THOSE CHERUBS.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 227, 25 September 1929, Page 20

THOSE CHERUBS.

(By DOKIS BROWN, Fcnton Street, Stratford, age 15.) Mrs. Smythe-Browne was a lady with Rolls-Royce tastes and a Ford income. I discovered that before I had been a •week as nurse-maid to her two darling sons for a handsome ten shillings peaweek. One day, after administering breakfast to the cherii'biins, I decided to take them to the park, where, I thought, they could do less mischief. Nat so. In the park was a small, winding, oozy pond on which Diddy and Danny were determined to sail their boats. There was no harm in that. Of course not! I had just settled down quietly under the trees when I 'heard a loud wail. Diddy was in the water up to his neck. Valiantly, I rushed in to rescue him, but' found myself held fast in the mud. HoSvever, a young man with nice, grey eyes pulled us' out. Hβ tried hard not to laugh at the eorry spectacle we presented, but he was not a very successful actor. It appeared that the two boys were racin-f their boats, and,so that Danny's elioukln't win, Diddy had waded in and scuttled it. Meanwhile, where was Danny? Not a glimpse of him anywhere. But a loud quacking come from behind a flax-bush round the bend. Resolutely, I made towards it, keeping a firm hold on Diddy. There was Danny holding a live duck (don't ask me how he caught it!) from the wing of which he was trying his hardest to pull a feather. "I want a feather for Indians," he explained. '•Didn't you know it hurt the duck?" I asked, relenting. " 'Course I did/' said the angel. "Say, Diddy, didn't it squawk?" It was not without misgivings that I left Dan by himself while I washed hie brother. They were fully justified. He had found a jar of vaseline that Mary had just been applying to a burn, and had smeared it thickly over every mirror in the house! In this maim tho morning passed pleasantly. Mrs, Smythe-Browne called me in to assist with her toilet, over which ehe took only one and a half hours in the afternoon. "But what about the children? madam ?" I anxiously inquired. "All! they'll be all right. The darlings will be as good as gold," she replied dotingly. Nevertheless, as soon as I could, I rushed away to find them. Everything was quiet—a bad sign. They were not anywhere in the house, for I searched everywhere, even looking in the coal bin. From over the side fence I heard the most blood-curdling yells. Looking hastily in that direction, I saw a inoet unusual sight—so extraordinary, in fact, that I almost fell off the fence. Danny and Diddy were as Nature made them, and, in addition, were painted red from head to foot! One was brandishing a tomahawk and the other an axe. I rushed inside, where I found Mary blackleading the stove. "Mary," I gasped, "for heaven's sake get the bath ready. "What," now?" queried Mary resignedly, putting her hand to her head and leaving a black mark there. "They've painted themselves red;" and I rushed off, leaving 'her gasping faintly, like a fish out of water. We scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed. Mary said she 'remembered seeing in the paper once that caustic soda removed paint, and was for trying it. "It 'ml get the paint off, at any rate," she pointed out. I did not doubt her. Later their clothes were discovered in the pig stye, the door of which they had left open. Exit pig. I had the delightful task of washing their garments. About seven o'clock, when I had got my charges ready for bed, in sailed Mrs. Smythe-Browne. "Hullo, darlings," she greeted the little innocents. "How are mummy's little love-birds ?"