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Title: Eunice and Cricket
Author: Timlow, Elizabeth Weston
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Eunice and Cricket" ***
[Illustration: AT THE PARTY.]
EUNICE AND CRICKET
BY
ELIZABETH WESTYN TIMLOW
AUTHOR OF
“CRICKET: A STORY FOR LITTLE GIRLS,” “CRICKET AT THE SEASHORE”
=Illustrated by=
HARRIET R. RICHARDS
BOSTON
ESTES AND LAURIAT
PUBLISHERS
_Copyright, 1897_
BY ESTES & LAURIAT
=Colonial Press:=
Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.
Boston, Mass., U.S.A.
TO
ELMA AND SYLVIA
AND
THE GOAT
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. TWO AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHERS 11
II. A DISCOVERY IN FILMS 25
III. A “MUMPFUL” PARTY 37
IV. IN QUARANTINE 59
V. AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR 68
VI. A PHILANTHROPIC SCHEME 83
VII. MOSINA 99
VIII. A BEDFELLOW 110
IX. CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS 120
X. THE BOY 139
XI. A VISIT TO MOSINA 152
XII. KEEPING HOUSE 165
XIII. THE DIAMOND RING 187
XIV. SCHOOL THEATRICALS 211
XV. A DAY IN THE NURSERY 234
XVI. A GOAT EPISODE 253
XVII. A SCRAPE 268
XVIII. AN EXPEDITION 279
XIX. THE RESULT 292
XX. OLD MR. CHESTER 299
XXI. BREAKING UP 307
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
AT THE PARTY _Frontispiece_
GETTING READY FOR THE PARTY 49
AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR 79
THE LOST BABY 85
KEEPING HOUSE 173
THE DIAMOND RING 191
IN THE NURSERY 239
A SUDDEN DOWNFALL 259
EUNICE AND CRICKET
CHAPTER I.
TWO AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHERS.
Two eager heads bent over a small, square, black object that stood on
the stone post at the foot of the doorsteps.
“‘Hold the camera steady and push the lever,’” read the brown-eyed girl
with the long, dark braid, from the little pamphlet she held in her
hand. “Look down in the little round hole, Cricket; you can see the
picture perfectly. Isn’t it the _cutest_ thing?”
Cricket squinted down critically.
“It’s going to be perfectly _jolly_,” she cried enthusiastically. “Now
stand still as mice, children, while I count three.”
“Stand still as a mice, Helen,” immediately admonished the small girl in
the dark red coat, giving a great pinch to the little golden-haired,
brown-clad lassie who stood beside her, by way of emphasising her older
sister’s words. “Stand still as a mice, Johnnie-goat,” giving the third
member of the group a tickle on the back that made him drop his curved
horns for more.
“Keep still ‘as a mice,’ yourself,” said Cricket, tapping Miss Red-coat
briskly on the head. “All ready, Eunice. ‘You push the button, and we’ll
do the rest,’” she quoted, clapping her hands in her favourite fashion.
“Hooray! there she goes! Oh, I hope it will be good! That’s all, Zaidie
and Helen. You stood _beautifully_. Run along now. Can’t you go around
to the stable and take Johnnie-goat back, ’Liza?”
Eunice swept the trio a low bow.
“Thank you, Mr. Johnnie-goat, for standing still so long,” she said,
addressing the horned member of the party. “I hope your picture will be
_very_ good,” she added, picking up the camera with a highly
professional air.
“Take me again,” demanded Zaidie instantly, when Cricket told her once
more that they were through with this wonderful process, and that they
might go. “I like having my picture tooken. Don’t you, Helen? Let’s sit
on Johnnie-goat, and be tooken again,” and Zaidie tried to climb upon
the goat’s white back. This, however, was a familiarity which Johnnie
could not think of permitting, even from his best friends. He instantly
sidled off, not wishing to hurt her feelings by a direct butt. Zaidie
unexpectedly sat down on the ground.
“No, we don’t want any more pictures of you now, thank you,” said
Eunice, examining her Kodak, while Zaidie demanded a view of the one
already taken.
“She thinks it’s like putting a penny in the slot and a picture drops
out. This isn’t that kind, my dear. There’s a lot of hard, hard work
before you see that picture,” said Cricket importantly.
The day before had been Eunice’s birthday, and this Kodak, which had
been a long-desired possession, was a birthday present. As it was given
to them entirely ready for use, they had literally nothing to do but
“press the button.”
Papa had been too busy that morning to explain the mysterious little
affair very particularly, but he told the children to study the pamphlet
carefully, and follow directions closely. Eunice and Cricket promptly
sat down and read the pamphlet from title-page to _finis_.
Both looked a little blank when they had finished. _Could_ they ever
remember all those instructions?
“It’s all _plain_ enough,” said Eunice meditatively, “but the question
is, how are we going to remember it all at important times? Now, for
instance, about the stops. Listen: ‘Snapshots can only be made when the
largest stop is in the lens.’ Will you remember that, Cricket?”
“We might just sit down and learn the whole thing off by heart,”
suggested Cricket, wrinkling her forehead thoughtfully.
“Horrors, no!” returned Eunice. “Learn all that? Let’s just carry the
pamphlet around with us all the time. If we take the camera anywhere, we
can certainly take the book, too. Now let’s go and take a picture.”
“It’s easier to take them out doors, everybody says,” answered Cricket,
jumping up. “There’s ’Liza starting out to walk with the twins. Let’s go
and take them sitting on the front doorsteps.”
The twins, of course, were perfectly delighted at the idea of having
their pictures taken. Zaidie straightway sat herself down on the lowest
step, with her hands firmly folded in her lap, and her feet out straight
before her, trying vainly to keep the smile out of her dimpled face.
“I don’t want you that way,” said Eunice, laughing, as she turned
around. “You must get in some romantic attitude. No, I don’t mean
romantic, but picturesque.”
“Couldn’t I be sliding down the railing?” suggested Zaidie eagerly,
thinking she saw a chance to indulge in her favourite amusement.
“Wouldn’t that be pick-chesk?”
“You can’t slide down no railings, pick-chesk or no pick-chesk,” put in
Eliza, promptly.
“You couldn’t, anyway,” said Cricket, “because you have to sit still,
Zaidie. You can’t hop around when you have your picture taken. Don’t you
remember?”
“Zaidie, you stand up by the post,” began Eunice, when Cricket
interrupted her.
“Look! There’s Johnnie-goat trotting up the street. Do let’s have him
in. He _would_ be picturesque.”
“S’pose he’d stand still?” asked Eunice doubtfully. “I don’t want to
spoil my picture.”
Johnnie-goat was a very celebrated character in the neighbourhood. He
belonged to a livery-stable that was on the square back of the Wards. He
was famous for eating off his rope and running away. He was a big white
goat, with unusually long horns, and a very inquiring disposition. He
was such a ridiculous fellow, too, sometimes munching sedately at a
stray banana-skin or orange-peel, then kicking up his heels as if an
invisible imp had tickled him, and walking off on his forefeet. He was a
very discerning goat, also, and knew perfectly well his friends from his
enemies. He had goodwill for the one, and butts for the other. One way
that he knew his friends was that they always wore dresses, while his
enemies were clad in trousers. That was one invariable mark. Then, his
friends gave him apples to eat, and scratched the sensitive place
between his horns that he couldn’t possibly reach himself, and which,
therefore, was seldom properly scratched. His enemies usually saluted
him with stones, and offered him tin cans to eat. Now Johnnie-goat was
perfectly willing to acknowledge that he _could_ eat tin cans on
occasions, but they were not his favourite diet, and he didn’t care much
for them. He regarded it as something of an insult to be constantly
offered them. It was one thing, if he chose occasionally to pick one up
himself and see if he liked the brand, but he decidedly objected to
having them so often forced on his attention.
The result of all this was, that Johnnie-goat’s disposition was somewhat
mixed. Like some people whom we have known, when he was good he was
_very_ good indeed, but when he was bad he was simply terrific. He
seemed to know no middle course.
I do not know why he was not called Billy, in accordance with all
traditions. His full title was John O’Rafferty, Esq., and on many
occasions he got the whole benefit of it.
He was great friends with all the Ward children, who, from having so
many pets of their own at Kayuna, had a special predilection for any
stray animal. Johnnie-goat perfectly understood this fact—for any one
who thinks that a goat is not a highly discriminating creature, is not
acquainted with his peculiarities.
On this particular morning, Johnnie-goat was quite willing to be treated
to some banana-skins, which the cook brought out to tempt him with. He
fully realised that it was a very solemn occasion, for he stood like a
sentinel, and only blinked once.
“We must take all sorts of things, Cricket,” said Eunice, when the
children had trooped away down the street, with Johnnie-goat marching
sedately behind them, with now and then a sudden frisk of his hind legs
in the air, and then such an instant return of his composure, that you
doubted the evidence of your eyes.
“There are only a dozen pictures on one roll, you know, and we want a
good variety. Aren’t you just wild to develop them? I am. It sounds so
grown-up to talk of the chemicals and the ‘hypo.’”
“What _is_ the ‘hypo?’” asked Cricket, as they went down the street in
search of a good subject.
“Why, just hypo, I suppose. I don’t believe it’s anything in
particular,” said Eunice vaguely.
“Donald said Marjorie had the hypo yesterday,” said Cricket
thoughtfully, “when she was sort of dumpy all day. But I suppose it
isn’t the same kind.”
“No, of _course_ not, goosie. The hypo is that white powder that comes
with all the things. Didn’t you notice it? Perhaps Donald meant that
Marjorie had been taking some. Oh, look! wouldn’t that corner of the
little park make the _sweetest_ picture? Let’s take it!”
“Yes, let’s! and that’s two,” added Cricket, when the picture was
secured. “_Isn’t_ this exciting? Can’t I take the next one, Eunice? Just
let me look at the pamphlet a moment to see something.”
Cricket buried herself in the book of instructions for a moment, then
darted tragically at the camera.
“Oh, _Eunice_! See! the pamphlet says that after you take a picture, you
must turn the key around three or four times, till the next number
appears before the little window, and that will put a new film ready;
and we never did it! What do you s’pose it will be?”
The two girls stared at each other in dismay.
“Oh, dear! dear!” exclaimed Eunice. “Then we’ve taken another picture
right on top of Johnnie-goat and the twins, and they _were_ so cunning!”
“There isn’t any way to _un_take it, is there?” asked Cricket, in real
Mrs. Peterkin fashion.
“I’m afraid not. I wonder what it _will_ look like! It will be a
composite photograph, I suppose, like Marjorie’s class picture.”
“Perhaps it won’t be bad,” said Cricket, the hopeful. “You see, this
last picture is trees and shrubbery, and there may be a glimpse of
Johnnie-goat and the twins behind them. It may look as if we did it on
purpose. I shouldn’t wonder if it would be lovely. Perhaps we’ll want to
take more that way.”
“Perhaps,” assented Eunice, doubtfully. “It makes me think of Kenneth
this morning. I was in mamma’s room while you were practising, and
Kenneth was there too. He brought a piece of paper to mamma and asked
her to draw a man, and she drew the side face of one—and Kenneth asked
her where the other side of his face was, and if it was on the other
side of the paper. Mamma told him the other side of the face was there,
but he couldn’t see it; and then she turned him _her_ side face to show
him. Well, Kenneth took the paper and ran off, but came back in a moment
with some straight lines across it, and told mamma that that was a kitty
and a fence, and mamma said she saw the fence, but where was the kitten?
And _what_ do you think the baby said?—that the kitten was behind the
fence! That it was really there, only she couldn’t see it. _Wasn’t_ that
cute?”
“He’s just the dearest, smartest baby that ever was!” cried Cricket,
always enthusiastical over her beloved small brother. “We’ll just tell
people, then, that the children are behind the trees, even if they can’t
see them. There, now, I’ve turned the film ready, this time. See!
there’s the figure 2 in the little window at the back. Now, we are all
ready. What shall we take?”
“Let’s take each other,” suggested Eunice. “I’ll stand here by the park
fence. Am I all right?”
The picture-taking went on merrily after that. They got a fine snap at
papa just getting out of his buggy, and one of mamma, as she came home
from market. They got another dear little picture of the twins as they
came down the street hand in hand. It did not take long to use up all
the films at this rate, and at luncheon they were able to announce,
triumphantly, that they were ready to develop their pictures that
afternoon.
“But you don’t know how,” objected papa; “and I have to be out all the
afternoon and can’t help you.”
“Please let us try it by ourselves,” pleaded Eunice. “We can read the
directions, and they’re _terribly_ plain. A cat could use them. Do let
us!”
“Better not do it alone, youngsters,” advised Donald. “I’d show you,
myself, if I were going to be home, but I can’t wait.”
Donald was in college this year, but, being so near, he often came home
to lunch on Saturday, and sometimes spent Sunday there also.
“Of course we can do it,” returned Cricket, confidently. “We’ve read the
directions a million times already, and I pretty nearly know them by
heart. Listen: ‘Open one of the developer powders, then put the contents
(two chemicals) into the beaker and fill it up to the brim with water.
Stir, till dissolved, with wooden stirring spoon. Next take—’”
“Spare us,” begged Marjorie. “We’re willing to take your knowledge for
granted.”
“We can use the linen closet for a dark room,” said Eunice.
“By no manner of means,” put in mamma promptly. “I don’t fancy having
every sheet and pillow-case I own deluged with chemicals. You can have
the bathroom closet, though, if you’ll promise to put everything you
take out of it back very carefully. But children, I decidedly think you
should wait for papa or Don to show you how.”
“Do let them, mamma,” advised Marjorie. “Of course they will make a
frightful mess, and ruin the whole roll, but they will have the
experience.”
“The idea!” cried Eunice, much injured. “We’ve done everything right
thus far—or almost right,” with a sudden, guilty recollection of the
double exposure of the first film.
“_Almost_ everything!” laughed Donald. “Considering you only have to aim
the thing and press the button, it would be strange if you hadn’t. Did
you aim the wrong end of it and try to take something out of the little
back window?”
“Of course we didn’t,” said Eunice and Cricket, in an indignant breath.
Then they exchanged guilty, conscious glances.
“We’ll promise about the closet,” said Eunice hastily, to prevent
further inconvenient questions. “We’ll take the things out carefully;
and may we take the little nursery table to lay our trays on? It’s just
large enough to fit.”
These matters being settled, the two girls, as soon as luncheon was
over, eagerly began their preparations. They had a free field, for mamma
and Marjorie had gone to a matinée, and Eliza had taken the children to
the park for the afternoon. The housemaid’s closet in the bathroom was
soon cleared of its brooms and dustpans, and the small, low table from
the nursery was brought in. The little trays that came with the outfit,
the bottles of chemicals and “hypo” were duly arranged on it.
“There!” said Eunice, surveying the preparations with a professional
eye. “Everything is ready, I _think_. Let me see,” consulting the
pamphlet. “‘Also provide a pair of shears, a pitcher of cold water, and
a dark room having a shelf or table’—yes, all here. Trays, stirring rod,
chemicals, and when we shut the door we have our dark room—why,
_Cricket_!” with a sudden exclamation of dismay.
CHAPTER II.
A DISCOVERY IN FILMS.
Eunice’s exclamation was caused by the fact that when she suited the
action to the word, and shut the door, they were, of course, in total
darkness.
“I should say so,” returned Cricket, blankly. “Not being cats, we can’t
see in ’Gyptian darkness. Do open the door. We’ll have to get a lamp.”
“No, we mustn’t,” answered Eunice, opening the door, and consulting the
pamphlet. “It says, ‘neither daylight nor lamplight.’ It ought to be a
red light, like this one in the picture.”
Although the children did not know it, such a lamp had come with the
outfit, but when Donald unpacked the things he had left it in his own
room.
“We might get a lantern from the kitchen,” went on Eunice, “and wrap it
with a red cloth. That will do. Will you go for the lantern while I get
the red cloth?”
Cricket flew off, and returned in two minutes with the lantern.
“Cook says,” she announced, breathlessly, “that if we put anything over
it, we must be careful not to cover up the breathing-holes at the top.”
“Isn’t this fine for the cover!” said Eunice, displaying a small
turkey-red laundry-bag. Its contents lay on the floor under the table.
“_Now_, we’re all ready,” announced Eunice once more, with much
satisfaction. “What do we do first?—where’s the book?” when the lantern
was carefully covered, with a due regard for the breathing-holes.
“The book? why it’s—I _do_ believe we left it in mamma’s room. No, here
it is. And—goodness gracious! Cricket, we’ve forgotten to take the roll
of pictures out of the camera!”
“Aren’t we lunatics?” exclaimed Cricket, with her bubbling laugh, as she
threw open the door. “How do we get the things out, anyway? Everything
is so _tight_,” she added, turning it upside down. “I can’t see where
anything comes out. Where _does_ it come to pieces?”
“I’ll read the directions. ‘No dark room is required to take out the
spool of films, but you must take your position as far from the window
as possible.’ So glad we needn’t stay in this dark closet to do it! Read
the directions very slowly, Cricket, and I’ll do the things.”
“All ready,” said Cricket. “‘Unclose the catch at the bottom, holding
the camera _taut_.’ What in the world is _taut_?”
Eunice knit her brows.
“Can’t imagine, unless it means carefully,” she said, thoughtfully.
“Shan’t run any risks,” cried Cricket, jumping up and flying away. “I’ll
look it up in the dictionary.”
She came back in a moment, looking rather disgusted.
“It only means ‘tight,’ ‘firmly.’ Why in creation didn’t they say so?”
Fortunately, the remaining directions were sufficiently simple, and in a
few minutes the roll of exposures was in Eunice’s hand. The children
went back into the closet, to make ready the chemicals.
The careful measuring and mixing of the powder with the required amount
of water went on. The trays were arranged in due order, and Eunice
announced, for the third time:
“Everything is positively ready now, so we can begin to cut apart the
pictures,” taking up the roll of thick, black paper. “How can we tell
where to cut them? Oh, here are little white lines on the back. Can you
see to cut, Cricket?”
“Yes. What’s all this white stuff between for? It looks like paraffin
paper something, only it smells like fury.”
“It’s just to keep the other paper from rubbing when it’s rolled over
the spool,” said Eunice, sniffling at the paper, which, you all know,
was really the film, on which the picture had been taken. “I should say
it _does_ smell. Throw it on the floor after you have cut off the black
pieces.”
“Here’s one,” said Cricket. “Oh, I’m _so_ excited, Eunice. Listen: ‘Put
it in the water, _edge_ down, to prevent air bubbles.’”
“Done,” said Eunice. “Next.”
Cricket read on under the dim red light, till she came to “In about one
minute the film will begin to darken in spots.”
“There, we have not any watch,” interrupted Eunice. “Cut out and get the
nursery clock, Cricket. Cover the roll all up, because you know the
_leastest_ bit of light will spoil it.”
Cricket obediently “cut out,” and then resumed her reading.
“‘The films will begin to darken in spots, representing the lights.’
Isn’t that the _funniest_! how can black paper darken in spots, I’d like
to know?”
“Can’t imagine; but I know that chemicals make things do all sorts of
queer things,” answered Eunice, lucidly. “Cut some more to be soaking
while these go into the developer.”
“That first one’s been in more than a minute. Hold it up, Eunice, and
let’s see it darken in spots. It hasn’t changed a bit, yet,” she added,
disgustedly, after a moment. “Isn’t this waiting going to be slow work?”
The waiting did prove tiresome. Again and again the children took the
thick, black squares of carbon paper from their bath in the developer,
eagerly scanning the opaque substance, which naturally showed no trace
of change.
Five—ten—fifteen minutes ticked slowly away.
“Goodness gracious me!” groaned Eunice at last. “I should think we had
been here for five hours. Isn’t this poky?”
“This black paper can _never_ darken,” cried Cricket, despairingly.
“There’s some mistake. If it was that white lining paper there would be
some sense.”
There was a moment’s pause, and then both girls exclaimed, in a breath:
“Eunice!”
“Cricket!”
“We’ve gone and—”
“Soaked the _wrong thing_!”
