Title: Aunt Madge's Story
Author: May, Sophie, 1833-1906
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Aunt Madge's Story" ***


[Transcriber's notes: Punctuation and inconsistencies in language and
dialect found in the original book have been retained.
Sophie May is a pseudonym of Rebecca Sophia Clarke.
Smilie/Smiley spelled two ways: used Smiley.]


[Illustration: Frontispiece.]



    _LITTLE PRUDY'S FLYAWAY SERIES._



    AUNT MADGE'S STORY.

    BY

    SOPHIE MAY,

    AUTHOR OF "LITTLE PRUDY STORIES," "DOTTY DIMPLE STORIES," ETC.


    _ILLUSTRATED._


    BOSTON:
    LEE AND SHEPARD, PUBLISHERS.


    NEW YORK:
    LEE, SHEPARD AND DILLINGHAM.
    1874.


    Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871,
    BY LEE AND SHEPARD,
    In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.


    Electrotyped at the Boston Stereotype Foundry,
    No. 19 Spring Lane.



    _LITTLE PRUDY'S FLYAWAY SERIES._

    TO BE COMPLETED IN SIX VOLS.


    1. LITTLE FOLKS ASTRAY.

    2. PRUDY KEEPING HOUSE.

    3. AUNT MADGE'S STORY.

    (Others in preparation.)



CONTENTS.

    CHAPTER

     I. TOTTY-WAX.                   9

     II. THE LADY CHILD.            20

     III. THE BLUE PARASOL.         38

     IV. LIZE JANE.                 55

     V. THE PARTY.                  69

     VI. THE PATCHWORK SCHOOL.      87

     VII. THE LITTLE LIE-GIRL.     108

     VIII. THE TANSY CHEESE.       122

     IX. "WAXERATION."             140

     X. "THE CHILD'S ALIVE."       159

     XI. THE FIRST CAR RIDE.       174

     XII. BETTER THAN KITTENS.     188

     XIII. GOOD BY.                199



AUNT MADGE'S STORY.



CHAPTER I.

TOTTY-WAX.


Here you sit, Horace, Prudy, Dotty, and Flyaway, all waiting for a
story. How shall I begin? I cannot remember the events of my life in
right order, so I shall have to tell them as they come into my mind.
Let us see. To go back to the long, long summer, when I was a child:

There once lived and moved a little try-patience, called Margaret
Parlin; no more nor less a personage than myself, your affectionate
auntie, and very humble servant. I was as restless a baby as ever sat
on a papa's knee and was trotted to "Boston." When I cried, my womanly
sister 'Ria, seven years old, thought I was very silly; and my brother
Ned, aged four, said, "Div her a pill; _I_ would!"

He thought pills would cure naughtiness. If so, I ought to have
swallowed some. Pity they didn't "div" me a whole box full before I
began to creep; for I crept straight into mischief. Aunt Persis, a
very proper woman, with glittering black eyes, was more shocked by me
than words can tell. She said your grandma "spoiled me by baby-talk;
it was very wrong to let little ones hear baby-talk. If she had had
the care of me she would have taught me grammar from the cradle." No
doubt of it; but unfortunately I had to grow up with my own father and
mother, and ever so many other folks, who were not half as wise as
Aunt Persis.

They called me Marg'et, Maggie, Marjie, Madge; and your grandpa's pet
name was Totty-wax; only, if I joggled the floor when he shaved, it
was full-length "Mar-ga-ret."

I was a sad little minx, so everybody kindly informed me, and so I
fully believed. My motto in my little days seems to have been, "_Speak
twice before you think once_;" and you will see what troubles it led
me into. I never failed to "speak twice," but often forgot the
thinking altogether. Margaret means Daisy; but if I was like any
flower at all, I should say it was "the lady in the bower." You know
it, Prudy, how it peeps out from a tangle of little tendrils? Just so
I peeped out, and was dimly seen, through a wild, flying head of hair.
Your grandma was ashamed of me, for if she cut off my hair I was taken
for a boy, and if she let it grow, there was danger of my getting a
squint in my eye. Sometimes I ran into the house very much grieved,
and said,--

"O, mamma, I wasn't doin' noffin, only sitting top o' the gate, and a
man said, 'Who's that funny little fellow?'--Please, mamma, won't you
not cut my hair no more?"

I was only a wee bit of a Totty-wax when she stopped cutting my yellow
hair, and braided it in two little tails behind. The other girls had
braids as well as I; but, alas! mine were not straight like theirs;
they quirled over at the end. I hated that curly kink; if it didn't go
off it would bring my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

But, children, I fear some of the stories I told were crookeder
than even my braids. In the first place, I didn't know any better. I
told lies, to hear how funny they would sound. My imagination was
large, and my common sense small. I lived in a little world of my own,
and had very queer thoughts. Perhaps all children do; what think, Fly?
When I was lying in the cradle I found my hands one day, and I
shouldn't wonder if I thought they were two weeny babies come
visiting; what do you suppose? Of course I didn't know they belonged
to me, but I stared at them, and tried to talk. And from that time
until I was a great girl, as much as five years old, I was always
supposing things were "diffunt" from what they really were. I thought
our andirons were made of gold, just like the stars, only the andirons
had enough gold in them to sprinkle the whole sky, and leave a good
slice to make a new sun. When I saw a rainbow, I asked if it was "a
side-yalk for angels to yalk on?"

I thought the cat heard what I said when I talked to her, and if I
picked a flower I kissed it, for "mebbe" the flower liked to be
kissed.

I had a great deal of fun "making believe," all to myself. I made
believe my mamma had said I might go somewhere, and off I would go,
thinking, as I crept along by the fence, bent almost double for fear
of being seen, "_Prehaps_ she'll tie me to the bed-post for it."

And she always did.

I was the youngest of the family then, but I made believe I had once
had a sister Marjie, no bigger than my doll, and a naughty woman in a
green cloak came and carried her off in her pocket. I told my little
friend Ruphelle so much about this other Marjie that she believed in
her, and after a while I believed in her myself. We used to sit on
the hay and talk about her, and wonder if the naughty woman would ever
bring her back. We thought it would be nice to have her to play with.

This was not very wicked; it was only a fairy story. But the mischief
was, my dear mother did not know where to draw the line between fairy
stories and lies. Once I ran away, and Mrs. Gray told her she had seen
me playing on the meeting-house steps with Ann Smiley.

"No, mamma," said I, catching my breath, "'twasn't me Mis' Gray saw; I
know who 'twas. There's a little girl in this town looks jus' like me;
has hair jus' the same; same kind o' dress; lives right under the
meeting-house. Folks think it's me!"

Your grandma was distressed to have me look her straight in the face
and tell such a lie; but the more she said, "Why, Margaret!" the
deeper I went into particulars.

"Name's Jane Smif. Eats acorns; sleeps in a big hole. Didn't you never
hear about her, mamma?"

As I spoke, I could almost see Jane Smif creeping slyly out of the big
hole with mud on her apron. She was as real to me as some of the
little girls I met on the street; not the little girls I played with,
but those who "came from over the river."

My dear mother did not know what to do with a child that had such a
habit of making up stories; but my father said,--

"Totty-wax doesn't know any better."

Mother sighed, and answered, "But _Maria_ always knew better."

I knew there was "sumpin bad" about me, but thought it was like the
black on a negro's face, that wouldn't wash off. The idea of trying
to stop lying never entered my head. When mother took me out of the
closet, and asked, "Would I be a better girl?" I generally said, "Yes
um," very promptly, and cried behind my yellow hair; but that was only
because I was touched by the trembling of her voice, and vaguely
wished, for half a minute, that I hadn't made her so sorry; that was
all.

But when I told that amazing story about Jane Smif, in addition to
running away, mother whipped me for the first time in my life with a
birch switch.

"Margaret," said she, "if you ever tell another wrong story, I shall
whip you harder than this, you may depend upon it."

I was frightened into awful silence for a while, but soon forgot the
threat. I was careful to avoid the name of Jane Smif, but I very soon
went and told Ruphelle that my mamma had silk dresses, spangled with
stars; "kep' 'em locked into a trunk; did _her_ mamma have stars on
_her_ dresses?" Ruphelle looked as meek as a lamb, but her brother
Gust snapped his fingers, and said,--

"O, what a whopper!"

That is why I remember it, for Ruth heard him, and asked what kind of
a whopper I had been telling now, and reported it to mother.

Mother rose very sorrowfully from her chair, and bade me follow her
into the attic. I went with fear and trembling, for she had that
dreadful switch in her hand. Poor woman! She wished she had not
promised to use it again, for she began to think it was all in vain.
But she must not break her word; so she struck me across the wrists
and ankles several times; not very hard, but hard enough to make me
hop about and cry.

When she had finished she turned to go down stairs, but I said
something so strange that she stopped short with surprise.

"I _can't_ 'pend upon it, mamma," said I, looking out through my hair,
with the tears all dried off. "You said you'd whip me harder, but you
whipped me _softer_. I _can't_ 'pend upon it, mamma. You've telled a
lie yourse'f."

What could mother say? I have often heard her describe the scene
with a droll smile. She gave me a few more tingles across the neck, to
satisfy my ideas of justice; but that was the last time she used the
switch for many a long day. Not that I stopped telling marvellous
stories; but she thought she would wait till she saw some faint sign
in me that I knew the "diffunce" between truth and falsehood.



CHAPTER II.

THE LADY CHILD.


They say I grew very troublesome. Ruthie thought I was always "under
foot," and nothing went on, from parlor to kitchen, from attic to
cellar, but I knew all about it. There was not a pie, particularly a
mince pie, that I didn't try to have a finger in.

But I could not have been in the house _all_ the time, for Abner
declares I was always out of doors. My little shoes were generally
thick with mud, and my little frocks ready every night for the
wash-tub. If there was a spoon or a knife missing, Abner often found
it in the ploughed field, where I had been using it as a kind of
pickaxe to dig my way through to China. No matter how muddy or
slippery the walking, I begged to go out. I had a feeling that I
wanted to skip like a lamb, fly like a bird, and dart like a squirrel,
and of course needed all out doors to do it in.

"Don't fall down," cried mamma from the window; "look out for the
ice."

And I answered back from under my red, quilted hood,--

"Well, if I do fall down and break me, mamma, you mus' pick up all my
little bones and glue 'em togedder. God glued 'em in the firs' place,
all but my tongue, and that's _nailed_ in."

Not nailed in very tight: I could move it fast enough.

And when the snow and ice were gone, I liked to wade ankle-deep in
the mud. Father had to buy me a pair of rubber boots, and that is the
first present I remember. They filled my soul with joy. When I said my
prayers I had one on each side of me, and when I slept it was with
both boots on my pillow. At first I could think of nothing else to
wish for; but one day I said,--

"I wish I was a pussy-cat, mamma, so I could have _four_ yubber
boots!"

Brother Ned and I were great friends. Partly to keep his eye on me,
and partly because he enjoyed my conversation, he would say in the
cool spring days, "Come, Maggie, dear, bring your cloak, and I'll wrap
you up all so warm, so you can sit out on the woodpile while I chop my
stint."

I think he must have been a little fellow to chop wood. After I got
there, and was having a good time, he often remarked, in tones as
cutting as the edge of his hatchet,--

"If I had a brother, Miss Maggie, I shouldn't take pains to wrap up a
speck of a girl like you for company."

"Well, if had a little sister, I wouldn't _be_ yapped up for comp'ny,"
retorted I, rubbing my small, red nose; "I'd be a-yockin' her cradle."

Ned laughed at that; for it was just what he expected me to say. We
had one bond of sympathy; he longed for a little brother, and I longed
for a little sister. He liked to hear me talk grandly about "my new
baby-girlie, Rosy Posy Parlin. She wouldn't bl'ong to him any 'tall.
She'd be mine clear through."

He led me on to snap out little sharp speeches, which he always
laughed at; and I suspect that was one thing that made me so pert. I
looked up to him as a superior being, except when I was angry with
him, which was about half the time. I told Ruphelle Allen he was a
"bad, naughty boy;" but when she said, "Yes, I think so, too," I
instantly cried out, "Well, I guess he's gooder 'n _your_ brother;
so!"

Ruphelle was my bosom friend. We had shaken rattles together before we
were big enough to shake hands. She had beautiful brown eyes, and
straight, brown hair; while, as for me, my eyes were gray, and my
kinky hair the color of tow.

Sister 'Ria called Ruphelle "a nice little girl;" while, owing to the
way my hair had of running wild, and the way my frocks had of tearing,
she didn't mind saying I was "a real romp," and looked half the time
like "an up-and-down fright."

As I always believed exactly what people said, and couldn't
understand jokes, I was rather unhappy about this; but concluded I had
been made for a vexation, like flies and mosquitos, and so wasn't to
blame.

Ruphelle lived on a hill, in the handsomest house in Willowbrook, with
a "cupalo" on top, where you could look off and see the whole town,
with the blue river running right through the middle, and cutting it
in two.

Ruphelle had an English father and mother. I remember Madam Allen's
turban, how it loomed up over her stately head like a great white
peony. There was a saucy brother Augustus, whom I never could abide,
and a grandpa, who always said and did such strange things that I did
not understand what it meant till I grew older, and learned that he
was afflicted with "softening of the brain."

Then in the kitchen there was a broad-shouldered, ruddy-faced woman,
named Tempy Ann Crawford, whom I always see, with my mind's eye,
roasting coffee and stirring it with a pudding-stick, or rolling out
doughnuts, which she called crullers, and holding up a fried image,
said to be a little sailor boy with a tarpaulin hat on,--only his
figure was injured so much by swelling in the lard kettle that his own
mother wouldn't have known him; still he made very good eating.

There was a little bound girl in the family, Ann Smiley, who often led
me into mischief, but always before Madam Allen looked as demure as a
little gray kitten.

Fel and I were uncommonly forward about learning our letters, and
wished very much to go to school and finish our education; but were
told that the "committee men" would not let us in till we were four
years old. My birthday came the first of May, and very proud was I
when mother led me up to a lady visitor, and said, "My little girl is
four years old to-day." I thought the people "up street" would ring
bells and fire cannons, but they forgot it. I looked in the glass, and
could not see the great change in my face which I had expected. I
didn't look any "diffunt." How would the teacher know I was so old?

"O, will they let me in?" I asked. "For always when I go to school,
then somebody comes that's a teacher, and tells me to go home, and
says I musn't stay."

"You will have to wait till the school begins," said my mother, "and
that is all the better, for then little Fel can go too." I was willing
to wait, for Fel was the other half of me. In three weeks she was as
old as I was, and in the rosy month of June we began to go to the
district school.

Your grandfather lived a little way out of town, and Squire Allen
much farther; so every morning Ruphelle and her brother Augustus
called for me, and we girls trudged along to school together, while
Gust followed like a little dog with our dinner baskets. This was one
of the greatest trials in the whole world; for, do you see, he had a
pair of ears which heard altogether too much, and when we said
anything which was not remarkably wise, he had a habit of crying
"Pooh!" which was very provoking. We went hand in hand, Fel and I, and
counted the steps we took, or hopped on one foot like lame ducklings,
and "that great Gust" would look on and laugh. I had so much to say to
Fel that I couldn't help talking, though I knew he was there to hear.

"I'd like to be a _skurrel_ once," said I.

"O, pooh!" said Gust.

"I'd like to be 'em _once_, Gust Allen. I'd like to be 'em long enough
to know how they feel. Once there was a boy, and he was turned into a
skurrel, and his name was Bunny."

"_That's_ a whopper, miss!"

Such were "the tricks and the manners" of Fel's disagreeable brother.
Do you wonder I called him a trial? But Fel didn't mind him much, for
he was good to her, and never laughed at her as he did at me. She was
"a lady-child," and her disposition was much sweeter than mine.

Mr. Clifford, who was fitting for college then, used to pass us with
a book under his arm and pat our sun-bonnets, and call us "Juno's
swans." We had never seen any swans, and did not know who Juno was,
but presumed it was some old woman who kept geese and hens.

When we reached the school-house we were sure of a good time, for the
teacher lent us an old blunt penknife, with pretty red stones on the
back, the like of which was never seen before in this world. Nobody
else ever asked for the knife but us two little tots, and we went up
hand in hand; and I spoke the words, while Fel asked with her eyes.
Miss Lee smiled blandly, and said,--

"Well, now, the best one may have the knife a little while."

