asked Jacko Kinkytail of
his mother one Saturday morning when there wasn't any school.
"An automobile? Why, my dear boy, what would you do with an automobile?"
asked Mrs. Kinkytail.
"Oh, yes; please do get us one, mother!" begged Jumpo.
"Oh, my! I never heard of such a thing!" cried the monkeys' mamma, as
she trimmed the dough off the edge of an apple pie and put it in the
oven to bake. "What could you possibly do with it--you two little boys?"
"Why, we could soon learn to run it," said Jacko. "Then we could go to
school in it, and come home and take papa to the hand organ factory, and
take you to the store, and we could even take out parties on excursion
trips and make money that way."
[Illustration]
"What would you do when your auto wouldn't go?" asked Mrs. Kinkytail,
as she got ready to bake a chocolate cocoanut cake with cherries on the
top.
"Oh, we could take turns pulling it then," spoke Jumpo. "Uncle Wiggily
has one, so why can't we?"
"Uncle Wiggily is rich, since he found his fortune," said Mrs.
Kinkytail, "but your papa and I haven't money enough to buy even a set
of tires for an auto. Still, if you boys could earn the money yourselves
you might get one," she said. Of course, she was only joking, for she
never thought the boys would take her in earnest. But they did.
"All right, then, we'll earn the money," said Jacko. "Come on, Jumpo."
"Don't stay away too long," cautioned their mamma, and she smiled as the
two little monkey boys slid down the tree in which the house was built,
and hurried away.
"How are we going to make money?" asked Jumpo, as he followed after his
brother. "Are you going to gather up old rags, bones and bottles, and
sell them?"
"Come on, I'll show you," spoke Jacko, as he tied his tail in a bow knot
to keep it from dragging in the dust. "I'm going to the hand organ
factory, where papa works, and I'm going to ask him to lend us an old
organ. Then you and I will go around and play music and people will give
us pennies. We'll soon have enough to buy an automobile."
"The very thing!" cried Jumpo in delight. "You can play the organ and
I'll climb up to the windows where the children are and get the pennies.
Then this afternoon we'll buy the auto, and go for a ride. Won't mamma
be surprised?"
"I guess so," answered Jacko. "I hope we get enough money today. How
much do you s'pose an auto costs, Jumpo?"
"Oh, I guess twenty-six or twenty-seven cents. I know they're very
expensive. But we can easily earn the money, for if the children give
single pennies to a man playing the organ, who has a monkey with him,
they'll probably give us double five-cent pieces to see two monkeys, and
we'll soon have the twenty-seven cents, or, maybe, even thirty--who
knows."
Mr. Kinkytail was very busy in the factory when his two boys came in to
see him, and he said they could have a second-hand hand organ that
played sort of wheezy-eezy tunes. He was so busy that he didn't even ask
them what they wanted it for and they didn't tell him. They just took
the organ and started off with it.
"Now we must play the very best tunes, and you must do some of your
finest tricks," said Jacko, as they walked along until they came to a
row of brick houses. "This will be a good place to begin," said the red
monkey boy. "Rich people must live here."
Well, I just wish you could have heard Jacko play that hand organ.
Really, he did as well as you could, turning the handle sometimes with
his left paw, and sometimes with his right and sometimes with his tail.
"Oh, mamma!" cried a little girl at one window. "Come quick and see two
monkeys with a hand organ! And one of them is coming up here. Oh, give
me five cents for him!"
"Two monkeys!" exclaimed her mamma. "You must be mistaken. You mean a
man with a monkey."
"No, really, mamma!" cried the little girl. "Come and see."
"Sure enough!" spoke her mamma. "Two monkeys. Two monkeys. How very odd.
Here is ten cents for them. Aren't they cute?"
By this time Jumpo was climbing up the porch to where the little girl
was holding out the money for him and Jacko was grinding the handle of
the organ and playing a tune called: "If You Have Your Umbrella You Will
Never Mind the Rain."
When the little girl handed Jumpo the money he took off his pink cap,
made a low bow, and, then standing on the roof of the porch, he turned a
somersault, stood on his tail and made a queer face like an ice cream
cone inside of a watermelon.
"Oh, what a funny monkey!" cried the little girl in delight. "I wish I
could keep him!"
"I guess it's time for me to be going," thought Jumpo. "She might want
to keep me forever and then Jacko and I couldn't get the auto."
So he went on to the next house where there was a little boy, and Jumpo
climbed up, and did some more tricks and Jacko kept on playing. By this
time all the children in the block had heard about the two monkeys with
the hand organ, and the boys and girls came with so many pennies that
Jumpo's cap was hardly large enough to hold them.
"Oh, Jacko, we've got as much as fifty cents!" he cried as they went on
to the next block, and there they got more money until they had over a
dollar. And then a big dog chased them, and the two monkey boys hurried
back home.
"But we've got enough to buy our auto," said Jacko, "so it's all right.
Oh, won't we have fun in it!"
"Indeed, we will!" cried Jumpo, as he wiggled both his ears and on the
next page, in case the feather in the hat of the little girl next door
doesn't tickle my puppy dog and make him sneeze, I'll tell you how the
Kinkytails spent their money.
STORY XVII
THE KINKYTAILS SPEND MONEY
"Well, I must say I never thought you two monkey boys would go off and
earn money that way," said Mamma Kinkytail, as Jacko and Jumpo came in
with the second-hand hand organ, after having gone around and played
tunes, as I told you about in the story ahead of this.
"Neither did I know what they were up to," said their father, as he sat
reading the evening paper, after supper. "Why, when you boys came down
to the factory, and asked me to let you take a second-hand hand organ I
had no idea that you were going to do what you did."
"But you don't mind; do you?" asked Jumpo.
"Because we thought it was all right," spoke Jacko.
"Oh, bless you, no," said their mamma. "It _was_ all right." And then
Jacko told her how he and his brother had played the music and done the
tricks, and how the little girl had given them ten cents and the other
children pennies and five-cent pieces, and how delighted all the
children were to see them.
"It was clever of you," said Mrs. Kinkytail.
"How much money did you make?" asked their papa, laughing behind his
paper.
"We took in one dollar and seventeen cents," said Jacko, as he counted
it, "and we would have had eighteen cents, only I dropped one penny down
a crack in the board walk of a house. But maybe we can get it some day."
"And now may we go down town and buy our auto?" asked Jumpo eagerly.
"It's early yet and the stores will be open for some time. Please may
we, mother?"
"You can't get an automobile for a dollar and seventeen cents," said
their papa.
"Well, we can try, can't we?" asked Jacko.
"Oh, let them go," whispered their mamma to Mr. Kinkytail. "It will do
no harm, and they will very soon find out their mistake."
"I guess so," agreed their papa, as he looked in the paper to see if it
was going to be nice weather Sunday.
So Jacko and Jumpo having carefully wrapped their money in a piece of
paper, started down town. And on their way they met Sammie Littletail,
the boy rabbit, who wanted to know where they were going. So they told
him.
"Ha, ha! Ho, ho!" laughed Sammie. "You can't get an auto for that money.
Why an automobile costs as much as three dollars and fifteen cents, and
then there's the gasoline to make it go--that costs money, too."
"Don't mind him," spoke Jacko, pulling his brother by the sleeve. "We'll
get that auto anyhow."
So they kept on down town, and pretty soon they could see the lights in
the stores, and they hurried faster than ever, for they were very
anxious to get their auto.
"Have you got the money safe?" asked Jumpo.
"Yes," said Jacko, and just then, as they turned around a corner they
saw a poor little mousie girl. Oh, she was such a poor little girl, and
she had on such a ragged dress, and her shoes were so full of holes that
there was hardly room for her tiny feet in them. And she was crying and
shivering with the cold.
"Why, what is the matter?" asked Jacko, kindly.
"Oh, I'm so cold and miserable and hungry," said the mousie girl, wiping
away her tears.
"Then why don't you go home and get warm and have something to eat,"
said Jumpo. "That's what we do when we're cold and hungry, don't we,
Jacko?"
"Yes, but there is no fire in my house," said the poor little mousie
girl, "and there is nothing to eat."
"Why not?" asked Jacko, surprised like, and he felt in his pockets once
more, to see if he had his money safe.
"Because we are too poor," answered the mousie girl. "My papa is sick
with the epizootic, and my mamma has the rheumatism so bad that she
can't take in washing, and we are so cold and miserable! My little
brother sells papers, telling the mouse people about cheese and
crackers, and how to keep out of traps, but his toes got so cold,
because he had no shoes, that he can't sell papers any more.
"So I started out to sell matches, but I dropped them in a barrel of
water, and no one wants to buy wet matches, you know. Oh, hoo, boo! Boo,
hoo! How cold and miserable and hungry I am!" and she cried, oh so
sadly.
Jacko and Jumpo thought for a minute. Then Jacko pulled his brother to
one side.
"Look here," said Jacko, blinking his eyes, "we've got to do something
for that mousie girl."
"That's right," said Jumpo, sniffing his nose.
"I--I don't care much about an automobile, anyhow, do you?" asked Jacko.
"N--no--no--not--much," spoke Jumpo, slowly.
"They're always getting stuck, and won't go, and then you have to get
out and walk, and besides they use so much gasoline, and--and gasoline
smells so--so funny! Say, we don't need an auto. Let's give the mousie
girl this money."
"All right," said Jumpo, so Jacko handed the poor little girl the $1.17.
"There," said Jacko, "take it home and get some coal and something to
eat. We don't want an auto, anyway."