“We’ve soaked the _carbon paper_—”
“And thrown away the _film_!”
“Of course that white paraffiny-looking paper was the film!”
“Of course this thick stuff is the carbon paper to wrap around the other
and keep out the light.”
“Aren’t we _geeses_?”
“We just are! Don’t let’s _ever_ tell. Now, where are the films?”
“Just dropped around anywhere,” said Cricket, dolefully.
“Scrabble around carefully, and we’ll find them. Oh! aren’t we the
_idioticest_ girls?”
“We’ll have to mix some more developer, and change the water in the
first tray, too. It’s all black, for the colour in that old carbon paper
leaked out. Have you found all the films?”
“I had only cut six, and here they are. I’ll cover them up while you
open the door and fix some more developer.”
At last, everything was under way again.
“Four o’clock,” said Eunice, soberly, “and to think that we haven’t
developed a single one yet!”
“But, oh, see!” cried Cricket, joyfully, holding up the film, after a
moment. “It really is beginning to darken in spots. Hooray! See, Eunice,
that actually looks like an arm sticking out there! What is it, do you
suppose?”
“I don’t know. Looks like a ghost’s arm, doesn’t it? Put it to soak
again. Let’s look at this one.”
“Nothing here. Eunice, what makes all these scratches across it?”
“Probably we stepped on them. You know you threw them down any way.
Probably the scratches won’t show through. Oh, I do believe this is
mamma! Isn’t that her bonnet that begins to show?”
“Yes—no—I think it’s the one where we tried to take that runaway horse.
Seems to me that looks like a leg down there.”
It was a curious effect to watch the films as they eagerly held one
after another up, for the different parts came out in a ghostly,
unattached way. Here one lonely-looking leg was plainly to be seen. Then
a head, and again a branch of a tree or an arm.
“But look at this one,” cried Cricket, surveying one in deep disgust.
“Isn’t this the smallpoxiest-looking thing?”
It was pretty liberally sprinkled with dark spots, but one of them was
unmistakably Johnnie-goat’s head and horns.
“This must be the one we took on top of Johnnie-goat and the twins,
shouldn’t you think? I do believe it is them—it is they—which _is_
right?”
“I do believe it is,” answered Eunice, ignoring the grammatical appeal.
“It’s spotty enough to be anything. It’s certainly like Kenneth and his
cat, for I can see Johnnie-goat behind the trees.”
“So we can. Look at this one, Cricket. What we thought was mamma’s
bonnet or a runaway horse isn’t either. You held it upside down. See!
it’s this one where papa was getting out of his buggy. What we thought
was mamma’s bonnet is papa’s foot. I guess they are ready for the last
tray now. Go on with the directions.”
Long after five o’clock, two very sober and tired-looking children
emerged from the bathroom closet, and proceeded to set things to rights.
“Do you know,” said Eunice, breaking a long silence as they cleared
trays and wiped off the table, “the book says it only costs five cents
apiece to get the things developed at a photographer’s. Don’t you
_really_ think it would be worth while to save up our money for a time
and have some done? Of _course_ we could learn to do it all right after
a time, but—”
“Yes,” broke in Cricket emphatically, “I do. I don’t vote to stay in
every Saturday afternoon and develop smallpoxy pictures, with smelly old
chemicals and nasty, sticky films, and put my eyes out with red calico
lamps. This picture of papa is the only single one that is going to be
half-way decent; and the horse looks more like the ghost of a rhinoceros
than anything else. That post sticks up by his nose just like a horn.”
“Cricket, don’t let’s _ever_ tell that we soaked the carbon paper and
thought it was the film that the pictures were taken on,” said Eunice,
scrubbing with much soap and energy at the dull yellow stains on her
hands that stubbornly grew brighter, instead of fading. “We’d never hear
the last of it; and we _were_ geeses,” she added thoughtfully.
“_Indeed_, I’ll never tell,” returned Cricket with emphasis. “Papa and
Donald would tease us out of our boots.”
But at dinner-time there were many inquiries concerning the success of
the amateur photography.
“It was a little tiresome,” confessed Eunice. “Marjorie, was the matinée
good?”
“Yes, very. How many pictures did you develop?”
“Only one really good one. Papa, don’t you think you could drive us out
to Kayuna next Saturday?”
“Yes, if it’s pleasant. So only one picture developed?”
“Oh, they all _developed_,” put in Cricket, “only we couldn’t always
tell exactly what they were meant for. Marjorie, wasn’t May Chester at
the matinée? I thought I saw her going.”
“But we want to know about the pictures,” persisted papa, much amused at
the children’s fencing. “When will the gallery be opened? The twins said
you took them with Johnnie-goat.”
“Yes, we did, and it would have been fine, only we took another picture
on top of it,” said Cricket, regretfully. “We should have turned the
little key around every time we took a new picture, but we didn’t, and
they got a little mixed up.”
“We took some trees on top of Johnnie-goat,” broke in Eunice, “and we
hoped that it would look as if he and the children were behind them.
Really, I think that would be a pretty good plan, any way, if they would
only develop right.”
“So they didn’t, eh?”
“Papa, you needn’t tease us. Developing pictures isn’t a bit of fun, and
I’m not going to do it any more,” burst out Cricket desperately. “It
isn’t right to take money from the photographers anyway, for it’s their
business, and they lose so much if we do it ourselves.”
“I think so, too,” chimed in Eunice. “We staid in all this lovely
Saturday, shut up in a hot, smelly closet, and wasted a lot of stuff,
and got our hands all stained, and spoiled a whole lot of films.”
“But had your experience,” put in papa. “Experience is a hard school,
but wise men learn in no other way. How’s that, my Lady Jane? And now
about Kayuna on Saturday,” he went on, kindly changing the subject.
“Cricket, don’t _ever_ tell about the film,” whispered Eunice as they
left the table. “Don’t ever tell _any_ one.”
And they never have told but one person, and she has never told till
just now. Don’t _you_ tell, will you?
CHAPTER III.
A “MUMPFUL” PARTY.
Certain dainty blue billets were causing a wild flutter of excitement
among the ranks of Miss Lyon’s school, for every girl in “our set”
received one of the fascinating things.
“Miss Emily Drayton requests the pleasure of—” How deliciously grown up!
Emily’s parties were always simply perfect. Emily did not go to school
with the others, for she was a delicate little girl, and had her lessons
with a governess at home. Her friends rather envied her at times, since
she had short hours and not half the Latin and arithmetic to do that
they did, and an entire holiday whenever she did not feel quite well;
but, in her turn, Emily often looked wistfully at the others, and longed
with all her heart for the dear delights of school life. She always felt
“out of it” when her little friends laughed and chattered and compared
notes over school doings that she knew nothing of. They would kindly
explain the jokes and references, but when she did not know dear Miss
Bates and cross Miss Raymond and slipshod Susie Dane and stupid Jessie
Moore, the things that the girls laughed over till their sides ached did
not seem very funny to her. It made her rather a lonely little girl,
and, for this reason, her mother was always getting up some simple
little party or company for her, and having Emily’s friends to luncheon.
But this special party was to be a particularly fine affair, for it was
not only Emily’s birthday, but Hallowe’en as well, which double event
Mrs. Drayton always celebrated more elaborately than any other.
Such an excitement among the children, then, when the blue notes began
to circulate! Such jabbering at recess, such comparing of notes, such
arrangements for going, such questions about each other’s dress! Alas!
the party was a whole week off. Could breakfast, and luncheon, and
dinner, and going to bed and getting up, and school and lessons, ever
fill up this long stretch between?
“I suppose there are new gowns for this important occasion,” said
Donald, who had strolled in to dinner, one night. The family were all in
the back parlour.
“No,” said mamma. “Their organdies are fresh and nice, fortunately, and
new sashes are all they need.”
“Fortunately! _Un_fortunately, I say,” said Donald, teasingly. “I was
going to bring Cricket a dress of porcelain,” referring to a joke of
last summer, when Cricket had arrayed a heroine in flowing robes of
white porcelain.
Cricket coloured, but answered serenely, as usual:
“If I was a great big boy, eighteen years old, and a Freshman, too, I’d
be ashamed of an old chestnut joke like that. I described to auntie what
I meant, and she said I meant chiffon—that gauzy, filmy stuff, you
know.”
“_Filmy_ stuff would be appropriate,” murmured Marjorie. “With a sash of
black carbon ribbon you would be very swell.”
“This family is absolutely disgusting,” said Eunice, looking aggrieved.
“Mamma, I should think you would be ashamed of such perfectly impolite,
teasy children as Donald and Marjorie.”
“I ’xpect God picked out the bestest children he had around then,” piped
up Zaidie, who always put her oar in.
“Indeed, he didn’t,” said Cricket emphatically. “The good ones were all
gone, and mamma was in a hurry, and He just sent any He had on hand.”
“Good for you, Cricket!” cried Eunice approvingly, thumping her sister
on the back. “Now, Mr. Donald, who has come out the little end of the
horn?”
“Eunice, your slang is simply disgusting. Of course, we men talk it, but
girls should never think of it.”
“Hark, oh, hark, to the lordly Freshman!” chanted Eunice, clasping her
hands and rolling up her eyes.
“Notice everything he says, Eunice, so we’ll know how to behave when we
go to college, and are dear, cunning little Freshmen,” chimed in
Cricket.
“No more words of wisdom to-night,” announced Donald, getting up. “I’m
off.”
“The supply exhausted so soon?” murmured Marjorie, beginning a new
corner in her embroidery.
Donald kissed his mother, ignoring Marjorie. “I’ll order you a Dresden
China gown, my Lady Jane,” he said, twisting Cricket’s brown curls as he
passed her.
On the eventful Tuesday morning, Cricket awoke bright and early—or
rather, I should say, early but by no means bright. She had had a most
unpleasant dream of having exchanged heads with an elephant, and her
neck was, consequently, so much larger, that she could not fasten her
collar around it. Eunice suggested they should make a new collar of the
sail of the _Gentle Jane_, which she said would be just large enough.
That seemed a good suggestion, but as they went to get it, they saw the
_Gentle Jane_ being taken out to sea by some playful seals.
“Dear! dear!” said Cricket in her dreams. “Now I’ll have to go to the
party without anything around my neck, because there isn’t anything else
big enough to make a collar of, and my throat is getting bigger all the
time.” Just then she awoke, clutching her neck. Sure enough, it did feel
queer, and was very stiff on one side. She swallowed, experimentally.
“I don’t like that pretty well,” she announced to herself as the result
of her attempt. “I wonder if I have the lumbago in my throat,—and
to-night is Emily’s party! I _won’t_ have a sore throat. I never did in
my life before, and I won’t begin to-night—provoking old thing!”
She swallowed vigorously several times, and winked back the tears.
“There! that didn’t hurt much. Wonder if it’s swollen.” She hopped out
of bed quickly, and ran to the glass. She opened the neck of her
night-dress and examined her round, white throat critically. It
certainly was a trifle larger on one side, and was sore, as she pressed
it a little.
“Oh, my patience, if it should be lumbago!” she groaned tragically. She
hadn’t the faintest idea what lumbago is, but the name sounded to her as
if it might be something that could come in the throat. “Wonder how long
it would take lumbago to come on. I _won’t_ have it begin till after
to-night, anyway. How queer my head feels! I guess I’ll look inside my
throat.”
Cricket turned quickly to draw up the shade, that she might see better
what inroads the “lumbago” had already made. The quick movement made her
aching head dizzy. She stumbled forward, tripped over her long
night-dress, and sat down, hitting the water pitcher which she had left
the night before standing by the wash-stand. Over went the pitcher, and
out came a deluge of water, almost setting bewildered Cricket afloat, as
she lay huddled up on the floor.
“Cricket, what an awful racket you’re making,” said Eunice sleepily,
from her bed. “Don’t get up yet. It isn’t time. It isn’t light enough.”
“Don’t get up? Do you think I’m going to lie here and _drown_?” asked
Cricket indignantly, getting rather weakly on her feet. “I’ve knocked
over the water pitcher.” She pulled the towels off the rack, and began
mopping up the flood that crawled in every direction. “I’m wet through
to my bones, I do believe, and there isn’t a dry inch in my
night-dress.”
“Put on another one, and get on your bedroom slippers. Don’t hop around
there another minute with your bare feet,” ordered Eunice, sleepily, but
sensibly.
Cricket mopped dejectedly. “The water tipped straight into my slippers.
There! That will do till Jane gets at it. Ugh! my feet are as cold as
chopsticks. I’ll change my night-dress, and then I’m going to get into
bed with you, Eunice, and get warm.”
By breakfast time, Cricket felt very queer indeed. At any other time her
mother would have noticed her lack of appetite and flushed cheeks; but
just now it was, of course, put down to the excitement of the coming
event. Her throat was stiffer than ever. She managed to slip down a
little oatmeal, but the other things hurt too much to attempt.
“I _won’t_ have lumbago in my throat till after this party,” Cricket
repeated grimly, to herself, as she went up-stairs to get ready for
school. “Only—I do wish the party was last night, and I could go into
mamma’s room and lie down all day, instead of going to school. My throat
gets sweller and sweller. Do you suppose it could swell up so that I
couldn’t eat anything, and would starve to death?”
At this cheerful thought, Cricket groaned so deep a groan that Eunice
looked around in amazement.
“Was that you, Cricket? Did you hurt yourself?”
“No, I was only thinking. _Do_ you know those irregular French verbs?
Aren’t they awful?”
“I should think they were. They are enough to make a cow groan. Ready?
Come on. Why, aren’t you ready?”
Cricket swallowed an unhappy lump in her throat, and winked back a tear.
How her throat did hurt, and how her head ached!
“I’m not quite ready. I didn’t have ’Liza brush my hair out, and it’s
all full of bones, as Zaidie says. Upsetting that water pitcher, and
mopping it up, took up so much time. There! that must do. Where are my
books? Oh, here. I’m ready. Come on,” and Cricket ran out first, lest
Eunice should see her face.
The keen, fresh air seemed to do her head good, and by the time she
reached school, she felt a little better. All the girls were chattering
so hard about the party that night, that, for the time being, Cricket
forgot her throat.
Under any other circumstances her manner and appearance would have
attracted notice and comment. But it must be confessed that from a
school point of view, the day was a general failure, and among the many
flushed faces, hers passed unnoticed. She was sometimes languid and
dull, and then excited and inattentive, making all kinds of queer
blunders. She finally distinguished herself by announcing in her history
class that Tecumseh, the Indian chief, died of a severe attack of
lumbago, exclaiming as he fell, “Don’t give up the ship.”
“Really, Jean, it is fortunate that parties do not come every day,” said
her long-suffering teacher, rather surprised that it should be Cricket
who said this, for the child’s quick memory rarely failed her. Cricket
sat scarlet and mortified, and did not recover even when that stupid
Mary Blair wrote on the board in the grammar class, “Troy was concord by
the Greasians.”
However, the day slipped away. By dinner-time, her throat felt as if a
good-sized potato had taken up its residence there. Her head ached and
her bones ached, and down in one corner of her heart she began to wish
that some one would say positively that she could not go to the party.
Meantime, after luncheon Eunice had begun to feel heavy-headed and
stiff-necked herself. Like Cricket, she carefully concealed the fact,
and resolutely put on a bright face and a very “smily” smile, if any one
looked in her direction. Each child was so absorbed in concealing her
own feelings that neither noticed the other.
At dinner, both being rather exhausted by such unusual exertions, they
were so silent that papa asked them finally whether this was the night
they were going to Emily Drayton’s party, or the night they were going
to be hanged. He himself had forgotten, he said, and he couldn’t tell by
their faces.
“They have been going to this party every day and night for a week,”
said mamma, looking rather anxiously at each flushed face. “No wonder
they are all tired out beforehand. I had them both lie down for an hour
this afternoon, also. My chickens, you _must_ eat a little more dinner
than that, if you _are_ excited.”
“I positively _can’t_, mamma,” said Cricket, feeling every moment that
the tears _would_ come if she forced another morsel past that awful
lump, that now felt the size of a watermelon to her. Eunice resolutely
choked down another bit of mashed potato.
“I’m too excited,” she remarked, with a great assumption of
cheerfulness. “Mamma, will you excuse Cricket and me, and let us go
up-stairs now? I don’t want any dessert, do you, Cricket?”
Cricket jumped up briskly.
“No, indeed. Please ’scuse us, mamma,” and equally glad to escape, the
two children flew up-stairs. Each began to make conversation as they
dressed. Eliza was there, waiting to help them.
“Lawks, how hot your face is!” said Eliza, her hand touching Cricket’s
cheek, as she brushed the brown curls till the gold light in them shone
out.
“It’s excitement,” said Eunice. “Mine’s hot, too; just feel. Ouch!” with
an undignified exclamation, as Eliza’s hand touched the lower part of
her cheek rather heavily.
Cricket suddenly flashed a quick glance at her.
“Eunice,” she said hastily, as Eliza left the room for a moment, “does
your throat feel queer?”
“Yes. How do you know?” answered Eunice, surprised.
“’Cause mine does, awfully. It has all day. And my head aches.”
“So does mine!”
“And I’m _so_ hot—”
[Illustration: GETTING READY FOR THE PARTY.]
“So am I.”
“And I feel so queer all over.”
“So do I. What _can_ be the matter? It can’t be the party!”
“A party we haven’t been to can’t make us sick. No; I’m afraid we’re
going to have the lumbago in our throats, and I think _that’s_ something
dreadful.”
“Lumbago? It sounds dreadful. Why, I never heard of it. What is it?”
“Oh, I’ve heard of it. I heard papa telling mamma that May Chester’s
grandmother had it, and you know how sick _she’s_ been this fall.”
“This lump in my throat is bad enough for anything,” sighed Eunice,
putting her hand to it. “But let’s stand it till the party is over,
Cricket.”
“_I’ll_ stick it out,” said Cricket, with grim determination.
Mamma came in just here and put the finishing touches to the dainty
dresses, and then they went down to the back parlour to exhibit
themselves in all their bravery to papa and Marjorie.
Donald sauntered in as they were being duly admired.
“Hollo, kids! What giddy-looking girls! I am proud of you. Be sure and
be good girls. Don’t forget to ‘open your eyes and look very wise,
although you feel very silly.’”
“But we _don’t_ feel very silly,” returned Eunice with dignity. “_We’re_
not Freshmen in college.”
“Been polishing your wits for the party, I see. Good plan, my Lady
Greasewrister, and Madame Van Twister, your ladyship’s sister.”
“You always did call us names, and I s’pose you always will,” said
Cricket tolerantly. “But it amuses you, and we don’t care—do we, Eunice?
Isn’t it time to go, mamma?”
“Yes, the carriage is waiting. Put on my cloak for me, Donald. Thank
you, dear. All ready, my little maids.”
It was some distance to Emily Drayton’s, and during the drive the
children were so silent that mamma was a little worried. So little
excitement of this kind was allowed them, that generally they were as
merry as grigs.
“What is the matter, girls? I never saw such sober little faces bound
for a party. Is anything wrong?”
Cricket longed to confess that her throat felt like a boiled pudding,
that the skin of her neck was queer and stretched, that the lights
danced confusedly before her eyes, and that she wanted to turn around,
go home, and go to bed. However, since she had borne it all day, she did
not exactly like to sacrifice so much resolution, and giving Eunice’s
hand a tight squeeze, she said:
“No, it’s nothing much; only a joke we’re going to tell you after the
party.”
“A joke,” said mamma suspiciously. “Hadn’t you better tell me now?”
“No, really,” said Cricket earnestly. “It doesn’t have anything to do
with anybody but ourselves, truly, mamma,” quite believing her words.
“I don’t like jokes that make you look so sober, my chickens. Cricket,
are you very warm, dear? Your cheeks are so red that they are almost
purple.”
“It’s warm in the carriage. Don’t you think so?” struck in Eunice. And
then mamma, to take up their minds, began to talk brightly about some
funny occurrence that she had seen that morning while she was marketing,
and the children almost forgot their respective woes.
