Читать книгу The Story My Doggie Told to Me онлайн

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Then there are balls. Some balls are nice to play with and chew on. They are made of rubber. William had one and he used to throw it, and Freya and I, and sometimes Mother and Father, too, would scamper after it and see who could get it and bring it back to him. If Freya got it I always took it away from her, because I am bigger and stronger than she is. Besides, she’s only a girl dog! Once Freya found the ball in the harness room, where it had dropped off a shelf, and so she took it out under a tree and chewed on it until there was a hole in it. Then she wanted to see what was in the hole and so she tore the ball all to pieces. There wasn’t a thing in it. She ate some of the pieces and that afternoon the Doctor came and stayed quite a long time and Freya was very sick. William got another ball, but Freya would never go near it.

At the side of the house toward the orchard there was a lawn where the Family played a game they called croquet. They had mallets and a lot of different coloured wooden balls and they made the balls roll by hitting them with the mallets. Once Freya and I were there and we chased the balls. The Master laughed at us and said we mustn’t do it. But he didn’t really care, and the Baby, who was there with Nurse, clapped her hands and thought it was fine fun. So did we. We would run at the balls and bark at them and try to pick them up in our mouths. But we couldn’t because they were too big. The Master and Mistress laughed and laughed at us. Then I saw a ball rolling along very fast and I made believe it was a rat and ran for it as hard as I could go. But when I tried to bite it it wouldn’t stop but kept right on rolling. And so I rolled too. I rolled several times and when I found my feet I hurried off with a terrible pain in my head. Rubber balls and wooden balls are very different, like flies and bees.