“All right,” said Flop Ear.  “I’ll try to get it for you.”

So he went down to the eleven-and-six-cent store to buy a spinning top for his brother.  And he found it, too.  It was a top all painted red and blue and yellow and green, and when you wound it up, and pressed a spring, it spun around and around as fast as anything, making soft and low music like the wind blowing through the trees on a summer night, and sending the mosquitoes all sailing away to the north pole.

“I know Curly Tail will like this,” said Flop Ear.

So the store man wrapped the top up for him in a nice piece of blue paper, tied with a pink string, just the kind they have in the drug store, and Flop started back with the top to amuse his little sick, vaccinated brother.

And when Curly saw that top, all colored red and green, and blue and yellow and skilligminkpurple, as it was, he felt better at once, and, sitting up in bed, he began to spin it on a nice smooth board that his brother brought up from the woodpile for him.

Around and around on the board spun the top, looking like a pinwheel on the night before Fourth of July, and Curly’s sore arm began to feel better all at once.

Then Flop started to run down in the yard to play hop scotch with Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow, the puppy dogs, and Curly said: 

“Some day, Flop, when you’ve been vaccinated, I’ll get you a top to amuse you.”

“Thank you,” spoke Flop most politely, as he slid down the banisters and bumped off on the last step with a bounce.

So Curly played with his spinning top, and his brother was down in the yard, having fun, when, all at once in at the window where Curly was in bed, jumped a great big snail.  Now a snail is an animal that has horns, and he lives in a shell that grows on his back, and he goes very slowly.  But sometimes, when he has eaten red pepper for his lunch, he can go as fast as anything.  And this was what had happened to this snail.  He had eaten red pepper, and he fairly jumped in at the window where Curly was lying in bed.

“Bur-r-r-r!” warbled the snail, “Here I am,” and he made a grab for the little piggie boy, for he was a very large snail indeed, as big as a dog house.

“Look out for my vaccination!” cried Curly.  “Don’t hit my arm, please.”

“Oh, what do I care for vaccinations!” cried the snail.  “If you don’t give it to me at once, so I can throw it away, I’ll stick you with my horns,” and he wiggled them at Curly just as a mooley cow would have done.

“Give you my vaccination!” cried Curly.  “Why, how can I, when it’s fast on my leg?”

“No matter!” snapped and snipped the snail.  “Give it to me at once,” and he reached over, and he was just going to squeeze Curly Tail’s vaccination, and maybe hurt him like anything for all I know, when, all of a sudden, the little piggie boy thought of his spinning top.

It was all wound up, ready to spin, so Curly just pushed the spring, and whizzicum-whazzicum, around and around went the top, on the board in bed, right in front of the snail.  And when the queer creature, with his home on his back, saw it he cried out: