Page:Helen Leah Reed - Napoleons young neighbour.djvu/76

52 oughtn't to have told the Emperor she was afraid of him. At least, I wouldn't have done so had I known how he would act, for he brushed up his hair so it stood out like a savage's, and when he came up to Lucy he gave a queer growl so that she screamed until mamma thought she might have hysterics and hurried her out into the house."

"It was ridiculous for a man to act like a child," responded the sedate Jane, who had not acquired Betsy's admiration for Napoleon.

"It was more ridiculous for her to scream. Napoleon laughed so at her that I had to take her part. 'I thought you a kind of an ogre, too,' I said, 'before I knew you.' 'Perhaps you think I couldn't frighten you now,' he answered, 'but see;' and then he brushed his hair up higher and made faces, and he looked so queer that I could only laugh at him. 'So I can't frighten you!' he said, and then he howled and howled, and at last seemed disappointed that I wasn't alarmed. 'It's a Cossack howl,' he explained, 'and ought to terrify you!' To tell you the truth, it was something terrible, but though I didn't like it I wouldn't flinch. Of course it was all