When they arrived at the Drayton’s, most of the children were already
there. The lovely house presented a gay scene. Emily greeted Eunice and
Cricket rapturously.
“I was so afraid that something had happened, and you weren’t coming,”
she said. “We are just going to play ‘Quack,’ and Cricket is always so
funny in that. Come over here.”
The classic game of “Quack” was started. All of you know it, do you not?
A large circle is formed, and one person, blindfolded, stands in the
middle with a cane in her hand. The circle moves slowly around till the
person in the centre thumps the cane as a signal to stop, and then it is
pointed at some one. This person takes the other end of the cane, and
the blindfolded one asks any question, which must be answered by the
word “Quack,” uttered in a disguised voice. The one in the centre must
guess the speaker, and is allowed three questions.
Cricket was always in demand for the centre, because her quick wits
supplied her with funny questions. To-night, however, she rather lost
her reputation, for her tired little brain could concoct nothing more
original than, “What is your name?” “Do you like butter?” and all the
other stupid questions that everybody asked. One game succeeded another,
but somehow nothing went very briskly. Presently Mrs. Drayton drew Mrs.
Ward aside, anxiously.
“What is the matter with these children? It is so hard to get them
started at anything. They don’t seem to be having a good time.”
“I’ve noticed something wrong,” said Mrs. Ward, looking about her. “I
never knew it so before, especially at this house. I’ve been watching my
own two pretty closely, and something is certainly wrong.”
“See!” said Mrs. Drayton, “that is the eighth child that has dropped out
of that game, and it is so with everything we have started.”
“There is something in the air,” Mrs. Ward said to her friend. “And
look! there is Cricket actually sitting all alone behind that palm, with
her head in her hand. I asked her a few minutes ago what is the matter,
but she insists there is nothing. Why not hasten supper?”
“That’s always a good suggestion,” answered Mrs. Drayton. “Will you set
them to playing ‘Going to Jerusalem,’ then they will be all ready to
march out. Mrs. Fleming will play for them.”
Even “Going to Jerusalem” was not a brilliant success. Most of the
children marched rather listlessly around, dropping into chairs when the
music stopped, without the usual scramble. Many of the little faces were
flushed a dark red, and eyes were heavy-lidded. The announcement of
supper was a relief, but Mrs. Drayton’s quick eyes noticed, to her
perplexity, that many of the dainty dishes were passed by untouched, and
that on many a plate the luscious creams and ices were scarcely tasted.
Directly after supper Cricket sought Eunice.
“Eunice, I can’t stand it any longer. The party is most out, and I
_must_ tell mamma that I have lumbago in my throat. If I don’t, it may
get so bad it can’t be mended. I mean cured. Do you mind _very_ much if
I ask mamma to take us home? The party isn’t half as nice as I thought
it was going to be.”
“I don’t mind a bit,” said Eunice, with an unexpected readiness. “I feel
too queer for anything. Do you suppose it’s something awful we’ve got,
Cricket?”
“I don’t know. I feel as if I were two persons plastered together.
There’s so much of me. My eyes are pulled sideways down to my ears. I
feel so queer and big,” finished Cricket, dolefully.
So a few minutes later Mrs. Ward heard a dilapidated little voice behind
her:
“Mamma dear, we’re ready to go home whenever you are.”
Mamma was absolutely paralysed by this unexpected remark.
“Cricket! is it you? What is the matter, dear? Are you ill?”
“No-o. At least I think not. But—well—my head aches a little and my
throat is stiff and hot, and my eyes are leaky and I’m sort of dizzy,
and—”
“My darling child! your throat is sore? Why didn’t you tell me before?
Where’s Eunice? We will go immediately. Find Eunice, and both of you
slip away to the dressing-room without speaking to any one. I’ll say
good-by for you to Emily and Mrs. Drayton.”
“Eunice is ready, mamma. She feels queer, too.”
Mrs. Ward’s heart, mother-like, jumped into her mouth. Cricket’s
description of her feelings might mean any one of so many things!
However, she kept a calm face, and hastened to explain matters to Mrs.
Drayton.
“Do you know, I almost believe that all the children are coming down
with something,” said Mrs. Drayton, anxiously. “That would account for
their all being so heavy and dull, and hard to amuse. Poor little Emily
is in despair. She has looked forward to this so long!”
The next day, seventeen of the children who had been at the party were
down with the mumps.
CHAPTER IV.
IN QUARANTINE.
“So it’s only the mumps!” sighed Cricket, with much relief, after papa’s
visit to their respective bedsides the next morning. “Papa, do you know
I was _dreadfully_ afraid that I had lumbago in my throat all day
yesterday, when it was all swelly-feeling and hurt so to swallow. That
would have killed me, wouldn’t it?”
Papa laughed hard.
“It might be a serious matter if you had it in your throat, but you are
in no more danger of its getting there than you are of having toothache
in your toes, my Lady Jane. Will you take a look at yourself this
morning?” and papa held up a hand mirror.
All resemblance to Cricket had totally disappeared from the
swollen-faced little maid on the bed, and the child stared in blank
astonishment.
“Is that _me_?” she gasped.
“It is you, grammar and all,” laughed papa, turning to Eunice, who lay
in her cot on the other side of the room. “Admire each other to your
heart’s content, for you are just alike, my blooming little beauties.”
“It’s bad enough to be sick without being such frights,” said Eunice
dolefully. “Cricket, you look _so_ funny. I want to laugh at you all the
time, and I can’t laugh for my face is so stiff that I can’t seem to
manage it.”
“I’ve been wanting to laugh at you ever since we woke up, but I didn’t
want to hurt your feelings,” said Cricket, politely. “I didn’t know I
looked just as worse.”
“You look ‘just as worser,’ if anything, little Lindley Murray,” said
papa, rising to go.
“But I don’t feel so _very_ sick to-day, excepting my head. Couldn’t I
get up by-and-by, papa? My legs feel so kicky.”
“Yes, you may get up, but don’t leave this room, remember. Here comes
mamma now. Have you given Eliza directions about the children, dear?”
“Yes, she will keep them on the nursery floor. So these two can get up?
That’s nice. Mumps may not be very comfortable, my chickens, but it is
nothing dangerous, if you don’t take cold. Think of you two going to the
party last night in that condition!”
“I guess it was the mumpfulest party there ever was,” said Cricket
musingly. “I don’t believe there was a single unmumpful child there.
Good-by papa; be sure and stop and see if Emily has the mumps—and if she
hasn’t, I’ll send her some.”
“It might be a good plan to have an auction sale of them,” laughed papa,
as he left the room.
The day was a long and weary one, and in spite of mamma’s company and of
many amusements, Eunice and Cricket were glad to creep back into bed
again early in the afternoon. Cricket was much the sicker of the two
children, for she had taken a little cold from her unexpected plunge the
morning before.
Just before dinner Donald came in, and went directly to his father’s
office.
“Father, I feel confoundedly queer,” he said. “I wish you’d give me
something. My throat is thick and I can scarcely swallow, and I’ve a
splitting headache, and a toothache around my entire jaw. Please patch
me up, for I have to go to a society meeting to-night.”
Doctor Ward lay back in his office-chair and looked up at his tall son
with a quizzical smile.
“H’m! lumbago in your throat too, eh? Sit down here, old boy, and let me
have a look at you.”
Donald sat down, while his father asked him a question or two. Then
Doctor Ward burst out laughing. Donald looked injured.
“I presume it is nothing serious then,” he said, with so precisely the
same air of dignity that the younger children often assumed when he
teased them, that his father laughed harder.
“It’s serious or not, as you take it,” he said. “For my part, I think
it’s decidedly serious. My dear fellow, you have the mumps.”
Donald jumped about two feet.
“Mumps!” he ejaculated. “That baby-disease at my age! Great Cæsar’s
ghost! how the fellows will guy me!” He dropped down in a chair, with
his feet straight out in front of him—a comical picture of despair.
“It was considerate of you to come home to have them,” said Doctor Ward
comfortingly. “Eunice and Cricket are just down with them. We’ll
quarantine you all together, and then you can amuse each other.”
“The kids, too?” groaned Donald. “See here! Did they give ’em to me?
I’ll wallop them!”
Doctor Ward laughed harder.
“I don’t know where they came from, yet. I’ve had twenty cases to-day.
Most of the children at the Drayton party are down. ‘A mumpful affair,’
as Cricket says. _You_ may have picked them up on the street-cars. You
could not have gotten them from our children.”
“Then I’ll stay home till the confounded things are over,” said Donald,
rising. “I suppose I mustn’t go to dinner? Are the kidlets down? No?
Well, I’ll go to my room and stay there. Since Eunice and Cricket are
next door to it, that’s all right. Is mother with the kids? I’ll look in
on them.”
So, just as mamma was cudgelling her distracted brain for more stories
to tell her two forlorn children, a knock was heard at the door, and
Donald’s curly head poked itself in.
“Hollo, Lady Greasewrister, and Madame Van Twister, her ladyship’s
sister! How are your noble mumpships?”
“Go ’way, Don,” called Cricket dolefully. “We’re all mumpy in here.
You’ll get them.”
But Donald boldly advanced. “Your humble servant, Madame Van Twister.
Your gracious majesty was pleased to smile on me last night, and your
native generosity shares even your ailments with me. Behold, thy servant
also is mumpy.”
“You, too, Donald,” shrieked Eunice delightedly. “Oh, don’t make me
laugh,” holding her hands to her throat. “Isn’t it funny, mamma? I
didn’t know _Freshmen_ ever had mumps and things.”
“Are you going to stay here with us, Don, really?” said Cricket
interestedly.
“Yes, Miss Scricket, I am. Any objections? That is, in my cell next
door. And as we are jointly quarantined from the rest of the family, I
foresee we’ll have some high old times. Oh, how they’ll wish they had
the mumps!”
“Poor boy!” said Mrs. Ward, sympathetically. “What a nuisance for you!”
For a week the mumps held high carnival at the Ward’s. Imagine, if you
can, the effect of all those swollen faces in a group. If Eunice and
Cricket looked funny, they were nothing to lordly Donald, whose face was
extended to the funniest possible proportions, for he had the affliction
only on one side.
“We’ve a regular fat man’s picnic,” said Cricket the day that Zaidie
joined the up-stairs party. For by the usual law of contraries, Zaidie,
who was always strong and well, succumbed after two days, and delicate
little Helen, as well as Kenneth, entirely escaped.
After Zaidie was promoted to the third floor, the original occupants had
all the delights of a bear-garden. It was fortunate for her
long-suffering family that Zaidie was seldom ill, for she was the
hardest possible child to take care of when she was. When she was well,
she was sunny-tempered, like the rest. She was harder now than she would
have been otherwise, for really the poor little thing was dismally
homesick for her little twin, her other self, from whom she had scarcely
ever been separated an hour in her life.
After two days of Zaidie’s confinement up-stairs, Eunice and Cricket
were in such a state of exasperation and excitement over the poor little
thing’s constant wailing and fretting for Helen, her refusing to be
comforted or amused, that it was plain she must have a room to herself.
Marjorie was detailed to look after her especially.
Marjorie, it fortunately chanced, had had the mumps when she was small.
Moreover, Zaidie was passionately attached to this eldest sister of
hers. When the little twins were born, Marjorie, aged nine, had eagerly
begged that, since mamma had two babies now, she might have one of these
to “call hers.” Mamma let her choose, and her selection instantly fell
upon the big, black-eyed baby, which appealed to her childish heart much
more than the tiny, violet-eyed one, that was so delicate that for a
year it was scarcely out of its mother’s or its nurse’s arms.
Marjorie had always petted Zaidie after that, and made much of her and
called her “her baby,” and the strong-willed little maid obeyed Marjorie
better than any one but her father and mother. Marjorie delighted in
her, because she was such a fine, noble-looking child, with her erect,
firmly-knit little figure, her short, silky black hair, her great, dark
eyes, and peachy complexion. She loved to take her to walk, for
strangers would turn and look after her, or perhaps stop and ask whose
child she was.
Helen, with her dainty beauty, her fluffy golden hair, and tiny figure,
was not nearly so striking-looking, though, after all, her caressing,
lovable little ways made her rather the family pet and baby, even more
than Kenneth, with his sturdy boy-ways. It is very apt to be the case,
however, in a large family, that each one of the older ones takes a
younger one under his or her special charge. Thus, as Marjorie had
adopted Zaidie, Eunice laid claim to Helen as her baby. In this same
way, Cricket felt that Kenneth was her particular property.
Therefore, it came about that Marjorie was quite willing to undertake
Zaidie’s amusement, but she soon discovered that a “mumpy” Zaidie tried
her resources to the uttermost. Mamma was with her also, all she could
be, but with the other girls needing her also, and with Helen down with
an unusually bad attack of the croup and fretting for Zaidie quite as
much as her little twin did for her, poor mamma said that she needed to
be three people, in order to satisfy all the demands upon her. Donald,
in spite of his own mumps, came bravely to the rescue, but Zaidie
managed to keep them all busy.
CHAPTER V.
AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR.
On the fourth day of imprisonment, Doctor Ward came up after luncheon
and carried mamma, somewhat against her will, off for a drive, as she
had not been out of the house for a breath of fresh air since the
Drayton party. Marjorie was left in charge. Zaidie, just in the state
where she wanted whoever she didn’t happen to have with her, wailed
disconsolately, as she stood at the window watching her father and
mother drive off.
“I want something to ’muse me with, Margie. Mamma’s gone and I
can’t—see—Helen, and I hasn’t anything—to ’muse me—with,” she sobbed,
flattening her nose against the window-pane.
“You ungrateful little wretch,” said Donald, trying to make a face at
her, but not succeeding in twisting his features much more than they
were already. “Here are two people devoting their days and nights to
keeping your highness serene—though I must say that I prefer to be paid
according to my efforts rather than my success.”
“If we were paid according to our success, we wouldn’t go to Europe on
the proceeds,” sighed Marjorie. “See, Zaidie, there’s Johnnie-goat
trotting down the street—I do believe his tail has grown a little
longer. Don’t you think so?”
Zaidie dried one eye and peered out. Instantly she conceived an idea.
“I want to see Johnnie-goat. I hasn’t seen him for seventy-ten years,
Marjorie. I want him to come up here and see me.”
“You can see him out of the window, pet. He couldn’t come up here—goats
don’t know anything about houses, you know.”
Zaidie instantly shrieked. Three days of immediate obedience to her
demands had spoiled her.
“I want him! I want him! My throat’s hurted me drefful, an’ I want
Johnnie-goat. I want him—up—here!”
“Great Scott, Zaidie! stop howling. Let’s have him up, Meg. Anything for
a diversion.”
“But, _Don_! the goat up _here_? We can’t.”
“In the bright lexicon of youth, there’s no such word as ‘can’t.’ I’ll
whistle down the speaking-tube to Sarah to entice him into the area, and
I’ll go down and bring him up somehow. He can’t do any harm, and if it
quiets the kidlet for a moment, it’s worth trying. Hollo, there, Sarah!”
Sarah responded, and the order was given. Zaidie stopped sniffling, and
watched the proceedings eagerly from the window.
Sarah—much amazed, but too well trained to question any order of Master
Don’s, however peculiar—ran out to induce Johnnie-goat, by every
blandishment in her power, to enter the basement door. But wary
Johnnie-goat, much more accustomed to being driven away from doors by
the application of broom-sticks than being politely entreated to enter,
suspected treachery, and backed off, moving his lowered head from side
to side.
The whole “mumpy” tribe eagerly watched the manœuvres from above. Sarah
would approach him with an indifferent, abstracted air, as if she didn’t
see him at all, and then would suddenly make a grasp at his horns.
Johnnie-goat would stand with an equally abstracted gaze as she came
nearer; then, at the last instant, up would go his heels skittishly, and
off he would go, to a convenient distance, and again await Sarah’s
approach. She displayed banana-skins temptingly, and drew him, by means
of them, almost to the area door, when the same performance would be
repeated. All the time she kept up an uncomplimentary tirade under her
breath, mingled with her enticing words to him.
“Come, Johnnie! Johnnie! good Johnnie! Oh, yer dirty blackguard! yer
wretched spalpeen, you! It’s a clubbin’ with a big shillaly I’d be after
givin’ you! Come here, yer good goaty! Come and see the purty little gal
what’s waitin’ fur ye! Oh, the capers! takin’ that son-of-a gun
up-stairs! You murtherin’ wretch, I’d drown yer fur a cint! Come here,
good old goaty! come to Sarah! Ach, murther, howly saints! git yer evil
eye off me!” as Johnnie suddenly reared and waltzed around on his hind
legs, in a way peculiar to goats, presenting a low-bent head
threateningly in her direction.
“Get hold of him now, Sarah,” shouted Donald, throwing up the window for
a moment. “He won’t really hurt you. Grab his horns!”
Here Marjorie slammed down the window indignantly. Sarah, quaking with
terror, but feeling she must obey Mr. Donald though the heavens fell,
made a desperate rush and really grabbed the threatening horns with a
heavy hand. She was big and strong, and as soon as she actually touched
him, her Irish blood was up for a scrimmage. Even Johnnie-goat, to his
own intense surprise and indignation, was as wax in her hands. Tucking
his head well under her arm, by main strength she dragged him along,
protesting with all his legs, to the area door. By that time Johnnie had
recovered his presence of mind, and then ensued a tremendous racket that
brought the waitress to the rescue.
Johnnie-goat, of course, was filled with amazement at these strange
proceedings, and his shrill “ba-a’s” went all over the house. Sarah and
Jane dragged him, struggling fiercely, along the basement hall to the
stairs. Then Sarah, getting him by his wrathful horns, and Jane pushing
from behind, wherever she could get hold, puffing and panting, they
propelled bewildered Johnnie-goat remorselessly up the stairway, his
sharp little hoofs beating a strongly rebellious tattoo as he went,
bleating like a whole ranch of goats.
Over the stair-railing, on the upper floor, hung five eager faces, each
of the older ones calling out different suggestions, while Zaidie, her
mumps all forgotten, shrieked hoarse applause to them all. As Eliza was
out with Helen and Kenneth, they missed all this exciting time.
Arriving on the second floor, panting Sarah was obliged to sit down on
the stairs to rest. She threw her apron over Johnnie-goat’s head,
thereby reducing him to a still wilder state of amazement, and hugged
his neck tightly under her arm to keep him quiet.
“Hould on to his hinder-legs, Jane,” she directed, and Jane immediately
got hold of each wildly kicking hind leg. As Johnnie-goat was obliged to
use his fore legs to stand on, he was, for the first time in his life,
reduced to a condition of ignominious surrender. His vociferous cries
filled the house.
The children, up-stairs, were in shrieks of laughter. Sarah looked as
grimly determined as if she were attacking a tramp. She strongly
disapproved of the whole proceeding, but, as is often the case with the
servants in a large household of children, she was absolute devotion to
the whole tribe, and if they had ordered it, would have attempted to
walk up the side of the house. Jane was doubled up with laughter, and
with difficulty held on to her end of the captive. Sarah kept up a
running comment.
“Be still, you slathery spalpeen; stop kickin’ me. Ye’ve kicked me till
the futs uv me is black till the knee, I’ll be bound. Rest yerself the
while; nobody’s going to hurt yer. Come, then, if yer wants to go, we’ll
be off wid yer now. Take another h’ist, Jane. Shure, Masther Don, it’s
hopin’ ye’ve got a rope up there I am, else it’s tearin’ yez all to
pieces he’ll be.”
“Come on,” shouted Donald, boyishly; “bring on your plunder. I’ve got a
trunk-strap to fasten him with.” Donald dived into the trunk-room, and
reappeared with a long strap.
“Oh, my goodness, how he wiggles!” cried Zaidie, clapping her hands
ecstatically, as the procession started up-stairs again. “Johnnie-goat!
Johnnie-goat! keep still, and let Sarah carry you, there’s a good
goatie!”
And thus, pushed and pulled, Johnnie-goat, bewildered and indignant, was
delivered into Donald’s hands, and the hot and panting maids returned
down-stairs.
