"I haven't decided yet. But you must stick to your colors and have more
faith in cocoanut than in all the others."
"Oh, yes! That's easy!"
"And so you eat nothing but cocoanut pie."
"Nothing else at all?"
"Nothing else. So long as you are a Christian you must stick to your
creed. You must feel considerably wiser and better than outsiders who
are eating grapes, and roast turkey and custards and watermelons, and
pudding and ice cream, and all who eat anything except your one kind of
pie."
"Oh, I couldn't do that!"
"But you must, if you want to be a true defender of your cocoanut
creed. For all the others are outsiders. Those pudding, turkey, grapes,
custard and ice cream people don't believe in your pie."
Cyrus slowly shook his head and pushed out his lips. "I couldn't
despise people for eating things they liked."
"Neither could I, Cyrus. So, for the present, anyway, we will eat
whatever we want to. And we are just as sure of going to Heaven as if
we stuck to one kind of pie."
"Yes, we will," declared the invalid, and in his face and voice had
come the enthusiasm of fresh hopes and a new life. "If our minister,"
he said, "would talk like that in the pulpit, about roast turkey and
ice cream and things to eat, it would be more--more interesting.
Wouldn't it?"
Dr. Alton bent over Cyrus and kissed him good night. "Yes, but he
wouldn't dare--unless his congregation consisted of empty boys."
The father's diagnosis was correct: his treatment a success. During
that short half hour the patient had been converted from a terrified
sinner to a hopeful gourmand. The anxious look had left his eyes. The
lips were smiling.
And that night, instead of fitful wakings interspersed with dreams of
hell and Hebrew prophets, of death, damnation and eternal punishment,
he slept a solid, tranquil sleep. And such dreams as came were happy
dreams. He dreamed of puddings of the richest kind, of turkeys all
stuffed and ready; of various pies, of custard, of pastry, and of ice
cream, all of which he ate, and ate--and ate. And lying flat upon his
stomach on a sponge-cake raft he floated in a sea of pineapple sherbet.
He would bite off edges of the raft, then, with his whole face in the
boundless ocean, he would suck up long gulps of this divine material.
And his permanent residence was in a cocoanut palace against a mountain
of vanilla ice cream.
When morning came, and he awoke and sat up in bed, he was himself
again. In the sunshine of his room the bottomless pit had lost its
menace. His spirit, refreshed by slumber and now guided by his nose,
ignored the fires of Purgatory and was hovering over the more friendly
heat of Joanna's kitchen stove.
A few days later, when he was curled up at one end of the sofa with a
book, he asked: "What is the transmigration of souls?"
[Illustration: "A COCOANUT PALACE AGAINST A MOUNTAIN OF VANILLA ICE
CREAM"--_Page 114_]
Dr. Alton explained.
Then Cyrus, after a good look into the face of the dog beside him:
"Whose soul do you suppose is in Zac?"
"That's a hard one, Cyrus. I could only guess at it."
"But it means for dogs, too, doesn't it?"
"It certainly ought. I shouldn't accept it unless it did."
"Then I say that whatever soul came into Zac was the soul of a mighty
good man."
"Yes--no doubt about that."
"Just think! Zac may be George Washington!"
"Well--you can't be too sure. You have all the good people in history
to choose from, you know."
"Yes, of course. I guess, after all, he isn't George Washington. He is
quicker and jumps about more." Then after another look into the dog's
adoring face: "Besides, I don't believe any great man in history would
be so awful fond of me as Zac is."
"Oh, he might be. Washington would have liked you, I think; although he
might not have followed you about so closely."
Other famous men were mentioned: the Emperor Augustus, Magellan,
Shakespeare, Daniel Boone and Fenimore Cooper--also Joan of Arc. But it
was agreed by both father and son that the best known characteristics
of those persons were not sufficiently obvious in Zac to make a clear
case.
[Illustration]