第38章

After a few minutes I tried again."Please tell me what your name is.""Bruno," the little fellow answered, very readily."Why didn't oo say 'please' before?""That's something like what we used to be taught in the nursery,"I thought to myself, looking back through the long years (about a hundred of them, since you ask the question), to the time when I was a little child.And here an idea came into my head, and I asked him "Aren't you one of the Fairies that teach children to be good?""Well, we have to do that sometimes," said Bruno, "and a dreadful bother it is." As he said this, he savagely tore a heartsease in two, and trampled on the pieces.

"What are you doing there, Bruno?" I said.

"Spoiling Sylvie's garden," was all the answer Bruno would give at first.But, as he went on tearing up the flowers, he muttered to himself "The nasty cross thing wouldn't let me go and play this morning,--said I must finish my lessons first--lessons, indeed!

I'll vex her finely, though!"

"Oh, Bruno, you shouldn't do that!" I cried.

"Don't you know that's revenge? And revenge is a wicked, cruel, dangerous thing!""River-edge?" said Bruno."What a funny word! I suppose oo call it cruel and dangerous 'cause, if oo wented too far and tumbleded in, oo'd get drownded.""No, not river-edge," I explained: "revenge" (saying the word very slowly).But I couldn't help thinking that Bruno's explanation did very well for either word.

"Oh!" said Bruno, opening his eyes very wide, but without trying to repeat the word.

"Come! Try and pronounce it, Bruno!" I said, cheerfully."Re-venge, re-venge."But Bruno only tossed his little head, and said he couldn't; that his mouth wasn't the right shape for words of that kind.And the more Ilaughed, the more sulky the little fellow got about it.

"Well, never mind, my little man!" I said.

"Shall I help you with that job?"

"Yes, please," Bruno said, quite pacified.

"Only I wiss I could think of somefin to vex her more than this.

Oo don't know how hard it is to make her angry!""Now listen to me, Bruno, and I'll teach you quite a splendid kind of revenge!""Somefin that'll vex her finely?" he asked with gleaming eyes.

"Something that will vex her finely.First, we'll get up all the weeds in her garden.See, there are a good many at this end quite hiding the flowers.""But that won't vex her!" said Bruno.

"After that," I said, without noticing the remark, "we'll water this highest bed--up here.You see it's getting quite dry and dusty."Bruno looked at me inquisitively, but he said nothing this time.

"Then after that," I went on, "the walks want sweeping a bit; and Ithink you might cut down that tall nettle--it's so close to the garden that it's quite in the way--""What is oo talking about?" Bruno impatiently interrupted me.

"All that won't vex her a bit!"

"Won't it?" I said, innocently."Then, after that, suppose we put in some of these coloured pebbles--just to mark the divisions between the different kinds of flowers, you know.That'll have a very pretty effect."Bruno turned round and had another good stare at me.At last there came an odd little twinkle into his eyes, and he said, with quite a new meaning in his voice, "That'll do nicely.Let's put 'em in rows--all the red together, and all the blue together.""That'll do capitally," I said; "and then--what kind of flowers does Sylvie like best?"Bruno had to put his thumb in his mouth and consider a little before he could answer."Violets," he said, at last.