"Oh, thank you so much!" exclaimed the mousie girl, as she hurried away.
"Well, I--I guess we might as well go back home," said Jacko, sadly,
after a bit.
"Yes," agreed Jumpo, and they started off together. Well, they hadn't
gone very far before they heard a bangity-bang noise down the street,
and, running up, they saw Uncle Wiggily standing in front of his auto.
It was standing still and smoking and making a terrible racket and a
policeman dog was saying:
"Come, now, Mr. Wiggily, you'll have to move along."
"Move along! I only wish I could," cried the old gentleman rabbit. "I
never saw such a pesky automobile! It's always stopping. I've jiggled
and joggled and tickled everything from the whoop-de-doodle-do down to
the slam-bangity-what-is-it, but it won't go. I'm done with it. Whoever
wants it can have it!"
"Oh, may we have it?" cried Jacko, as Uncle Wiggily started toward the
sidewalk, leaving the auto in the street.
"To be sure you may, and I'll buy a gallon of gasoline into the
bargain!" cried Uncle Wiggily.
"Come on, we'll pull it home, and then we'll fix it so that it will go!"
cried Jacko; so he and Jumpo pulled the auto home, and that's how they
got one after all, without any money. And the little mousie girl wasn't
cold or hungry any more.
And in case the ice box doesn't catch cold in the rice pudding and
freeze the potato salad so it can't go to moving pictures, I'll tell you
next about Jacko and Jumpo in their auto.
STORY XVIII
JUMPO AND JACKO IN THE AUTO
"Aren't you glad it's Saturday, when we don't have to go to school?"
asked Jacko Kinkytail of his brother Jumpo, the green monkey, when he
awoke one morning.
"Of course I'm glad," answered Jumpo. "But what are we going to do
today--go fishing?"
"No, indeed! Why, have you forgotten about the little automobile which
Uncle Wiggily gave us? It's down in the yard."
"Oh, of course! And we can go for a ride in it. Oh, how glad I am!"
And, would you believe me, Jumpo was so happy that he jumped out of bed
and hung by his tail from the back of the rocking chair.
And Jacko took up a ball and caught it, first in one foot and then in
the other, until it happened to slip away from him, striking Jumpo on
the nose.
"Ouch!" cried Jumpo, and he uncurled his tail from the chair and rubbed
his nose.
"Oh, I'm so sorry!" exclaimed Jacko. "I didn't mean to do that. Wait.
I'll help you rub your nose."
Well, he started to rub poor Jumpo's sore nose, but Jacko made a little
mistake. He took up a piece of sticky fly paper instead of a
handkerchief, and the fly paper stuck to the nose of the green monkey so
that he could hardly breathe, and his mamma had to come running in the
bedroom to see what was the matter.
"Oh, you funny boys!" she exclaimed. "You are always up to some tricks.
You had better get dressed at once and go out to play. It is a fine
day."
"Of course we will!" cried Jacko. "Come on, Jumpo. We'll go for a long
automobile ride."
So after Mrs. Kinkytail had taken the fly paper off Jumpo's nose, the
monkey boys had breakfast and they got ready to go out. The automobile
which Uncle Wiggily had given the monkey boys, because it wouldn't go
for him, had been fixed by Mr. Kinkytail, so it was now as good as ever.
The tires were pumped full of wind and then Jumpo climbed up on the seat
and took hold of the steering wheel. Jacko twisted the crank in front,
and he did it very well, too, for, you know, he had plenty of practise
in twisting the cranks of hand-organs, so he knew just how to do it.
And then the auto started off. Whizz! Whazz! Whuzz! it went, down the
street, faster and faster, until it was out on a nice country road.
"My! Isn't this just fine!" cried Jumpo.
"It certainly is as delicious as two ice cream cones and part of another
one," replied his brother.
And they laughed and looked at each other and they nearly ran over a
rooster, and the rooster crowed as loud as he could and said:
"You monkey boys had better look out where you are going! You have me
all ruffled up."
"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Jumpo most politely. "We will go more
slowly."
So he twisted some of the shiny things on the steering wheel, and he
tickled the thing-a-ma-bob and pushed the tittle-cum-tattle-cum and the
auto went slower. But even then it was going pretty fast.
"Say, if a burglar fox chased us now, he couldn't catch us, could he?"
said Jacko.
"Never in the world," answered his brother.
And just then a big, black bear stuck his nose out of the bushes and
growled:
"Hold on there, I haven't had any dinner yet."
"Well, you can't eat us!" shouted Jumpo, so he turned the
what-you-may-call-it around backward and away they went faster than ever
and the bear couldn't catch them, not even if he had put on roller
skates to slide with.
Well, after a while, not so very long, all of a sudden, as the monkey
boys were riding along through the woods, all of a sudden, I say, their
auto stopped. It wouldn't go a bit farther.
