The old voice, though it rose in pitch with each rise in rank, was not strong enough to overbear the titter, and the doll-maker paused in startled doubt to look at his own creation.
"I can see naught amiss," he muttered to himself; "it is as I used to make them, for sure." His anxious critical eye lingered almost wistfully over the bald head, the pincushion body, the sausage limbs of his creature, yet found no flaw in it; since fingers and toes were a mere detail, and as for hair, a tuft of wool would settle that point. What more could folk want, sensible folk, who knew that a doll must be always a doll--nothing more, nothing less?
Suddenly a thought came to make him put doubt to the test, and he turned to the nearest of the solemn-faced, wide-eyed semicircle of babies.
"Thou canst dandle it whilst I thread the needle, Gungi," he said pompously, "but have a care not to injure the child, and let not the others touch it."
The solemnity left one chubby brown face, and one pair of chubby brown hands closed in glad possession round the despised rag doll. Old Premoo heaved a sigh of relief.
"Said I not so, brothers and sisters?" he cried exultingly. "My hand has not lost its art with the years. A doll is a doll ever to a child, as a child is a child ever to the man and the woman. As for glass eyes, they are illusion--they perish!"
"Nevertheless, thou wilt put clothes to it, for sure, brother," remonstrated the fat butler, who had joined the group, "ere giving it to the Presences. 'Tis like a skinned fowl now, and bare decent."
Premoo shook his head mournfully. "Lo! _khângee_, my rags, as thou seest, scarce run to a big enough body and legs! And the _Huzoor's_ tailor would give no scraps to Premoo the garden coolie; though in the old days, when the little masters lay in these arms, and there was favour to be carried by the dressing of dolls, such as he were ready to make them, male and female, kings and queens, fairies and heroes, _mem-sahibs_ and _Lât-sahibs_ after their kind. But it matters not in the end, _khânjee_, it matters not! The doll is a doll ever to a child, as a child is a child ever to the man and the woman, though they know not whether it will wear a crown or a shroud."