That always happened to be Fel; but it was all the same, for we sat
together, and she let me play with it "more than my half." We were
really very forward children, and learned so fast that Miss Lee says
now she was very proud of us. I think she was, for I remember how she
showed us off before the committee men. We could soon read in the
Second Reader, and Fel always cried about the poor blind fiddler to
whom Billy gave his cake, and I poked her with my elbow to make her
stop. For my part I was apt to giggle aloud when we came to the story
of the two silly cats, and the cheese, and the monkey.

Ah, that dear old school-house, where we studied the "Primary's
Joggerphy," and saw by the map that some countries are yellow and some
fire-red, and the rivers no bigger than crooked knitting-needles! That
queer old school-house, with the hacked-up benches, where we learned
"rithumtick" by laying buttered paper over the pictures in Emerson's
First Part, and drawing blackbirds, chairs, and cherries all in a
row! Fel had a long wooden pencil, but poor I must do with half a one,
for 'Ria teased me by making me think people would call me selfish if
I had a long pencil all to myself, while my grown-up and much more
worthy sister went without any.

That funny old school-house, where Miss Lee used to make a
looking-glass of one of the window-panes, by putting her black apron
behind it, and peeping in to see if her hair was smooth when she
expected the committee men! How afraid we were of those committee men,
and how hard we studied the fly-leaves of our "joggerphies" while they
were there, feeling so proud that we knew more than "that great
Gust!"

That dear, queer, funny old school-house! No other hall of learning
will ever seem like that to me!

Didn't we go at noon to the spring under the river bank and "duck" our
little heads, till our mothers found it out and forbade it? Didn't we
squeeze long-legged grasshoppers, and solemnly repeat the couplet:--


    "Grass'per, grass'per Gray,
     Give me some m'lasses,
     And _then_ fly away."


Didn't we fling flat pebbles in the river to the tune of


    "One to make ready,
       Two to prepare,
     Three to go slap-dash,
       Right--in--there"?


And how we enjoyed our dinners under the spreading oil-nut tree,
chatting as we ate, and deciding every day anew that Tempy Ann made
the nicest sage cheese in the world, and our Ruthie the best
turnovers.

Sometimes at night father took me on his lap, and asked,--

"Do you whisper any at school?"

I turned away my face and answered,

"Fel whispers _orfly_."

"Well, does Totty-wax whisper too?"

I dropped my head, and put my fingers in my mouth.

"_Some_," said I, in a low voice. For I began to have a dim idea that
it was not proper to tell a lie.

When Fel and I had any little trouble,--which was not often, for Fel
generally gave up like a darling,--Maria was always sure to decide
that Fel was in the right. Fel thought 'Ria a remarkable young woman;
but I told her privately, in some of our long chats at school, that
older sisters were not such blessings as one might suppose. So far as
I knew anything about them, they enjoyed scrubbing your face and neck
the wrong way with a rough towel, and making you cry. And they had
such poor memories, older sisters had. They could never call up the
faintest recollection of a fairy story when you asked for one. They
were also very much opposed to your standing in a chair by the sink to
wipe dishes.

Now Tempy Ann allowed Fel to wipe dishes, and pat out little pies on
the cake-board, and bake doll's cakes. She was such a strong, large
woman too, she could hold Fel and me at the same time; and after we
were undressed, and had our nighties on, she loved to rock us in the
old kitchen chair, and chat with us.

We were confidential sometimes with Tempy Ann,--or I was,--and told
her of our plan of going to Italy to give concerts when we grew up. I
never saw but one fault in Tempy Ann; she would laugh over our solemn
secrets, and would repeat the hateful ditty,--


    "Row the boat, row the boat, where shall it stand?
     Up to Mr. Parlin's door; there's dry land.
     Who comes here, so skip and so skan?
     Mr. Gustus Allen, a very likely young man.
     He steps to the door, and knocks at the ring,
     And says, 'Mrs. Parlin, is Miss Maggie within?'"


Fel and I were both shocked at the bare hint of such a thing as my
marrying Gust. We didn't intend to have any great boys about. If Gust
should want to marry me, and ride in our gilt-edged concert-coach,
with four white horses, I guessed he'd find he wasn't wanted. I
should say "No," just as quick!

The more earnest I grew the more Tempy Ann shook with laughing; and
I had some reason to suspect she went and told Madam Allen my
objections to marrying her son, which I thought was most unfair of
Tempy Ann.



CHAPTER III.

THE BLUE PARASOL.

[Illustration: The Blue Parasol]


As I look back upon those make-believe days, naughty recollections
spring up as fast as dust in August.

Ruphelle seems to me like a little white lily of the valley, all
pure and sweet, but I was no more fit to be with her than a prickly
thistle. I loved dearly to tease her. Once she had some bronze shoes,
and I wanted some too, but there were none to be had in town, and to
console myself, I said to dear little Fel, "I'd twice rather have
black shoes, bronzes look so rusty; O, my! If I couldn't have black
shoes I'd go barefoot."

Fel did not wish me to see how ashamed this made her feel, but I could
not help noticing afterwards that she never wore the bronze shoes to
church.

I pined and fretted because I could not have nice things like her.
She had a coral necklace, and a blue silk bonnet, and a white dress,
with flowers worked all over it with a needle. Did _my_ best dress
have flowers worked over it with a needle? I should think not. And I
hadn't a speck of a necklace, nor any bonnet but just straw. I did not
know that Squire Allen was one of the wealthiest men in the state, and
could afford beautiful things for his little daughter, while my father
was poor, or at least not rich, and my mother had to puzzle her brains
a good deal to contrive to keep her little romping, heedless,
try-patience of a daughter looking respectable.

Once, when I was about six years old, I did a very naughty thing. Why,
Fly, what makes your eyes shine so? Can it be you like to hear naughty
stories? Queer, isn't it? Ah, but this story makes me ashamed, even
now that I am a grown-up woman. Wait a minute; I must go back a
little; it was the parasol that began it.

When Fel and I were going home from school one night, we stopped to
take some of our make-believe slides. Not far from our house, near the
river-bank, were two sloping mounds, between which a brook had once
run. These little mounds were soft and green, and dotted with white
innocence flowers; and what fun it was to start at the top of one of
them, and roll over and over, down into the valley. Somehow, Fel,
being a lady-child, never stained her cape bonnet, while mine was all
streaks; and she never tore her skirts off the waist; but what if I
did tear mine? They always grew together again, I never stopped to
think how.

This time, as we were having a jolly roll, Madam Allen rode along in
the carryall, with Tempy Ann driving.

"Stop, and let us see what those children are doing," said she; and
Tempy Ann stopped.

Fel and I danced upon our feet, and started to run to the carryall,
but of course I tumbled down before I got there. While I was picking
my foot out of the hole in my frock, I heard Fel exclaim, joyfully,
"O, mamma, is it for me? What a beauty, beauty, beauty!"

"Yes, dear, I bought it for you, but if you are going to be a gypsy
child, I suppose you won't want it."

I looked and saw the cunningest little sunshade, with its head
tipped on one side, like a great blue morning glory. Never again shall
I behold anything so beautiful. Queen Victoria's crown and Empress
Eugenie's diamonds wouldn't compare with it for a moment. They say we
feel most keenly those joys we never quite grasp; and I know that
parasol, swinging round in Fel's little hand, was more bewitching to
me than if I had held it myself. O, why wasn't it mine? I thought of
Fel's coral necklace, and blue silk bonnet, and the white dress with
needlework flowers, and now if she was going to have a parasol too, I
might as well die and done with it.

"O, Marjie, Marjie!" cried she, dancing up to me with her sweet little
face in a glow, "_do_ you see what I've got?"

I never answered. I just lay there and kicked dirt with my shoe. The
carryall was in front of us, and Madam Allen could not see how I
behaved.

"Come, little daughter," called she, "jump in and ride home."

But Fel thought she would rather walk with me, for I hadn't noticed
her parasol yet. So her mother drove off.

"Isn't it a teenty tonty beauty?" cried she, waving it before me.

I shut my teeth together and kicked.

"You haven't looked, Marjie; see what a teenty tonty beauty!"

She never could quite enjoy her pretty things till I had praised
them. I knew that, and took a wicked pleasure in holding my tongue.

"Why, Marjie," said she, in a grieved tone, "why don't you look? It's
the teenty tontiest beauty ever you saw."

"There, that's the _threeth_ time you've said so, Fel Allen."

"Well, it's the truly truth, Madge Parlin."

"No, it isn't neither; and you're a little lie-girl," snapped I.

This was an absurd speech, and I did not mean a word of it, for I
doubt if Fel had ever told a wrong story in her life. "You're a little
lie-girl. _Got a parasol, too!_"

She only looked sorry to see me so cross. She couldn't be very
unhappy, standing there stroking those soft silk tassels.

"I hope your mamma 'll give you one, too," murmured the dear little
soul.

I sprang up at that.

"O, do you s'pose she would?" I cried; and by the time I had taken
another roll down the bank my spirits rose wonderfully, and I let her
put the parasol in my hand, even exclaiming,--

"No, I never did see anything so nice!" But I secretly hoped my own
would be nicer still.

"Come home to my house," said I, "and ask my mamma if I can have a
parasol too."

We were very near the house, and she went in with me. Mother was in
the kitchen, stewing apple-sauce for supper. I remember what a tired
look she had on her face, and how wearily she stirred the apple-sauce,
which was bubbling in the porcelain kettle.

"You speak now," whispered I to Fel. "You speak first."

This was asking a great deal of the dear little friend I had just
called a lie-girl. If she hadn't loved me better, much better than I
deserved, she would have turned and run away. As it was, she called up
all her courage, the timid little thing, and fluttering up to my
mother, gently poked the end of the parasol into the bow of her black
silk apron.

"Please, O, please, Mrs. Parlin, do look and see how pretty it is."

That was as far as she could get for some time, till mother smiled and
kissed her, and asked once or twice, "Well, dear, what is it?"

I ran into the shed and back again, too excited to stand still.
Mother was always so tender of Fel, that I did think she couldn't
refuse her. I was sure, at any rate, she would say as much as, "We
will see about it, dear;" but instead of that she gave her an extra
hug, and answered sorrowfully,--

"I wish I could buy Margaret a parasol; but really it is not to be
thought of."

I dropped into the chip-basket, and cried.

"If she knew how to take care of her things perhaps I might, but it is
wicked to throw away money."

"O, mamma, _did_ you s'pose I'd let it fall in the _hoss troth_?"
screamed I, remembering the fate of my last week's hat, with the green
vine round it. "If you'll only give me a pairsol, mamma, I won't never
carry it out to the barn, nor down to the river, nor anywhere 'n this
world. I'll keep it in your bandbox, right side o' your bonnet, where
there don't any mice come, or any flies, and never touch it, nor ask
to see it, nor--"

"There, that'll do," said mother, stopping me at full tide. "I would
be glad to please my little girl if I thought it would be right; but I
have said No once, and after that, Margaret, you know how foolish it
is to tease."

Didn't I know, to my sorrow? As foolish as it would be to stand and
fire popguns at the rock of Gibraltar.

I rushed out to the barn, and never stopped to look behind me. Fel
followed, crying softly; but what had I to say to that dear little
friend, who felt my sorrows almost as if they were her own?

"You didn't ask my mamma pretty, and that's why she wouldn't give me
no pairsol."

No thanks for the kind office she had performed for me; no apology for
calling her a lie-girl. Only,--

"You didn't ask my mamma pretty, Fel Allen."

She choked down one little sob that ought to have broken my heart,
and turned and went away. You wonder she should have loved me. I
suppose I had "good fits;" they say I was honey-sweet sometimes; but
as I recall my little days, it does seem to me as if I was always,
always snubbing that precious child. When she was out of sight, I
dived head first into the hay, and tried for as much as ten minutes to
hate my mother. After a long season of sulks, such as it is to be
hoped none of _you_ ever indulged in, I stole back to the house
through the shed, and Ruth, who did not know what had broken my heart,
exclaimed,--

"Why, Maggie, what ails you? You've fairly cried your eyes out,
child!"

I climbed a chair, and looked in the glass, which hung between the
kitchen windows, and sure enough I was a sight to behold. My eyes,
always very large, were now red and swollen, and seemed bursting from
their sockets. I had never thought before that eyes could burst; but
now I ran to Ruthie in alarm.

"I _have_ cried my eyes out! O, Ruthie, I've _started_ 'em!"

She laughed at my distress, kissed me, and set me at ease about my
eyeballs; but the parasol was denied me, and I was sure that, blind or
not, I could never be happy without it.

The little bits of girls had afternoon parties that summer; it was
quite the fashion; and not long after this Madam Allen made one for
Fel. Everybody said it was the nicest party we had had; for Tempy Ann
made sailor-boy doughnuts, with sugar sprinkled on, and damson tarts,
and lemonade, to say nothing of "sandiges," with chicken in the
middle. I loved Fel dearly, I know I did; but by fits and starts I was
so full of envy that I had to go off by myself and pout.

"A party and a pairsol the same year! And Fel never 'spected the
pairsol, and didn't ask real hard for the party. But that was always
the way; her mamma wanted her to have good times, and so did Tempy
Ann. _Some_ folks' mammas didn't care!"

I was willing nice things should fall to Fel's lot; but I wanted just
as nice ones myself.

Fel showed the girls her "pairsol," and they all said they meant to
have one too; all but me; I could only stand and look on, with my
eyeballs just ready to pop out of my head.

I remember what sick dolls we had that afternoon; and when any of
them died, the live dolls followed them to the grave with weeping and
wailing, and their wee handkerchiefs so full of grief that you could
trace the procession by the tears that dripped upon the carpet. Yes;
but the mourners all had the cunningest little "pairsols" of
nasturtium leaves. There wasn't a "single one doll" that marched
without a pairsol, not even my Rosy Posy; for I had a motherly heart,
and couldn't mortify _my_ child! She _should_ have "sumpin to keep
the sun off," if it cost the last cent her mamma had in the world!

I had a dismal fit just before supper, and went into Grandpa
Harrington's room, back of the parlor. He was always fond of little
folks, but very queer, as I have told you. He had a fire in the
fireplace, and was sitting before it, though it was summer. He looked
up when I went in, and said, "How do, darling? My feet are as cold as
a dead lamb's tongue; does your father keep sheep?"

Next minute he said,--

"My feet are as cold as a dog's nose; does your father keep a dog?"

That was the way he rambled on from one thing to another. But when
he saw I was low-spirited, and found by questioning me that I needed a
parasol, and couldn't live long without one, he took me on his knee,
and said kindly,--

"Never mind it, Pet; you shall have a parasol. I will give you one."

I could hardly speak for joy. I did not feel ashamed of myself till
afterwards, for Grandpa Harrington did not seem like other people, and
I saw no harm in whining to him about my troubles.



CHAPTER IV.

LIZE JANE.


But my happiness did not last long. Grandpa Harrington never thought
of my parasol again from that day to the day he died; and little witch
and try-patience though I was, I dared not remind him of his promise,
still less tell my mother about it.

It was hard to have my hopes raised so high, only to be dashed to
the ground; harder still to have to keep it all to myself, and see Fel
trip along under that sunshade without a care in the world. If she had
been the least bit proud I couldn't have borne it; but even as it was,
it wore upon me. Once I called out in severe tones, "Ho, little
lie-girl; got a pairsol too!" but was so ashamed of it next minute
that I ran up to her and hugged her right in the street, and said, "I
didn't mean the leastest thing. I love you jus' the same, if you
_have_ got a blue pairsol, and you may wear it to meetin', and I'll
_try_ not to care."

And now I come to the naughty story.

I could not always have Fel for a playmate; she was too delicate to
be racing about from morning till night as I did, and when she had to
stay in the house, I found other girls to romp with me. Sometimes,
especially if I felt rather wicked, I enjoyed Eliza Jane Bean, a girl
two or three years older than myself. There was a bad fascination
about "Lize." When she fixed her big black eyes upon you, she made you
think of all sorts of delightful things you wanted to do, only they
were strictly forbidden. Her father and mother were not very good
people, and did not go to church Sundays. They lived in a low red
house near the Gordons. You never saw it, children; it was pulled down
ever so long ago, and used for kindlings. People called the house "the
Bean Pod," because there were nine little beans in it beside the big
ones. Rattlety bang! Harum scarum! There was always a great noise in
that house, and people called it "the rattling of the beans." It was
well it stood on a corner lot, and poor old Mr. Gordon was so deaf.

