Page:Anderson--Isle of seven moons.djvu/203

Rh bright an' the door it open. Then the key an the hand go away. "The beeg fat man who make money from the little bebees an the painted dolls he sleep on leetle bed inside an snore—oh, like a beeg whale. They step over him soft like this—an' there on the hard floor are the little bebees. The ends of their leetle tails stick out from the blanket.

"They pick them up an' wrap them in the blanket an' run out of the beeg city an' up to the hills.

"Next day the man says to the people: 'Come in an' see wonderrful merrmaids.' The people are very angry to pay their centesimos and not see them. They throw stone an' kill heem. I know it, Señorita, I am there an' I myself throw the stone that hit heem here" (he pointed to his temple) "an' kill heem. "When the sun get up an say 'Bon Dios,' the motherr and fatherr are away up in the hills with their bebees on their backs, an' their backs are not bent any more. Oh, so very straight like the tall mast up there! They hear little voices say: 'Mother let me down on the ground.' But the mother do not, for how can they walk on their tails and they have yet far to go?

"But the bebees wriggle out—like eels and the motherr an' fatherr turn around an', Señorita, those little bebees were walking on legs so straight and white. They reach the leetle hut in the yard an' there are the goats again, which the Holy Virgin give back to them. So they live happy ever"

But the spell was shattered by the sound of seven bells and a raucous voice calling: