hispered something to him. He shook his mustache at
us.

"Get out of here, you Young Scamps!" he cried. "Get out of here, I say!
_Get out!_"

No one had ever shaken his mustache at us before. We sat down on the
step to think about it.

The Gentleman ran off to call the Hotel Proprietor.

The Lady looked a little sorry. She came running back. She stooped down.
She took the book from Carol. And the pencil from me. She laughed a
little.

"You funny--funny children," she said. "What is it you want to know?
The Most Beautiful Smell in the whole wide world,--is that it?--The Most
Beautiful Smell in the whole wide world?" She looked back over her
shoulder. She wrote very fast. Her cheeks looked pink. She banged the
book together just the first second she had finished. She pulled my ear.
"I'm--I'm sorry," she said.

"Oh, that's all right," I assured her. "We'll be round and write the
rest of the book some other day!"

The Man with the Cross Mustache kept right on hunting all around.

When the Hotel Proprietor came running and saw who we were he gave us
two oranges instead, and a left-over roll of wall-paper with parrots on
it, and all the old calendars that were in his desk.

We had to race home across the railroad trestle to get there in time. It
wasn't till we reached the Blacksmith Shop that we had a chance to stop
and see what the Lady had written in our book. There was a Smoke Tree
just outside the Blacksmith Shop. It was all in smoke. We sat down under
it and opened our book.

This is what the Lady had written in our book.

The most beautiful smell in the world is the smell of an old
tattered baseball glove--that's been lying in the damp
grass--by the side of a brook--in June Time.

I looked at Carol. Carol looked at me. We felt surprised. It wasn't
exactly what you would have expected. Carol rolled over on his stomach.
He clapped his heels in the air. He pounded his fists in the grass.

We forgot all about going home. We went into the Blacksmith's Shop
instead. It was a very earthy place. But nothing grew there. Not grass.
Not flowers. Not even vines. Just Junk!

The Blacksmith's name was Jason. He looked something like a Stove that
could be doubled up in its stomach and carried round to all four corners
of a horse for the horse to put his foot on. He was making shoes for a
very stout black horse. The horse's name was Ezra. There were a great
many sparks around! And iron noises! And flame