---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----mules you

Scarcly had the vile words left his lips when----


"PENROD!"

It was his mother's voice, calling from the back porch.

Simultaneously, the noon whistles began to blow, far and near; and the
romancer in the sawdust-box, summoned prosaically from steep mountain
passes above the clouds, paused with stubby pencil halfway from lip to
knee. His eyes were shining: there was a rapt sweetness in his gaze. As
he wrote, his burden had grown lighter; thoughts of Mrs. Lora Rewbush
had almost left him; and in particular as he recounted (even by
the chaste dash) the annoyed expressions of Mr. Wilson, the wounded
detective, and the silken moustached mule-driver, he had felt
mysteriously relieved concerning the Child Sir Lancelot. Altogether he
looked a better and a brighter boy.

"Pen-ROD!"

The rapt look faded slowly. He sighed, but moved not.

"Penrod! We're having lunch early just on your account, so you'll have
plenty of time to be dressed for the pageant. Hurry!"

There was silence in Penrod's aerie.

"PEN-rod!"