A MONKEY INTERLUDE.
"Well, here's something new, and no mistake," cried Billy.
"Good, it will help pass our morning," declared Noddy, who was beginning
to find time hang heavily on his hands now that he had nobody to play
pranks on, like those he used to torment poor Pompey with.
An Italian was coming up the road toward the hotel. Strapped across his
shoulders was a small hand-organ. He led a trained bear, and two monkeys
squatted on the big creature's back. He came to a halt near the grinning
boys.
"Hurray! This is going to be as good as a circus!" declared Noddy.
"Start up your performance, professor."
"They're off!" cried Billy.
Summer residents of the hotel, anxious for any diversion out of the
ordinary, came flocking to the scene as the strains of the barrel organ
reached their ears, and the bear, in a clumsy fashion, began to dance to
the music of the ear-piercing instrument.
"Where are you going, Noddy?" asked Jack, as the red-headed lad tried to
get quietly out of the crowd.
"I just saw a chance for a little fun," rejoined Noddy innocently.
"Well, be careful," warned Jack. "This is no place for such jokes as you
used to play on Pompey."
"Oh, nothing like that," Noddy assured him as he hurried off.
"Just the same I'm afraid of Noddy when he starts getting humorous,"
thought Jack.
He would have been still more afraid if he could have seen Noddy make
his way to the hotel kitchen and bribe a kitchen maid to get him three
large sugar cakes. Then he made his way to the dining-room, and boring
tiny holes in the buns filled each of them with red pepper from the
casters.
"Now for some fun," he chuckled.
"I just know that boy is up to some mischief by the look on his face,"
remarked an old lady as he hurried by.
Quite a big crowd was round the Italian when Noddy got back. Almost as
soon as he arrived the man began passing the hat, and taking advantage
of this, Noddy proffered his buns to the animals. They accepted them
greedily.
"Peep! Peep!" chattered the monkeys.
"You mean 'pep,' 'pep'," chuckled Noddy to himself.
Both bear and monkeys tore into their buns as if they were half starved.
In their hunger they got a few mouthfuls down without appearing to
notice that anything was wrong. Then suddenly one of the monkeys hurled
his bun at the bear and the other leaped on the big hairy creature's
head. Apparently they thought the innocent bear had something to do with
the trick that had been played on them.
"Da monk! da monk!" howled the Italian, "da monk go a da craz'."
"He says they are mad," exclaimed an old gentleman, and hurried away.
Just as he did so, the bear discovered something was wrong. He set up a
roar of rage and broke loose from his keeper. The monkeys leaped away
from the angry beast and sought refuge. One jumped on the head of an
elderly damsel who was very much excited. The other made a dive for a
fashionably dressed youth who was none other than Donald Judson.
"Help!" screamed the old maid. "Help! Will no one help me?"
"I will, madam," volunteered an old gentleman, coming forward. He seized
the monkey and tugged at its hind legs, but it only clung the tighter to
the elderly damsel's hair.
Suddenly there came a piercing scream.
"Gracious, her hair's come off!" cried a woman.
"She's been scalped, poor creature!" declared another.
"Oh, you wretch, how dare you!" shrieked the monkey's victim, rushing at
the gallant old gentleman. She raised her parasol and brought it down on
his head with a resounding crack. In the meantime the Italian was
howling to "Garibaldi," as he called the monkey, to come to him.
But this the monkey had no intention of doing. Clutching the old maid's
wig in its hands, it leaped away in bounds and joined its brother on the
person of Donald Judson.
"Ouch, take them off. They'll bite me!" Donald was yelling.
The monkeys tore off his straw hat with its fancy ribbon and tore it to
bits and flung them in the faces of the crowd. Then, suddenly, they both
darted swiftly off and climbed a tree, where they sat chattering.
It was at that moment that the confused throng recollected the bear,
which had not remained in the vicinity but had gone charging off across
the lawn looking for water to drown the burning sensation within him.
Now, however, an angry roar reminded them of him. The beast was coming
back across the lawn, roaring and showing his teeth.
"Look out for the bear!"
"Get a gun, quick."
"Oh, he'll hug me," this last from the old maid, were some of the cries
which the crowd sent up.
"He's mad, shoot him!" cried somebody. The Italian set up a howl of
protest.
"No, no, no shoota heem. Mika da gooda da bear. No shoota heem."
"If you don't want him shot, catch him and get out of here. You'll have
my hotel turned into a sanitarium for nervous wrecks the first thing you
know," cried the proprietor of the place.
"Somebody playa da treeck," protested the Italian. "Mika da nica da
bear, da gooda da bear."
"I guess he's like an Indian, only good when he's dead," said the hotel
man. "I'm off to get my gun."
Noddy watched the results of his joke with mixed feelings. He had not
meant it to go as far as this. He looked about him apprehensively, but
everybody was too frightened to notice him.
Suddenly the bear headed straight for Noddy. Perhaps his red head was a
shining mark or perhaps the creature recollected the prank-playing youth
as the one who had given him the peppered bun. At any rate he charged
straight after the lad, who fled for his life.
"Help!" he called as he ran. "Help, help!"
"Noddy's getting a dose of his own medicine," cried Jack to Billy.
"But we don't want to let the bear get him," protested Billy.
"Of course not, but he'll beat the bear into the hotel, see if he
doesn't."
The hotel front door was evidently Noddy's objective point. It appeared
he would reach it first, but suddenly he tripped on a croquet hoop and
went sprawling. He was up in a minute, but the bear had gained on him.
As he rushed up the steps it was only a few inches behind him.
Noddy gave a wild yell and took the steps in three jumps. The next
second he was at the door and swinging it shut with all his might. But
just then an astonishing thing happened.
Just as Noddy swung the door shut the bear made a leap. The result
surprised Noddy as much as Bruin.
The edge of the door caught the big creature's neck and held him as fast
as if he had been caught in a dead-fall. He was gripped as in a vise
between the door and the frame. But poor Noddy was in the position of
the man who caught the wild cat.
He didn't know how to let go!