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eyed Karen, fat Freddy and busy Pat. "You," said Pat, who was seven.
"No," said five-year-old Freddy. "Will."
"Celine," said Will. "Here."
The girl named Celine took the book from him and began obediently. " 'Coppie thought to herself-'"
"No," said Pat. "Open."
The girl opened the book, embarrassed, glancing at the dying old man. He was smiling at her without
amusement, only love. She began to read:
Coppie thought to herself that the geese might be hungry, for she herself ate Lotsandlots. Mumsie often
said so, though Coppie had never found out what that mysterious food might be. She could not find any,
so took some bread from Brigid Marie Ann-Erica Evangeline, the Cook Whose Name Was So Long
That She Couldn't Remember It All Herself. As she walked along Dusty Path to Coppie Brambles's Very
Own Pond-
Celine hesitated, looking at the old man with sharp worry, for he had moaned faintly, like a flower
moaning. "No, love," he said. "Go on." The swelling
soft bubble before his heart had turned on him, but he knew he still had time. The little girl read:
-As she walked along Dusty Path to Coppie Brambles's Very Own Pond, she thought and thought, and
what she thought finally came right out of her mouth. It was a Real Gay Think, to be Thought While
Charitably Feeding Geese: They don't make noise like little girls and boys, And all day long they're
aswimming. They never fret and sputter 'cause they haven't any butter,
They go where the water's wetly brimming. But say- Anyway- I
Like Geese!
There was more, but the child paused and, after a moment, closed the book. DeBeckett was no longer
listening. He was whispering to himself.
On the wall before Mm was painted a copy of one of the illustrations from the first edition of his book, a
delightful picture of Coppie Brambles herself, feeding the geese, admirably showing her shyness and her
trace of fear, contrasted with the loutish comedy of the geese. The old man's eyes were fixed on the
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picture as he whispered. They guessed he was talking to Coppie, the child of eight dressed hi the
fashions of eighty years ago. They could hardly hear him, but in the silence that fell on the room his
voice grew stronger.
He was saying, without joy but without regret. "No more meadows, no more of the laughter of little
children. But I do love them." He opened his eyes and sat up, waving the nurse away. "No, my dear," he
said cheerfully, "it does not matter if I sit up now, you know. Excuse me for my rudeness. Excuse an old
and
tired man who, for a moment, wished to live on. I have something to say to you all."
The nurse, catching a sign from the doctor, took up another hypodermic and made it ready. "Please, Mr.
DeBeckett," she said. Good humored, he permitted her to spray the surface of his wrist with a fine mist
of droplets that touched the skin and penetrated it. "I suppose that is to give me strength," he said. "Well,
I am grateful for it. I know I must leave you, but there is something I would like to know. I have
wondered . . . For years I have wondered, but I have not been able to understand the answers when I was
told them. I think I have only this one more chance."
He felt stronger from the fluid that now coursed through his veins, and accepted without fear the price he
would have to pay for it. "As you know," he said, "or, I should say, as you children no doubt do not
know, some years ago I endowed a research institution, the Coppie Brambles Foundation. I did it for the
love of you, you and all of you. Last night I was reading the letter I wrote my attorneys-No. Let us see if
you can understand the letter itself; I have it here. Will, can you read?"
Will was nine, freckled darkly on pale skin, red haired and gangling. "Yes, Mr. DeBeckett."
"Even hard words," smiled the dying man.
"Yes, sir."
DeBeckett gestured at the table beside him, and the boy obediently took up a stiff sheet of paper.
"Please," said DeBeckett, and the boy began to read in a highpitched, rapid whine.
" 'Children have been all my life and I have not regretted an instant of the years I devoted to their
happiness. If I can tell them a little of the wonderful world in which we are, if I can open to them the
miracles of life and living, then my joy is unbounded. This-I have tried, rather selfishly, to do. I cannot
say it
was for them! It was for me. For nothing could have given me more pleasure.'"
The boy paused.
DeBeckett said gravely, "I'm afraid this is a Very Big Think, lovelings. Please try to understand. This is
the letter I wrote to my attorneys when I instructed them to set up the Foundation. Go on, Will."
" 'But my way of working has been unscientific, I know. I am told that children are not less than we
adults, but more. I am told that the grown-up maimers and cheats in the world are only children soiled,
that the hagglers of commerce are the infant dreamers whose dreams were denied. I am told that youth is
wilder, freer, better than age, which I believe with all my heart, not needing the stories of twenty-year-
old mathematicians and infant Mozarts to lay a proof.
" 'In the course of my work I have been given great material rewards. I wish that this money be spent for
those I love. I have worked with the heart, but perhaps my money can help someone to work with the
mind, in this great new science of psychology which I do not understand, in all of the other sciences
which I understand even less. I must hire other eyes.
" 'I direct, then, that all of my assets other than my books and my homes be converted into cash, and that
this money be used to further the study of the child, with the aim of releasing him from the corrupt adult
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