"Well, first there is the direct way," returned the Imp. "You say just as plainly as can be, "Daddy, I want the key to your cigar box." He will reply, "No, you are too young to smoke," and that will make your mamma laugh, which will be a good thing in case your papa is feeling a little cross when you ask him. There is nothing that puts a man in a good humor so quickly as laughing at his jokes. That"s way number one," continued the Imp. "You wait five minutes before you try the second way, which is, briefly, to climb upon your father"s knee and say, "There are two ends to your watch chain, aren"t there, papa?" He"ll say, "Yes; everything has two ends except circles, which haven"t any;" then you laugh, because he may think that"s funny, and then you say, "You have a watch at one end, haven"t you?" His answer will be, "Yes; it has been there fifteen years, and although it has been going all that time it hasn"t gone yet." You must roar with laughter at that, and then ask him what he has at the other end, and he"ll say, "The key to my cigar box,"
to which you must immediately reply, "Give it to me, won"t you?" And so you go on, leading up to that key in everything you do or say for the whole day, if it takes that long to ask for it thirteen times. If he doesn"t give it to you then, you might as well give up, for you"ll never get it. It always worked when I was little, but it may have been because I put the thirteenth question in rhyme every time. If I wanted a cream cake, I"d ask for it and ask for it, and if at the twelfth time of asking I hadn"t got it, I"d put it to the person I was asking finally this way--
"I used to think that you could do Most everything; but now I see You can"t, for it appears that you Can"t give a creamy cake to me."
"But I can"t write poetry," said Jimmieboy.
"Oh, yes you can!" laughed the Imp. "Anybody can. I"ve written lots of it. I wrote a poem to my papa once which pleased him very much, though he said he was sorry I had discovered what he called his secret."
"Have you got it with you?" asked Jimmieboy, very much interested in what the Imp was saying, because he had often thought, as he reflected about the world, that of all the men in it his papa seemed to him to be the very finest, and it was his great wish to grow up to be as like him as possible; and surely if any little boy could, as the Imp had said, write some kind of poetry, he might, after all, follow in the footsteps of his father, whose every production, Jimmieboy"s mamma said, was just as nice as it could be.
"Yes, I have it here, where I keep everything, in my head. Just glue your ear as tightly as you can to the "phone and I"ll recite it for you.
This is it:
"I"ve watched you, papa, many a day, And think I know you pretty well; You"ve been my chum--at work, at play-- You"ve taught me how to romp and spell.
"You"ve taught me how to sing sweet songs; You"ve taught me how to listen, too; You"ve taught me rights; you"ve shown me wrongs; You"ve made me love the good and true.
"Sometimes you"ve punished me, and I Sometimes have wept most grievously That yours should be the hand whereby The things I wished were kept from me.
"Sometimes I"ve thought that you were stern; Sometimes I could not understand Why you should make my poor heart burn By scoldings and by reprimand.
"Yet as it all comes back, I see My sorrows, though indeed most sore In those dear days they seemed to me, Grieved you at heart by far the more.
"The frowns that wrinkled up your brow, That grieved your little son erstwhile, As I reflect upon them now, Were always softened by a smile
"That shone, dear father, in your eyes; A smile that was but ill concealed, By which the love that in you lies For me, your boy, was e"er revealed."
Here the Imp stopped.
"Go on," said Jimmieboy, softly.
"There isn"t any more," replied the Imp. "When I got that far I couldn"t write any more, because I kind of got running over. I didn"t seem to fit myself exactly. Myself was too big for myself, and so I had to stop and sort of settle down again."
"Your papa must have been very much pleased," suggested Jimmieboy.
"Yes, he was," said the Imp; "although I noticed a big tear in his eye when I read it to him; but he gave me a great big hug for the poem, and I was glad I"d written it. But you must run along and get that key, for my time is very short, and if we are to see Magnetville and all the wire country we must be off."
"Perhaps if the rhyme always brings about the answer you want, it would be better for me to ask the question that way first, and not bother him with the other twelve ways," suggested Jimmieboy.
"That"s very thoughtful of you," said the Imp. "I think very likely it would be better to do it that way. Just you tiptoe softly up to him and say,
"If you loved me as I love you, And I were you and you were me, What you asked me I"d surely do, And let you have that silver key."
