The Little Sugar House and other stories [antikvár]

The Bear and the Duck ONCE upon a time there were two toys, a bear and a duck. They Hved on the top shelf in the toy-shop, and they had been there for a whole year. Fancy that! A whole year! They were very unhappy about it. It was dreadful not to be sold. They got dustier and dustier, and at last they almost gave up hope of ever having a little boy or girl to own them. You see, by some mistake, the duck had a bear's growl and the bear had a duck's quack. It was most upsetting. Whenever the bear was squeezed in his middle, he said "Quack!" very loudly indeed— and whenever the duck was squeezed she said "Grrr-rrrrrr!" The shop-keeper had tried to sell them, but she couldn't, and that was why she had put them away on the top shelf. One day a little girl came into the shop with her mother. She was seven years old that day, and she had come to spend the money that her granny had given her for her birthday.