FullReads

At the summit of the little hill, under some trees, he paused, and waved the kidnaper knife in circles. “Ears to sharpen!” he shrilled again. “Eyes to sharpen! Edges taken off of tongues!”

She smiled up at him engagingly, noting how his gray hair hung over the back of his collar. She felt no fear of him whatever. “I think you’re nice, Mr. Man-Who-Makes-Faces,” she announced presently. “I’m so glad I can look straight at you. I didn’t know you, ’cause your voice is different, and ’cause I’d never seen you before ‘cept when I was looking down at you.”

He had been ignoring her. But now, “Wasn’t my fault that we didn’t meet face to face,” he retorted. Though his voice was still cross, his round, bright eyes were almost kind. “If you’ll remember I often came under your window.”

“And I threw you money,” she answered, nodding brightly. “I wanted to come down and talk to you, oh, lots of times, only—”

At that, he relented altogether. And, reaching out, shook hands cordially. “Wouldn’t you like,” said he, “to have a look at my establishment?” He jerked a thumb over a shoulder. “Here’s where I make faces.”

In the City she had seen many wonderful shops, catching glimpses of some from the little window of her car, visiting others with Miss Royle or Jane. Among the former were those fascinating ones, usually low of ceiling and dark with coal-dust, where grimy men in leather aprons tried shoes on horses; and those horrifying places past which she always drove with closed eyes—places where, scraped white and head downward, hung little pigs, pitiful husks of what they once had been, flanked on either hand by long-necked turkeys with poor glazed eyes; and once she had seen a wonderful shop in which men were sawing out flat pieces of stone, and writing words on them with chisels.

But this shop of the Man-Who-Makes-Faces was the most interesting of all.

It occupied a square of hard-packed ground—a square as broad as the nursery. And curiously enough, like the nursery, it had, marking it off all the way around its outer edge, a border of flowers!

It was shaded by one huge tree.

“Lime-tree,” explained the little old gentleman. “And the lights—”

“Don’t tell me!” she cried. “I know! They’re lime lights.”

These made the shop exceedingly bright. Full in their glare, neatly disposed, were two short-legged tables, a squat stool, and a high, broad bill-board.

The Man-Who-Makes-Faces seated himself on the stool at one of the tables and began working industriously.

But Gwendolyn could only stand and stare about her, so amazed that she was dumb. For in front of the little old gentleman, and spread handily, were ears and eyes, noses and mouths, cheeks and chins and foreheads. And upon the bill-board, pendant, were toupees and side-burns and mustaches, puffs, transformations and goatees—and one coronet braid (a red one) glossy and thick and handsome!

The bill-board also held an assortment of tongues—long and scarlet. These, a score in all, were ranged in a shining row. And underneath them was a sign which bore this announcement:

Gwendolyn clapped her hands. “Oo! how nice!” she exclaimed, finding her voice again.

“Quite so,” said the little old gentleman, shoving away a tray of chins and cheeks and reaching for a forehead. “Welcome, convenient, and satisfactory.”

She saw her opportunity. “Please,” she began, “I’d like to buy six.” She counted on her fingers. “I’ll have a French tongue, a German tongue, a Greek tongue, a Latin tongue, and—later, though, if you don’t happen to have ’em on hand—a Spanish and an Italian.” Then she heaved a sigh of relief. “I’m glad I saw these,” she added. “They’ll save me a lot of work. And they’ve helped me about a def’nition. I looked for ‘lashing’ in my big dictionary. And it said ‘to whip.’ But I couldn’t see how anybody could whip anybody else with a tongue. Now, though—”

The Man-Who-Makes-Faces nodded. “Just wait till you see the King’s English,” he bragged.

“The King’s English? Will I see him?”

“Likely to,” he answered, selecting an eye. He had all his eyes about him in a circle, each looking as natural as life. There were blue eyes and brown eyes, hazel eyes and—

“Ah!” she exclaimed suddenly. “I remember! It was you who gave the Policeman a black eye!”