Some of the party decided that "one people" was a
good place to stop, and the little boys sent off some fresh
torpedoes in honor of the people. But Mr. Peterkin was not
satisfied. He invited the assembled party to stay until sunset, and
meanwhile he would find a copy, and torpedoes were to be saved
to be fired off at the close of every sentence.
And now the noon bells rang and the noon bells ceased.
Mrs. Peterkin wanted to ask everybody to dinner. She should have
some cold beef. She had let Amanda go, because it was the
Fourth, and everybody ought to be free that one day; so she could
not have much of a dinner. But when she went to cut her beef she
found Solomon had taken it to soak, on account of the saltpetre,
for the fireworks!
Well, they had a pig; so she took a ham, and the boys had bought
tamarinds and buns and a cocoa-nut. So the company stayed on,
and when the Antiques and Horribles passed again they were
treated to pea-nuts and lemonade.
They sung patriotic songs, they told stories, they fired torpedoes,
they frightened the cats with them. It was a warm afternoon; the
red poppies were out wide, and the hot sun poured down on the
alley-ways in the garden. There was a seething sound of a hot day
in the buzzing of insects, in the steaming heat that came up from
the ground. Some neighboring boys were firing a toy cannon.
Every time it went off Mrs. Peterkin started, and looked to see if
one of the little boys was gone.
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