Lize Jane used to come to our house for currants. My mamma did not
like to have me see much of her, but could not refuse the currants,
for our bushes were loaded. It seemed as if the family must have lived
half the summer on currants and molasses; for almost every night there
was Lize Jane with her big tin pail. It had holes in the bottom, and
the juice used to run out sometimes upon her dress; but it didn't make
much difference, for her dress was never clean.

One night she came for currants when they were almost gone. Mother had
been sick, and was very late about making jelly. She told Eliza Jane
she couldn't let her come any more after that night; the rest of the
fruit must be saved for our own use. Lize Jane said nothing, but she
rolled her black eyes round towards me, and I felt a little ashamed,
for I knew she thought mother was stingy, and that was why she rolled
her eyes.

I went into the kitchen, and said to Ruth,--

"Don't you want me to pick you a bowl of currants?"

Of course she did. She didn't know Lize Jane was there, or she
wouldn't have been so pleased and so ready to get me my sun-bonnet.
She had to reach it down from a hook in the ceiling. That was the
place where Ned hung it when he wanted to "pester" me; he did it with
an old rake handle.

When I was going anywhere to meet Lize Jane, I always felt as if I
was stealing raisins. I never exactly stole raisins; but when my
mother said I might go to the box and get two or three, I had
sometimes taken a whole handful. I knew by the pricking of my
conscience that that was wrong, and in the same way I knew that this
was wrong too. Mother was in the green chamber, covering an ottoman
with green carpeting, so she wouldn't see me from that side of the
house.

I ran into the garden, and, going up close to Lize Jane, began to pick
with all my might. "My bowl fills up faster 'n your pail," said I.
"Cause its littler," said she; "and besides, I'm picking 'em off the
stems."

"What do you do that for, Lize Jane? It takes so long."

"I know it; it takes foreverlastin'; but mother told me to, so'st I
could get more into my pail."

I opened my eyes.

"She told me to get my pail chuck full. She didn't use to care, but
now the currants are most gone, and she wants all she can get."

I said nothing, but I remember I thought Mrs. Bean was a queer
woman, to want our very last currants.

"Sh'an't you have your party before they're all gone?" said Lize Jane.

"What party?"

"Why, the one you're going to have."

I suppose she knew my heart was aching for one.

"I want a party dreffully," said I, "but mamma won't let me."

"Won't let you?" cried Lize Jane, in surprise. "Why, Fel Allen had
hers last week."

"I know it, and Tempy Ann made us some lemonade."

"Did she? I wish I'd been there," said Lize, pursing her lips. "But
Fel lives in such a monstrous nice house, and wouldn't ask me to her
party; that's why. Mother says I hadn't oughter care, though, for when
she dies she'll lay as low as me."

I did not understand this speech of Mrs. Bean's, which Lize Jane
repeated with such a solemn snap of her black eyes; but it came to me
years afterwards, and I think it the worst teaching a mother could
give her little child. No wonder Lize Jane was full of envy and spite.

"But you'll ask me to _your_ party, won't you?" said she, with a
coaxing smile.

"I can't, if I don't have one, Lize Jane."

"You're a-makin' believe, Mag Parlin. You will have one; how can you
help it, with a garden full of gooseb'ries and rubub?"

"And thimbleberries, too," added I, surveying the premises with a
gloomy eye. We certainly had enough to eat, and it was a very strange
thing that I couldn't give a party.

"Has your mother got any cake in the house?" added Lize.

"Yes, lots in the tin chest; but she never lets me eat a speck,
hardly," bemoaned I. I was not in the habit of talking to Lize Jane of
family matters; but she had shown so much good sense in saying I ought
to have a party, that my heart was touched.

"Your mother, seems to me, she never lets you do a thing," returned
Lize Jane, in a pitying tone. "Ain't you goin' to have a silk pairsol,
like Fel Allen's? I should think you might."

She had driven the nail straight to the mark that time. I could have
wailed; but was I going to have Lize Jane go home and tell that I was
a baby? No! and I spoke up very pertly,--

"Where's _your_ pairsol, Lize Jane Bean? You never had one any more 'n
me."

"No; but there's something I have got, though, better than that. Good
to eat, too. And I'll tell you what; if you'll ask me to your party,
I'll bring you some in a covered dish."

"What is it, Lize? Ice cream?"

For her face was wondrous sweet.

"Ice cream! How'd you s'pose I kep' that froze? No!" and the
bewitching sparkle of her eye called up luscious ideas. I could almost
see apricot preserves, pine apples, and honey-heart cherries floating
in the air. But why was it a covered dish? "Somethin' nuff sight
better 'n ice cream, but I shan't tell what."

"O, I wish you'd bring it to me in the covered dish, 'thout any
party, for my mother won't let me have one, Lize, now truly."

"Then you can't have the--what I was goin' to bring," said Lize Jane,
firmly.

"That's too bad," I cried; but it was of no use talking; she couldn't
be moved any more than the gravel walk, or the asparagus bed.

"Your mother ain't much sick, is she?"

"Not now," replied I; "her strength is better."

"Well, then, why don't you ask some girls to come, and she'll get 'em
some supper; see if she don't."

I was so shocked that I almost fell into a currant bush.

"Lize Jane Bean, what you talking about?"

"Why, you said your mother warn't sick."

"No, her strength is better, but she don't 'low me to do things, Lize
Jane Bean, 'thout--'thout she lets me."

"Of course not; but I guess she don't know you want a party so
dreadful bad, Maggie, or she _would_ let you. I don't believe your
mother is ugly."

"But she never said I might have a party, though."

"No, for she don't think about it. She ain't a bad woman, your mother
ain't, only she don't think. Your mother don't _mean_ to be ugly."

Lize Jane spoke in a large-hearted way, at the same time stripping
currant-stems very industriously. "She'd feel glad afterwards,
s'posing you _did_ have a party, I'll bet."

"O, Lize Jane, what a girl! 's if I'd do it 'thout my mother said I
might."

"O, I didn't mean a real big party; did you s'pose I did? I didn't
know but you could ask me and some of the girls to supper, and not
call it a party. We'd play ou' doors."

"O, I didn't know _that's_ what you meant. But I
can't,--'cause,--'cause."--

"Well, you needn't, if you don't want to; but I didn't know but you'd
like to see that--what I's going to bring."

"But I can't be naughty, and get tied to the bed-post," said I,
thoughtfully. "Is that what you's going to bring, something I never
saw in all my life, Lize Jane?"

"Yes, I'm certain sure you never."

And she made up another delicious face, that filled the air around
with sweet visions.

"And would you bring it if I didn't ask but--but--two girls?"

"No, I don't _think_ I could," replied Lize Jane, squinting her eyes
in deep meditation. "I don't hardly think I _could_; but if you had
four girls I'd bring it, and _risk_ it."

"Four 'thout you?"

"No, me 'n three more, if you're so dreadful scared."

That settled the matter. With my usual rashness I cried out,--

"Well, I'll ask 'em."



CHAPTER V.

THE PARTY.


I went to bed that night in great excitement, and I dare say did not
get to sleep for ten minutes or so. What strange thing was this I was
about to do?

"Well," said I, "it's only four girls, that's all. I know my mamma 'd
be glad to have me have 'em, but I don't dare ask her; so I'll have
'em _'thout_ asking. She says she wants her little daughter to be
happy. That's what she says; but she don't give me no pairsol. How'd
she 'spect I's goin' to be happy? But I could be some happy if I had
four girls,--not a party, but four girls."

The next day was Saturday, the day I had agreed upon with Lize
Jane. I chewed my bonnet-strings all the way to school, and never
invited Fel till we got into the entry. At recess I asked Abby Gray
and Dunie Foster; that made up the four girls. But when school was
out, I happened to think I might as well have a few more, and singled
out Sallie Gordon, Mary Vance, and Anna Carey; but Phebe Grant was
standing close by, and I knew she would be "mad" if I didn't ask her;
and after that I flew about and dropped invitations right and left,
till I entirely forgot that I was doing it without leave. "I want you
to come to my house, to my party, to-morrow afternoon,"--began to
sound perfectly proper.

Instead of speaking _twice_ before I thought, I spoke thirty or
forty times. I didn't slight anybody. I asked all the First and Second
Reader classes, and the little specks of girls in A B C. They all
looked very much pleased. Some of them had never been invited to a
party before, and didn't know enough to find the way to "my house;"
but I thought, while I was about it, I might as well make a clean
sweep: it was no wickeder to have a big party than a little one. I was
sorry enough that boys were not in fashion, for I wanted a few. There
was Tommy Gordon in particular, who always had his pockets full of
"lickerish" and pep'mints; it was as much as I could do to help asking
him. As for Gust Allen, I would as soon have had a wild monkey, and
that is the truth.

I trudged home at noon, with my eyes looking strange, I know. I had
done my _speaking_, and now I began to _think_. It came over me like a
little whirlwind. I realized for the first time what I had done.

Ruth was hurrying up the dinner.

"Don't come near me, child," said she. "I've got _my_ hands full."

I went into the sitting-room. There was mother on the sofa, bathing
her head with cologne. It didn't seem much like having a party! She
could eat no dinner, and father said she looked as if she ought to be
in bed.

"I feel almost sick enough to be in bed," said she; "but I must help
Mrs. Duffy put down that parlor carpet. I have waited for her ever
since the carpet was made, and this was the very first day she could
come."

"O, dear," thought I, "where'll I have my party?"

"Can't Mrs. Duffy put the carpet down alone?" asked father.

"No; she would skew it badly."

"But, my dear, you are sick; why not have Ruth help her?"

"Ruth does not understand the business as well as I do; and more than
that, we have a large quantity of raspberries to be made into jelly.
They would spoil if they were kept over Sunday."

Worse and worse! Who was going to get supper for my party?

Then I remembered that wonderful _something_ which Lize Jane had
promised to bring in the covered dish,--that delicious mystery which
had been the first cause of getting me into trouble. Perhaps there
would be enough of it to go round, and we could finish off with cake.
I began to think it wasn't much matter what we had to eat.

While life lasts I shall never forget that horrible afternoon. What
could I say? What could I do? I felt as Horace used to, as if I
should "go a-flyin'." I ran into the parlor where mother and Mrs.
Duffy were putting down the carpet, and hopped about till I got a tack
in my foot; and after mother had drawn it out, and I had done crying,
I ventured to say,--

"Mamma, there's a little girl coming to see me this afternoon. Are you
willing?"

"This afternoon? Who?"

She might have asked who wasn't coming, and I could have answered
better.

I thought a minute, and then said, "Fel," for I knew she liked her
best of all the little folks.

"Very well," said mother, and went on stretching the carpet.

Fel came so often that it was hardly worth mentioning.

"But, mamma, there's somebody else coming, too. It's--it's--Dunie
Foster."

Dunie was a lady-child, almost as well-behaved as Fel.

"Ah! I'd rather have her come some other time. But run away, dear, you
are troubling me. Take the little girls into the dining-room. I want
the sitting-room kept nice for callers."

I couldn't get my mouth open to say another word. Three o'clock was
the usual hour for little girls to go to parties, and I flew into the
kitchen to ask Ruth what time it was.

"Two o'clock," she said.

"And in an hour would it be three? How many minutes was an hour? Did
that jelly boil fast enough? Did jelly bake all hard in the little
glass cups so you could eat it the same day--the same night for
supper? Was there any cooked chicken in the house, with breastings in
(stuffing)? Any sandiges? Why didn't Ruthie make sandiges? Do it very
easy. Why didn't Ruthie make sailor-boy doughnuts? _I_ could sprinkle
the sugar on 'em, see 'f I couldn't."

In the midst of my troublesome chatter Abner came around to the
kitchen door with the horse and wagon, saying he was going to mill,
and would Tot like to go, too?

"Will you be back by three o'clock?" said I.

"Yes; it won't take me half an hour."

"I wonder what's the child's notion of watching the clock so snug,"
remarked Ruth, as I was darting into the parlor to ask if I might go
to mill.

As I rode along with Abner, and felt the soft summer air blow on my
face, and saw the friendly trees nodding "Good day," it seemed as if I
had left trouble behind me. What was the use in going back to it? I
had half a mind to run away.

"I didn't want to stay and see those little girls starve to death. No
place but the 'dine-room' and the barn to play in! Be tied to the
bed-post for it too! Ought to be! Wicked-bad-girl! But would mamma tie
me any _shorter_ if I staid away till the moon came up? And then the
girls 'd be gone! Get away from Abner just 's easy! He'll be a talkin'
to the man 'th flour on his coat, then he'll look round an' I'll be
gone, an' he'll say, 'That child's _persest_'; he always says
'_persest_,' and then he'll go home and forget."

But stop a minute; what would the girls think?

"They'll think me very _unagreeable_ to go off and leave my party.
They'll call me a little lie-girl; they wont ask me to their house no
more."

So I didn't run away. I sat in the wagon, groaning softly to myself.
The way of the transgressor _is_ hard. _Every_ way was hard to me
since I had set out to do wrong. It was hard to run off and be called
"unagreeable," and very, very hard to go home and face my troubles.

I had not supposed there was the least danger of any one's coming
before three o'clock; but to my surprise, when we reached the house, I
found the front entry full of small girls--the little specks in A B C.
There they stood, some of them with fingers in their mouths, while
mother held the parlor-door open, and was asking them very kindly what
they wanted. "Margaret," said she, "these little girls have been here
as much as ten minutes; I don't know yet what they came for; perhaps
you can find out."

[Illustration: THE PARTY. Page 78.]

Poor, sick mother was holding her head with her hand as she
spoke. I hated myself so that I wanted to scream.

"Hattie," stammered I, taking one of the tiny ones by the hand, "come
out in the garden, and I'll get you some pretty posies." Of course the
rest followed like a flock of sheep. But we had hardly reached the
garden before I saw three or four more girls coming. It was of no use;
something must be done at once. I left the A B C girls staring at the
garden gate, and ran to the house for dear life.

"Mamma, mamma!" cried I, as soon as I could get my breath; and then I
rolled myself up into a little ball of anguish on the parlor carpet.

"Where's the camfire?" exclaimed Mrs. Duffy, springing up; "that
child's really a fainting off." Mother came to me and took my hands;
she says I was so pale that it quite startled her. "Where do you feel
sick, dear?" she asked tenderly.

That sympathetic tone broke me down entirely. My stubborn pride
yielded at once, and so did that bitter feeling I had been cherishing
so long in regard to the parasol.

"O, mamma!" sobbed I, catching the skirt of her dress and hiding my
head in it, and forgetting all about Mrs. Duffy; "I don't care what
you do, mamma. You may send 'em home, and tell 'em they didn't be
invited; you may go to the front door and say it this minute."

"It's gone till her head," said Mrs. Duffy, laying down the hammer;
"see her shuvver! She nades hot wather till her fate, poor thing."

"I don't care what you do to me, mamma; you may tie me to the
bed-post, and sew me up in a bag and throw me in the river. You would,
if you knew what I've been a doin'. I--I--_I've got a party_!"

Mother held her hand to her head and stared at me. Just then the
door-bell rang.

"That's some of the party," wailed I. "And those little bits of girls
were some, and this is some now, and more's a comin'. I'm _so_ glad
you didn't give me no pairsol, mamma."

"It can't be; Margaret, you haven't--"

"Yes, I have too. Yes, mamma, I've got a party! I'm wickeder 'n ever
you heard of. Wont you put me in the river? I want you to. O, I'm _so_
glad you didn't give me no pairsol."

Mother pulled the carpet and looked at me, and then pulled the
carpet again. She was considering what to do. Ruthie had gone to the
door when the bell rang; we heard her voice in the entry.

"Call Ruth in here to me," said mother, "and take your little girls
into the garden."

I knew by that, that she didn't mean to send them home; and O, how I
loved her. It seemed to me I loved her for the first time in my life,
for I never knew before how good she was, or how beautiful! Her head
was tied up in a handkerchief, and she wore a faded calico dress and a
tow apron, but I thought she looked like an angel. I lay flat at her
feet and adored her.

While I was taking my little girls into the garden and trying to play,
mother was talking to Ruthie about this strange freak of mine. This I
learned afterwards.

