Page:Poor Cecco - 1925.djvu/192

172 there. And on enquiry, it appeared that no one had seen Ida since the early morning. Without Ida the wedding could not very well proceed, but just as they were all getting quite concerned the Easter Chicken called out:

“Here’s Ida! And, my goodness, look what she’s bringing!”

Ida, with her tender heart, had felt really upset when she saw the Money-Pig in pieces on the floor. All through the day, at intervals, she thought of him, put tidily away in the doll’s trunk. And now, when Tubby was found again and every one so happy it seemed too bad the Money-Pig, unpopular as he was, should be missing all the good times.

So after much hunting about Ida found an old tube of glue in a box on the pantry floor, and very secretly, while the others were busy, she set herself down in a corner of the toy-cupboard beside the doll’s trunk and proceeded to glue him together. It was a hard job; many of the pieces were chipped and wouldn’t fit, one ear was lost entirely, though Ida searched high and low for it; but in the end she got him together somehow, and more or less like his former self, except that the slit in his back would always remain a little crooked, try as she might. Well pleased with her labour, she had to wait till the glue was dry enough for him to be moved, and he could be brought, with the help of the Wooden Engine, as far as the Willow Tree. So there he stood at last, rather patchy in parts, shaky still