Donald fastened the long strap to his collar, and then to the
balustrade. Being released from durance vile—that is, from his enforced
retreat under Sarah’s strong arm,—he shook himself vigorously, and then
straightway executed a war-dance, first on his hind legs and then on his
fore legs, and then, apparently, on one at a time, alternating the
performance with a succession of dives and butts that sent the children
shrieking and laughing in all directions out of his way.
“Oh, my throat!” sighed Cricket, wiping the tears from her eyes. “I’ve
certainly split my mumps! _Don’t_ make me laugh so, Johnnie-goat. Don’t
you know your friends?”
Apparently Johnnie didn’t, for he instantly butted fiercely in Cricket’s
direction.
“I do b’lieve he’s hungry,” said Zaidie, hospitably offering him a
newspaper. In the midst of his wrath, Johnnie-goat recognised this
familiar object, and, after eying it a moment, he suddenly dropped his
warlike demeanour, accepted the paper as a peace-offering, and fell to
chewing as placidly as if he stood on his native heath—that is, the
livery stableman’s back yard. Under the calming influence of this
familiar occupation, he soon dropped every appearance of resentment, and
finally ducked his head in his usual friendly fashion, to let Zaidie
scratch him between the horns.
One of Johnnie-goat’s accomplishments was jumping over a rope held a
foot from the ground. Cricket now proposed to make him do it, as the
hall was long enough to give him a good run for it. As they did not dare
to let him go entirely, Donald tied a long, stout cord to each side of
his collar, so that somebody could drive him and jump the rope with him.
Of course that somebody was Cricket. When the reins were ready, and
Cricket had them well in hand, Donald unfastened the trunk-strap, and
Eunice and Zaidie each held an end of it in place, so that Johnnie-goat
could jump over it.
He knew the programme perfectly well, and stood quietly while the
arrangements were being made.
“All ready,” cried Donald, as much a boy at heart as ever, in spite of
his eighteen years and his Freshman dignity. “Let him go, Gallagher!”
“Get up, sir!” cried Cricket, shaking her string reins. Johnnie-goat
stood provokingly still, gazing abstractedly out of the window.
“Get up, sir,” repeated Cricket, giving him a gentle push in the rear
with her foot.
The touch gave Johnnie-goat the excuse he had been waiting for. He gave
one of his sudden darts, dragging the strings from Cricket’s hand, and
was free. He pranced forward, escaping Donald’s hands, knocked down
Zaidie, who promptly howled, and dashed into Eunice’s room. There he
encountered a small table, the contents of which were instantly strewed
over the floor, while the children ran screaming after him.
“My work-basket!” shrieked Eunice, darting forward to rescue it, as
Johnnie-goat stopped, with one foot through the pretty straw cover, and
nibbled inquisitively at a tape measure. He kicked out behind and butted
in front when the children tried to catch him, and then turned his
attention to a little silver-topped emery.
“Oh, Don! do get it!” cried Eunice, clasping her hands tragically, as
the emery went into the capacious mouth, and Johnnie-goat meditatively
rolled it over with his tongue, to get its full flavour.
Don deftly seized Johnnie-goat’s horns with one hand, and bent back his
head with the other, pulling at the silk cord that drooped gracefully
out from his mouth—thus rescuing the emery from its Jonah-like retreat.
“Oh! oh!” wailed Eunice, taking the wet and dirty object daintily by
thumb and finger, “it’s all spoiled! You bad Johnnie-goat! Box his ears,
Don. Look out, Cricket, there he goes at your new shoes. Do get him down
stairs now. Ow! there goes my Dresden pin-tray!” with a shriek of
despair. Johnnie-goat, whisking from side to side of the room, in search
of new excitement, had swept his bearded chin over the low
dressing-table, among the array of pin-cushions, trays, bottles,
photographs, and brushes. Smash went the dainty Dresden pin-tray on the
floor as Eunice spoke, and Johnnie-goat danced off.
“Come, you young bull in a china shop, we’ve had enough of you,” said
Donald, diving after him, and catching him by whatever was nearest. It
happened to be his tail, which was a short but firm handle. Johnnie-goat
whipped around indignantly, and Donald grabbed at his horns.
[Illustration: AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR.]
“Whistle down the tube for Sarah to take him, Meg,” he called. “No,
stop; I’ll take him down myself, the kids are out of the way. Come this
way, young chap,” and Donald pulled and hauled Johnnie, vigorously
rebelling, to the top of the staircase. As Johnnie looked down to the
floor below, possibly he regarded the stairs as some curious kind of
mountains, which his inherited instinct made familiar, for he suddenly
plunged headlong down them so fast that Donald lost his balance, and
went heels-over-head after him, goat and Freshman arriving at the bottom
at the same moment, in an inextricably mixed-up condition. Overhead the
excited girls watched and screamed.
Donald unwound his long length slowly. He and the goat had mutually
broken each other’s fall, and nearly each other’s necks. As it happened,
neither was hurt. At least, Donald discovered that he was not, and as
for Johnnie-goat, he seemed as much alive as ever, but in such a state
of amazement at all the strange experiences that he was going through,
that he quietly submitted to let Don lay hold of his collar, and escort
him at a slow and dignified walk down the next flight.
They were half-way down when there was a quick click of a latch-key, and
the front door opened. Doctor Ward and a stranger entered. Both stared
in amazement.
“How under the canopy—” began Doctor Ward; but Donald interrupted him,
explaining calmly:
“Goat ran away from the Odd-Fellow’s Lodge, over there. The poor
creature is nearly starved; I’m taking it back.”
CHAPTER VI.
A PHILANTHROPIC SCHEME.
One morning, when the mumps were a thing of the past, Eunice and Cricket
walked along to school arm-in-arm. Cricket swung her books, as usual, by
the long strap, and Eunice had hers snugly tucked under her arm. Both
were chattering as fast as their busy tongues could wag. As they turned
around the corner into a quiet street, the sound of a crying child
attracted their attention, though at first there was nothing to be seen.
“There it is,” said Cricket. “See that mite up there.”
The “mite” was a funny-looking little thing about three years old,
poorly dressed, bareheaded, with a little flaxen pig-tail sticking out
behind each ear. The child stood at the top of some steps, wailing
steadily, and beating its little blue fists against the door.
“It’s been shut out, poor little thing,” said Eunice, running up the
steps and ringing the bell, vigorously. “Wait a moment, Cricket, till
someone comes to the door.”
The baby stopped crying and surveyed her new friend with a pair of
staring, pale-blue eyes.
It was certainly a very dirty baby, and Eunice wondered at its belonging
to such a nice-looking house. Then a trim maid opened the door.
“I found this baby, here, trying to get in,” began Eunice, civilly, “so
I rang the bell for her, and waited till you came to take her in.”
The trim maid surveyed the baby in indignant scorn.
“It don’t belong here, miss, for sure. The likes o’ that!”
“Doesn’t belong here? The poor little thing! Then she must be lost. She
was pounding on your door and crying dreadfully. What shall I do with
her?”
“’Deed, I don’t know, miss,” answered the maid, backing away and partly
shutting the door, as if afraid that Eunice would insist on leaving the
interesting infant there. It had immediately adopted Eunice as its
protector, apparently, for it grasped her skirt with one hand, and with
a thumb tucked deep into its mouth, it stood passively staring from one
to the other. Somebody must do something, that was clear.
[Illustration: THE LOST BABY.]
“Come on,” called Cricket, who had walked slowly on. “Won’t she go in?”
“Come back a minute. The maid says she doesn’t belong here. What shall
we do with her? I suppose she’s lost. Can’t I leave her here? I have to
go to school,” added Eunice, turning to the girl, who had now left only
a crack of door open.
“’Deed, no. _We_ didn’t find her,” said the girl, impertinently. “It
doesn’t belong anywhere about here. Take her to the police station. We
can’t take care of beggar’s brats,” and with that she shut the door,
leaving Eunice staring as blankly at the door as the baby did at her
dress.
“What a horrid, cross girl!” said Eunice, indignantly, at last,
descending the steps slowly to accommodate her steps to the short, fat
legs beside her. The child still clung closely to a fold of her dress.
“What shall we do with it? We’ll be dreadfully late for school.”
“Let’s take it to school,” suggested Cricket.
“How could we? Baby, what is your name, and where do you live?”
Baby uttered a gurgle that doubtless meant volumes, but which the girls
could not interpret. She was a Dutchy-looking little thing, with a wide,
chubby face and squat little figure. Her little flaxen pig-tails were
about an inch and a half long, and were tied with white string.
“Shall we take her to the police station? Let’s hurry, whatever we do.
It’s ’most nine.”
“The police station? and have the poor little atom locked up in a big,
black cell?” exclaimed Eunice, indignantly. “Never!” for her ideas as to
the exact advantage of taking a lost child to a police station were
somewhat vague.
“Let’s take her to the little bake-shop woman by the school, and leave
her there for the morning, anyway. I’m sure she’ll take care of her.
We’ll take her home after school, and papa will see about her.”
Eunice assenting to this proposal, they now took up the line of march.
People glanced and smiled at the funny, dirty baby, with the
handkerchief that Eunice tied over its head, and the two well-dressed
children, but _they_ did not notice it.
“Eunice, we might adopt it!” cried Cricket suddenly. “Wouldn’t that be
fun? It could play with Kenneth, and ’Liza wouldn’t mind one more child
to take care of.”
“What fun!” exclaimed Eunice. “And if ’Liza didn’t want the trouble we
could do it ourselves. It could sleep in a crib in our room. I’d wash it
one morning, and you could the next.”
“Yes, and we’d spend Saturday mornings making its clothes.”
“And we’d take it to walk when we got home from school—”
“And we’d teach it its letters—”
“And put it to bed—”
“Would we have to spank her if she was naughty?”
“Oh, do let’s _beg_ them to let us have it for our very own, and bring
it up ourselves. Would you like to live with us, baby?”
The possibility of a distracted mother, searching around for the child,
somehow never occurred to the girls, in their planning about the little
waif, and they chattered on, in their eagerness, till they reached the
shop of the little baker, with whom they meant to leave the child.
The good-natured little woman, who knew the children well by sight, was
quite interested in their story, and was entirely willing to take charge
of the lost baby till one o’clock. She was an ignorant little German
woman, and she never thought of telling the girls to send it to the
police station to be kept till its friends could look it up.
The thought of the baby kept the girls excited all the morning. After
school they started off immediately, without waiting, as usual, for
their friends. The baby recognised Eunice as soon as she appeared, and
pulled her dress delightedly.
“Could you lend us something to put on her head?” asked Eunice, eyeing
the flaxen pig-tails doubtfully. “My handkerchief makes her look so
queer, and I’m afraid she’ll take cold without anything over her head.”
The little bake-shop woman good-naturedly produced a very
remarkable-looking cap of her own baby’s, and tied it on the little
waif’s head.
“I haf ask her the name,” she said, as she tied the strings, “but I no
unnerstan’ her. She try to talk, but she yust—”
“Jabbers,” said Cricket. “I should say she did. Good-by! Thank you ever
so much for taking care of her for us.”
When the girls arrived at home they found a free field. Mamma had gone
to Marbury to spend the day with grandma, and had taken Kenneth with
her. Marjorie was out to lunch with a friend; and papa, Jane said, had
been unexpectedly called out of town an hour ago, and would not be back
that night. They took the baby up to the nursery, and introduced their
prize to astonished ’Liza and the twins.
“But you can’t _keep_ it,” said ’Liza. “I jest guess its poor mother is
running all around the streets looking for it.”
“Oh, do you think so?” said Eunice surprised. “Why, I never thought of
her. Well, of course, papa will advertise the baby, and do everything
about it, but if we _don’t_ find anyone belonging to her, we are going
to keep her, Cricket and I.”
Whereupon ’Liza pretended to faint away.
The twins were perfectly delighted with the addition to the family.
“It’s just like the little boy we finded once,” piped up Zaidie, “only
it’s a girl. Auntie wouldn’t let us keep it.”
“This is a really, truly, losted baby, though, and Phelps wasn’t,”
explained Helen. “He had only runned away.”
The “losted baby” here took its thumb out of its mouth, and suddenly
began to cry.
“It’s hungry!” announced Cricket, with the air of one discovering
America. “What do you s’pose it can eat, ’Liza?”
“’Most anything it can get, I rather guess,” said ’Liza. “That kind
generally does, and is glad to get it, too.”
“She isn’t ‘that kind,’” said Cricket indignantly, resenting the tone.
“Come, baby; we’ll go down-stairs and get some bread and milk. You
’ittle tunnin’ sing!” as the baby stopped in its howl as suddenly as it
had begun, and trotted away contentedly with the girls.
Cook duly exclaimed over “the find,” but she reiterated the advice of
the cross maid, and recommended them to take the baby to the police
station.
“Why does _every_body want to send this poor little mite to the police
station?” cried Eunice. “It hasn’t done a thing, only got lost, and
prob’ly it didn’t want to do that; and everybody wants to shut it up in
a big, black cell. Papa can advertise it when he gets home, if he likes,
and if anybody comes for it they can have it. If no one _does_ come,
we’ll keep you ourselves; won’t we, baby? Drink the milk, now.”
“Wish we knew its name,” said Cricket.
“Let’s name it something ourselves,” suggested Eunice.
“To be sure. Don’t you know when Pharaoh’s daughter found Moses she
named him Moses, herself? Oh, Eunice, let’s call her _Mosina_!”
“Oh, _Cricket_, how lovely! Just the thing! We didn’t find her in the
bulrushes, but we did find her on some steps. Oh, you darling Mosina! I
_hope_ your mother won’t come for you!”
When the new arrival had finished her luncheon, and the children had had
theirs, they carried Mosina off to their room. Zaidie and Helen
immediately came toiling up from the nursery, to help entertain their
guest. Fortunately she was not at all shy, and jabbered and gurgled in
her unintelligible baby talk, showing the greatest readiness to be
amused.
“La! she’s awful dirty,” said Eliza, looking in on them presently. “I
wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole.”
“Let’s wash her, and dress her up in Kenneth’s things,” cried Cricket,
straightway catching hold of Mosina, who speedily stood arrayed only in
her own rosy skin; for the dirt which ’Liza had exclaimed at, was really
chiefly on her hands and face.
Eunice drew the water in the bath-tub, and all four, with great laughing
and excitement, superintended a very thorough scrubbing process, to the
infinite amazement of the small child, who had probably never been so
scrubbed before since she was born.
There was a small bruise on one side of the round, dimpled thigh, that
presently caught Zaidie’s attention.
“Here’s another dirt-spot, Eunice,” she said, with an air of much
importance at the discovery. It was so delightful to be the scrubber
instead of the _scrubbee_. She seized the nail-brush, and squeezing in
under Eunice’s arm, began vigorously applying it to the baby’s soft
flesh. That small person instantly howled again.
“Stop, Zaidie! that isn’t dirt, it’s a bruise,” said Eunice, taking the
nail-brush away. “Can’t you tell the difference?”
“Not unlets I poke ’em,” said Zaidie, looking surprised. “When I have
one I always poke it, and if it hurts I know it’s a bruise. If it
doesn’t I guess it’s dirt. I couldn’t tell it on the baby, could I?”
“You had better experiment on yourself,” said Cricket, laughing. “There,
Miss Mosina, you’re pretty clean now, I think. Let’s take her out,
Eunice. Put down the big bath-towel, Zaidie.”
Baby had endured the process in awed silence thus far, but when she
stood dripping like a little cupid on the bath-towel, she patted her
round, fat legs with every appearance of delight, and even attempted to
climb back into the tub. It was probably her first experience of a
plunge.
“You _cunning_ thing!” cried Eunice, as rapturously as if she had never
seen a small child tubbed before. “Cricket, won’t you run and ask ’Liza
for some of Kenneth’s clothes? I don’t want to put her dirty ones on her
again.”
Cricket ran off and presently came back, laughing.
“’Liza says she couldn’t dress such little beggars in gentlemen-folkses’
children’s clothes, but finally she let me have these old ones, that
mamma had put by to give away. Let me see; where do you begin?”
“I know,” said Zaidie; and by the united efforts of all four, Mosina was
presently arrayed.
This process had taken up a great part of the afternoon, and at this
moment, Marjorie, who had just returned, came running up-stairs.
“Oh, have mamma and Kenneth come back so early?” she said, catching
sight of a tiny figure in a familiar blue dress.
“No, but this is our new baby, and we’re going to adopt it, if its
mother doesn’t come for it; and I don’t much believe she will, for it
was pretty dirty, and probably she doesn’t care for it much, so Eunice
and I are going to keep it,” poured out Cricket in a breath.
Marjorie dropped against the newel-post.
“_Adopt_ it? What, in the name of common sense, are you talking about,
Cricket? Where did the atom come from?”
“We found her in the street this morning,” explained Eunice, “and we
couldn’t find anybody that belonged to her, so we _had_ to bring her
home, Marjorie. We couldn’t leave her to starve, could we? Poor little
mite! she was freezing cold.”
Mosina, quite aware that she was under discussion, clung to the dress of
her first friend, sucking her thumb, and staring from one to the other
with her solemn blue eyes.
“But, my dear children,” began Marjorie, in a very superior,
elder-sisterly tone, “that is perfectly absurd. With all the raft of
children we have now, we can’t adopt a whole orphan asylum. Besides, her
mother will be looking for her; probably she is nearly frantic. You must
send her to the police station.”
“There!” cried Eunice, aggrieved, “that old police station again!
Everybody says that. As if I would have this cunning thing, that loves
me so, shut up in a horrid old black cell. Why, she’d be as afraid as
anything.”
“They don’t put lost children in cells,” began Marjorie, and then
stopped, not quite certain what they did do with them. “At any rate, you
ought to take her there. People always do.”
“I shan’t do it,” said Eunice, stoutly.
“And, Marjorie, she’d be frightened to death among all those big men,”
expostulated Cricket. “We have just _got_ to keep her.”
“Then I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” compromised Marjorie. “I’ll send Jane
around to the police station, and tell them she’s here, and describe
her, and leave our address. If any one comes, they can send here.”
Just then the door-bell rang.
CHAPTER VII.
MOSINA.
In a moment, Jane came up with a telegram from mamma, saying that she
would stay in Marbury all night, as it looked like rain, and Kenneth had
a slight cold.
The children looked at each other in blank dismay. Mamma’s absence, for
one night, really made no difference at all, but they felt as if the
bottom had dropped out of the house. Of course mamma had not known of
papa’s absence for the night, as he had been telegraphed for after she
had left in the morning.
Conscientious Marjorie looked as if the affairs of the nation rested on
her shoulders.
“Oh, dear me!” she sighed. “And this baby on my hands.” And then she
explained to Jane about the police station, and what she wanted.
“Now, if the child is to stay here to-night, we must arrange about its
sleeping,” she added.
“In Kenneth’s bed,” piped up Zaidie.
“I’ll see ’Liza about it,” said Marjorie, turning to the nursery. “Take
her up-stairs, Eunice, do, and keep her amused till dinner.”
“I’ll tell you, Miss Marjorie,” said ’Liza in confidence, “them children
have the notion of adopting that baby. Of course it’s all nonsense, but
you let ’em have her in their room to-night, and they’ll get off the
notion. Tell ’em I can’t have the bother of it here. ’Course I’ll sleep
with one ear open, and if they get into trouble, I’ll go up.”
“Very well, ’Liza, I’ll do that,” said Marjorie, turning away.
Eunice and Cricket proclaimed themselves perfectly _delighted_ with the
arrangement. It was just what they meant to do, anyway.
“Of course, Marjorie, if _we_ adopt the baby, we’d expect to take all
the care of it, you know,” said Cricket. “’Liza has enough to do with
the younger ones; ’course she’ll sleep here. Eunice, you can have her
half the night, and I’ll take her the other half.”
“I may forget to wake up,” objected Eunice. “Suppose I take her to-night
into my bed, Cricket, and you take her to-morrow night. There’s the
dinner-bell. She can stay in the nursery with ’Liza and the twins, and
get her supper, while we’re at dinner.”
“Come, Mosina,” said Cricket. “Oh, Marjorie, I forgot to tell you, we
named her Mosina, after Moses.”
“You are the most ridiculous children about names,” said Marjorie,
laughing. “Come to dinner now. After dinner let us try that duet,
Eunice.”
Marjorie and Eunice were both musical, and each played exceedingly well
for their respective years. Although Cricket loved music, she had no
aptitude for the piano, and her lessons had been discontinued. Instead,
her talent for her pencil was being cultivated. But all the children
were more or less musical. Marjorie and Eunice both had very good
voices, and, with Donald’s aid, they often practised trios, as well as
duets by themselves.
After dinner, Marjorie and Eunice played duets for a time, but Eunice
was so impatient to get back to her adopted baby, and made so many
mistakes, that presently Marjorie, in disgust, sent her off. The two
younger girls immediately flew up to the nursery.
’Liza was getting the twins ready for bed, and gave Eunice some
night-things of Kenneth’s for her charge, together with a shower of
instructions for the night. Then the children carried off the baby,
nodding and heavy-eyed, but quiet and stolid still.
With much giggling and fun, and a feeling of immense importance, the two
girls finally had Mosina undressed and ready for bed. By this time she
was almost asleep on their hands.
“Just see this room!” exclaimed Eunice, looking about her, after the
infant was safely tucked away in her cot. “Doesn’t it look as if a
cyclone had struck it? It’s more mussed up than the nursery ever gets
with all three children there.”
“We’ll put it in order to-morrow, for it’s Saturday, and we’ll have
plenty of time,” said Cricket, gathering up the baby’s things with a
sweep of her arm, and putting them on a chair. “Come on down-stairs
again. Doesn’t it seem grown-up and motherly just to turn down the gas
and go down and leave the baby asleep? _Won’t_ mamma be surprised when
she comes home?”
“We must listen to see if she cries,” said Eunice, beginning to feel the
responsibility of a family.
The children went down-stairs again, to the back parlour, where Marjorie
was deep in to-morrow’s trigonometry. They each took a book and
pretended to read, but each found herself starting up at every sound,
and asking each other if that was the baby’s voice. A dozen times Eunice
tiptoed to the front hall and stood listening at the foot of the stairs,
with a queer feeling of the necessity of keeping very quiet, although
she certainly had never felt that necessity with the twins or her small
brother. A dozen times Cricket started up, fancying she heard a little
wail from above.
“Dear me!” sighed the latter, at last, “I know now what mamma means by
saying she sleeps with her ears open. I have one ear up-stairs, and the
other on my book, and I’ve read this page six times, and I have
forgotten to turn over.”
“It shows your distracted condition, if you are trying to read with your
ears,” Marjorie stopped her studying to observe. “Don’t bother about
that infant, girls. She’s all right. _I’m_ only thinking about her poor
mother. Jane said there had been no inquiries at the police station.”
“Everybody’s been firing that police station at our heads all day,” said
Eunice, “but I couldn’t bear to have the poor little thing put in a
cell.”
“But they don’t put lost children in cells, goosie,” said Marjorie. “I
suppose they have a woman to take care of them. They send to the Central
Office and tell them they have a lost child there. Then anybody who has
lost a child goes to the nearest station and tells about it. Then they
send to the Central and ask if a lost child has been reported there, and
then they telegraph back if it has, and the parents go and find it,
wherever it is. You know I sent to the station to say it is here.”
“How very simple,” said Eunice, thoughtfully. “I wish we had known that
this morning. I didn’t think about the mother’s part of it, as I do now.
How we would feel if Kenneth was lost for even an hour.”
“Come, Eunice,” said Cricket, shutting her book with a slam. “Let’s go
to bed. I’ve had such an exciting day that I’m just _reeking_ with
sleep. Good night, Meg.”
“Good night, and take care of your infant.”
The children tiptoed into their room, and turned up the gas a very
little.
“Do look at that child,” said Eunice, stopping short.
Certainly if Mosina was quiet by day she plainly made up for it at
night. She had twisted, and wiggled, and kicked, till the clothes were
lying in every direction, and she herself was curled into a little ball
at the foot of the bed, with her beloved thumb tucked into her mouth as
far as it would go.
“How shall we get her back again without waking her? Would you dare lift
her?”
“We’ll have to. You can’t sleep without any clothes over you, can you?
Come up here, you rascal,” and Cricket lifted the small round ball
gently in her arms and laid her, right side up, at the other end of the
bed. Baby settled down with a gurgle.
After the girls were in bed, and silence and darkness had reigned for
ten minutes, Eunice suddenly remarked:
“Do you know, Cricket, I never realised before how small this cot is.
This midget seems to take up all the room. She slips right down into the
middle.”
“Sleep on the other side,” murmured Cricket, drowsily.
“I can’t very well sleep on both sides of her at once; I’ll move her
along once more.”
Silence again, broken by a sudden grunt from Eunice.
“Ugh! she’s planted her feet whack in my stomach. Cricket, she flops
just like a little fish. I never know where she’s going to land next;
and she’s a regular windmill with her arms. There she comes, whack, on
my nose again.”
“Tell—her—to—stop,” advised Cricket, in far-away tones.
“Much good that would do! Now, you midget, get over on your own side,
and stay there;” and Eunice, having lost all fears of awakening her
protegé, placed her with much firmness back on the other side.
Poor Eunice! As the cot was only three feet wide, and as she was
entirely unaccustomed to sleeping with any one, much less a wriggling,
squirming baby, she naturally found her present experience rather a
trying one. She listened enviously to Cricket’s even breathing, which
showed that she was safe in the Land of Nod; but when she herself was
almost there, a tiny foot or hand was suddenly planted on her, or the
soft, round little body came rolling over, and landed plump upon her.
“_Oh_, DEAR!” cried Eunice at last, in despairing capitals, “how do
mothers ever sleep at night, if their babies sleep with them?”
She stretched herself on the outermost limit of her cot, after pushing
Mosina well along to the other side. For a time quiet reigned, and
Eunice’s heavy eyelids fell. She was peacefully sailing away to
dreamland, when suddenly a thud and a roar awakened them. Of course
Mosina had fallen out of bed.
“Cricket! Cricket! do get up and light the gas! I’m afraid to get out
for fear I’ll step on her. Do hurry, Cricket!”
Cricket tumbled sleepily out of bed and groped for the matches, which
hung in a little swinging receiver on the gas-jet. She hit it
accidentally, and every match went flying to the floor. Meanwhile Mosina
steadily roared. Eunice leaned over the edge and felt around for her.
“Where have every one of those plaguey matches gone?” demanded Cricket,
with emphasis, groping around on her hands and knees, and hitting every
kind of object save a match. Just at that moment Eliza, aroused by the
uproar, appeared, carrying a candle.
“The baby fell out of bed,” explained Eunice, somewhat unnecessarily,
springing out of bed herself as the welcome light appeared. Mosina lay
sprawled on her back, kicking her fat legs, and screaming lustily.
“’Tain’t hurt, by the way it cries,” said Eliza, picking up the baby
with a practised hand. “It’s mad. There now! ’sh! hushaby! Where was it
sleeping, Miss Eunice?”
“Here in my bed. Cricket, perhaps it _would_ be better to take half a
night apiece instead of every other night. I want _some_ sleep. She
thrashes like a whale. I’m all black and blue where she has punched me.”
By this time Mosina, hushed in Eliza’s arms, had gradually ceased crying
and was shutting her sleepy eyes again.
“Yes, give her to me,” said Cricket, hopping into bed, and holding out
her arms. “Isn’t she soft and warm, though. She’s just like a little
hot-water bag. I’ll put you on the side next the wall, you cunning
thing, so you can’t fall out again.”
Eunice jumped into bed and drew up the blankets with a perfect groan of
relief, and Eliza departed, leaving them in darkness and quiet again.
“If she kicks _very_ hard, Cricket, I’ll take her back, after I’ve had a
little—snooze—but—I’m so—” and Eunice dropped off, even as she spoke.
Cricket cuddled the baby in her arms, where it actually lay still for a
minute or two, and Cricket improved the opportunity to go to sleep
herself.
CHAPTER VIII.
A BEDFELLOW.
Two or three hours passed, and the household were all asleep; Cricket,
in the intervals of her disturbed dreams, had fished her little charge
up from her feet, and extricated her from an amazing tangle of sheets
and blankets. She had awakened from an oppressive dream of drowning to
find the baby sprawling over her chest, with both legs around her neck.
She had patiently restored her each time to her own corner. At last,
thoroughly tired out with this unaccustomed wakefulness and
responsibility, she fell into a sleep much heavier than usual,
regardless of Mosina’s continued antics.
At last a strange, new sound slowly penetrated her consciousness, and
she gradually awakened to the fact that there had been a queer, wheezing
noise close to her ear for some time. Still dazed with sleep; she lay
bewildered for a moment or two, till it suddenly dawned on her that the
queer noise came from the small atom at her side. Mosina was wheezing
and choking in a way that became more alarming every moment.
“Eunice! Eunice!” cried Cricket, suddenly realising that something was
seriously wrong; “for goodness sake, wake up! Something’s the matter
with the baby!”
“In a moment,” answered Eunice, sleepily, thinking that she was being
called to breakfast.
“_Eunice_, get up! Run for ’Liza! Baby’s _dying_!”
“What?” cried Eunice, startled into full wakefulness. “Oh, Cricket! What
is it? What awful noises!”
“I don’t know what’s the matter,” said Cricket, feeling her way to the
gas again. “Oh, _do_ hurry! Here, you light it, and I’ll go.” And
Cricket flew away barefooted.
In a moment she was back again, and directly after ’Liza appeared, in a
trailing flannel wrapper and felt shoes.
“Croup!” she had exclaimed to herself, as she heard the wheezing noises
away down-stairs. “A bad case, too,” she added to herself, as she
entered the room.
Eunice had the gas lighted, and the two shivering, frightened little
girls hung over the cot, where the baby lay fighting for breath, with
that dreadful, whooping noise that mothers know and dread. Eliza came
forward quickly; although she had not much head for any emergencies out
of her own line, she was a good and efficient nurse where children’s
ordinary ailments were concerned.
“Put on your dressing-gowns and slippers,” she ordered the children, she
herself flying to the wash-stand, and wringing out a towel in cold
water. “Run up-stairs, Miss Eunice, and wake Jane, and tell her to go
for Dr. Townsend. Pass me a flannel petticoat out of your drawer,
Cricket, please. I dasn’t wait to go to the nursery for things.”
The children flew on their respective orders, and in a twinkling Eliza
had a cold compress on the baby’s chest, well protected by Cricket’s
blue flannel petticoat.
Jane appeared a few moments later, ready to go for the doctor, and
Marjorie, aroused by the voices and general commotion, came flying
up-stairs.
“Them big, fat children always has croup dretful,” said Jane cheerfully.
“Like as not she’ll die.”
“Die!” echoed ’Liza, scowling at her. “You get along, Jane Lackett, and
bring that doctor, and tell him Doctor Ward’s away; and don’t let the
grass grow under your feet, neither.”
“Oh, ’Liza, will she die?” whispered Cricket, clinging to Eliza’s hand.
“Oh, lawks! I guess not, honey; but she’s fair to middlin’ sick. Helen
ain’t nothin’ to her. Never heard a worse wheezin’. S’pose she’s took a
fine cold this morning, runnin’ round without any hat on.”
It was dreadful to the girls, who had never seen a bad attack of croup
before, to stand there helplessly, and watch the little creature
fighting for breath, every respiration coming with a long whoop that
seemed to tear the little frame apart.
“Can’t you do anything, ’Liza?” begged Marjorie. “It’s dreadful to see
her suffer so. Aren’t there any medicines to give her?”
“Yes, Miss Marjorie; there’s syrup of squills. It’s in your ma’s
medicine chest. No; it’s all out, I know. I’ll give her some vaseline,
if you’ll get some.”
“Make her _eat_ that stuff!” exclaimed Cricket. “Why, it will choke her!
Don’t do it. It’s cruel!”
But Eliza, unheeding, took a spoonful of vaseline, and opening the
baby’s already gasping mouth still further, put the soft, slippery mass
down the poor little throat.
Presently the doctor came, and to the children’s amazement, he nodded
approvingly over the vaseline. Then he ordered them all off to bed.
“Go and finish the night in mamma’s bed, you and Cricket,” suggested
Marjorie. “’Liza, I’ll be on the lookout for our children, since my room
is next to theirs, and you must stay here. Is the baby very sick,
doctor?”
“It’s a pretty bad attack, but nothing to be frightened about,” said the
doctor cheerily. “But who in the world is the youngster?”
While Marjorie explained, Eunice and Cricket crept off to mamma’s room,
and tucked themselves into her wide bed, feeling as if they had been
through a lifetime’s experience since nine o’clock that night. How
delightfully peaceful and care-free it seemed to settle down without
anyone to look after but themselves.
“Really, Cricket, it may sound funny to you,” said Eunice, squeezing her
sister, “but I feel as if I had had babies in my bed for _years_. It
actually seems funny not to feel her squirming around.”
“And I’m very sure, for my part, that adopting babies is not what it’s
cracked up to be,” returned Cricket, decidedly. “Eunice, don’t let _us_
adopt her, even if her mother doesn’t come for her. Mamma can, if she
wants to, or papa can find somebody else to. I think we have enough
children, anyway.”
“She would take a lot of time,” asserted Eunice.
“Yes; and think of dressing her every morning!” added Cricket.
“And having her sleep with us, and kicking us black and blue every
night!” said Eunice feelingly.
“Yes, and keeping us awake. Wonder how the poor little thing is.”
“The doctor and ’Liza will take care of her. Listen, Cricket! There’s
the clock actually striking two o’clock! Mercy! were we ever awake so
late before?”
“Never. I feel forty-six years older than I did last night, don’t you,
Eunice?”
But a grunt was Eunice’s only answer, and Cricket speedily followed her
to the Land o’ Nod.
The doctor and Eliza had a busy hour over the baby, and at the end of
that time it was sleeping quietly, and the night was finished in peace
and quiet.
It was very fortunate that Eliza was the most patient, long-suffering
nurse imaginable, for she accepted Mosina as a temporary inmate of the
nursery the next day as a matter of course, and looked after her as
carefully as after the other children. Jane made another visit to the
police station, after breakfast, but only brought back the information
that no lost child had yet been reported.
Papa returned about luncheon time, and to his great amazement, was
presented to the new member of his family.
“We thought at first we’d like to adopt her, but we’ve come to the
conclusion we don’t care much about it,” confessed Eunice frankly, at
the end of her tale; “at least, we don’t if she has to sleep with us.”
“Because, papa,” chimed in Cricket, “you see, she’s the restlessest,
squirmiest child you ever saw. Oh, yes; she looks mild enough now, but
if you felt her wiggle just one night, you’d believe it.”
“You both of you look as if you had been on a prolonged spree,” said
Doctor Ward, pinching the rather pale cheeks of his two
ex-philanthropists. “Never mind, I’ll look out for the baby. Somebody
will be sure to turn up for her.”
And somebody did. About seven o’clock that evening, the somebody marched
up the steps and rang the bell furiously. It was a distracted little
Dutch woman, who in broken English demanded her baby. Mosina was brought
down, but after the first little gurgle of pleasure at seeing her
mother, sucked her thumb as placidly as ever, while her mother hugged
and kissed her rapturously, pouring forth a stream of mingled Dutch and
English. It was some time before she was calm enough to explain the
situation.
She went out to work by the day, when she could, and, when she was at
work, would often leave the baby at her married sister’s for two days at
a time, as the sister lived at a distance, and she would sometimes be
too tired to go for her at night. The day before, she had taken her
there as usual. However, the little thing must have slipped out and run
after her, and the sister thought the mother had taken her, after all.
She had to go to work at a place on the other side of the city for two
days, and so had not gone for the child the night before, thinking, of
course, she was safe, as usual. She was wild with terror when she went
there and found that her sister thought she had the child with her. They
went immediately to a police station, and soon had the necessary
information of the baby’s whereabouts.
The little Dutch mother was overwhelmed with gratitude at the kindness
and care her baby had received. She said that the little thing often had
croup, and very bad attacks, too.
Mamma, who had returned from Marbury just before dinner, began to talk
quietly to the excited little woman, and learned her story. It was very
short and very simple. They had come over to this country two years
before, and did well till her husband was killed by an accident a few
months previous. She spoke so little English that it was hard for her to
get work, and their little savings slipped away quickly. Now she was
anxious for all the work by the day she could get.
Mrs. Ward listened sympathisingly, promised to speak to her friends
about her, and gave her a bundle of Kenneth’s clothes to take home,
besides the ones that Mosina was then arrayed in.
“So you don’t want to go into the orphan asylum business?” said papa,
pulling Cricket’s curls, when the excitement was all over, and Mosina
and her mother had departed, laden down with bundles.
“I think I _might_ like it,” said Cricket, meditatively, “if only I
didn’t have to sleep with the orphans.”
CHAPTER IX.
CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS.
Christmas time was approaching, and the Wards’ house was to be full to
overflowing of young people for a week or two. Donald was to have a
college friend of his with him for several days. Eunice and Cricket were
to have their little Kayuna friends, Edith Craig and Hilda Mason, to
visit them; and, at the last moment, Mrs. Somers had written, begging
that Will and Archie might be taken in, if possible, as Edna had just
come down with scarlet fever, and they had to go away. Five extra people
in an already rather full house made a great deal of planning and
arranging necessary, but I almost think that the children enjoyed the
bustle it all made as much as the expected visit.
Donald had an extra bed put up in his room for his friend. Eunice was to
share the spare room with Edith Craig, and Hilda was to have Eunice’s
cot, according to the first plan; but when Will and Archie had to be
arranged for, mamma could think of nothing else to do but to give them
the girls’ room, and put up two more cots in the spare room—fortunately
a large one—so that all four girls could sleep there. The children were
ready to stand on their heads with delight at this arrangement.
“So boarding-school-y!” beamed Cricket, surveying the room, when the
beds were all ready. It looked, for all the world, like a hospital ward.
“_Oh_, what fun we’ll have! You were such an _angel_, mamma, to arrange
for us all to be together.”
“I hope I won’t regret it,” said mamma, laughing, but looking a little
dubious.
“Indeed, you won’t,” promised Eunice. “We’ll be good, truly. Only it
will be such fun to plan jokes on the boys; and they can’t do much to us
when we are all together, you see.”
“Remember, I don’t like practical jokes, dear,” said mamma. “They are
dangerous things.”
“Oh, we’ll tell you all the things we do,” promised Cricket, “and we
truly won’t do anything you think we’d better not. _Please_ don’t say we
can’t play any jokes.”
Christmas fell on Thursday, and the guests were to arrive the next day.
Christmas itself was the gala day it always is in a house full of happy
young people. It began, of course, with the usual excitement over the
stockings, big and little, that hung on the back-parlour mantel. Then
there were the presents that were too big to go into stockings to be
oh-ed and ah-ed over. Then came the church service and the Christmas
dinner, and in the evening, a little party at a neighbouring house.
The girls from Kayuna arrived Friday afternoon. Doctor Ward took Eunice
and Cricket to the station to meet them, and in due time four broadly
smiling girls walked into the house, where the little guests were warmly
welcomed by mamma and Marjorie.
Edith Craig was a tall, fine-looking girl, a year older than Eunice,
and, being the eldest of five children, she was very mature for her
years. She was really very companionable for Marjorie as well as for
Eunice. Cricket she regarded as a mere infant, and her motherly ways
towards that young lady were very amusing. All the family were very fond
of Edith, however; she was a bright, jolly, sensible girl, who seemed
equally happy whether she was exchanging confidences with Eunice, or
sitting with Mrs. Ward and chatting over her embroidery, or romping with
Cricket, or giving Doctor Ward intelligent attention when he was talking
of some late medical discovery, or playing duets with Marjorie, or
frolicking with the children in the nursery. A well-bred, adaptable girl
is always charming.
Cricket thought that Hilda had grown very much in the four months since
she had seen her, but her bronze curls were as smooth, and her clothes
as trim, and she was as plump and pretty as ever.
The little hostesses had planned enough for the ten days’ visit to fill
a month, as children generally do; but that was very much better than
not having enough to do. Saturday, the first day, was a lovely
beginning, for Mrs. Drayton had planned one of Emily’s pleasant little
matinée parties. Ten children, including the four of the Ward party,
were invited to lunch with Emily and go to the matinée afterwards, to
see “Robin Hood.” This was an especially great treat for Eunice and
Cricket, for they were seldom allowed to go to the theatre, and their
little guests rarely had the chance. The lunch was perfect; Mrs. Drayton
and Emily were as delightful as they always were; “Robin Hood” was
charmingly given, and the day was a perfect success.
They found when they reached home that Will and Archie had just arrived,
and as Donald’s friend had come also, the whole party collected around
the dinner table.
Doctor Ward looked around beamingly on the flock, as he flourished his
knife over the big turkey.
“Cricket, this is an improvement on your orphan asylum, I think,” he
said. “How is it? Do you prefer the babies?”
“I really think, now that I’ve had experience,” said Cricket
reflectively, “that I like middle-aged people, like ourselves, better.
We aren’t so much trouble, I’m sure.”
There was a shout at Cricket’s “middle-aged people.”
“I mean people who aren’t little things, like Zaidie and Helen, or grown
up, like mamma,” explained Cricket defensively. “Just scattered along,
like all of _us_, I mean.”
The days flew by on wings. Edith was sufficiently companionable to
Marjorie for the latter to be included in many of the little doings that
mamma planned for the younger girls. Will and Archie sometimes
accompanied them also, and sometimes were off on their own account.
Archie was as much of a tease as ever, and with the four girls right
under his thumb, so to speak, he had a most congenial employment in
tormenting them. Indeed, the various tricks on both sides formed a large
part of the entertainment.
The second night of his arrival, Archie carefully made apple-pie beds,
in which he was an adept, for the occupants of the spare room, and the
girls soon found it wisest not to go to bed on any night without
carefully examining everything in the room. One night all the sheets
were thickly strewn with salt, which, being white, did not show at a
casual glance, but was painfully apparent when they lay down. Again, he
cut up the splints of a number of whisk brooms, and the straws he
scattered on the mattress under the sheet. Did you ever go to bed under
the same circumstances? It is not comfortable. Another night, he lined
the pillow-cases with white paper, carefully basted on the ticking.
Once, by an ingenious arrangement of some nails tied together with
string and hung outside the window one windy night, a weird sound, like
a clanking chain, was made, and the girls had a lively hunt for the
mysterious noises that kept them all awake.
Mamma watched the fun carefully, but let them go on, as long as it was
all good-natured. And indeed, the girls found many a way to repay their
ingenious tormentor. They sewed up the sleeves of his night-shirt
securely, not only of the one he was wearing, but of all he had with
him, and Will’s also, lest Archie should borrow. They filled his
tooth-powder bottle with soda, and stuffed the fingers of his best
gloves with cotton.
One night, when Archie had been particularly bad all day, Cricket took
her revenge by creeping stealthily into his room after he was
asleep—having been kept awake herself, for the purpose, by the united
efforts of the other three—and very cautiously pasted postage stamps
over his eyelids. Like most boys, when once asleep, he rivalled the
“Seven Sleepers,” and he never stirred during the performance. Adorned
with the stamps, he peacefully slept on all night, while Cricket
jubilantly crept back to bed. By morning, the stamps stuck as tightly as
if they had been nailed there.
When Archie awoke, to his horror, he could not open his eyes. He felt of
them, but the stamps stuck so close that he could not imagine what was
the matter, and called out in alarm to Will. Will, of course, when he
once opened his own sleepy eyes, was nearly in convulsions of laughter
over the blue one-cent stamp adornment on Archie, but, in pretended
fright, advised him not to touch his eyes till he could call his uncle.
He summoned Doctor Ward in hot haste. Archie, really much disturbed in
mind over this strange disorder, was lying perfectly still when his
uncle entered. The doctor, entering into the joke, told him that it was
nothing serious yet, only a strange growth that had come during the
night—perhaps from cold—and he would get his surgical instruments and
remove it. Archie groaned at the sound, but his uncle assured him that
it would not hurt him much, if he kept perfectly quiet and did not touch
his eyes, while he got his instruments. Then the doctor stepped to the
bathroom, and came back with a sponge and warm water, and, after much
preparation, he began swabbing Archie’s eyes, talking all the time, till
Archie was nearly frantic.
“By Jupiter, uncle! How long will I have to keep my eyes bandaged after
this operation? What ails the confounded things, anyway? They _feel_ all
right, now, if only I could get them open.”
“There!” said his uncle at last, “now try, _very_ carefully, if you can
open your eyes. Slowly, mind.”
Archie raised his eyelids, and looked about him.
“Why, they’re all right,” he cried in great surprise. “They don’t hurt a
bit. Did you _cut_ something off, uncle? Didn’t it bleed? Here, you
idiot,”—to Will, who was rolling on the floor in convulsions of
laughter,—“what’s the matter with you?”
“Oh! oh!” gasped Will. “Did it bleed, uncle? That’s too much! The dear,
brave little boy! He never whimpered.”
Archie, in a state of raging indignation, flung a pillow at him.
“You old lunatic!”
Doctor Ward held up one of the stamps by a pair of nippers.
“A nocturnal visit of a certain household insect, usually harmless, is
plainly the cause of your trouble, my boy,” he said, “but as I told you,
I do not consider it serious. Bathe your eyes in warm water. Also, I
recommend temporary seclusion, and the cultivation of a calm and
forgiving frame of mind.”
Another pillow went whack at Will, as a partial relief to Archie’s
helpless rage. He only wished he dared throw one at his uncle, as Doctor
Ward went out, laughing.
No remarks were made at breakfast time relative to the situation. Archie
gazed haughtily past Cricket, and devoted himself ostentatiously to
Hilda, whom, usually, he rather snubbed. Like most people who love to
tease, he could not easily endure a joke on himself. So he scorned
Cricket’s overtures of peace, and even meditated refusing to join the
skating party planned for that day. The skating party, however, had been
in prospect for several days, and as even Donald and his friend, Mr.
Herrick, were to join it, Archie could not quite make up his mind to
this sacrifice, even for the sake of punishing Cricket. In this trait
Zaidie and Archie were comically alike. Both usually took revenge by
making themselves thoroughly uncomfortable.
“I suppose Archie will treat me with an air of cold familiarity all
day,” said Cricket, in confidence to Will, as he took her skates, and
Archie walked on ahead with Hilda. Hilda was delighted. Archie had
usually so little to say to her.
Will went off in a shout of laughter at Cricket’s remark. She thought it
was at the memory of the morning.
“I don’t think he ought to mind just a little joke like that, when he
just _piles_ jokes on other people,” went on Cricket, in an injured
tone. “Look at all the things he’s done to us, and we smile at him just
the same.”
The skating party was a grand success. They went out of town, on the
street cars for several miles, to the lake, which was a glittering sheet
of ice. The day was clear and not too cold. Everybody skated well, but
Archie particularly excelled. He was up in every kind of fancy figure,
and in the delight of showing off, his wounded feelings were gradually
soothed—at least outwardly.
“But I’ll get even with that little minx,” he said, grimly, to himself.
“She’s altogether too fresh,” forgetting, as practical jokers generally
do, that he had had the first innings.
They returned home in time for half-past one luncheon, with the
appetites of anacondas. No one noticed that Archie whipped into the
dining-room, instead of going up-stairs with the others, when they first
came in, chattering, and laughing, and glowing with exercise. In ten
minutes time the luncheon-bell rang.
“Waffles! hurrah!” cried Will, boyishly, as Jane brought in his
favourite dish.
“Auntie, you’re a brick!” chimed in Archie. “Miss Scricket, don’t you
take all this syrup on yours, for I want some myself, and there isn’t
much in the syrup jug,” and Archie peered in.
“You don’t need any, being so sweet yourself,” returned Cricket, pouring
out a liberal supply of the clear, delicious-looking syrup from the jug
that stood by her plate.
The next instant the family were startled by a most unmannerly gulp from
Cricket, who clapped her hands over her mouth and bolted from the table
without the ceremony of an “Excuse me” to mamma. Everybody looked after
her in surprise; then mamma, excusing herself, hastily followed her to
the butler’s pantry, whither she had retired. The sickest,
forlornest-looking child imaginable held up a white face.
“It was—the—syrup,” she managed to say “It’s sour or something. Oh, I’m
so sick at my stomach!”
Not waiting to investigate the matter at that moment, mamma called
Sarah, who carried poor little Cricket up-stairs in her arms. A very
unhappy hour followed. As soon as mamma could be spared, she flew
down-stairs to the dining-room.
Archie stood by the window, drumming on the window-pane. He turned
around as his aunt entered.
“Yes, I did it,” he said. “It’s castor-oil. I slipped in and emptied the
syrup jug just before luncheon, and put some castor-oil in, out of a
bottle in uncle’s office. It won’t hurt her, will it? I didn’t think
she’d get more than a taste of the stuff.”
“It’s nothing serious, only you’ve given poor little Cricket a pretty
bad quarter of an hour, my boy. It chances that oil of any kind, even
salad oil, makes her deathly sick. She never eats salad or lettuce, if
it is dressed; but of course you did not know that.”
Archie looked uncomfortable.
“Of course I didn’t, auntie, or I wouldn’t have been such a brute.”
“Surely not. It was just the ‘chances of war.’ It is always so with
practical joking. Each goes a step farther than the other, till some
one—generally the weaker party—gets the worst of it. Suppose you drop it
now, dear?”
“See here, auntie,” said Archie, awkwardly, “I—you know—well, Cricket
really owes me one now. Let her go on and do me up, if she wants to. I’d
a jolly lot rather she would; and I won’t do another single thing after
that. Did she bluster much?”
“No,” said Mrs. Ward, smiling. “Cricket is always ‘game,’ as you boys
say, and would not let me blame you. But let me say one more word, my
lad. Since you love to play jokes and tease people, as well as you do,
don’t you think you might be a little generous, and let them have the
same sport with you, without losing your temper? Turn about is always
fair play, my boy.”
Archie looked slightly shame-faced—a most unusual state of affairs for
him. But, as Mrs. Ward never nagged the children, a few words from her
always had their due weight.
In a couple of hours, Cricket was ready to join the girls, who were
clustered about the cosy open fire in mamma’s room, laughing and
chattering over their embroidery. Now that the violent nausea, which the
least taste of oil always gave her, was over, Cricket was rather
disposed to look upon the whole thing as very funny, after all. She was
really rather amazed when the girls sympathised with her and
energetically heaped abuse upon Archie.
“It wasn’t anything,” she insisted. “I’d have done it myself, if I’d
have thought of it. Of course it isn’t very pleasant to have your
stomach sick at itself; but he didn’t know I don’t like oil. But, oh,
mamma, I’ve thought of _such_ a nice little trick to play on him now!”
“It’s time to stop, dear,” said Mrs. Ward. “Don’t let’s carry it any
further.”
“Please, mamma, it’s such a _little_ joke, and it wouldn’t hurt him a
bit; and I do think he deserves a good taking-down,” pleaded Cricket.
“He’ll crow over me, always, if I don’t; he’ll call me ‘’fraid cat,’ and
I’m _not_ a ‘’fraid cat;’ I’ll leave it to anybody.”
“Let’s hear the joke,” said mamma judicially, remembering Archie’s own
words; and Cricket unfolded her little scheme.
“I thought of that when I was sickest,” she finished triumphantly. And
mamma said she might do it.
That evening the boys had planned to go and make a formal call on May
Chester. Formal calls were rather a new experience for both of them, and
each felt as important as a little dog with a new collar. They went
up-stairs, to get ready, directly after dinner, and were gone an
unconscionably long time.
“I know those boys will try to sneak down-stairs, and get out without
being seen,” said Eunice, getting impatient for their appearance.
“They can’t do it. I’m on the lookout with my little eye,” chirped
Cricket, from the portières. “Isn’t it funny how ashamed boys always are
of being dressed up! ’Sh! there they come now. Edith, you know you’re to
go out and ask them to come in a moment. They won’t suspect you.”
“Slip out in the hall as if you were looking for something, and meet
them by accident,” advised Eunice.
Edith obediently sauntered out into the hall, and met the boys as
directed. After a moment’s conversation, she succeeded in coaxing them
into the parlour, for approval from the family. Archie came in with a
lofty expression, as if making formal calls on young ladies, with pale
yellow kid gloves on, was an every-night affair. Will looked somewhat
conscious.
“Is that your new suit, Archie?” asked Mrs. Ward. “How well it fits!”
“_Seems_ to me,” said Cricket, screwing up her face critically, “it sort
of wrinkles across the shoulders,” patting his back patronisingly.
Archie wheeled around to a mirror hastily.
“Wrinkles, Miss Scricket! You ought to be wrinkled yourself! It fits
like a—a house-afire,” he said indignantly, nearly twisting his neck
off.
“And we all know how perfectly a house-afire fits,” observed Marjorie.
Cricket continued patting Archie’s back, and smoothing out imaginary
wrinkles. By the time he had reached the doorway she had succeeded in
what she was trying to do, for as he went out, after waving a light
yellow hand patronisingly to the girls, there was pinned across his back
a broad slip of paper with good-sized printed letters on it:
“I’m such a little boy; please to send me home early.”
“There!” remarked Cricket with much satisfaction, as the front door
shut, “I think Archie will be pleased to have May Chester see that. I
winked at Will—he won’t tell; and he helped him on with his overcoat
_very_ carefully. I peeked to see.”
“I’d like to see his face when he finds it out,” said Hilda.
“Oh, _wouldn’t_ I!” cried Cricket fervently. “And, mamma, Archie can do
anything he likes to me now—I won’t pay him off again. I’ll tell him
so.”
Half an hour later, Donald came in.
“Here’s something I picked up on the doorstep,” he said. “Probably a
circular or something thrown down. Why, what’s this?”
He held it up. A burst of laughter from the girls greeted it. It was
that identical paper, which had probably been rubbed off by the
overcoat, and had worked down.
Cricket looked perfectly blank for a moment, and then joined in the
laughter.
“If Archie only knew it,” she cried, “_wouldn’t_ he crow! Joke’s on me
now, for sure!”
CHAPTER X.
THE BOY.
Mrs. Ward came to the luncheon table the next day, holding up three pink
tickets.
“A treat for the musical ones,” she said, gaily. “Mrs. Chester has just
sent around these tickets for the matinée performance of that little
musical wonder, this afternoon. For some reason they are unable to use
them.”
“Hurrah!” said Marjorie, clapping her hands in true Cricket fashion,
“I’ve been dying to hear him. Oh, Edith, people say he’s the greatest
_dear_!”
“I thought you and Edith and Eunice could go, dear,” said Mrs. Ward.
“You will enjoy it better than the younger ones.”
“But don’t you want to go yourself, mamma?” asked Eunice, quickly.
“No; for you know papa and I heard him, two weeks ago, when we were in
New York. He certainly _is_ a wonder, Edith. I don’t care much about
prodigies, as a rule, but _his_ playing is very wonderful. New York was
wild over him.”
“I’ve wanted to hear him _so_ much,” said Edith, enthusiastically. “It’s
perfectly lovely!”
“Then I’ll take you two down-town with me,” said Mrs. Ward to Cricket
and Hilda. “Will it be too cold for ice-cream?”
The three matinée girls got off in good time. As they entered the lobby,
they encountered Mrs. Drayton.
“I’m so glad to see you, girls,” she said, in her cordial way. “I came
early, and have been waiting here in hope of seeing some of you. I am
going to the dressing-room, to see the little pianist, during the
intermission, and I thought if I could find any of you, you would like
to go too.”
The girls fairly gasped. To go behind the scenes into that wonderful,
mystical dressing-room, and actually see and touch a real, live
individual that came out on the stage and played! Could it be true?
“Oh, Mrs. Drayton!” they all cried, breathlessly.
“I have seen him several times,” Mrs. Drayton went on. “The little
fellow, with his father and some others, lunched with us yesterday. He
is a perfect little dear. Just as childlike and sweet as if he never had
been before the public at all.”
Mrs. Drayton’s husband, though a prominent lawyer, was a fine amateur
violinist, and he kept closely in touch with all musical matters. His
house was always a centre for amateur musicians, and he often
entertained professionals.
“How lovely of you, Mrs. Drayton!” exclaimed Marjorie, enthusiastically.
“It will be just delightful to see that cunning thing off the stage!”
This bit of thoughtfulness was just like Mrs. Drayton.
“I have a little box of toys for him,” she went on, showing the corner
of a white paper parcel under her long cloak. “We will take them in to
him during the intermission. Where are your seats, Marjorie? Let me see
your tickets. Oh, yes. Fortunately, they are near mine. You can get up
and come out into the aisle when I do.”
In due course of the programme, the marvellous ten-year-old came forward
to take his place at the piano, looking ludicrously tiny among the big
German musicians. The grand piano seemed to swallow him up as he stood
by it for a moment, bowing in a grave, self-possessed, yet childlike
manner, in response to the applause that greeted him. He had a sweet,
serene little face, with dark brown hair falling over his forehead. His
broad lace collar made him look still younger than he really was.
He turned, after his bow, and climbed upon the piano-stool, settling
himself with his small hands folded in his lap. Then he awaited the
signal to begin, as composedly as if no large audience listened
breathlessly for his first notes.
When the number was finished, he turned sidewise on the stool, and bowed
to the audience, with his little feet swinging. At the renewed applause,
he slipped down, bowing with a funny, quaint little gesture of his
hands, and then turned and climbed to his perch again. Some one had
started to lift him up, but he had put him aside with a dignified little
motion. After the third number, his last in the first part, he slipped
down again, made a hasty little bow, and scampered away like a flash,
amid mingled laughter and applause.
At last came the intermission. Mrs. Drayton, followed by the girls, made
her way to the dressing-room. She was well-known to the attendants, so
she had no difficulty.
The Boy, the marvellous little musician, sat on the floor playing with a
little train of cars that went choo-choo-ing over the carpet, propelled
by steam made from real water in the tiny boiler.
“Look out for my cars there,” he exclaimed, with a funny, foreign
accent, as his visitors entered, not even glancing up at them in his
absorbed interest. The lad’s father stood by the door.
“Get up, my son, and greet these gracious ladies,” said the father, in
German, as he turned and spoke to Mrs. Drayton, himself. The Boy got up
lingeringly, with a most bored expression, but his face changed and
brightened as he recognised his kind friend, with whom he felt quite
well acquainted. He sprang forward quickly, and, throwing his arms about
her neck, he kissed her repeatedly in his pretty, foreign fashion. The
girls looked on, amazed enough that he proved to be just an ordinary,
every-day little boy.
“I thought we’d find him reading Beethoven’s life, or, at least,
studying the score,” whispered Marjorie to Edith. “Just imagine that
genius sitting down on the floor and playing _cars_!”
“I’ve brought these young ladies to see you,” said Mrs. Drayton, putting
the little fellow down. “Will you kiss them, dear?”
Marjorie and Edith and Eunice, all awe-struck at the idea of kissing a
genius, bent down to the dear little boy, who dutifully kissed each one
of them, first upon one cheek and then upon the other, in foreign
fashion, as if it were a performance he was very used to.
“What have you brought me?” he demanded, in German, of Mrs. Drayton,
standing before her in boy fashion, with his small feet somewhat apart,
and his hands deep in his pocket.
“We all spoil him by always bringing him something, I suppose,” said
Mrs. Drayton to the girls, laughing at his tone, as she laid the box she
had brought in his hands. He eagerly tore off the paper and the cover.
The box contained a curious mechanical toy, which the Boy seized with
delight. He immediately sat down on the floor to examine it.
Just at this moment, the strains of the violins sounded again, and the
call-boy came to say that he must go in a moment.
