Donkey Boy Read Online Free

say how do you do to him before he departed.”
    “Oh, did you really, now? I suppose you haven’t been telling him what I said to you?”
    “No, dear, of course not. He has to get back to town, for a rehearsal, he says.”
    “A rehearsal?”
    “He is going to be Gonzalo, the Wandering Violinist, dear. He has a very important part at the Tivoli, and has to rehearse.”
    “I should have thought he had done his rehearsal already. How long has he been here?”
    “Only about an hour, Dickie.”
    “Did he come in that extraordinary garb?”
    “No, dear, of course not! He changed in the front room.”
    This information caused Richard’s lips to tighten; but he made no remark. He followed Hetty downstairs.
    “Hullo, Hugh,” he said, with a faint smile. “Hetty says you are just off. Won’t you stay and take pot luck?”
    “No no, old man, thanks all the same, but I never take luncheon,” replied the other. Hugh Turney had changed back into tweed jacket and trousers swiftly; then the Wandering Violinist outfit had been stuffed into a gladstone bag, watched by Phillip, who peered at everything he did, from removing the large ear-rings clipped to his lobes to snapping the lock on the bag and drawing the straps through their brass buckles.
    “Well, old girl, we must meet again when there is more time to have a chat,” said Hugh as he pulled on his dog-skin gloves.
    “I’ll say goodbye, Hugh, and I wish you every success for the new venture.”
    “Thank you, Dick, I shall need it. Now will you give me your opinion—I’ve asked your noble son here, but he is prejudiced—d’you mind telling me which strikes you as the better name—Gonzalo the Wandering Violinist, or, more simply, Normo the Ning-a-ning Man?”
    “Ning-a-ning man, Mummie! Ning-a-ning man come!”
    “Yes, dear, he did come, but hush, Uncle Hugh is speaking.”
    “Well, if you ask my opinion, Hugh, to be perfectly frank, I do not feel myself properly qualified to give an opinion on the matter.”
    Hugh Turney hid his desire to scoff at this typical Dickybird remark. Hetty did her best to help.
    “I like Gonzalo the Wandering Violinist, Hugh. At least I think I do. Though the Ning-a-ning Man is more homely, perhaps. Really, I like both.”
    Very helpful, thought Richard, as he withdrew from the group about the door-mat. He disliked prolonged farewells, especially by or outside an open door. He went into the kitchen, to find the stone jar of carbolic acid, meaning to go over, with a damp rag, every possible place which might have been touched by Hugh Turney.
    At the gate Hetty was saying, “Don’t leave it so long before we meet again, Hugh dear. Come one afternoon early, if you can, and we will have a picnic tea on the Hill, it is lovely up there. You know we are moving to our own house, don’t you? So we shan’t be here much longer.”
    “Yes, Mamma told me. You’ll miss your old Ning-a-ning man, won’t you, Pilly boy?”
    The child stared up at him. “Bile inn, p’e, Uncle Hoo, more bile inn, p’e.”
    “He appreciates the broken-hearted clown, bless him,” said Hugh, caressing the boy’s hair with a hand. “Your boy’s got the artistic temperament, Hetty—poor little devil.”
    “Yes, he loves beautiful things, I am sure. The trouble is, if he sees a thing which Dickie has interested him in, he immediately wants it.”
    “Don’t we all? Well, not necessarily what your respected spouse, the Man in the Moon, is interested in, perhaps—but human nature is entirely based on imitation, Hett.”
    “Still, you won’t be a naughty boy and take Daddy’s butterflies again, will you, Phil?”
    “No, no,” said the child, earnestly. “Pilly naughty boy!”
    “Dickie’s butterflies mean such a lot to him—to Dickie, I mean,” explained Hetty.
    “And to Pilly boy, too, of course, if he sees them through his papa’s eyes first. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery! When’s the other due, Hett?”
    “In June, Hugh. Now,