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Show DADDY 5 H EVENING 2 FAIRY TALE llt MsrErahemBunnEr i WADING THE SEA Harry was talking to tile great constellation con-stellation Orion up in the sky. "I!o you know Homer?" Orion asked suddenly. "He was an Earth person." "I've heard of him, but he lived long before my day." "All right Just so long as you know the gentleman I mean. Homer, as you know, was no small object id the story-telling world. "Even a constellation admires brightness bright-ness in others. Homer said Homer said Homer said" "What did he say?" Harry asked. "I want to lead up to this by degrees de-grees it is so nice. I don't want the ending to come too soon. Homer said I was the tallest and most beautiful man anywhere and he said I could wade the sea. Isn't that grand, simply sim-ply grand?" "Is that the end of the story?" "What more do you want? Me said I could wade the sea. Isn't that something some-thing to say?" Orion seemed a little sad as he continued con-tinued talking. "There are some who are never satisfied. sat-isfied. They always want something more, and I don't like going on with the story beyond that point." "Then there is more? Not but what I think that's a fine story," Harry added ad-ded hastily. "I'm sure I never knew anyone who had such a story told about him, or such a thing said of him." "Yes,' there is more to my life's story than that. It was said that I boasted that I could vanquish any creature on earth and at that the scorpion came up and bit my foot." "That wasn't so nice," Harry admitted. ad-mitted. "I should say not. He was a poisonous poi-sonous serpent and it was almost the end of poor Orion. I felt so sorry for myself then, so very, very' sorry. But Diana oh, Diana was lovely put me up in the heavens in my lovely star family, and she put me opposite that agl teg "Ho Said That I Could Wade." wretched serpent so he could never bite me again. So I'm safe, safe In the sky." "That's a nice ending, too," said Harry, "and I like the bit of excitement excite-ment that comes before it." "So that is the way you want your stories to be? There are other stories about me, too, but I'll tell you of my family. Betelgeuse is a reddish star in my right shoulder not exactly a member of the family but so close to us that we feel toward him as you would toward one of your family. "I don't believe any of your Earth creatures boast of having a star in their shoulder." "You have us there. Orion." Orion smiled a broad, magnificent smile. "Iligel Is the bluish white star in-my in-my loft foot." "That's pretty fine, too," Harry said admiringly, "to have a star in your left foot." "fllad you appreciate it yes, not merely my right foot, but my left foot." "We have some fine left-handed pitchers on .some of our ball teams," Harry told Orion, "but none of our families have stars In the left feet." Orion stretched himself out so that he looked taller and more magnificent than ever. "In less than half an hour after you see Betelgeuse, ltigel comes twinkling along. I'iel is one of thee creatures always asking for another fifteen minutes min-utes or so before getting up, but then Kigel goes to bed a couple of hours earlier. He says he needs more rest in order to be bright. But the real reason is that he Is further south and has less distance to travel between rising and setting. "Then I have other fine stars In my family. There's Bellatrix In my left shoulder. Of course, three darling members of my family have grouped themselves around me so ns to give me a star belt, which is so kind of them." "I never knew anyone with a star belt before." "It Is pretty nice," Orion said, as modestly as possible. "There is the great dark bay in my star estate, too they call it the Park Horse Nebula, for the dnrk clouds look something like a horse's head and m:.ne, and there is a cloud field nearby." |