The Boy uttered an impatient exclamation that was equal to “Oh, bother!”
in English, but he paid no other attention to his summons. His father
was talking to Mrs. Drayton, and did not hear the call-boy enter or
leave.
In a moment, the call-boy came again.
“Can’t they wait a minute?” the Boy demanded impatiently, in English,
which he spoke very well. “I _must_ get this together. It’s almost
done.”
The applause of the audience came to their ears. The call-boy repeated
the summons in great impatience, knowing that he would be scolded for
presumably not having given long enough notice.
“Very well,” said the Boy, getting up reluctantly. “Please go not till I
return, gracious ladies. I will play fast. I do so much wish to see this
strange thing together,” and off the child scampered, leaving the three
girls staring in amazement at the remarkable manners of a prodigy.
“He’s a real little boy,” said Edith, drawing a long breath of surprise.
“To see him playing with these toys, and then imagine what he can do
with those wonderful little fingers of his! Listen!” as the wonderful
strains floated in.
“Isn’t he a _darling_?” exclaimed Marjorie enthusiastically. “He isn’t
spoiled a bit!”
The boy’s father had left the room, and Mrs. Drayton joined the girls.
“He is very carefully managed and trained,” she said. “He is allowed to
see very few people, on the whole, and as he has played before an
audience ever since he was five years old, it is nothing to him. They
want to keep him simple and unspoiled.”
If the girls had been in their seats, they would have been amused to see
the Boy come half running on the stage. He made a funny little sidewise
bow, and climbed upon the piano-stool. He had already kept the audience
waiting a full minute, but he placidly took up a programme that lay on
the piano, ran down it with his finger, found the place, creased the
paper across, laid it down, and instantly was the inspired little
musician again. It was a magnificent concerted piece, and the programme
announced that the child had seen it, for the first time, the day
before, but his tiny fingers interpreted the large, grave measures in a
way that held the great audience breathless. In a long, elaborate bit,
that belonged to the first violin, he would soundlessly follow the notes
with the fingers of one hand, as if in pure enjoyment of the swift
motion.
The selection came to an end at last, with a grand succession of chords.
The instant the last notes had died away, the child slipped down, and
ran away without his bow, before any one could stop him. He darted into
the dressing-room.
“Are you here yet, gracious ladies?” he said, breathlessly. “I’m so
glad! Now I want to get this together; I don’t play next time. Do you
hear the clapping? They want me to come back and play again, but I
_shan’t_ till it’s time. See! this is the way it goes!”
Just then, amid the prolonged applause of the audience, some one came to
lead him back to make his acknowledgments, and play again.
“I don’t want to, now, and I _shan’t_,” he said, positively. “It isn’t
my turn. Let the next one play.”
Another messenger arrived, here, with orders for him to come at once, as
the applause renewed itself, growing still more insistent.
“I’m busy,” the Boy said, sitting still. Just then his father came in,
and bade him go at once. Reluctantly he put down his plaything, and went
off to the stage. He made his way down the centre, between the
musicians, bowing this way and that, and making his funny little foreign
gestures with his hands. The applause redoubled at the sight of him, and
a shower of flowers fell about him. He picked up a big bouquet of roses,
that fell at his feet, and then saying perfectly distinctly to the first
violin:
“There! that’s all I’m going to do,” he marched off again. Everybody
laughed and applauded, although, of course, only the nearest musicians
heard what he said. The conductor gave the signal for the next number,
and the performance went on. By this time, Mrs. Drayton had taken the
girls back to their seats.
After the last regular number of the programme, some musician was
invited to come from the audience and give the Boy a simple theme for
him to improvise upon. At this request, a well-known amateur musician,
an old resident of the city, came forward, and went upon the stage. He
was a tall, peculiar-looking man, with long hair lying on his shoulders.
He sat down on the piano-stool with an odd little mannerism, which he
always had while playing, bending his head forward in a funny, rather
affected way. For a theme, he played “Home, Sweet Home,” very slowly.
The Boy listened, with his head on one side, in his little, bird-like
manner. When Professor Sands had played the air through once, he
repeated it more rapidly. As he began, the boy put out his hand
impatiently to stop him, but the professor played on. Whereupon, the Boy
gave the pedal a petulant little kick, as if to say:
“What in the world is he playing that easy thing over again for? How
many times does he think I need to hear a theme?”
But the professor finished it, and then resigned his seat to the child.
As soon as he was seated, he placed his fingers stiffly on the keys,
with his head bent forward, in an irresistibly funny imitation of the
professor’s manner, and played the theme through just as slowly as he
had; then he straightened up, and darted through it again at lightning
speed. Next he wove it into the most elaborate improvisations, recurring
constantly to the theme. Whenever he played, even a dozen notes of it,
he instantly dropped into Professor Sands’s mannerism. The audience were
soon in convulsions of laughter, and even the professor himself,
recognising the joke, laughed till the tears rolled down his cheeks. Not
a muscle of the Boy’s face moved. At last he flashed into “Yankee
Doodle,” slipped again to “Home, Sweet Home,” playing it so swiftly that
it was only a ripple of melody, dropped, then, into his imitation of
Professor Sands again, and finished with a series of chords so rich and
full that it seemed scarcely possible those tiny fingers could evoke
them.
Between laughter and applause the audience made the roof ring. The Boy
stood, still grave and demure as always, with his folded hands hanging
in front of him, but those nearest caught the wicked little twinkle in
the dark eyes. Of course, the three girls clapped their gloves into
rags.
“Did you ever see such a perfectly fascinating darling?” sighed
Marjorie, in pure delight, as the child was finally allowed to leave the
stage.
“Marjorie, _do_ you feel that you can ever touch the piano again, when
you think of that little mouse sitting up there and playing like that,
without half trying?” said Edith mournfully. “It’s just—just
presumptuous to try!” This was said as they were coming down the steps,
on the way out.
“Indeed, that is never the way to feel after listening to a genius,”
said Mrs. Drayton, cheerily. “Certainly you cannot expect to rival
playing like that, but it should be an inspiration to you, to lift you
up, and make you do your very best yourself.”
“But one’s very _bestest_ is poor and weak after that,” said Marjorie,
earnestly. “I’m simply ashamed to look at a piano.”
“Do not feel that. Do your best faithfully, and be patient with
yourself. One need never be ashamed of one’s _best_. Fortunately, it’s
no disgrace _not_ to be a genius, which is a great consolation for all
of us commonplace people. You need only be ashamed of a low standard.
Aim high, and keep your eyes fixed on your goal, my girls. That’s the
secret of success.”
CHAPTER XI
A VISIT TO MOSINA.
“Mamma, may I take Hilda to see Mosina this morning?” asked Cricket, the
next day at breakfast. “The girls are going to the Museum, and we don’t
want to go very much, and I do want Hilda to see our cunning Mosina.”
“Oh, I’m rather afraid, dear,” hesitated mamma. “You’ve never been there
alone, you know. I’m not quite sure that it’s perfectly safe for you to
go by yourselves. Is it, papa?”
“Down in——Street? Why—yes—I think so. Are you sure you know the way,
Cricket?”
“Perfectly sure, papa. What harm could come to us? _Do_ let us! I know
Mosina is just wild to see us. Oh, Hilda, she is the _cutest_ thing!
She’s just like a little roll of butter, with blue buttons for eyes;
they’re so round.”
“Hilda, if you ever feel any inclination to adopt a little sister—”
began Doctor Ward, with twinkling eyes, but Cricket went straight on:
“She’s the fattest thing you ever saw. She’s all creases. She looks just
as if she had strings tied around her legs and arms—regular _corduroy_
arms.”
“I’d love to see her. Do let us go, Mrs. Ward. We’ll be very careful and
not get lost.”
“I think I will let you. Keep your wits about you, Cricket, and don’t go
wandering off anywhere. And I’ll send a little bundle of things down to
Mosina’s mother. By the way, tell her to come up on Saturday, and I’ll
have a big bundle ready for her. You can carry a few cookies down in a
little box, couldn’t you, Hilda, if Cricket carries the parcel?”
The children set off on their expedition, in great glee, about ten
o’clock. To be sure, Cricket had never been there alone before, but the
way was very direct and simple, and the neighbourhood where Mosina’s
mother lived, though poor, was perfectly respectable. Mrs. Ward had
fulfilled her promise to little Mrs. Brummagen—had given her work, and
told her friends about her, and moreover, had been to see her, herself,
several times. The children still called the baby “Mosina,” and the
child had already learned to use the name herself. As the children
walked along, Cricket rehearsed, for the third or fourth time, the story
of the finding and the temporary adoption of Mosina.
“She’s awfully cunning, but I’m _glad_ we didn’t adopt her,” concluded
Cricket. “She would have been a lot of work. Children always are, I
guess. I’ve thought, ever since that night, that I wonder how mothers
stand it.”
“Oh, mothers are made so!” said Hilda, comfortably.
“I wonder if that makes it really any easier for them,” meditated
Cricket, thoughtfully. “Mamma says that I had colic just steadily till I
was about six months old, and cried all the time, and would scarcely
stay with the nurse at all. Mamma was up with me most every night. Think
of it! And one night just used me up.”
“Mothers don’t mind,” repeated Hilda. “Mamma just _loves_ to do things
for me, so I always let her,” she added, superbly.
Cricket knit her brows a little, but as they were already at Mosina’s
home, she put the question away, to think over at her leisure.
Mosina and her mother were delighted to see their visitors. Mrs.
Brummagen was hard at work, washing, and Mosina was tied to the
door-knob by a string. This, at first sight, did not seem a necessary
precaution, for she was sitting perfectly still, upon the floor, staring
into space, when the girls entered. This one little room was the whole
of Mrs. Brummagen’s residence. Here she slept and washed clothes and did
her bit of cooking, but it was all clean and tidy as Dutch neatness
could make it. The girls delivered the box of cookies and the other
things, and gave Mrs. Ward’s message.
Hilda stared about her. She had never, before, been in the home of the
very poor.
“Why, that’s a bed! Does she sleep in the kitchen?” she whispered to
Cricket, as Mrs. Brummagen went back to her washing, and Cricket lifted
Mosina in her arms.
“This isn’t the kitchen; it’s all she has,” responded Cricket, in an
equally low voice. “Lots of people have only one room.”
“Do they _like_ it? Don’t they want more room?” said Hilda, amazed; for
she always found it difficult to realise that people occasionally did
things that they did not like to do. Her own experience, in that way,
was very limited.
“They have to do it, goosie,” said Cricket, who had often been with her
mother to see her poor people. “I like to come here. Isn’t it
story-booky? See this cunning thing? Isn’t she clean?”
“She _is_ awfully fat. Can she talk?”
“Just jabbers; you can’t understand her. Say ‘How do you do?’ baby.”
Mosina was a fine plaything, for she was exactly like a big wax doll.
The children could do anything they pleased with her.
“You wouldn’t think this child could be such a torment at night,” said
Cricket, feelingly. “In the daytime she is just like a lump of dough.
She stays just where you put her. But at night—oh, goodness! she was
just as if she had yeast in her. I was black and blue for a week after
she slept with me that night. Oh, _weren’t_ you bad!” addressing Mosina,
with uplifted finger.
Just then a sharp knock came at the door, and Mrs. Brummagen, drying her
hands on her apron, hurried to open it. A messenger stood there, saying
that she was wanted immediately for a little extra work at the house of
one of her regular employers. Some servant had unexpectedly left, and
company was expected, and Mrs. Brummagen was requested to come back with
the messenger for a few hours’ work.
“Ach, himmel!” cried little Mrs. Brummagen, uncertainly. “What I do?
Mine vash in ze wassa iss, und mine leetle babby alone vill be. I
cannot.”
“But you _must_,” said the boy, impatiently. “She tole me not to come
back widout yer. Leave de kid wid de naybors. Yer’ll be back at four
o’clock, she said.”
“Oh, Mrs. Brummagen,” said Cricket, eagerly, “you go, and I’ll stay with
the baby. I can as well as not. Mrs. Whitby lives near us, and you just
stop and tell mamma about it, please. We’d like to, wouldn’t we, Hilda?”
Poor little Mrs. Brummagen, overwhelmed by the thought of the young
ladies staying and taking care of her baby, and distracted by the boy,
who instantly urged the plan, hardly knew which way to turn. Cricket and
Hilda both insisted loudly, the boy announced that she must go anyway,
and so, before she really knew what she was about, she had on her bonnet
and shawl, and was borne away triumphantly by the boy, protesting, all
the time, that she mustn’t leave the clothes in soak.
Hilda and Cricket looked at each other, with broadly smiling faces, when
they were left in possession.
“Isn’t this fun?” beamed Cricket. “I’ve always wondered how it would
seem to live in one room. Just like a baby-house, isn’t it?” executing a
war-dance around the solemn little Mosina, who watched the proceedings
with calm interest.
“Lots of fun!” assented Hilda. “What will we do about lunch?”
“Lunch!” replied Cricket, blankly, at this practical suggestion; “I
forgot about lunch. Oh, I guess there’ll be something to eat in the
ice-box. Why, there isn’t any ice-box! Well, in the cupboard then! We’ll
find something and cook it! Oh, ‘wot larks!’ as Archie says;” and
Cricket danced gaily around Mosina again.
“Let’s play we live here all the time,” she added, stopping, with one
foot up. “I’ll be Mrs. Brummagen. No, I won’t; I can talk Irish better
than Dutch, so I’ll be Mrs. O’Flanagan, sure. You can be—let me see—you
can be my daughter or my sister.”
“No, I won’t be either,” said Hilda with dignity. “I’ll be your mother,
and wear a cap, and say ‘Arrah go bragh,’ and all those things.”
“Oh, splendid! you always do the old lady parts so well,” said Cricket,
approvingly. “Let’s see what we can find for a cap. See! here’s a little
white skirt of Mosina’s; guess it’s her best one. Have you any pins? We
can pin the belt together and double the skirt, and here’s a beautiful
cap with a ruffle and all, and so becoming!” adjusting the big cap,
admiringly, and tucking up Hilda’s long curls.
“Now pin this funny little shawl around your shoulders. What a lovely
grandma you always make!”
No wonder Hilda got on so well with Cricket, who always made things easy
for her, and loved and admired her with all her unselfish little soul.
“You must pin up your skirts like a washerwoman,” said the old lady,
quite delighted with her own appearance. “Now roll your sleeves up.
Mosina is your baby, you know, and I’m her grandma. Now, what let’s do?”
“I wonder what Mrs. Brummagen does when she isn’t washing? Do you s’pose
she reads? Why, _Hilda_, there isn’t a book around! Don’t you s’pose she
ever _reads_?” with the greatest astonishment.
“Probably she gets books from the public library,” suggested Hilda.
“Anyway, I dare say she hasn’t much time to read. I shouldn’t think
washerwomen people would have. Perhaps she sews.”
“There isn’t a sign of a work-basket,” said Cricket, looking around with
increased astonishment. “Do you suppose _this_ is all she sews with?”
pointing to a spool of coarse white thread with a big needle sticking in
it, and a brass thimble standing by it.
“It must be. No books and no sewing! What do you suppose she does in the
evening?” exclaimed Hilda.
“It’s very queer,” said Cricket, thoughtfully.
Neither child, of course, had much more idea of the life of the very
poor than they had of the habits of a kangaroo.
“But we must do something. We can’t sit around all day,” added Cricket
briskly. “Oh, let’s finish the washing!”
“Do you think that’ll be fun?” asked Hilda, doubtfully. “The clothes are
all wet.”
“Well, Hilda, of course they are! Who ever heard of washing clothes in
dry water? Come on! We needn’t splash much, if we’re careful. Yes, I
really think we ought to do it. You know she didn’t want to go and leave
her clothes in the water. Perhaps they would get rancid, or mildewed, or
something.”
“I don’t believe I want to,” objected Hilda. “Ugh! think of putting your
hands into that messy water! I wouldn’t do it for anything!” peering
into the tub disgustedly.
“It doesn’t look very—appetising,” said Cricket, hesitating for a word.
“But see! here’s the wringer on this tub. She was ready to wring them
out. That’s fun, anyway. We can fish up the things with this stick, and
poke them in, and turn the handle and they come out dry. Then we could
iron them, and they’ll be all done when she comes home.”
Hilda still looked doubtful about this form of amusement, and, with her
ruffled cap very much to one side, she silently watched Cricket
experiment with a stick.
“These clothes are the funniest! They don’t seem to have any ends;
they’re all muddly,” she said, fishing, vainly, to bring something out
of the wet mass. “Oh, I see! They’re sheets,” bringing one up slowly.
“Shouldn’t you think it was for a giant’s bed? Look!” raising the sheet
on the stick as far up as she could stretch, while some of its slippery
folds still lay in the water. “Doesn’t it make a good banner?” waving it
slightly, to and fro.
“Look out, Cricket! you’re spattering me! Ow! look _out_!” and Hilda
dodged hastily, for the big banner overbalanced itself, and the heavy
sheet fell, with a splash, outside the tub on the floor.
“Just like me!” lamented Cricket. “Oh, Hilda, pick up the baby! she’ll
be drowned in all this water. How can I get this thing up?” struggling
with the stick to raise the unwieldy mass. This proving impossible, she
picked it up in her arms, getting herself delightfully wet, and bundled
it back into the tub.
“Your dress is a perfect mess,” remarked Hilda, who had put the baby on
the table, and was sitting on a chair beside it, with her feet tucked
under her, to get out of the way of the water.
“I know it,” said Cricket, cheerfully. “Can’t help it. Hilda, you’ll
have to sit there till the water dries on the floor, for there isn’t
anything to wipe it up with. Anyway, I’ve found the end of this sheet,
now, and I’m going to wring it. Isn’t this fun! It’s just like a
hand-organ;” and Cricket turned the handle gaily.
It was fun till the heavy folds were suddenly all drawn up in a bunch in
the wringer, and the machine stuck.
“Come and help me, Hilda. Tiptoe over here. Oh, you can’t leave the
baby. Well, I’ll scatter it out a little.”
“Scattering the sheet out” was effective, and Cricket turned the crank
with all her might, not noticing that the long squeezed end was piling
up on the floor till the last corner slipped through and fell down.
“It’s all on the floor,” observed Hilda from her perch. “Won’t it get
all dirty and wet again?”
“So it has,” cried Cricket, disappointedly, picking the sheet up. “Won’t
it brush off?” rubbing at the dirt that had collected on it, and thereby
making it ten times worse. “I should have put something there to catch
it. Why do I always think behindhand better than beforehand? How _can_
people think of everything at once? Never mind; I guess it will come off
when I iron it. I’ll squeeze another; there’s a pan for it to go into.
Don’t you want to come and help me? Tie Mosina to that chair over in
that corner; it’s dry over there.”
Fishing out the ends of the sheets and turning the wringer was really
great fun, and in their zeal the children quite forgot Mosina for a
time. Suddenly a roar, behind them, startled them. Mosina seldom cried,
but when she did it was with a ponderousness that was quite in keeping
with her plump body.
CHAPTER XII.
KEEPING HOUSE.
Poor little Mosina had crawled around her chair till her length of
string had given out, and then, endeavouring to crawl between the
chair-legs, had fallen forward on her face, and lay sprawled out like a
little turtle. The girls flew for her, and rescued her by drawing her
out by the heels. She refused to be comforted, however, and continued to
roar.
“I suppose she’s hungry,” said Cricket, at last, in a tone of despair.
“Hilda, please look in the closet and see what there is for her
luncheon. Mosina, _do_ hush, baby! What, Hilda?”
“I said that there isn’t a thing in the closet but two plates and a
stone mug, and such things,—not a single thing to eat.”
“Look in that little cupboard by the chimney, then. Shouldn’t you think
she must have _something_ to eat around? What _shall_ we do if there
isn’t anything to eat anywhere?” in deeper despair.
“There _is_ something here,” announced Hilda, joyfully, having climbed
upon a chair to look in the little chimney-closet. After a moment she
got down, soberly, and proclaimed the contents of the larder to be two
dried herrings, a half loaf of stale bread, some doubtful-looking
butter, and a piece of very dry cheese.