"I don't like to disappoint all these little children," said she,
"and I don't like to expose my naughty daughter either. You see,
Ruth, if they find out what a dreadful thing she has done, they will
not like her any more, and their mothers will not let them come to see
her. And that may make Margaret a worse girl, for she needs a great
deal of love."

"I know it," said Ruthie; "she's got a big, warm heart of her own, and
one can feel to forgive such children better than the cold, selfish
ones; you know that yourself, Mrs. Parlin. Why, bless her, she never
had an orange or a peach in her life, that she didn't give away half."

It gratified my poor mother to see Ruthie so ready to take my
part. It was more than she liked to do to ask the tired girl to go to
work again over the hot stove and prepare a supper for an army of
children; but Ruthie did not wait to be asked; for love of mother and
for love of me, she set herself about it with a hearty good-will. I do
not remember much that was said or done for the rest of the afternoon;
only, I know every single girl came that was invited, and they all
said it was a nicer party than even Fel's; but Fel didn't care; she
was glad of it. Of course it was nicer, for Ruthie spread the table in
the front yard, and 'Ria was so kind as to adorn it with flowers, and
lay wreaths of cedar round the plates. We had cup-custards and
cookies, and, something I didn't expect, little "sandiges," with cold
ham in the middle. But didn't I know it was more than I deserved?
Didn't my heart swell with shame, and guilt, and gratitude? I remember
rushing into the house in the very midst of the supper, just to hug
mother and Ruthie.

The funny thing, the only funny thing there was to the whole party,
was Lize Jane's present. In my agitation I had almost forgotten how
anxious I was to see it. She came dressed very smartly in red calico,
with a blue bow at her throat. Her hair was remarkably glossy, and she
told us, in a loud whisper, she had "stuck it down with bear's grease
and cologne." She brought her old tin pail, the very one she picked
currants in, only it really had a cover on it now, and _that_ was what
she called "a covered dish." And guess what was in it?

_Pumpkin sauce!_ The drollest looking mess. Dried pumpkin stewed in
molasses. She said I never tasted anything like it before, and I am
sure I never did, and never should want to again.

And that was the end of my party. Mother didn't sew me up in a
bag and throw me in the river, for she was the most patient woman
alive. She only forbade my going to anybody's house for a long time to
come. It was a hard punishment; but I knew it was just, and I could
not complain. My heart was really touched, and I had learned a lesson
not easily forgotten. When I think of that party now, it is with a
feeling of gratitude to my dear mother for her great forbearance, and
her wise management of a wayward, naughty little girl.



CHAPTER VI.

THE PATCHWORK SCHOOL.


Fel and I had begun to read before we were four years old, and by
the time we were six we knew too much to go to the town school any
more. I believe that was what we thought; but the fact was, Fel was
very delicate, and her mother considered the walk to the school-house
too long for her, and the benches too hard. She wished to have a
governess come and live in the house, so the child could study at
home. I thought this was too bad. I knew almost as much as Fel did.
Why must I go to the town school if it wasn't good enough for her?

"Mamma, I wish I was del'cate," whined I. "Ned snipped off my finger
in the corn-sheller,--don't that make me del'cate?"

"Delicate!" said Ned. "You're as tough as a pine knot."

I thought this was a cruel speech. He ought to be ashamed to snip off
my finger, and _then_ call me tough.

In looking about for a governess, Madam Allen thought at once of
dear Martha Rubie, who lived just across the garden from their house.
Uncle John's wife was her sister, the aunt Persis I told you about,
who thought I ought not to hear baby-talk. Aunt Persis wasn't willing
her sister Martha should go away from home; she said Fel might trip
across the garden and say her lessons at her house. Fel didn't like to
do it, for she was afraid of aunt Persis--she wouldn't go unless I
would go with her; and finally mother said I might; so it turned out
just as well for me as if I was delicate. She wanted Gust to go too,
and he wasn't willing. But if Fel set her heart on anything it
generally came about.

"Augustus," said Madam Allen, smiling with her pleasant black eyes,
which had a firm look in them, "you will recite to Miss Rubie if I
wish it."

"Well, then, I want some of the other fellows to 'cite too," sniffed
little Gust; "'tisn't fair for one boy to go to a patchwork school,
long o' girls."

And thus it happened that several children joined us, and Miss Rubie
had quite a sizable school.

And now I must tell you what sort of a house we went to; for the
whole thing was very queer. In the first place, there was dear uncle
John,--yes, _your_ uncle John; but don't ask any questions; I'll tell
you more by and by,--and his wife, that was aunt Persis; and his
wife's sister, dear sweet Martha Rubie; and his little boy, Zed. Aunt
Persis was an elegant, stately woman, but there was always something
odd about her. I think myself it was odd she shouldn't like baby-talk.

She knit herself into my earliest recollections when she was Pauline
Rubie, and after she married uncle John, she knit my stockings just
the same, and uncle never interfered with the stripes, red and white,
running round and round like a barber's pole. They were the pride of
my life till Gust Allen said they made my little legs look like sticks
of candy, good enough to eat. Then I hated them; but aunt Persis had
got in the way of knitting stripes, and wouldn't stop it, beg as I
might--for she always thought her way was right, and couldn't be
improved.

Among other things she thought she knew all about medicine. There was
a system called "hot crop," or "steaming," and she believed in it, and
wanted everybody to take fiery hot drinks, and be steamed. That was
the chief reason why we were so afraid of her.

Her house was a very pleasant, cosy one, or would have been if it
hadn't had such a scent of herbs all through it. The first day we went
to school aunt Persis met us at the door, and asked Fel to put out her
tongue. Then she took us to a cupboard, and gave Fel something to
drink, that we both thought was coffee; but it was stinging hot
composition tea. Miss Rubie came into the kitchen just as Fel was
catching her breath over the last mouthful, and said she,--

"O, Persis, how could you?"

We followed Miss Rubie into the school-room as fast as we could go.
This school-room was right over a little cellar, just deep enough for
a grown person to stand up in. It was called the "jelly-cellar," and
when we were naughty Miss Rubie opened a trap-door and let us down. I
was so restless and noisy that for a while I spent half my time in
that cellar, surrounded by jars of jelly and jam. And I am afraid I
could say sometimes, "How sweet is solitude!" for there was just light
enough from the one window to give me a clear view of the jars, with
their nice white labels, and more than once I did--I blush to confess
it--I did put my fingers into a peach jar and help myself to
preserves. I was old enough to know better; I resisted the temptation
a great many days, but one unlucky morning I espied Dunie Foster
coming up from the cellar with jelly stains on her white apron, and
that set me to thinking.

"Ah, ha; Dunie eats perserves, and looks just as innocent's a lamb!
Folks think she's better 'n me, but she isn't, she's a
_make-believer_. I wonder if it's dreadful wicked to take perserves?
Prehaps auntie spects us to eat 'em. Any way, Fel Allen never gets put
down cellar, and it's real mean; and if I have to stay down there the
whole time I ought to have something to make me feel better; I feel
real hungry, and they ought to _spect_ I'd eat perserves." So I did
it; partly because Dunie did, partly because Fel wasn't punished and
ought to be, and partly because it was most likely auntie put 'em
there a-purpose! I think I never did it but three times; and the third
time it was thoroughwort and molasses! Strong, I assure you, boiled
down to a thick sirup. I had the jar at my lips, and had taken a long,
deep draught, when I happened to look up, and there was aunt Persis
going by the window, and looking straight down at me!

I was so startled by the bitter taste in my mouth and the sight of
aunt Persis, both coming at the same time, that I gave a little
scream, and pranced round and round the cellar like a wild animal.
Miss Rubie heard me, and came down to see what was the matter. She did
not ask if I had been meddling with the jars; but she must have known,
for a sticky stream was trickling over my dress, and I had set the
sirup down on the floor with the cover off. She bent a keen glance on
me, and at the same time I saw a little twinkle in her eye. I suppose
she thought my guilt would bring its own punishment, for she probably
knew the thoroughwort would make me sick.

"Are you ready now to be a good, quiet girl?" said she. I had been
shut down for noisiness.

"Yes'm," said I, meekly, and followed her up stairs.

But though my heart was heavy with shame, I could not help thinking,
"What orful tastin' perserves!" and wondering if aunt Persis really
was crazy, as Tempy Ann said she was.

Miss Rubie had had reason to think before that some of the children
went to those jars, but she did not say so; she merely remarked,--

"It is nearly noon, children; you may lay aside your books now, and,
if you like, I will tell you a story."

Everybody was pleased but me. I wanted to go home. The story was from
the text, "Thou, God, seest me." It was about Adaline Singleton, a
little girl who took her mother's cake without leave, and her mother
counted the slices, and found her out.

I could not look up at Miss Rubie all the while she was talking, but I
noticed Dunie Foster did. I was trying to rub that zigzag stream of
sirup off my apron; and O, how sick I grew! Would she ever stop?

I knew God had seen me yesterday and day before, when I ate peach
preserves, and I had no doubt it was to punish me that I had been
allowed to swallow this bitter stuff to-day. But, O, if I could go
home!

I never see that story of Adaline Singleton now among my books but it
calls up a remembrance of guilt and nausea too. I would give a great
deal, little Fly, if I hadn't so many bad things to remember. It is
because I hope to do you good that I am willing to tell of them. May
you have a purer childhood to look back upon!

Thankful was I when school was out that noon, but I wasn't able to go
again in the afternoon; and my mother knew why!

It was the last time I was ever put in that cellar. Miss Rubie found
another method of punishment; and I think I can say truthfully it was
the last time I ever took sweetmeats without leave. I did other wrong
things in plenty, but that I could never do again. When mother said I
might go to the box and get "half a dozen raisins," I got half a
dozen, and not a handful. Those solemn words rang in my ears,--"Thou,
God, seest me,"--just as Miss Rubie had spoken them in her low, sweet
tones.

For days I dared not meet aunt Persis's eye, but she treated me just
the same, often loading me down with pennyroyal and spearmint to take
home to mother. I did not know she was near-sighted, and had not seen
me drinking her thoroughwort. It was the first medicine of hers I had
ever taken, and that bitter taste in my mouth decided me, upon
reflection, that she _was_ crazy. As it proved, I was not very far
wrong.

There had been something the matter with her wits for two or three
years, and she was growing queerer and queerer. People began to wonder
what made her want to look at their tongues so much. She said now if
she met people on her way to church, "Please, put out your tongue;"
and sometimes said it on the very church steps. This was queer; but
they did not know how much queerer she was at home. We children could
have told how she came into the school-room and felt all our pulses,
but we thought Miss Rubie would be sorry to have us tell.

Her little boy Zed, about four years old, had to take her dreadful
medicines, of course, for medicine was the very thing auntie was crazy
about. He carried some of his doses into school to drink at recess,
and we all pitied him. Sometimes he ate dry senna and raisins mixed on
a plate, and we teased away the raisins, and he had to chew the senna
"bare." He cried then, and said we ought to help eat that too, and we
did. I thought it had a crazy taste, like the thoroughwort, and was
sorry Zed had a liver inside him, and wished that his mother hadn't
found it out.

Miss Rubie was very good and patient with us, but we began to dread to
go to school. I overheard Tempy Ann say to Polly Whiting,--

"The story is, that Mrs. Adams (aunt Persis) steamed her own mother
out of the world."

"You don't say so!" said Polly. "How long since?"

"About two years ago. The poor old lady sailed off very easy, with a
jug of hot water close to her nose."

That frightened us dreadfully. We knew aunt Persis steamed Zed, for
he said so; and what if she should steam us all out of the world with
jugs of hot water close to our noses? And she was always trying to
make Fel swallow something bad, and always talking about her white
face. "Tell your mother to let me have you for a month," said she,
"and I'll put roses into your cheeks, my dear."

Fel was so afraid that she trembled when we went into the house,
expecting auntie would spring out upon her, and set her over the fire
to steam. But she was such a patient, still little thing that she
never complained, even to her own mother, and I was too rattle-brained
to think much about it, though if I myself had expected to be cooked,
the whole town would have heard of it.

Zed grew paler and paler. I asked Miss Rubie, privately, "what made
his mother boil him?" And she smiled, though not as if she was happy,
and said,--

"She doesn't boil him when I can help it, dear."

About this time I heard my mother say to my father she wished uncle
John was at home, for auntie acted so odd, and her eyes looked so
strange.

"Yes, mamma," cried I, rushing in from the nursery, "she boils her
little boy, and she wants to boil Fel. I should think you'd tell Fel's
mother, for Fel dassent tell, she's so scared."

I think mother went right to Madam Allen with what I said, for the
next night, when I was at Squire Allen's, and Fel was sitting in her
mamma's lap, Madam Allen said,--

"Why didn't my little girl let me know she was afraid of Mrs. Adams?
When darling feels unhappy about anything she must always tell
mamma."

Fel was so glad somebody was going to protect her, that she threw her
arms about her mother's neck, and sobbed for joy. "Don't let her hurt
Zed either," said she. She was such a dear little soul, always
thinking about others.

"Now tell me if that boy has got a name?" spoke up grandpa Harrington.
That was what he always asked when any one spoke of Zed.

"Yes, sir; his name is Rosalvin Colvazart," said Madam Allen. "Zed is
for short."

"I know, I know, Rose Albert Coffeepot," laughed grandpa. He had said
that fifty times, but he always thought it a new joke.

That night, while we were all soundly asleep, we were suddenly
roused by the sharp ringing of the door-bell. Squire Allen went to the
door, and there, on the steps, stood our dear teacher, Martha Rubie,
in her night dress, with a shawl over her shoulders.

"O, Mr. Allen! O, madam! come quick! My sister is worse. She has
steamed Zed, and she was trying him with a fork; but I locked him into
the closet. Do come and take care of her. She is putting lobelia down
the cow's throat."

Fel and I screamed, and Tempy Ann had to come in and soothe us. Fel
wasn't willing her father and mother should go; but I said, "Don't you
be afraid; aunt Persis won't boil 'em; they're too big to get into the
kettle."

Tempy Ann laughed in her shaky way--which always made me provoked.

"Tempy Ann," cried I, jumping over the foot-board, "I guess _you_
wouldn't laugh if _you_ should be doubled up, and put over the stove!
You needn't think Fel and I are babies, and don' know what you said
about her boiling her mother up the chimney, with a jug on her nose;
but we do know, and it's so, and sober true, for we've seen the
kettle."

But it wasn't of the least use to reason with Tempy Ann when she had
one of those shaky spells. So silly as she was at such times, I almost
wished she could be boiled half a minute, to see if it wouldn't sober
her down.

It seems aunt Persis had really become very crazy indeed; and that
dear, sweet, patient, good Martha had been trying to keep it a secret;
but it couldn't be done any longer. She acted so badly that Martha
couldn't manage her. When Squire Allen went into the house, she was
stirring "Number Six" into some corn-meal for the hens, and was very
angry with him because he made her leave off and go to bed.

Father and mother had to take care of her till uncle John came; but
she was as sick as she was crazy, and did not live till October.

I remember looking at her beautiful, white face, the first I ever saw
in death, and thinking,--

"How glad auntie is to be so still."

No one told me she was tired, but somehow I knew it, for she was
always flying about in such a hurry, and I was sure it must rest her
very much to go to sleep. I received then a pleasant, peaceful
impression of death, which I never forgot.

Miss Rubie staid at Squire Allen's for some time, and taught Fel. Now
she is a person whom you all know very well; but I shall not tell who
she is till by and by.



CHAPTER VII.

THE LITTLE LIE-GIRL.


And now I will skip along to the next summer, and come to the dreadful
lie I told about the hatchet. You remember it, Horace and Prudy, how I
saw your uncle Ned's hatchet on the meat block, and heedlessly took it
up to break open some clams, and then was so frightened that I dared
not tell how I cut my foot. "O, mamma," said I, "my foot slipped, and
I fell and hit me on something; I don't know whether 'twas a hatchet
or a stick of wood; but I never touched the hatchet."

It was very absurd. I think I did not know clearly what I was
saying; but after I had once said it, I supposed it would not do to
take it back, but kept repeating it, "No, mamma, I never touched the
hatchet."

Mother was grieved to hear me tell such a wrong story, but it was no
time to reason with me then, for before my boot could be drawn off I
had fainted away. When I came to myself, and saw Dr. Foster was there,
it was as much as they could do to keep me on the bed. I was
dreadfully afraid of that man. I thought I had deceived mother, but I
knew I couldn't deceive him.