"I think that"s just the way," said Jimmieboy, repeating the verse over and over again so as not to forget it. "I"ll go to him at once."
And he did go. He tiptoed into the library, at one end of which his papa was sitting writing; he kissed him on his cheek, and whispered the verse softly in his ear.
"Why, certainly," said his papa, when he had finished. "Here it is,"
taking the key from the end of his chain. "Don"t lose it, Jimmieboy."
[Ill.u.s.tration: BEFORE HIM STOOD THE IMP.]
"No, I"ll not lose it. I"ve got too much use for it to lose it," replied Jimmieboy, gleefully, and then, sliding down from his papa"s lap, he ran headlong into the back hall to where the telephone stood, inserted the key in the key-hole of the little door over the receiver and turned it.
The door flew open, and before him stood the Imp.
II
_IN THE IMP"S ROOM_
"Dear me!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Jimmieboy, as his eye first rested upon the Imp.
"That"s you, eh?"
"I believe so," replied the Imp, standing on his left leg, and twirling around and around until Jimmieboy got dizzy looking at him. "I was me when I got up this morning, and I haven"t heard of any change since. Do I look like what I told you I looked like?"
"Not exactly," said Jimmieboy. "You said you had lilac-colored hair, and it"s more like a green than a lilac."
"You are just like everybody else naming your colors. People are very queer about things of that sort, I think. For instance," said the Imp, to ill.u.s.trate his point, "you go walking in the garden with one of your friends, and you come to a rose-bush, and your friend says, "Isn"t that a pretty rose-bush?" "Yes," say you; "very." Then he says, "And what a lovely lilac-bush that is over there." "Extremely lovely," say you.
"Let"s sit down under this raspberry-bush," says he. Well, now you think lilac is a delicate lavender, rose a pink, and raspberry a red--eh?"
"Yes," said Jimmieboy. "That"s the way they are."
"Well, maybe so; but that lilac-bush and rose-bush and raspberry-bush are all the same color, and that color is green, just like my hair; you must have thought I looked like a rainbow or a paint shop when I told you about myself?"
"No," said Jimmieboy. "I didn"t think that, exactly. I thought, perhaps, you were like the pictures in my _Mother Goose_ book. They have lots of colors to "em, and they are not bad looking, either."
"Well, if they are not bad looking," said the Imp, with a pleased smile, "they must be very much like me. But don"t you want to come in?"
"I"m not small enough," said Jimmieboy; "but I"ll eat that apple you spoke about, and maybe it"ll make me shrink, though I don"t see how it can."
"Easy enough. Haven"t you seen a boy doubled up after eating an apple?
Of course you have; perhaps you were the boy. At any rate there is no reason why, if an apple can work that way, it can"t work the other. It"s a poor rule that won"t work both ways, and an apple is pretty good, as a rule, and so you have it proved without trying that what I say is true.
Here"s the apple; eat it as quickly as you can and give me the core."
Jimmieboy took the dainty piece of fruit in his hand and ate it with much relish, for it was a very sweet apple, and he was fond of that sort of thing. Unfortunately, he liked it so well that he forgot to give the core to the Imp, and, when in a moment he felt himself shrinking up, and the Imp asked for the core, he was forced blushingly to confess that he had been very piggish about it, and had swallowed the whole thing.
"I"ve half a mind not to let you in at all!" cried the Imp, stamping his foot angrily upon the floor, so angrily that the bells rang out softly as if in remonstrance. "In fact, I don"t see how I can let you in, because you have disobeyed me about that core."
"I"m surprised at you," returned Jimmieboy, slightly injured in feeling by the Imp"s behavior. "I wouldn"t make such a fuss about an old apple-core. If you feel as badly about it as all that, I"ll run down into the kitchen and get you a whole apple--one as big as you are."
"That isn"t the point at all," said the Imp. "I didn"t want the core for myself at all. I wanted it for you."
"Well, I"ve got it," said Jimmieboy, who had now shrunk until he was no taller than the Imp himself, not more than two inches high.
"Of course you have, and if you will notice it is making you grow right back again to the size you were before. That"s where the trouble comes in with those trick apples. The outside makes you shrink, and the core makes you grow. When I said I wanted the core I meant that I wanted it to keep until we had had our trip together, so that when we got back you could eat it, and return to your papa and mamma just as you were in the beginning. Just run to the parlor mirror now and watch yourself."