"What's the matter?" asked Jacko.
"I don't know," said Jumpo, looking all around.
"Maybe the squee-gee is on crooked," said the red monkey.
"No, that's all straight," answered the green monkey, as he looked at it
to make sure.
"Then perhaps the busticated-what's-his-name needs oiling," suggested
Jacko.
So Jumpo put some oil on the busticated-what's-his-name, but still that
auto wouldn't go any more than a clock will if it isn't wound up.
"Maybe all the wheels are off," spoke Jacko.
So they got out to look, but the wheels were on all right and tight, and
the big tires were full of wind like a bologna sausage. Well, these
monkey boys didn't know what to do, and they were beginning to be
frightened, for they were in the deep woods, where there might be
wolves. They began to wish they hadn't come so far, or else that they
knew more about autos.
All of a sudden they heard a rustling in the bushes, and they looked
around, fearing they might see the burglar fox, perhaps, but whom do you
suppose it was? Why, no one else than Grandfather Goosey Gander.
"Oh, our auto is stuck!" cried Jacko.
"Yes, it won't go," said Jumpo.
Grandfather Goosey took one look at the machine, then he sniffed the air
and said:
"Why, of course, it won't go, you have no more gasoline. I know, for I
once had a motor-boat and the same thing happened to me. You need
gasoline, just as I did. Go buy some gasoline."
"Where can we get it; here in the woods?" asked Jacko.
Grandfather Goosey Gander sniffed the air again.
"I smell gasoline," he said, "and it's over this way. Come with me." So
he led the monkey boys through the woods toward a big stump, and there,
right behind it, was Aunt Lettie, the old lady goat. And what do you
s'pose she was doing? Why, she was cleaning the spots off the trousers
of Jimmie Wibblewobble, the duck boy, with gasoline. She had a big can
full, for you know gasoline cleans spots off things very nicely.
"Oh, will you please give us some of your gasoline to make our auto go?"
asked Jacko politely of the old lady goat.
"Mercy sakes alive, child! Of course I will," said Aunt Lettie.
So she gave the monkey boys some, and Grandfather Goosey Gander showed
them how to pour it in the tank of their car. Then Jumpo twisted the
tinkerum-tankerum and away the auto went, whizz-whazz! and the boys had
a fine ride.
They went through the woods and up one hill and down another, and when
they were almost home a big savage wolf chased them, but he couldn't
catch up to that auto; no, sir, no matter how he tried, and he couldn't
bite any holes in the tires, either.
So Jacko and Jumpo got safely home, just in time for dinner, and they
had huckleberry pie and chocolate drops on it with their milk.
So that's all now, if you please, but in case the spoonholder doesn't
squeeze the salt-shaker and make the pepper box sneeze, I'll tell you on
the next page about Jumpo and the roast marshmallow candy.
STORY XIX
JUMPO AND THE ROAST MARSHMALLOWS
It was almost time for school to be out, and Jacko and Jumpo, the red
and green monkey boys, could hardly wait, as they wanted to run home and
go for another ride in their little auto. Of course, all the other
animal children also wished school was over, for Jacko and Jumpo had
promised to let all of them have turns riding in the gasoline car. But
just when it was almost time for school to be out the owl school teacher
said:
"Now, children, I am going to give you all some lessons to study at
home, and I want you all to do them as nicely as you can. Now pay
attention, please."
So she gave some of the pupils examples to do, and to others she gave
spelling, and to still others writing, while the bigger children, like
Sammie Littletail or Johnnie and Billie Bushytail, had geography to
study. And the little kindergarten children had to cut things out of
paper--horses and cows and houses and trees, and things like that.
"Now you may all go," said the teacher, "and bring your lessons in with
you to-morrow morning."
Well, the animal children marched out, but they weren't very happy. They
didn't think they ought to have to study at home, but it has to be done,
sometimes, you know. And really it isn't so hard if you don't think so.
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Jacko to his brother, when they were outside the
school. "We can't go for an auto ride if we have to study our examples."
"No; isn't it mean?" exclaimed his brother. "But perhaps if we run along
quickly we'll have time for just a little ride before we have to do our
home work."
So they hurried as fast as they could and they soon reached home. Then
their mamma said they might ride around the block a couple of times in
their auto before doing any study.
"And then, after your lessons are done, you may ride some more," she
said; "that is if it isn't too dark."
Well, Jacko and Jumpo took their little ride, and they gave rides to as
many of their friends as they could. Then they went in the house to
study.
But alas and alack-a-day! You know how it happens sometimes. Jacko got
his example all twisted up, and the answer wouldn't come right. And
Jumpo's numbers got all snarled up, until the figure six looked like a
nine and the figure eight like a brown cruller which his mamma sometimes
made in the lard kettle.
"Oh, dear!" cried both the monkey boys. "We'll never get done in time to
go auto riding before dark."