cat, and he
walked along to his house, dragging his cart.

And his shovel rattled in the bottom of it, and his cat ran on before
him.

But he had forgotten his hoe. It was in the pile of sand.

And that's all of this story.

V

THE WATER-MEN STORY

Once upon a time there was a little boy and he was almost five years
old. And there weren't any other children near for him to play with,
so he used to play happily all by himself.

He had his cat and his cart and his shovel and his hoe, and he always
wore his overalls when he was playing. And his name was David.

They were building a house in a field near David's house; and, one
morning, he heard a curious sound, and he wondered what they were
doing, and he asked his mother.

"Mother," he said, "what are they doing? What are they? It sounds as
if they were pickaxing the dirt."

His mother laughed. "Well," she answered, "perhaps they are. I don't
know what they are doing. I think you'll have to go and see."

"Think I'll have to go and see," David repeated; "but I'll have my
breakfast first."

So he had his breakfast first, and he hurried a little because he
wanted to know what the noise was.

And when he was through his breakfast he took off his napkin and
slipped down from his chair and went around to kiss his mother.

His father had gone off to town in the early train.

"Good-bye," said David.

"Good-bye, dear," said his mother. "Be very careful."

He nodded. "Yes, I will." He was going out, but he stopped. "I don't
hear it now, mother. I don't hear the noise. Do you suppose they've
stopped doing it?"

"If you go right along over there, I think you'll find out about it."

So the little boy went out, and he picked up his shovel, but he
couldn't find his hoe.

And he put his shovel into his cart, and took up the handle of the
cart, and his cat came running, and he went toward the new house,
dragging his cart behind him with his shovel rattling in the bottom of
it. His cat ran on ahead.

Long before he got as far as the house, he saw some men's heads bob up
in the middle of the road; heads without any bodies to them.

And he went nearer, and he saw that the men were in a trench that they
had dug in the road, as far as the new house.

Some long iron pipes were in the gutter. The pipes were big enough for
his kitty to crawl through.

He wanted to ask somebody about them, but there was nobody there
except the two men in the trench, so he w