"So, so, little girl, you thought you'd make me a good job while you
were about it. There's no half-way work about you," said he. And then
he laughed in a way that rasped across my feelings like the noise of
sharpening a slate pencil, and said I mustn't be allowed to move my
foot for days and days.

Every morning when he came, he asked, with that dreadful smile,--

"Let us see: how is it we cut our foot?"

And I answered, blushing with all my might, "Just the same as I did in
the first place, you know, sir."

Upon which he would show all his white teeth, and say,--

"Well, stick to it, my dear; you remember the old saying, 'A lie well
stuck to is better than the truth wavering.'"

I did not understand that, but I knew he was making fun of me. I
understood what Ned meant; for he said flatly, "You've told a bouncer,
miss."

I was so glad Gust Allen wasn't in town; he was a worse tease than
Ned. When Abner came in to bring me apples or cherries, he always
asked,--

"Any news from the hatchet, Maggie?" And then chucked me under the
chin, adding, "You're a steam-tug for telling wrong stories. Didn't
know how smart you were before."

Miss Rubie said nothing; she came in with Fel every day; but I
presumed she was thinking over that solemn text, "Thou, God, seest
me."

'Ria did not say anything either; but I always felt as if she was just
going to say something, and dreaded to have her bring in my dinner.

I knew that father "looked straight through my face down to the
lie;" but I still thought that mother believed in me. One day I found
out my mistake. Ned had been saying some pretty cutting things, and I
appealed to her, as she came into the room:--

"Mayn't Ned stop plaguing me, mamma?"

"No more of that, Edward," said mother, looking displeased. "It is too
serious a subject for jokes. If Margaret has told us a wrong story,
she is, of course, very unhappy. Do not add to her distress, my son.
We keep hoping every day to hear her confess the truth; she may be
sure there is nothing that would make us all so glad."

So mother knew! She must have known all along! She turned to bring me
my dolly from the table, and I saw her eyes were red. I wanted to
throw myself on her neck and confess; but there was Ned, and somehow I
never saw mother alone after that when I could make it convenient.

She was right in thinking me unhappy, but she little dreamed how
wretched I was. Horace and Prudy, you have heard something of this
before; but I must tell it now to Dotty and Fly; for that hatchet
affair was a sort of crisis in my life.

You know I had not always told the truth. My imagination was active,
and I liked to relate wonderful stories, to make people open their
eyes. It was not wrong in the first place, for I was a mere baby. The
whole world was new and wonderful to me, and one thing seemed about as
strange to me as another. I could not see much difference between the
real and the unreal, between the "truly true" and the make believe.
When I said my mamma had silk dresses, spangled with stars, I was
thinking,--

"Perhaps she has. There's _sumpin_ in a trunk locked up, and I _guess_
it's silk dresses."

But as I grew older I learned better than to talk so. I found I
must keep such wild fancies to myself, and only tell of what I knew to
be true. Every time I wanted to utter a falsehood, a little voice in
my soul warned me to stop.

Fly, you are old enough to know what I mean. Your eyes say so. You
didn't hear that voice when you were patting round grandma's kitchen,
making Ruthie's coffee-mill buzz. You were too little to hear it then.
It had nothing to say to you when you stole your mamma's "skipt," and
soaked it in the wash-bowl; or when you stuffed your little cheeks
with 'serves without leave, or told lies, lies, lies, as often as you
opened your sweet little lips.

"You don't 'member actin' so?"

O, no; it was "so _many_ years ago!" But I was going to say you did
all those dreadful things, and still you were not naughty. Nobody
thinks any the worse of you to-day for all your baby-mischief. We
only laugh about it, for you did not know any better. But if you were
to do such things now, what _should_ we say? Your soul-voice would
tell you it was wrong, and it would be wrong.

My soul-voice talked to me, and I was learning to listen to it. I was
not in the habit of telling lies; I had been hurried and frightened
into this one, and now it seemed as if I could not stop saying it any
more than a ball can stop rolling down hill.

It was dreadful. I had to lie there on mother's bed and think about
it. I could not go out of doors, or even walk about the room. Fel had
lain in her pretty blue chamber day after day, too sick to eat
anything but broths and gruel; but then her conscience was easy. I
wasn't sick, and could have as many nice things to eat as the rest of
the family; still I was wretched.

My little friends came to see me, and were very sorry for me. I was
glad to be remembered; but every time I heard the door open, I
trembled for fear some one was going to say "hatchet."

And when I was alone again I would turn my face so I could watch the
little clock on the mantel. It ticked with a far-away, dreamy sound,
like a child talking in its sleep, and somehow it had always one story
to tell, and never any other;--"You've told--a lie;--you've told--a
lie."

"Well," thought I, "I know it; but stop plaguing me."

There was a pretty picture on the clock door of a little girl, with
her apron full of flowers. It was to this little girl that I
whispered, "Well, I know it; but you stop plaguing me." She went right
on just the same,--"You've told--a lie; you've told--a lie." I turned
my face to the wall to get rid of her, but always turned it back
again, for there was a strange charm about that dreadful little girl.
I could tell you now just how she was dressed, and which way she bent
her head with the wreath of flowers on it. You have noticed the old
clock in Ruth's room at grandpa's? That's the one. I never see it now
but its slow tick-tock calls to mind my sad experience with the
hatchet.

Days passed. I was doing my first real thinking. Up to that time I had
never kept still long enough to think. It was some comfort to draw the
sheet over my head, and make up faces at myself.

"You've told a lie, Mag Parlin. Just 'cause your afraid of getting
scolded at for taking the hatchet. You're a little lie-girl. They
don't believe anything what you say. God don't believe anything what
you say. He saw you plain as could be when you cut your foot, and
heard you plain as could be when you said you never touched the
hatchet. And there he is up in heaven thinking about you, and not
loving you at all! How can he? He don't have many such naughty girls
in his whole world. If he did, there'd come a rain and rain all day,
and all night, for as much as six weeks, and drown 'em all up 'cept
eight good ones, and one of 'em's Fel Allen. But 'twouldn't be you,
for you're a little lie-girl, and you know it yourself."

It is idle to say that children do not suffer. I believe I never
felt keener anguish than that which thrilled my young heart as I lay
on mother's bed, and quailed at the gaze of the little girl on the
clock door.

Still no one seemed to remark my unhappiness, and I have never heard
it alluded to since. Children keep their feelings to themselves much
more than is commonly supposed, especially proud children. And of
course I was not wretched all the time; I often forgot my trouble for
hours together.

But it was not till long after I had left that room that I could bring
my mind to confess my sin. I took it for granted I was ruined for
life, and it was of no use to try to be good. I am afraid of tiring
you, little Fly; but I want you to hear the little verse that grandpa
taught me one evening about this time, as I sat on his knee:

"If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our
sins."

I see you remember it, Dotty. Is it not sweet? "God is faithful and
just." I had always before repeated my verses like a parrot, I think;
but this came home to me. I wondered if my dreadful sin couldn't be
washed out, so I might begin over again. I knew what confess meant; it
meant to tell God you were sorry. I went right off and told him; and
then I went and told father, and I found he'd been waiting all this
time to forgive me. It was just wonderful! My heart danced right up. I
could look people in the face again, and wasn't afraid of the girl on
the clock door, and felt as peaceful and easy as if I'd never told a
lie in my life--only I hated a lie so. I can't tell you how I did hate
it.

"I'll never, never, never tell another as long as I breathe,"
whispered I to the blue hills, and the sky, and the fields, and the
river. And I knew God heard.

I suppose it is a little remarkable, Fly; but I believe this really
was my last deliberate lie. Children's resolves are not always the
firmest things in the world, and my parents did not know how much mine
was good for. They did not dream it had been burnt into my soul with
red-hot anguish.

I have always been glad, very glad, I was allowed to suffer so much,
and learn something of the preciousness of truth. It is a diamond with
a white light, children. There is no other gem so clear, so pure.



CHAPTER VIII.

THE TANSY CHEESE.


You are not to suppose from this that I became a good girl the very
next day. No, nor the day after. I ceased from the wickedness of
telling lies, just as I had stopped pilfering sweetmeats. This was
all; but it was certainly better than nothing.

I was soon able to play once more, only I could not run as fast as
usual. How pleasant it was out of doors, after my long stay in the
house! The flowers and trees seemed glad to see me, and I knew the
hens and cows were, and old Deacon Pettibone, the horse. I resumed my
old business of hunting hens' nests, though it was some weeks before
I dared jump off the scaffold, and it seemed odd enough to come down
on the ladder.

"I'd twice rather have it be you that had cut your foot, Fel Allen,"
said I, "for you don't want to run and jump; and folks that don't want
to, might just as well have a lame foot as not."

Fel couldn't quite understand that, though it was as clear to _me_ as
A B C. And after all my suffering, she wouldn't own I was as
"delicate" as she. I didn't like that.

"You don't remember how many bad things have happened to me," said I,
waving my thimble-finger, which had lost its tip-end in the
corn-sheller.

"Well, Ned's going to give you a gold thimble to pay for that, and I
suppose you're glad it's cut off," said Fel, who had never met with
an accident in her life, and was naturally ashamed of not having a
single scar or bruise on her little white body, not so much as a wart
or pimple to show me. I could not help feeling my superiority
sometimes, for I had been cut and burnt, and smashed and scalded, and
bore the marks of it, too.

"Well, but you don't have so bad headaches as me," said Fel,
recovering her self-esteem. "Your mamma never has to put mustard
_pace_ on your feet, and squeeze up burdock leaves and tie 'em on your
head, now, does she?"

"I don' know but she did when I was a baby; I never heard her say,"
returned I, coolly. "Folks don't think much of headaches. Polly
Whiting has 'em so she can't but just see out of her eyes. But that
isn't like hurting a place on you so bad your mother doesn't dass do
it up! I guess you'd think it _was_ something if you cut your foot
most in two, and the doctor had to come and stick it together!"

[Illustration: Squeezing Herdsgrass. Page 125.]

That silenced Fel, and I had the last word, as usual.

It was already quite late in the summer. One day Fel and I were
snuggled in the three-cornered seat in the trees, trying to squeeze
herdsgrass, to see which would be married first, when Ruthie came out
at the side door to sweep off the steps.

"Maggie 'll be pleased," said she; "but how we shall miss her little
mill-clapper of a tongue."

She was talking to 'Ria, who was going back and forth, doing something
in the kitchen.

"Yes, we shall miss her," said 'Ria; "but I shan't have her dresses
to mend. I pity poor cousin Lydia; she'll think--"

Then 'Ria's voice sounded farther off, and I did not hear what cousin
Lydia would think.

"Put your head down here, Fel Allen. I've found out something,"
whispered I, starting suddenly, and tearing my "tyer" on a nail.

"I'm going to cousin Lydia Tenney's."

"How do you know?"

"Why, didn't you hear 'Ria say she shouldn't have to mend my dresses?
That means I shan't be here, of course."

"Perhaps it means you'll be a better girl, and not tear 'em."

"O, no, it don't. 'Ria knows better 'n that. Didn't you hear her say
she pitied poor cousin Lydia? Well, it's because she'll have _me_ in
her house; and that's why 'Ria pities her."

"Then I wouldn't go to her house, if 'twill make her feel bad," said
Fel.

"O, I know what makes you say that; its because you don't want me to
go."

"Of course I don't. Who'd I have to play with?"

"Lize Jane Bean."

"H'm."

"Well, then, there's Dunie Foster; you think she's a great deal nicer
'n me."

"Now, Madge Parlin, I only said she kept her hair smoother; that's all
I said."

"Well, there's Abby Gray and Sallie Gordon," added I, well pleased
to watch the drooping of my little friend's mouth. "You can play with
them while I'm gone. And there's your own brother Gust, that _you_
think 's so much politer 'n Ned."

"You know there's nobody I like to play with so well as I do you,"
said Fel, laying her cheek against mine, and we sat a while, thinking
how dearly we did love each other. Then we saw Abner wheeling the
chaise out of the barn. I ran down the steps from the tree, and
asked,--

"Is anybody going anywhere, Abner?"

"Well, yes; I believe your pa's going over yonder," said he, pointing
off to the hills.

"Anybody--anybody going with him?"

"He talks of taking the Deacon," said Abner, dryly, as he began to
wrench off the wheels, and grease them.

"Madge, Madge, where are you?" called 'Ria, from the side door.
"Come into the house; I have something to tell you."

It was just as I expected. I was going to Bloomingdale to-morrow. The
news had been kept from me till the last possible moment, for when I
was excited about anything, I was noisier than ever, and as Ruthie
said, "stirred up the house dreadfully."

Next morning father tucked me into the chaise, behind old Deacon. I
didn't know why it was, but I couldn't help thinking about the
hatchet, and wondering mother should have taken so much pains to get
such a naughty girl ready. I had been told I might stay till after
apple-gathering, and I was glad, for I wanted to make Fel as lonesome
as she had made me those two weeks she spent in Boston. I had never
been away from home but twice to stay over night, and my playmates
couldn't any of them know my true value, of course.

But as I looked at the dear friends on the piazza, growing dearer
every minute, especially mother, I had my doubts whether I cared much
about cousin Lydia's apples.

"She'll be back with father," remarked Ned, "as homesick as a kitten."

"Just you see if I do!"

It was well we were driving away just then, for my brave laugh came
very near ending in a sob.

"I'm on business," said father, whipping up the Deacon, "and shall
come back to-morrow; but you can do as you please, Totty-wax--you can
come with me, or wait a month or six weeks, and come with cousin
Lydia."

I was disposing, privately, of a stray tear, and could not answer.

"Your cousin will take the cars," said he.

"Take the cars!" I slipped off the seat, and stood upright in my
surprise. The railroad had only just been laid to one corner of
Willowbrook, and I had never taken a car in my life; had never seen
one; didn't even know how it looked. This had been a great
mortification to me ever since Fel went to Boston.

"O, father," cried I, whirling round and getting caught in the reins,
"did you say the cars? I s'posed cousin Lydia would come in a wagon,
and I didn't know 's I cared about staying. _Did_ you say the cars?"

"There, there; don't fall out over the Deacon's back. Did you ever
hear what the water-wagtail said?"

Then I knew father was laughing at me. When I was so happy I
couldn't keep still, he often asked me if I ever heard what a small
bird, called the water-wagtail, said, who thought the world was made
for him:--


    "Twas for my accommodation
       Nature rose when I was born;
     Should I die, the whole creation
       Back to nothing would return."


That was what the little bird said. But father was mistaken this time.
I felt remarkably humble for me. I had been thinking so much about the
hatchet that I couldn't have a very high opinion of myself, to save my
life.

It was twenty miles to cousin Lydia's. When we got there she was
looking for us. I knew her very well, but had never been at her house
before. It was a pretty white cottage, with woodbines creeping over
it, and Boston pinks growing by the front door-stone. There was a red
barn and barnyard on one side of the house, and a woodshed on the
other; and in front of the porch door, facing the street, was a well,
with an old oaken bucket, hanging on a pole. I had never seen a
well-sweep before, and supposed it must be far nicer than a pump.

Cousin Lydia had a farmer husband in a striped frock, and a beautiful
old mother in a black dress and double-frilled cap. Then there were
her husband's two sisters, who lived with her, and a cat and a dog;
but not a child to be seen.

I didn't feel quite clear in my mind about staying; but cousin Lydia
seemed to expect I would, and showed me a little cheese-hoop, about as
big round as a dinner-plate, saying she would press a cheese in it on
purpose for me, and I might pick pigweed to "green" it, and tansy to
give it a fine taste. So I should almost make the cheese myself; what
would my mother say to that? Then there were the beehives, which were
filling with honey, and some late chickens, which were going to chip
out of the shell in a week. Remarkable events, every one; but it was
the tansy cheese which decided me at last, and I told father he might
go without me; I wanted to stay and make a visit.

It was not till he was fairly out of sight that I remembered what a
long visit it would be. Why, I shouldn't see mother for as much as a
month! A new and dreadful feeling swept over me, as if I was left all
alone in the great empty world, with nothing to comfort me as long as
I lived.

Samantha, one of Mr. Tenney's sisters, found me an hour afterwards
sitting beside a chicken-coop, crying into my apron. She asked me if I
was homesick. I thought not; I only wanted to see my mother, and I
felt bad "right here," laying my hand on the pit of my stomach. The
feeling was not to be described, but I did not know homesickness was
the name for it.

