"No. 'Cause I want to fill it again then," said William, firmly.
"Dear, _dear_!" murmured Aunt Jane.
This was Aunt Jane's usual contribution to any conversation.
He looked coldly at the three pairs of horrified aunts' eyes around him, then placidly continued his meal.
Mrs. Brown hastily changed the subject of conversation. The art of combining the duties of mother and hostess is sometimes a difficult one.
Christmas afternoon is a time of rest. The three aunts withdrew from public life. Aunt Lucy found a book of sermons in the library and retired to her bedroom with it.
"It's the next best thing, I think," she said with a sad glance at William.
William was beginning definitely to dislike Aunt Lucy.
"Please'm," said the cook an hour later, "the mincing machine's disappeared."
"Disappeared?" said William's mother, raising her hand to her head.
"Clean gone'm. 'Ow'm I to get the supper'm? You said as 'ow I could get it done this afternoon so as to go to church this evening. I can't do nuffink with the mincing machine gone."
"I'll come and look."
They searched every corner of the kitchen, then William's mother had an idea. William's mother had not been William's mother for eleven years without learning many things. She went wearily up to William's bedroom.
William was sitting on the floor. Open beside him was "Things a Boy Can Do." Around him lay various parts of the mincing machine. His face was set and strained in mental and physical effort. He looked up as she entered.
"It's a funny kind of mincing machine," he said, crushingly. "It's not got enough parts. It's _made_ wrong----"
"Do you know," she said, slowly, "that we've all been looking for that mincin' machine for the last half-hour?"
"No," he said without much interest, "I di'n't. I'd have told you I was mendin' it if you'd told me you was lookin' for it. It's _wrong_,"
he went on aggrievedly. "I can't make anything with it. Look! It says in my book 'How to make a model railway signal with parts of a mincing machine.' Listen! It says, 'Borrow a mincing machine from your mother----"
"Did you borrow it?" said Mrs. Brown.
"Yes. Well, I've got it, haven't I? I went all the way down to the kitchen for it."
"Who lent it to you?"
"No one _lent_ it me. I _borrowed_ it. I thought you'd like to see a model railway signal. I thought you'd be interested. Anyone would think anyone would be interested in seein' a railway signal made out of a mincin' machine."
His tone implied that the dullness of people in general was simply beyond him. "An' you haven't got a right sort of mincin' machine. It's wrong. Its parts are the wrong shape. I've been hammerin' them, tryin'
to make them right, but they're _made_ wrong."
Mrs. Brown was past expostulating. "Take them all down to the kitchen to cook," she said. "She's waiting for them."
On the stairs William met Aunt Lucy carrying her volume of sermons.
"It's not quite the same as the spoken word, William, dear," she said.
"It hasn't the _force_. The written word doesn't reach the _heart_ as the spoken word does, but I don't want you to worry about it."
William walked on as if he had not heard her.
It was Aunt Jane who insisted on the little entertainment after tea.
"I _love_ to hear the dear children recite," she said. "I'm sure they all have some little recitation they can say."
Barbara arose with shy delight to say her piece.
"Lickle bwown seed, lickle bwown bwother, And what, pway, are you goin' to be?
I'll be a poppy as white as my mother, Oh, DO be a poppy like me!
What, you'll be a sunflower? Oh, how I shall miss you When you are golden and high!
But I'll send all the bees up to tiss you.
Lickle bwown bwother, good-bye!"
She sat down blushing, amid rapturous applause.
Next Jimmy was dragged from his corner. He stood up as one prepared for the worst, shut his eyes, and--
"Licklaxokindness lickledeedsolove-- make--thisearfanedenliketheeav'nabovethasalliknow."
he gasped all in one breath, and sat down panting.
This was greeted with slightly milder applause.
"Now, William!"
"I don't know any," he said.
"Oh, you _do_," said his mother. "Say the one you learnt at school last term. Stand up, dear, and speak clearly."
Slowly William rose to his feet.
"_It was the schooner Hesperus that sailed the wintry sea_,"
he began.
Here he stopped, coughed, cleared his throat, and began again.
"_It was the schooner Hesperus that sailed the wintry sea._"
"Oh, get _on_!" muttered his brother, irritably.
[Illustration: "IT WAS THE HESPER SCHOONERUS THAT SAILED THE WINTRY SEA AN' I'M NOT GOIN' ON IF ETHEL'S GOIN' TO KEEP GIGGLIN'."]
"I can't get on if you keep talkin' to me," said William, sternly.
"How can I get on if you keep takin' all the time up _sayin'_ get on?
I can't get on if you're talkin', can I?"