A look of reverent thankfulness came into his face. "Mother
will be glad I ever met Neil," he thought.
TWO small brown hands were held outstretched in the air. Cautiously
they moved forward, lower and lower. Then they darted and grasped
with speed what seemed to be some sand. Something in the sand
objected, but the boy held on and gathered sand and all into his
tin. He looked with much satisfaction at his presumably indignant
prisoner, a spiny gray "horned toad" that had been peaceably sunning
himself, nearly buried in sand, on the hill.
The owner of the two nimble hands, Arturo, smiled.
"Get four bit, maybe!" he anticipated.
"Get four bit for tia Marta!"
In California "four bits" means a half dollar. Occasionally somebody
on the overland train that stopped at the station in town would be
attracted toward a spiny "horned toad" as a curiosity, and would buy
one. Arturo meant to try to sell this specimen in that way. If he
got the money, he would give it to tia Marta.
Tia Mama was Arturo's aunt. "Tia" means "aunt" in Spanish.
Presumably for the reason that nephews are sometimes troublesome to
their aunts, there is a Spanish proverb that warns a nephew against
making his aunt too frequent visits:
En casa de tia, Mas no cads dia:' ("In the house of thy aunt, But
not every day.") Notwithstanding this adage, however, the boy Arturo
lived with his Aunt Marta.
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