Samantha consoled me as well as she could with colored beads to
string, and a barrel of kittens out in the barn. I felt a little
better at dinner time, for the dinner was very nice; but my spirits
were still low.

Julia, the other young lady, was not very fond of little girls, and
had no box of trinkets as Samantha had, or, at any rate, did not show
any to me. She seemed to be always talking privacy with her sister, or
with cousin Lydia, and always sending me out of the room. Not that she
ever told me, in so many words, to go away--but just as if I didn't
know what she meant!

"Don't you want to go out in the barn and hunt for eggs?" said she.

No, I certainly didn't. If I had wanted to I should have found it out
without her speaking of it. But I was only a little girl; so I had to
go, and couldn't answer back. The neighbors' children were few and far
between; and though I strolled about for hours behind cousin Joseph
Tenney and the hired man, there were times when I liked to see what
was going on in the kitchen, and it was vexing to hear Julia say,--

"If I was a little girl about your age, I never should get tired of
looking at that speckled bossy out in the barn."

Indeed! I almost wished she had to be fastened into the stall a while,
just to _see_ if she wouldn't get tired of that speckled bossy.

But when the time came to make my cheese, I had a right to stay in
the house. Cousin Lydia let me look on, and see it all done. First, I
picked the pigweed and tansy, or how could she have made the cheese?
Then she strained some milk into a pan, and squeezed the green juices
through a thin cloth. After that she put in a little rennet with a
spoon.

"There," said she, "isn't that a pretty color? Watch it a few minutes,
and you will see it grow thick, like blanc-mange, and that will be
curd."

Then she made some white curd in another pan, without any green
juice. After the curd "came," it was very interesting to cross it off
with a pudding-stick, and this she let me do myself. Next morning she
drained the curd in a cloth over a cheese-basket, and put on a stone
to press out the whey. When it was drained dry enough, she let me cut
it up in the chopping-tray, and she mixed the two curds together, the
green and the white, salted them, and put them in that cunning hoop,
and then set the hoop in the cheese-press, turned a crank, and weighed
it down with a flatiron. There, that is the way to make a cheese. When
it came out of the press it was a perfect little beauty, white, with
irregular spots of green, like the streaks in marble cake. I knew then
how that greedy Harry felt, in the story, when his mother sent him a
plum cake, and he couldn't wait for a knife, but "gnawed it like a
little dog."

Of course I did not gnaw the cheese, but I did want to have it cut
open, to see if it tasted like any other I ever ate. But cousin Lydia
covered it with tissue paper, and oiled it, and set it in a safe, and
every day she oiled it again, and turned it. I would have spent half
my time looking at it, only she said I must not open the dairy-room
door to let the flies in.



CHAPTER IX.

"WAXERATION."


Still, in spite of cheeses, beehives, bossies, and kittens, I had many
lonesome hours, and sometimes cried after I went to bed. Samantha must
have known it, for I slept with her; I was afraid to sleep alone.

There were times when I thought I would start off secretly, and go
home on foot. I asked the hired man how long he supposed it would take
a little girl to walk to Willowbrook, and what were the chances of her
getting lost if she should try it? I thought I spoke in such a guarded
way that Seth would not have the least idea what I meant; but he must
have been very quick-witted, for he understood in a minute. He did
not let me know it, though, and only answered coolly,--

"Wal, I should think now it would take her about a week's steady
travel, and no knowing but she'd starve to death on the road. Why,
_you_ hain't heerd of a little gal that thinks of such a thing, I
hope?"

"No; I don't see many little girls," said I, with a dismal sigh; "they
don't have anything here but bossies and horses."

I did not know, till Seth nipped it in the bud, what a sweet hope I
had been cherishing. Should I truly starve to death if I took my
little cheese in a basket on my arm, and some doughnuts and
turn-overs? But no, it would be stealing to take things out of cousin
Lydia's cupboard, and run off with them. I would rather stay at
Bloomingdale and suffer, than be a thief.

I know now that Seth told cousin Lydia what I said to him, and her
kind heart was touched. I am sure she must have had a hard time with
me, for she knew nothing about children, and was as busy as she could
be with her dairy and her "fall work." I ought not to have been so
unhappy. Some children at that age, with so much done for their
amusement, would have felt perfectly contented; but I had naturally a
restless disposition, and wanted, as Ned said, "sumpin diffunt."

Ah, Horace! very gallant in you to say I have "got bravely over it."
Thank you, dear; I hope I have, to some degree; still I might have got
over it much younger if I had only tried a little harder. A child of
seven is old enough to be grateful to its friends, when they do all
they can for its comfort and pleasure.

Cousin Lydia wrote mother about my state of mind; and it troubled her.
She talked with Madam Allen, who was always full of plans. Madam
thought a minute, and then said,--

"Poor Marjie, we can't have her homesick. Do you suppose she would
like to have Ruphelle go there and stay with her?"

Of course mother knew I would be happy with Ruphelle.

Then Madam Allen wished mother would please write cousin Lydia, and
ask if Fel might go to Bloomingdale a few weeks. She hoped the
mountain air would be strengthening to the dear little girl, who
seemed rather drooping.

Cousin Lydia was willing; and Madam Allen sent Ruphelle by cars,
with a gentleman and lady who were going to Boston. Not a word was
said to me; and when Seth harnessed the horse and went to the station
to meet her, I supposed he was only "going to see his mother;" for
that was what he always said when I asked any questions. It was about
three miles to the flag station, and I believe his mother lived
somewhere on the way.

I was not watching for him to come back, or thinking anything about
him, when I happened to look out of the window and see him helping a
little girl out of the wagon. The red and white plaid looked exactly
like Fel's dress; and as the little girl turned around, there were the
soft, brown eyes, and the dark, wavy hair, and the lovely pale face of
Fel Allen herself!

I never expect to be much happier till I get to heaven than I was
for the next hour or two. I danced and screamed, and laughed and
cried, and wondered how Fel could keep so calm, when we hadn't seen
each other for as much as three weeks.

"I don't see what's the matter with me," sobbed I; "I never was so
glad in my life; but I can't help a-crying!"

Fel was not one of the kind to go wild. She usually knew what she was
about. Supper was ready, and she sat at the table, and ate honey on
her bread and butter, as if she really enjoyed it; also answered every
one of cousin Lydia's many questions like a little lady.

I had no appetite, and could hardly have told what my name was if any
one had asked me.

But from that time my homesickness was gone. I took my little friend
all about the farm, which was a very nice place, only I had never
thought of it before, and showed her the speckled bossy, which seemed
to have grown handsomer all in one night.

"Here are some black currants, Fel; do you like 'em?"

"O, yes."

"Why, I don't; I just despise 'em."

"Well, I don't like 'em _very_ well," said Fel; for after our long
separation she could not bear to disagree with me in anything.

"Cousin Lydia," said I, very soon after Fel came, "may we tell scare
stories after we go to bed? She wants us to."

Cousin Lydia did not know what I meant by "scare stories."

"It's all the awful things we can think of," said I, eagerly. "And we
like to, for we want to see 'f our hair 'll stand out straight."

Cousin Lydia laughed, and said "children were perfect curiosities."

"It makes us shiver all over. It's splendid," said I.

"Well, you may try it this once," said cousin Lydia, "if you'll stop
talking the moment I tap on the wall."

So, as soon as we got into bed we began. "You tell first," said
Ruphelle; "you can tell the orfulest, and then I'll tell."

"Mine'll be about the Big Giant," said I, clearing my throat.


_The Big Giant._

"Once upon a time he had three heads, and he roared so you could hear
him a mile."

"That isn't anything," said Fel; "my hair don't stand out a bit."

"Why, I hadn't but just begun. You wait and see what comes next. Did
I say the Big Giant had three heads? He had sixteen. And every one of
'em had three mouths, and some had ten; and they made a noise when he
chewed grass like----like thunder."

"It don't scare me a bit," said Fel, stoutly.

"Did I say the Big Giant ate grass? He ate _fire_; he ate live coals,
the _liver_ the better."

"I should have thought 'twould have burnt him all up," said Fel.

"There, miss, you needn't pretend not to be scared! I'm so scared
myself I can't but just tell!--No, it didn't burn him up; it came out
at his great big nose. And when the Big Giant walked along the streets
folks ran away, for he blazed so. And there wasn't enough water in
Willowbrook to put him out!"

"He didn't live at Willowbrook?"

"O, yes, right between your house and my house; _and lives there
now_!"

By that time Fel began to tremble and creep closer to me.

"Tell some more," said she, laughing. "It don't scare me a bit."

And I told, and I told. There was no end to the horrible things that
Big Giant had done, was doing, or was going to do.

"Does your hair stand up, Fel?"

"No; feel and see if it does. But there's a creepy feeling goes over
me; don't it over you?"

"Yes," said I, highly excited. "Got your eyes shut, Fel?"

"Yes, shut up tight."

"Open 'em," said I, solemnly; "for how do you know but that Big
Giant's got into this room? Can't you _see_ the fire coming out of his
nose?"

Fell couldn't, exactly.

"Get out," said I, "and get the wash-bowl and pitcher, and let's throw
it at him kersplash."

"I dassent," said Fel, faintly.

"Nor I dassent neither."

By that time I was out of bed, much more frightened than Fel was, and
calling "Cousin Lydia," as loud as I could shout. She came in in great
surprise, and it was some time before she could succeed in calming us.
I remember how heartily she laughed, and how my teeth chattered. I
actually had to be wrapped in a blanket and dosed with ginger tea. I
wonder how many times cousin Lydia said,--

"Well, children ARE perfect curiosities."

       *       *       *       *       *

We could not think of such a thing as spending the night alone after
all this, and Samantha was obliged to get into our bed and sleep in
the middle. Cousin Lydia said we made too much hard work for the
family by telling "scare stories," and we must not do it again while
we staid at her house.

"I have just found out, Marjie, why it is that you are afraid to sleep
alone," said she; "it is because you allow yourself to think about
such frightful things. Is it not so?"

"Yes'm," said I, quivering in the blanket.

"Well, child, you must stop it at once; it is a very foolish habit,
and may grow upon you. Never think of dreadful things. Say your little
prayer, asking God to take care of you, and then lie down in peace,
for he will certainly do it. Ruphelle, are you ever afraid?"

"No'm, only when I'm with Marjie; but I like to hear her tell
things; I ask her to."

Fel often said she had beautiful thoughts about angels after she went
to bed, and dreamed that they came and stood by her pillow.

Ah, that was no common child; she lived very near the gates of heaven.
Strange I could have associated with her so much, and still have been
so full of wrong desires and naughty actions!

Julia Tenney, who was not very fond of children, certainly not of
me, took a decided fancy to Fel the moment she saw her. I soon found
this out, for she did not try to conceal it, and said more than once
that "that child was too good for this world." I thought everybody
liked her better than me, from Miss Julia down to the cat. I did not
consider this at all strange; only I longed to do something to show
myself worthy of praise, as well as she.

There was a panic at that time about small-pox, and the doctor came
one day to vaccinate everybody in the house. We children looked on
with great interest to see the lancet make a scratch in cousin Lydia's
arm, and then in Miss Samantha's, and Miss Julia's.

"Now for the little folks," said the doctor, and drew Fel along to
him; but she broke away in great alarm, and began to cry. "Well,
well," said the doctor, turning to me, "here's a little lady that will
come right up, I know she will; _she_ won't mind such a thing as a
prick of a needle."

No, I really didn't mind it; why should I, when I had been gashed
and slashed all my life? So I walked up very quickly to show my
courage. I guessed they wouldn't laugh about my Big Giant now! I
rolled back my sleeve with an air of triumph, and looked down on Fel,
who shrank into a corner. Everybody was surprised, and said, "Well
done!" and hoped I wasn't _all_ the brave child there was in the
house.

I walked on thrones, I assure you; for there was Fel crying, and
begging to wait till after dinner. Why, she hadn't any more courage
than a chicken. I was ashamed of her. The doctor said he would wait
till after dinner if she would surely have it done then.

"O, you little scare-girl!" said I, as he walked out to talk with
cousin Joseph, and we two children were left alone in the room.

The doctor had laid his lancet and the little quill of vaccine
matter on the table, having no thought, I suppose, that such small
children as we would dare touch them.

"I can waxerate as well as he can," said I, taking up the lancet, "for
I watched him. Push up your sleeve, Fel, and I'll waxerate you, and
then when the doctor does it, you'll get used to it, you know."

"Don't you, _don't_ you touch that sharp thing, Madge Parlin."

"Poh! do you think I'm a little scare-girl like you?" returned I,
proudly, for my little head was quite turned with flattery. "He didn't
say folks musn't touch it, did he, Miss Fel? It's just like a needle;
and who's afraid of a needle but you? I'll waxerate _me_, if _you_
don't dast. Just you look! When I've done it three times to me, will
you let me do it to you?"

Fel wouldn't promise, but I went boldly to work. Let me count the
scars--yes, twenty scratches I made above my elbow, never forgetting
the vaccine, saying, as I stopped to take breath,--

"Ready now, Fel?"

She never was ready, but she stood looking on with such meekness and
awe, that I was just as well satisfied. After the doctor was gone, and
she was in cousin Lydia's lap, quite overcome by the fright of
"waxeration," I told what I had done, expecting to be praised.

"Why, Maggie!" said cousin Lydia, really shocked, "what will you do
next? It was very, very wrong for you to meddle with the doctor's
lancet."

"Ah, well," said Miss Julia, "I guess she'll be a sick enough child
when it 'takes.'"

I did not understand that, but I saw I had sunk again in
everybody's esteem. And that very afternoon Miss Julia allowed Fel,
who had been such a coward, to dress up in her bracelets, rings, pin,
and even her gold watch, only "she must be sure and not let Maggie
touch them."

Of course I see now what a heedless child I was, and don't wonder
Miss Julia wished to preserve her ornaments from my fingers; still she
ought not to have given them to Fel before my very eyes. I thought it
was hard, after scratching myself so unmercifully, not to have either
glory or kisses, or even a bosom-pin to wear half an hour. My arm
smarted, and I felt cross. As Miss Julia went out of the room she
patted Fel's head, but took no notice of me, and cousin Lydia did the
very same thing two minutes afterwards. It was more than I could
bear.

"Ho, little _borrow-girl_," said I to Fel, "got a gold watch, too!
'Fore I'd wear other folks's things! I don't wear a single one thing
on me but b'longs to me; you may count 'em and see!"

It seemed as if I could not let her alone; but such was the sweetness
of nature in that dear little girl that she loved me through
everything.

"I thought you wanted to go out doors and play with me," said I; "and
if you do, you'd better take off your borrowed watch!"

Fel did not answer, but tucked the watch into her bosom; and we went
out in no very pleasant mood.



CHAPTER X.

"THE CHILD'S ALIVE."[*]

(* The following is a true incident.)



Samantha and Julia were gone to a neighbor's that afternoon, and
cousin Lydia was filling a husk-bed in the barn. There was no one at
home but lame and half-blind grandma Tenney.

"I don't care if they are gone, for they all think I'm a naughty, bad
girl," thought I. "O, why don't they love me? My mamma loves me, and
hugs me every day when I'm home."

I walked along to the well, my eyes half-blinded by tears. That
well-sweep had always fascinated me, and I had been allowed to play
with it freely; but lately cousin Joseph had observed that the curb,
or framework round the mouth of the well, was out of order; the boards
were old, and the nails were loosened; he should put on new boards as
soon as he could stop; but until he did so, I must let it alone. Would
I remember?

"Yes, sir," said I, at the same time thinking in this wise: "Why, I
drawed water day before yes'day, and he didn't say the boards were
old. How could they grow old in one day?"

Still I fully intended to obey. I forgot myself when I said,--

"Fel, le's do a washing, and wash our dollies' clo'es. I'll go get a
little tinpail to draw water with."

For I could not lift the bucket.

"Well," said she; "and I'll go get a cake o' soap."

She had heard nothing about the well-curb, and did not know we were
doing wrong to draw water. She enjoyed swinging the pole just as much
as I did, and we soon forgot our slight disagreement as we watched the
little pail drop slowly into the well.

"There are stars down there," said I, "for I saw 'em once; they say
it's stars, but I shouldn't wonder if 'twas pieces of gold--should
you?"

I was letting the pail down as I spoke, and Fel was leaning against
the curb, peeping into the well.

"O, I forgot," cried I; "cousin Joseph said--"

But even before I had finished the sentence, the rotten boards gave
way, and Fel pitched suddenly forward into the well!

My brain reeled; but next moment my reason--all I ever had and more
too--came to my aid. I can't account for it, but I felt as strong and
brave as a little woman, and called out,--

"Take hold of the pole, Fel! take hold of the pole!"

I don't know whether she heard me or not, for her screams were coming
up hoarse and hollow from the watery depths. All I know is, she did
put out both her little hands, and clutch that short pole. The
ten-quart pail was dangling from the end of the pole, within two feet
of the water.

What was I to do? I could draw up the little tin pail, but not such a
heavy weight as Fel. My hope was that I might keep her above water a
while, and as long as I could, of course she would not drown. It was a
wise thought, and showed great presence of mind in a child of my age.
I am glad I have this one redeeming fact to tell of myself--I, who ran
wild at the silly story of a make-believe Big Giant!

Yes, I held up that long pole with all the might of my little arms,
crying all the while to Seth in the barn,--

"Come quick! come quick!"

It was just as much as I could do. I am sure strength must have been
granted me for the task. For a long while, or what seemed to me a long
while, nobody heard. Seth was making a great noise with his flail, and
if my shout reached his ears he only thought it child's play; but when
it kept on and on, so shrill and so full of distress, he dropped his
flail at last and ran.

Not a moment too soon; my little strength was giving out.

"Jethro! what's this?" cried he, and caught the pole from my hand.
"Well, you're a good one! Don't be scared, little dear." That was to
Fel. "Hold on tight, and I'll fetch you up in a jiffy."

She did hold on; stupefied as she was, she still had sense enough to
cling to the pole.

"There, there, that's a lady! Both arms round my neck! Up she comes!"

By that time cousin Lydia was on the spot, looking ashy white, and
Seth, with Fel in his arms, was rocking her back and forth like a
baby, and saying, "There, there, little girlie, don't cry."

"The Lord be praised!" exclaimed cousin Lydia; "the child's alive! the
child's alive!"

"Yes, and this Marjie here is a good one," said Seth, pointing to me;
"she's got the right stuff in her. I never saw a young one of that age
do anything so complete in my life."

I cried then; it was the first time I could stop to cry. Cousin Lydia
put her arms round me, and kissed me; and that kiss was sweet to my
soul.

Seth carried Fel into the house. She was trembling and sobbing
violently, and did not seem at first to understand much that was said
to her. Cousin Lydia rubbed her, and gave her some cordial to drink,
and I looked on, half proud and half ashamed. Seth kept saying there
were five feet of water in the well, and if I hadn't held Fel up, she
must have drowned before anybody could get to her. I knew I had been
very brave, and had saved Fel's life. I knew it before Seth said so.
But who drowned her in the first place? I expected every minute cousin
Lydia would ask that question; but she didn't; she never seemed to
think of it.

When the young ladies came home, Miss Julia took me in her lap, and
said,--

"Well, Marjery, you're a smart child; there's no doubt about it--a
very smart child."

Just think of that from Miss Julia! It wouldn't have been much from
Miss Samantha, for she had a soft way with her; but Miss Julia! Why,
it puffed me out, and puffed me out, till there was about as much
substance to me as there is to a great hollow soap-bubble.

"Yes," said cousin Joseph, in his slow way, "Marjery is smart enough,
but she ought to be very smart to make up for her heedlessness."

There, he had pricked the bubble that time! I twinkled right out.

And it was the last time Julia admired me; for she happened to think
just then of her gold watch. It was not on Fel's neck; it had gone
into the well where the stars were. Seth got it out, but it was
battered and bruised, and something had happened to the inside of it,
so it wouldn't tick.

Miss Julia never took me in her lap again; but she liked Fel as well
as ever. She said Fel was not at all to blame. I knew she wasn't, and
somehow, after that dreadful affair, I was willing people should love
Fel better than me. I had been fairly frightened out of my crossness
to her. O, what if I _had_ drowned her? Every time I wanted to snub
her I thought of that, and stopped. I suppose I put my arms round her
neck fifty times, and asked, "Do you love me _jus_ the same as if I
hadn't drowned you?"

And she said "Yes," every time, the precious darling!

I had a very lame arm not long after this; it almost threw me into a
fever. I was ashamed to have that doctor come, for they had told me
what was the matter. It has always been my luck, children, if I ever
tried to show off, to get nicely paid for it!

Now I think of it, Dotty, how easily Fel could have turned upon me at
this time, and said, "Ho, little meddle-girl! Got a sore arm, too!"

But you may be sure she never thought of such a thing. It grieved her
to see me lie in bed, and toss about with pain. She sat beside me, and
patted my cheeks with her little, soft hands, and sometimes read to
me, from a Sabbath school book, about a good girl, named Mary
Lothrop,--she could read as well as most grown people, for she really
was a remarkable child,--but I didn't like to hear about Mary Lothrop,
and begged her to stop.

"She's too tremendous good," said I. "It killed her to be so good, and
I'm afraid--"

I believe I never told Fel what I was afraid of; but it was, that she
was "too tremendous good" herself, and would "die little," as Mary
Lothrop did. I thought she seemed like Mary; and hadn't Miss Julia
said she was too good for this world? O, what if God should want her
up in heaven? I had thought of this before; but if I had really
believed it, I should all along have treated her very differently. We
should none of us speak unkindly if we believed our friends were soon
going away from us, out of this world. What would I give now if I had
never called the tears into that child's gentle eyes!

My arm got well, and the next thing that happened was a letter from
home--to us two little chickens, Fel and me both. Seth brought it
from the "post-ovviz," directed to Miss Ruphelle Allen and Miss
Margaret Parlin, care of Joseph Tenney, Esq. Here it lies in my
writing-desk, almost as yellow as gold, and quite as precious. How
many times do you suppose we little girls read it and kissed it? How
many times do you suppose we went to sleep with it under our pillows?
We took turns doing that, and thought it brought us pleasant dreams.

Her mother wrote one page of the letter, and my mother another; 'Ria a
few lines, and Ned these words, in a round hand:--


     "DEAR SISTER: I suppose you want to hear all about our house and
     barn. I went to Gus Allen's party. We trained, and a pretty set
     of fellows we were."


That was all he told about our house and barn, and he did not sign
his name. Perhaps he would have said more after resting a while; but
Miss Rubie saved him the trouble, and ended the letter, by inviting
"you darlings,"--Fel and me,--to her wedding, which was to take place
in a few weeks.

We had a little waltzing to do then! A wedding! We danced right and
left, with that letter under our feet.

"I should think you'd better read on, and see what the man's name is,
you little Flutterbudgets," said cousin Joseph, laughing at us.

We hadn't thought of that. We looked, and found it was uncle John!
Another surprise. It was a new idea to both of us, that a man who had
had one wife should ever have another. We remembered aunt Persis, who
wanted to steam Fel.

"And she died years, and years, and _years_ ago."

"About eleven months," said cousin Lydia. Your uncle John is obliged
to go to England this fall, and wants to take Zed; and I am very glad
Miss Rubie is willing to be Zed's mother, and will go with them."

"How can she be his mother?" said I. "She's his auntie."

But we didn't care about the relationship, Fel and I; all we cared
about was the wedding. And I did hope I should have a string of wax
beads to wear on my neck.

Here is our reply to the letter. (The words in Italics are Fel's.)


     "DEAR LITTLE MOTHERS: We thought we would write to you. _We are
     glad we shall go to the wedding._ Do you think you can buy me
     some wax beeds? _We want to see you very much._ But I want the
     wax beeds, too. Fel said a prayer for my sickness. I think she
     is a very pias girl. The cow is dead, &c., & ect. So good by."


        "From MAJ and RUPHELLE."



CHAPTER XI.

THE FIRST CAR RIDE.


It seemed as if cousin Lydia never would get ready to start. Ever
since the letter from our mammas, Fel and I had been sure we were
wanted at home; but there was no end to the things cousin Lydia had to
do, and so far as we could see, Miss Samantha and Miss Julia didn't
help her much. We dared not say this, however; we laid it away in our
minds, with twenty other things we meant to tell our mothers when we
got home.

My great consolation while waiting was a Maltese kitten with white
toes, and eyes the color of blue clay; and when, at last, the joyful
time came for going to Willowbrook, I begged to take that kitty with
us. Miss Julia said, "Nonsense!" But cousin Lydia was really a
sensible woman; for what did she do but butter Silvertoe's paws, and
tie her into an egg-basket.

"But you must take care of her yourself, Maggie; I shall have my hands
full with you, and Ruphelle, and the baggage."

Kitty behaved beautifully at first; but presently the rough mountain
roads began to jar upon her nerves, I think; for by the time the stage
reached the station, she was scratching and mewing at such a rate that
I was ashamed of her. I lagged behind, so cousin shouldn't hear.

And was this the depot? A jail, I should say. Such a wicked man
staring through the hole in the wall! Wonder what he was put in for?

"The ticket-master, that is," said cousin Lydia, smiling at me, though
I hoped she couldn't see what I had been thinking.

Then she bought the tickets; but she wouldn't let Fel or me keep ours.
She said the kitty was all I could manage. So I should think!

We heard a shriek like my Big Giant. It frightened me dreadfully; I
began to think there _was_ such a man. No wonder kitty jumped. Next
moment some yellow things came tearing along. Then I knew it was the
cars.

"Come," said cousin Lydia, climbing the steps.

Well, I intended to come. My foot was just a little stiff, but I was
hurrying as fast as I could, when up sprang the cover of the basket,
and out popped the kitty. Of course, I wasn't going without
Silvertoes. She scampered round the end of the depot, and I ran after
her. It was of no use; she dropped into a hole. I couldn't have been
gone half a minute; but those yellow things took that time to whisk
off. I ran the whole length of the platform, calling, "Whoa!" but they
never stopped.

The black-whiskered man had come out of his cell, and was locking the
depot door.

"O, won't you stop that railroad? Please, for pity's sake!"

The man made no reply; only shut one eye and whistled. I danced and
screamed. There were those things puffing out of breath, and
determined not to stop.

"'Tain't no use to make a rumpus. The cars won't take back tracks for
nobody."

I thought he didn't understand.

"Why, my cousin Lydia bought me a ticket, sir, right out of that hole.
Don't you _know_ she did? And that railroad went off and left me. I
was getting in in a minute, as soon as I found my kitty!"

"O, that's it, hey? Well, you see this ere's only a flag-station, and
they don't stop for cats."

I began to cry. The man patted me on the back, just as if I had a
fish-bone in my throat, and called me "Poor sissy." It made me very
angry--seven _whole_ years old--to be called sissy! I wiped my eyes at
once, and told him decidedly that I thought my cousin would make the
"driver" come back for me.

The man whistled harder. This caused me to feel a little like a dog
that has lost his master; and I felt so all the more when the man
pointed his finger at me and told me to follow him, and he would try
to get me "put up" for the night. But not knowing anything better to
do, I trudged after him with my empty basket, forgetting all about the
kitten.

We crossed the road, and went through a long yard where clothes were
drying, till we came to a little brown house. Near the open door of
the porch sat a woman beating eggs in a yellow pudding-dish. She had a
skin somewhat the color of leather, and wore a leather-colored dress,
gold beads, a brass-topped comb, and gold ear-drops, like upside down
exclamation points. I thought she looked a little like a sheepskin
book father had in a gilt binding.

"This little creeter got left by the train, Harr'et; I don't see but
we shall have to eat and sleep her. What say?"

"Eat and sleep me!" I took a step backward. Of course they did not
mean what they said; but I thought joking on this occasion was in
very poor taste.

"Got left over? Poor little dear!"

The woman stopped her work to pity me, and drops of egg dripped from
the fork-tines like yellow tears. I fell to crying then.

"It seems she's some related to Captain Tenney's folks," said the
whistling man, ending with another love-pat, and "Poor Sissy!"

But even those insulting words could not stop my crying this time.

"Leave her to me, Peter," said the woman. "Most likely she's afraid of
men folks."

The man went away, to my great relief, and she took my bonnet and
cloak, and then made me tell her all about my trials, while she beat
time with her fork. My mouth once open, I talked steadily, giving the
complete history of my life between my sobs,--only leaving out my lie
about the hatchet.

"Something cut my foot and I go a little lame, or I could have catched
that kitty,--she has white _pors_. But _does_ the railroad have any
right to run off and leave folks that's bought tickets?"

"Never mind, dear, you're welcome to stay over with us. Brother Peter
and I never calculate to turn folks away while we have a crust to eat,
or a roof to cover us."

"O, dear, what poor people!" I ought not to stay. But it seemed they
were to have something to-night better than crusts. Harr'et was frying
pancakes,--how could she afford it?--and shaking them out of the
kettle with a long-handled skimmer into a pan in a chair. She brought
me one, which she called her "try-cake;" but it didn't look like
Ruth's, and I was too homesick to eat; so I managed to slip it into my
pocket.

Harr'et wore heavy calfskin shoes, and shook the house fearfully when
she walked. I couldn't help thinking of what she had said about the
roof, and it seemed as if it might fall any minute and "cover us,"
sure enough.

While I sat on the door-step watching her, all forlorn, she drew out a
red armchair, gave it a little twitch, as you would to a sunshade, and
lo! it turned into a table, with a round top. Then she covered it with
a cloth, from a drawer in the chair part of the table, and put on some
green and white dishes.

When tea was ready, the whistling man seemed to know it, and came in.
It didn't look very inviting to me. The biscuits were specked with
brown spots as if the oven had freckled them; and I didn't like
molasses for sauce.

I thought of home, and the nice supper cousin Lydia was eating there,
and could almost see her sitting next to mother, with my purse in her
pocket, and my ticket too. And I could almost see Fel, and hear her
queer grandpa asking her questions, while Miss Rubie looked on, all
smiling, and dressed in her wedding-gown, of course.

They all thought I was lost, and they should never see me again.
Perhaps they never would. How could I go home without a ticket? Once
there was a man put off the car because he couldn't show a ticket. Fel
saw the "driver" do it.

That thought choked me, together with the sudden recollection that I
hadn't told Harr'et my purse was gone. She and Peter might be
expecting to make quite a little sum out of my board, enough to keep
the roof on a while longer.

"Do eat, child," said the man.

"I didn't tell you, sir," I sobbed, "that the railroad ran off with my
purse,--cousin Lydia, I mean,--and I haven't the leastest thing to pay
you with!"

I drew out my handkerchief in a great hurry, and out flew the pancake.
Peter and Harriet looked at it and smiled, and I hid my face in shame.

"Never you worry your little head about money," said Peter, kindly. "I
know young ladies about your size ain't in the habit of travelling
with their pockets full of rocks----let alone doughnuts."

O, what a kind man! And how I had mistaken him! I forgave him at once
for calling me poor sissy.

"If you've done your supper, Peter, I motion you take her out and show
her the sheep and lambs."

Peter did so, besides beguiling me with pleasant talk; but pleasantest
of all was the remark,--

"Don't be a bit concerned about your ticket; I'll make that all right
to-morrow."

And this was the man I had been so afraid of, only because he was
rough-looking, and liked to make jokes.

He told me his name was Peter Noble, and Harr'et was his sister, and
kept house for him; and I actually told him in confidence that I meant
to go to Italy when I grew to be a lady; for we became close friends
in a few minutes, and I felt that he could be trusted.

It was almost dark when we went back to the kitchen; but there was
Harriet, laughing.

"Whose kitty?" said she.

And it was Silvertoes, lapping milk out of a saucer by the stove. She
was very hungry, and I suppose came to that house because it was so
near the depot. I felt as happy as Robinson Crusoe when he found
Friday. My trials were now nearly over.

I remember little more, except Peter's taking me into a car next day
in his arms, and Harriet's giving me my kitty through the window. I
hope I thanked them, but am not sure. That was the last I saw of them;
but I carried the marks of Harriet's "try-cake" while my frock lasted,
for soap took out the color.

The "driver" treated me with marked politeness, and when we reached
Willowbrook Corner, put me into the yellow stage, with as much care as
if I had been a china tea-set.

There was a shout when I got home, for all the family were at the
gate.



CHAPTER XII.

BETTER THAN KITTENS.


Yes, they seemed just as glad to see me as if I was the Queen of
England, and had been gone all the days of my life. Father,
especially, looked really overjoyed.

"How they must have missed me!" thought I, springing out of the coach
and falling headlong over old Towser. "O, please catch that kitten."

Ned seized the empty basket and whirled it over his head.

"Who cares for such trash? We've got something in the house that's
better than sixteen kittens."

"Rabbits?"

"Come and see," said 'Ria, giving me one hand, while she stroked
Silvertoes with the other.

"O, I don't believe it's anything. Is it wax beads? You haven't asked
where I came from, nor whose house I staid to. There was a woman with
gold beads, and he called her Harret, and--"

"Yes, I knew they'd take good care of you," said cousin Lydia.

"And where d'you s'pose I found my kitty?" But no one seemed to hear.
I had expected to be pelted with questions as to my eating, drinking,
and sleeping, and to be pitied for the late distress of my mind. But
no one showed the slightest curiosity; they all seemed in a great
hurry to get into the house.

I stopped talking, and walked along with all the dignity of an
offended pea-chicken. There might or might not be something worth
going to see; but I was resolved to keep perfectly cool. Up stairs?
Well, up stairs then, or up in the attic, or out on the roof,--it made
no difference to me. I could keep from asking questions as long as
they could, if not longer.

O, mother's room, was it? Well, I'd been wondering all the while where
mother was, only I wouldn't ask. Dear me, was she sick? "So glad to
see little Madge," she said, kissing me over and over again. "And what
a hard time I had had."

There, _she_ knew how I'd been suffering, and was just going to ask me
some questions, when that troublesome Ned whisked me right up in his
arms, and whirled me round towards the fireplace.

"If you've got any eyes, Maggie, look there."

My eyes were good enough, if that was all; but what was that woman
sitting there for? I thought she had a heap of woollen clothes in her
lap.

Father took it.

"Come here, Totty-wax."

I put out my hands, and felt something as soft as kittens.

"Presto, change!" cried Ned, and pulled down the top of the blanket.
There lay a little, wrinkled, rosy face, a baby's face, and over it
was moving a little wrinkled hand.

I jumped, and then I screamed; and then I ran out of the room and back
again.

"O, O, O! Stop her! Hold her!" said Ned.

But they couldn't do it. I rushed up to the baby, who cried in my
face.

"What IS that?" said I; and then I burst into tears.

"Your little sister," said father.

"It isn't," sobbed I, and broke out laughing.

Everybody else laughed, too.

"Say that again," said I.

"Your little sister," repeated father.

"Does Fel know it? And it _isn't_ Ned's brother?" seizing father by
the whiskers. "And he can't set her on the wood-pile! Came down from
heaven. What'm I crying for? Came down particular purpose for me."

"Yes, Totty-wax," said father, smiling, with a tear in the corner of
his eye,--


    "'Twas for my accommodation
       Nature rose when I was born."


"Has this child had any supper?" asked mother, in a faint voice from
the bed.

"No, _she_ can't eat," laughed I; "her face looks like a roast apple."

"Your mother means you, Maggie. You are tired and excited," said
cousin Lydia. "Ruth made cream-cakes to-night."

"But I shan't go, 'thout I can carry the baby. Ned's holding her. She
isn't _his_ brother. I haven't had her in my arms once. How good God
was! O, dear, what teenty hands! She can't swallow 'em, on 'count of
her arms. Sent particular purpose for me--father said so. 'Ria Parlin,
she's nowhere near your age. You have everything, but you can't have
this. She gapes. She knows how to; she's found her mouth; she's found
her mouth!"

And so I ran on and on, like a brook in a freshet, and might never
have stopped, if they had not taken me out of the room, and tied me in
a high chair before a table full of nice things. And Ruthie stood
there with a smile in her eyes, and said if I spoke another word, I
shouldn't see baby again that night.

I couldn't help pitying Ned. I wasn't sure I had treated him just
right. I had prayed, off and on, as much as two or three weeks in all,
that God would send me a sister, and of course that was why she had
come. I didn't wish Ned to know this; he would be so sorry he hadn't
thought of it himself, and prayed for a brother. I told Fel about it,
and she didn't know whether it was quite fair or not. "Yes, it was,
too," said I; for I never would allow Fel the last word. "It was fair;
Ned's older 'n me, and ought to say his prayers a great deal more
_reggurly_."

O, that wonderful new sister! For days I never tired of admiring her.

"Look, mamma! 'Ria, did you ever, ever see such blue eyes?"

And then I sat and talked to the new sister, and asked her


    "Where did she get her eyes of blue?"


But she did not answer, as the baby does in the song,--


        "Out of the sky, as I came through."

    "What makes the light in them sparkle and spin?
     Some of the starry spikes left in."

    "Where did you get that pearly ear?
     God spake, and it came out to hear."


Ah! If she could only have talked, wouldn't she have told some sweet
stories about angels?

I couldn't have left her for anything else but that wedding; but
Ruthie promised to take good care of her--and I could trust Ruthie!
Ned wasn't going; there were to be no children but Fel and me. Well,
yes, Gust was there; but that was because he happened to be in the
house. The wedding was in Madam Allen's parlors. _I_ stood up before
the minister, with wax beads on my neck, and white slippers on my
feet. Somebody else stood there, too; for one wouldn't have been
enough. Fel dressed just like me--in white, with the same kind of
beads; only she was pale, and I wasn't, and she looked like a white
rosebud, and I didn't.

We stood between the "shovin' doors,"--that was what Gust called
them,--and there was a bride and bridegroom, too. I nearly forgot
that. I remember lights, and flowers, and wedding cake; and by and by
Madam Allen came along, looking so grand in her white turban, and gave
the bride a bridal rose, but not Fel or me a single bud. Then, when
people kissed the bride, I kissed her, too, and she whispered,--

"Call me aunt Martha, dear."

"O, yes, Miss Rubie," said I; "you are my cousin, aunt Martha."

For I could not understand exactly.

Uncle John hugged me, and said they were all going away in the
morning, he and aunt Martha, and Zed; and then I felt sorry, even with
my wax beads on, and said to father,--

"I tell you what, I love my uncle John _that was_."

No, Fly, he didn't have any horse then called "Lighting Dodger;" but
it was the same uncle John, and aunt Martha is the very woman who pets
you so much, and has that pretty clock, with a pendulum in the shape
of a little boy in a swing.

After that wedding there was a long winter. I went to school, but Fel
didn't. She looked so white that I supposed her mother was afraid she
would freeze. Miss Rubie was gone, and there were no lessons to learn;
but Madam Allen didn't care for that; she said Fel was too sick to
study. Whenever I didn't have to take care of the baby, I went to see
her; but that baby needed a great deal of care! For the first month of
her life I wanted to sit by her cradle, night and day, and not let any
one else come near her. The next month I was willing Ned should have
her half the time; and by the third month I cried because I had to
take care of her at all.



CHAPTER XIII.

GOOD BY.


It happened that she was a cross baby. It did not take her long to
forget all about heaven. She liked to pull hair, and she liked to
scratch faces; and no matter how much you trotted her up and down, she
just opened her toothless mouth and cried.

"She's a wicked, awful baby!" exclaimed I, scowling at her till my
eyes ached.

"Div her a pill, _I_ would," said Ned, laughing. He could laugh, for
he didn't have to sit and hold her, as I did.

"Poor little thing isn't well," said mother.

"I don't 'spect she knows whether's she's well or not," returned I, in
disgust. "She just hates everybody, and that's what she's crying
about."

"You grieve me, Madge. I thought you loved this dear sister."

"Well, I did; but I don't love her any more, and I don't ever want to
rock a baby that hates me so hard she can't keep her mouth shut."

"You don't mean you are not glad God sent her? O, Madge!"

"Yes'm, that's what I mean. I'm real sorry he sent her, and I wish
he'd take her back again."

Hasty, bitter speech! Even a child knows better than to talk so
recklessly. Next day, and for many days, those words came back to my
heart like sharp knives. Little sister was very ill, and I knew by the
looks of people's faces that they thought she would cross the dark
river, on the other side of which stand the pearly gates. Mother saw
me roving about the house, crying in corners, and sent me away to the
Allens to stay all night. When I got there, Madam Allen took me right
up in her motherly arms, and tried to soothe me; but I refused to be
comforted.

"I thought baby looked a little better this morning," said she.

I shook my head.

"Has baby grown any worse?"

"No'm."

"Then why do you shake your head?"

"'Cause," sobbed I, "'cause--"

And then, hiding behind her turban, I whispered,--

"O, if you tell God you want anything, is that a prayer?"

"Yes, dear, if you tell him you want little sister to get well, that
is a prayer."

I moaned still more bitterly at these words, and slid out of her lap.

"Why, what is it, darling?"

"I can't tell you," said I; "I can't, I can't. There isn't anybody in
this world I can tell but just Fel."

Then Madam Allen went out of the room, and left us two little girls
alone.

"O, Fel," said I, as soon as my sobs would let me speak, "I said I
wished God would take my little sister back again."

Fel looked very much shocked.

"And O, I'm afraid it was a truly prayer, and God 'll do it."

"No, I guess it wasn't a truly prayer, Madge."

"What makes you think it wasn't?" cried I, eagerly, for I supposed she
must know.

"Wasn't you mad when you said it?"

"Yes, very. She made that long scratch on my nose, and I was very
mad."

"She did dig awful deep; I don't wonder you felt bad," said Fel,
soothingly. "But you didn't want her to die, any more'n anything; now
did you?"

"No, O, no!"

"Well, then, if you didn't want her to die, God knows you didn't; for
he knows everything, don't he?"

"Yes, yes."

"And so it wasn't a truly prayer," added Fel, positively.

"And won't he answer it?"

"Why, what you 'spose? Of course not, Madge."

She seemed to feel so clear upon the subject, that I began to breathe
more freely. O, it was everything to have such a wise little friend!

"But I oughtn't to said it, Fel! O, dear! What s'pose made me? _You_
never say bad things, never!"

Fel thought a moment, and then answered, as she looked at me with her
clear, happy eyes,--

"Well, you have lots of things to plague you, Madge; but I don't.
Everybody's real good to me, because I'm sick."

I looked at her, and began to cry again. My little heart had been
stirred to its very depths, and I could not bear to have her speak of
being sick.

"Now, Fel Allen," said I, "you don't s'pose you're going to die 'fore
I do? I can't live 'thout you! If you die, I'll die too."

"Why, I never said a thing about dying," returned Fel, in surprise.

"Well, you won't never leave me, will you? Say you won't never! Just
think of you up in heaven and me down here. I can't bear it!"

"Why, Madge."

"Well, if you should go up to heaven first, Fel, you'd sit there on
those steps, with a harp in your hand, and think about me; how I said
cross things to you."

"Why, what cross things did ever you say to me, Madge Parlin?"

"There, there," cried I, smiling through my tears, and beginning to
dance; "_have_ you forgot? O, that's nice! Why, Fel, I called you a
lie-girl."

"O, well, I don't care if you did. I wasn't, _was_ I?"

"And I called you a borrow-girl, too. And I drowned you, and I--I--"

"I wish you'd stop talking about that," said Fel, "or you'll make me
cry; for you're just the nicest girl. And who cares if you do scold
sometimes? Why, it's just in fun, and I like to hear you."

Now, Dotty Dimple, I declare to you that this conversation is sweeter
to my memory than "a nest of nightingales." Naughty as I was, Fel
didn't know I was naughty!

When I went home next morning, the little Louise was much better, and
in a few days seemed as well as ever. I was very thankful God knew I
was not in earnest, and had not taken me at my word, and called her
back to heaven.

She was never quite as cross from that time, and I had many happy
hours with her, though, as I told Fel,--

"She's cross _enough_ now, and sometimes seems 's if I couldn't
forgive her; but I always do; I don't dass not to!"

I was not required to hold her very much, for Fel was not well, and
wanted me with her half the time. Mother was always willing I should
go, and never said,--

"Don't you think you ought to be pacifying the baby?"

I never dreamed that Fel was really sick. I only knew she grew sweeter
every day, and clung to me more and more. I had stopped teasing her
long ago, and tried to make her happy. I couldn't have said a cross
word to her that winter any more than I could have crushed a white
butterfly.

One day I was going to see her, with some jelly in my little basket,
when "the Polly woman" walked mournfully into the yard.

"I've just come from Squire Allen's," said she, unfastening her
shawl, and sighing three times,--once for every pin.

"And how is Fel?" asked mother.

Polly slowly shook her head,--

"Very low; I--"

Mother looked at her, and then at me; and I looked at her, and then at
Polly.

"Dr. Foster says her brain has always been too active, and--"

"Madge, you'd better run along," said mother. "The baby's asleep now;
but she'll wake up and want you."

I went with a new thought and a new fear, though I did not know what I
thought or what I feared.

When I reached Squire Allen's, Ann Smiley came down the path to meet
me.

I asked, "_Is_ Fel very low? Polly said so."

And she answered,--

"Why, no, indeed; she is as well as common. Polly is so queer."

I went into the house, and Madam Allen drew me close to her, and
said,--

"Bless you, child, for coming here to cheer our little darling."

When she set me down, I saw she had been crying. I had never seen her
with red eyes before.

"You and Fel may stay in the warm sitting-room," said she; "and Ann
shall carry in some sponge cake and currant shrub, for Fel hardly
tasted her dinner."

I remember how Fel clapped her hands, and smiled to see me; and how
Ann brought the cake into the sitting-room, and drew up a little table
before the fire. We sat and played keep house, and sipped currant
shrub out of some silver goblets which had crossed the ocean.

It is a beautiful picture I am seeing now, as I shut my eyes: Fel,
with that lovely smile on her face, as if some one were whispering
pleasant things in her ear.

"I love you so, and it's so nice;" said I.

Gust came in, and she took his hand and patted it.

"Yes," said she; "I love you and Gust, and it is nice; but we'll have
nicer times when we get to heaven, you know."

Gust gave her one little hug, and rushed out of the room. Then I
remember throwing myself on the rug and crying; for there was an ache
at my heart, though I could not tell why.

Grandpa Harrington came in, and began to poke the fire.

"Well, well," said he; "its hard for one to be taken and the other
left, so it is. But Jesus blessed little children; and I wouldn't cry,
my dear."

That was the last time I ever played with Fel. She grew feverish that
night, and the doctor said she must not see any one. Something was the
matter with her head, and she did not know people. I heard she had
"water on the brain," and wondered if they put it on to make it feel
cool.

There, children, I do not like to talk about it. It was all over in
three short weeks, and then the angels called for Fel. She was "taken"
and I was "left," and it seemed "very hard." I grieved for a long
while, and wanted to go too; but Madam Allen said,--

"You are all the little girl I have now to take in my arms. Don't you
want to stay in this world to make Fel's mother happy?"

"Yes," said I; "I do."

And my own mamma said,--

"The baby needs you, too. See, she has learned to hold her hands to
you!"

They all tried to comfort me, and by and by I felt happy again. I am
told that the loss of my dear little friend made me a different child.
I grew more kind and gentle in my ways, more thoughtful of other
people. Not very good, by any means, but trying harder to be good.

Well, I believe this is all I have to tell you of my little days, for
very soon I began to be a large girl.

I am leaving off at a sad place, do you say, Prudy? Why, I don't think
so. To me it is the most beautiful part of all. Just think of my dear
little friend growing up to womanhood in heaven! I ought to be willing
to spare her. O, yes!

She was always better than I, and what must she be now? It would
frighten me to think of that, only she never knew she was good, and
had such a way of not seeing the badness in me.

I shall never forget my darling Fel, and I think she will remember me
if I should live to be very old. Yes, I do believe she loves me still,
and is waiting for me, and will be very glad to see me when I go to
the Summer Land.

Here is a lock of her hair, Fly. You see it is a beautiful golden
brown, and as soft as your own. A certain poet says,--


    "There seems a love in hair, though it be dead."


And that is why I shall always keep this little tress.

Now kiss me, dears, and we will all go to the study, and see what
uncle Gustus is doing.

Yes, Fly, I did like your uncle Gustus, because he was Fel's brother.
Well,--I don't know--yes, dear,--perhaps that _was_ part of one little
reason why I married him.





*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Aunt Madge's Story" ***

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