The children looked at each other in dismay. Luncheon to them seemed a
very serious and pressing matter, especially as Mosina was still
roaring, and they knew she was hungry.
“What shall we do?” said Cricket, mournfully; “I feel as hungry as a
bear, myself. Oh, Hilda, those cookies!”
Hilda flew across the room for them, with her cap flopping.
Cricket popped a big piece of a cookie into Mosina’s open mouth, and put
another in her hand.
“Sit down on the floor now, and be a good baby,” she said, putting her
charge down. “It’s dry enough. Now, Hilda, what will _we_ eat? I want
something more than cookies.”
“I can’t eat dried herring,” said Hilda, decidedly, her fastidious nose
going up in disgust.
“We might toast the bread, I suppose,” said Cricket. “_Do_ you think
they don’t ever have anything but dried herring? I’ve always wondered
why mamma is always sending things to eat to poor people, and now I
know.”
“Can’t they cook, do you suppose, or do they spend all their time
washing?” wondered Hilda. “Don’t you think they ever have anything to
eat except what people send them?” in an awe-struck tone.
“I don’t believe they do. Can you cut bread, Hilda?”
“Of _course_. Anybody can cut bread, I should think; where’s the knife?”
“I can’t find any regular bread-knife,” said Cricket, rummaging in the
cupboard. “Here’s one, take this; it’s awfully dull, though. While
you’re cutting it, I’ll look for a gridiron to toast the bread on.”
Hilda took the loaf and the knife confidently, but soon discovered that
cutting bread is a fine art, and not by any means so easy as it looks.
“What _is_ the matter?” she said in despair, at last. “Well, nobody
could cut bread with this old knife, that’s as dull as a hoe,” she
added, surveying the jagged, uneven wedges, which were all she could
manage. “Have you found the gridiron?”
“No. She doesn’t seem to have _anything_ except a teakettle and a
saucepan. And here’s a flat thing like what cook fries potatoes in, and
here’s a tin pan, and that’s every single thing I can find. What do you
suppose she cooks with?” asked Cricket, with increasing surprise, and
with a vision before her eyes of the quantities of shining utensils that
lined the kitchen closets at home.
“Toast the bread on a fork, then,” said Hilda; “and can’t we cook the
herring in some way? I’m getting hungry enough to eat nails now.”
“I suppose we might fry them. Then we could toast the cheese. I know how
to do that.”
“All right! we’ll fry the herring in the spider,” said Hilda,
brightening; “I believe it will be real good. But what will Mosina eat?
Ought she to have herring and toasted cheese?”
“Oh, here’s some milk out on the window ledge!” cried Cricket, joyfully.
“We can crumble some of this dry bread in it, and feed Mosina with it.
That will be fine for her. Bless the child! she’s as good as a lamb
now.”
“Isn’t she! I’ll toast the bread, and you can set the table, Cricket.”
Cricket assented; but after rummaging a while, asked Hilda where she
supposed Mrs. Brummagen kept her table-cloths and napkins.
“In that cupboard drawer, probably,” said Hilda, trying to make the
uneven chunks of bread balance on the two-tined steel fork which she had
found.
“I don’t suppose we ought to look in her drawers, even if we _do_ want a
table-cloth. Well, I’ll just peek in. No; there’s nothing there but a
dress of Mosina’s,” after a hasty “peek.”
“I can’t eat off that faded pink thing on the table,” said Hilda, with
decision. “At least, I don’t believe I can,” she added, more doubtfully,
as the empty place in her stomach began to protest against waiting much
longer for something to put in it. “Ow! there goes the bread into the
fire again!”
She prodded the scorched wedge of bread with the fork, and brought it up
successfully. She was growing quite expert in rescuing the pieces and
blowing off the ashes.
“Cricket, this bread is simply roasted, instead of toasted.”
“It does smell pretty scorchy,” said Cricket, looking at it anxiously.
“We can’t waste it, though, for there isn’t much of it. Hilda, I can’t
find a single thing to put on for a table-cloth, excepting a sheet.
Wouldn’t you rather have the pink cloth? It looks clean, anyway.
Probably her white cloths are all in the wash.”
“I’d eat it on the floor now,” said Hilda, with a decided change of
base. “The bread’s done. Now for the herring.”
Cricket proceeded to set the table, by putting the knives and forks and
the two plates on.
“There’s the table set. Looks sort of bare, though. What will you do
with the herrings? Put them in the spider and let them frizzle?”
“I _think_ so,” said Hilda, doubtfully. “I never saw any cooked, but how
else could we eat them? This fire doesn’t seem very hot, Cricket. Can’t
we do something to it?”
Considering that the stove lids had been off for fifteen minutes during
the bread-toasting, it was not surprising that the top of the fire was a
mass of gray ashes.
“Put on coal,” said Cricket, with the air of the lady from Philadelphia.
“But do let’s cook the herring first. I’m hungry enough to eat Mosina.
Oh, you fatty! aren’t you happy with your cookies!”
“Oh, Cricket, here are some cold boiled potatoes,” cried Hilda, as
joyfully as if she had discovered a gold mine. “They were back in this
corner. Can’t we fry them?”
“We can,” returned Cricket, promptly. “I’ll fry them in the saucepan
while you do the herring. I’ll cut them up.”
Ten minutes later, the two little cooks stood looking at each other in
despair. The thin iron of the spider and saucepan heated immediately,
even over the dying fire, and the potatoes and herring being put in
without any lard, or fat of any kind, naturally stuck fast to the bottom
of the pan, and scorched. Most unpleasant odours filled the air.
“Did you ever imagine it was so hard to cook?” sighed Cricket. “That
toast was stone-cold long ago. Look at these messy things!”
“The worst of it is that we can’t eat the burned parts,” said Hilda,
hungrily, “and there’ll be so little left.”
“Hilda, let’s eat what we can of it right _now_,” proposed Cricket. “If
we cook any more we’ll _never_ get anything to eat.”
“I could eat fried boards,” said Hilda. “Yes, let’s scrape out what of
the potatoes isn’t burned tight down, and eat it up _fast_;” and Hilda
picked up the saucepan.
“Oh, Hilda, I forgot about Mosina! Aren’t you the _bestest_ baby! She
ought to have her milk, Hilda, and I’ll give her some while you’re
fixing luncheon on the table.”
Cricket poured some of the ice-cold milk out into a bowl, and crumbled
some dry bread in it.
Mosina received each mouthful with a series of solemn smacks.
“I’m ready when you are, Cricket,” announced Hilda at length, surveying
the somewhat scanty board with a hungry eye.
“There goes the last mouthful, Mosina,” said Cricket, stuffing the spoon
so hastily into Mosina’s open mouth that the baby choked.
“There! never mind, baby! it didn’t hurt. Now I’m ready, Hilda. Oh, just
think! we’ve been so busy with washing and cooking that we’ve forgotten
to play for ever so long.”
[Illustration: KEEPING HOUSE.]
“Yes, but don’t let’s play now, for goodness sake! I’m too starving
hungry! Sit down and begin.”
Cricket and Hilda drew up their chairs to the delicious banquet. On one
plate lay a curious-looking heap of what Hilda called toast. It
consisted of wedges of bread an inch and a half thick on one side, and
nothing at all on the other, burnt crisp on the thin edges, and scorched
on the thick ones, with the dust of the ashes which it had collected in
its numerous descents into the fire still sticking to it. It was
perfectly cold, so that the small lumps of white butter stuck to it
unmelted. Two herrings, burnt perfectly black on one side, and, of
course, as hard as a piece of coal, reposed side by side on a saucer.
Potatoes cut in little chunks, each very black as to one side and very
white as to the other, were heaped up on another saucer. These dainties
comprised all the meal.
Cricket and Hilda looked at each other a moment in silence, then Cricket
said briskly:
“Isn’t this fun? Let’s play this is roast turkey. Shall I carve? or
perhaps I’d better give you a whole turkey, seeing we are wealthy enough
to have two,” transferring one of the herrings to Hilda’s plate. “Will
you have some scalloped oysters?” passing the potatoes. “They’re done by
a new recipe,” she added, laughing, and attacking her herring with knife
and fork. Hilda followed her example. Of course they might as well have
tried to cut their stone plates.
“I’m desperate! please excuse me,” cried Cricket, lifting her herring,
head and tail, with her fingers, and attacking it this time with her
teeth. She desisted after a vain effort.
“It’s no use,” she sighed. “I got off a few splinters, but they are not
so _very_ good. They do taste burned, and if there’s one thing I hate,
it’s _burn_. Well, let’s have some toast.”
“That’s burned a little, too,” said Hilda, apologetically. “Perhaps we
can scrape it off where it’s thicker and eat the inside. Cricket,
these—these oysters seem to need something. They don’t taste like fried
potatoes a bit.”
“Of _course_ they don’t, for they’re oysters. How could oysters taste
fried potatoes? But they do taste queer, even for oysters,” said
Cricket. “The toast is a little burned, isn’t it?” nibbling first around
one scorched place and then around another. Finally she laid the piece
down in despair.
“Hilda, the more I eat, the hungrier I get! I think I’ll try some plain
bread.”
“There isn’t any more. I toasted all I cut, and the rest you gave to
Mosina.”
The two girls sat hungrily surveying the remains of their luncheon. The
herring had been abandoned as hopeless. The white top of each little
chunk of potato was eaten, though every one knows that scorched potato,
without either salt or butter, is not exactly appetising. The inside of
the thick ends of the bread had been devoured also, but their fragments
were not very satisfying to hearty little appetites.
“There are the cookies,” said Hilda, suddenly.
Cricket sprang for them eagerly, at the suggestion.
“It seems sort of mean to eat the very things we brought,” she said,
hesitating a moment. “Oh, well, mamma will send some more things down
to-morrow, when I tell her how we eat up everything Mrs. Brummagen had
in the house. _Don’t_ these taste good? I feel as if I were at home
again now,” attacking a thin, crisp ginger-snap, and making way with it
almost in one mouthful. In a minute there was nothing left but the
crumbs of the whole supply. Mosina sat staring wistfully at them.
“The poor dear!” said Hilda. “We’ve eaten up every single thing now, and
she looks hungry still.”
“There’s a little more milk,” said Cricket, getting it. “Drink this,
baby. Hilda, do you suppose the burned bread would hurt her if we
crumbled it into the milk for her? Perhaps she won’t taste it.”
Apparently Mosina did not mind it, for she eat it eagerly.
“What let’s do now?” asked Hilda. “When will Mrs. Brummagen be home, do
you think?”
“I don’t know. Let’s clear the table and iron these sheets. You know we
were going to get them all done.”
Flat-irons had been standing on the stove all the morning, though the
girls had pushed them back in their attempts at cooking. Hilda looked
resigned at Cricket’s proposal, but said nothing. The two cleared the
table of the remains of their banquet, and piled up the scanty array of
dishes.
The sheets were still lying in damp, flattened coils in the basket,
where they had put them. Cricket found the ironing-board and put it
between the table and a chair, as she had seen the laundress do at home.
They unfolded a sheet and spread it out carefully, wrinkled and wet,
over the board, not noticing that half of it lay on the floor behind.
Cricket, with a professional air, tested one of the irons, again
imitating the laundress.
“Pretty hot,” she said. It was really barely warm, for the fire was fast
dying, but to her unaccustomed finger it felt hot.
“Now, I’m really Mrs. O’Flanagan. We mustn’t forget to play. You take
care of the baby, mother, and I’ll iron. And—Hilda!” with a sudden
change of tone, “Look here!” for the half-warm flat-iron on the damp
sheet had left a long, black smooch. “What in the world is the matter?
It keeps doing it;” for Cricket tried different places, with the result
of producing a smallpox of black spots. “Did you ever?”
“Perhaps the iron is too hot, and scorches it,” suggested Hilda,
surveying the places critically.
“I never want to hear the word ‘scorched’ again,” said Cricket, setting
down her iron with a thump. “If it’s being scorched, I shan’t iron any
more. That’s one thing sure;” and Cricket hastily bundled the sheet back
into the basket. Between lying on the floor and the smooches from the
iron, the colour of the sheet was fast becoming African.
“It’s the queerest thing! I thought that ironing was as easy as falling
off a log,” using her favourite comparison, which long experience had
shown her was very easy indeed.
“When Sarah irons, she leaves smooth streaks everywhere the iron
touches. I thought _any_body could iron.”
“_I_ thought anybody could fry potatoes. Cricket, what time do you
suppose it is? I think it must be nearly dinner-time. Don’t you feel as
if you’d been here a week?”
“Yes, a month. Don’t eat that string, Mosina. You’re as bad as
Johnnie-goat.”
“And, Cricket, just _suppose_ she shouldn’t get home before dark!”
“Oh, papa would send for us,” said Cricket, securely. “He knows we’re
here. But I _do_ wish Mrs. Brummagen would come home. I’m getting
dreadfully tired of playing I’m poor. What do you want, Mosina?” picking
up the plump baby that crawled up to her, pulling at her dress. She sat
down on the floor, taking her little charge in her arms.
“What you get fat on, Mosina, _I_ don’t know, unless it’s fattening not
to eat much. Mosina, I used to think it would be fun to live in one
room, and get your own meals, and play housekeeping, but I’ve changed my
mind. When you have to live on burnt herring—”
“And stale bread,” burst in Hilda.
“And burned potatoes—”
“And iron with irons that won’t iron—”
“And have messy washing around all the time—”
“And nothing to sew with—”
“And nothing to cook with, and nothing to cook in it—”
“And only wooden chairs to sit down on—”
“And nothing to read—”
“Oh, goodness, gracious me! I do believe I won’t ever scold again at
home, and say I hate things,” said Hilda, drawing a long breath. “I
never thought before how perfectly horrid it would be _never_ to have
anything nice. I wonder if poor people mind it.”
“Oh, dear, I hope not!” said Cricket, looking troubled. “When I’m rich,
Hilda,”—with the confidence of childhood that such a time is surely
coming,—“I’ll give everything I have to poor people, so they won’t have
to work so hard, and can get books to read.”
“But you couldn’t do that,” objected Hilda, practically, “for you would
not have anything left for yourself, and _you’d_ be poor. And if nobody
was poor, who’d do our cooking, and all those things?”
This problem was too deep for Cricket’s troubled little brain.
“It’s a puzzle,” she sighed; then she added, brightening, “I’ll ask
papa; _he’ll_ fix it, when he’s rich. But—I don’t see _why_—” she
pondered, struck by another thought, “why _I_ should have a nice home
and such a dear family, and books, and everything I want, and Mosina
have only this little room and not much to eat. Suppose _I’d_ happened
to be Mosina, and Mosina had been _me_! Oh, dear! it gets worse and
worse!”
And Cricket, with a sigh of puzzlement over this problem of all ages,
dropped a kiss on Mosina’s placid cheek.
But Mosina, herself, suddenly put an end to the consideration of all
hard questions, by setting up one of her unexpected roars, as she
doubled herself up like a little jack-knife. Poor little thing! the
ice-cold milk had naturally given her a severe attack of colic.
“What is the matter, baby?” cried Cricket, in dismay, cuddling Mosina in
her arms, in her motherly little fashion. Mosina roared on, alternately
doubling herself up and straightening herself out. Cricket and Hilda
began to get thoroughly frightened.
“Cricket, she isn’t dying, is she?” whispered Hilda, trembling. Not
having any brothers or sisters, she was perfectly helpless with
children.
“I don’t know, but I guess not,” said Cricket, feeling rather disturbed,
herself. “There, baby! hush, dear! What shall I do for you? Mercy,
Hilda, she’s getting black in the face! Do go for somebody.”
“Where shall I go?” asked Hilda helplessly, wringing her hands.
“Anywhere—down-stairs—in the next room. Find somebody quickly.”
Hilda flew for the door, and ran plump into Mrs. Brummagen, who rushed
in breathlessly. In a twinkling, the baby was in her arms. Mosina was
holding her breath, and was purple in the face. Her mother promptly blew
down her throat, and thumped her on the back, and in a moment the roar
began again, but rather less vehemently. The colic was evidently passing
over.
Poor little Mrs. Brummagen was in a state of excitement and apology
bordering on distraction, at the idea of the young ladies staying there
all day long, and taking care of Mosina all that time.
“An’ you eat—vat?” she demanded, tragically. “Der vas noding to eat. An’
you been here—four—five—six—hour!”
“We couldn’t find much to eat,” admitted Cricket, honestly. “We tried to
cook the herrings, but they were rather tough, and we fried potatoes,
only they wouldn’t fry. They seemed to burn, somehow.”
Mrs. Brummagen poured out a string of mingled German and English
ejaculations, expressive of her distress.
“And, Mrs. Brummagen, we thought we’d help you a little and get your
sheets all washed and ironed, but somehow it didn’t go right, and we
made a dreadful mess of it. I guess you have to know how, if you wash
and iron. It looks so easy, I thought any one could do it. The sheet is
dreadfully dirty—the one we did, I mean,—and it’s all smoochy, too. Will
it come out?” and Cricket shook out the damp sheet from the basket, and
anxiously displayed it.
Mrs. Brummagen was more overcome than before.
“Ach, the dear chilt!” she cried. “Ya, it vill come out, ven I vash him
mit soap.”
“I’m so glad,” said Cricket, greatly relieved. “Of course, mamma would
have given you another one, though. Now, we must go, I think. Oh, Hilda!
we forgot your cap! Mrs. Brummagen, we dressed up to play keeping house,
but we were so busy _doing_ it, that we forgot to play much.”
Mrs. Brummagen helped them on with their things, talking all the time,
in her broken English, and telling them how she ought not have gone at
all, and how she hardly knew what she was doing, and how she couldn’t
get away sooner, and how she had worried all day about their getting
something to eat.
“Never mind,” said Cricket. “We enjoyed it ever so much. Good-bye,
Mosina. Bring her up on Saturday, when you come for the bundle, won’t
you? Good-bye.”
It was getting well into the dusk of the short winter day, when the
children arrived at home. Cricket flew into her mother’s arms and kissed
her as if she had been gone six weeks.
“My little girl, where _have_ you been, and what have you been doing? I
was just sending Eliza down for you. Somebody left word at the basement
door that you were going to stay at Mrs. Brummagen’s all day, but I
expected you home long ago.”
“Mamma, we’ve been playing poor, and I don’t—like—it—one—bit,” said
Cricket, slowly, with her head on her mother’s neck. “I always thought
it would be rather fun to be poor, but it isn’t. It’s just perfectly
horrid. And I’m so hungry, you can’t think! And oh, mamma dearest!
suppose—just _suppose_—that I’d been Mrs. Brummagen’s little girl,
instead of yours!”
CHAPTER XIII.
THE DIAMOND RING.
The short days of the girls’ visit flew by on wings.
“Only till to-morrow!” sighed Cricket, as they got up from the luncheon
table. “This time to-morrow you’ll be gone, and we’ll be left forlorn! I
wish people who come here to visit would stay for always, and never go
away.”
“What an India-rubber house you’d have to have,” said Archie, sweeping
all her curls over her face with a nourish of his arm, as he passed her.
“Archie, when you get to heaven, you won’t be happy unless you can muss
my hair up,” said Cricket, resignedly, shaking it back.
“Don’t get riled, Miss Scricket,” returned Archie, whirling her around.
“That’s only a love-pat.”
“A love-pat!” said Cricket, scornfully. “I shouldn’t like to feel one of
your _hate_-pats, then. Mamma, what can Hilda and I do this afternoon?”
“We girls are going to the museum again,” said Eunice. “Come with us.”
“No, we don’t want to. You like to see such _dis_interesting things.
Mummies and all that. I only like the pictures and marbles, anyway.”
“We want something _very_ nice,” put in Hilda, “because we kept house
all day yesterday, and did very hard work.”
“Yes,” sighed Cricket, “I’ve learned two things lately. I don’t want to
adopt a baby and have it keep me awake at night, and I don’t want to be
poor and not have any books to read. Mamma, what _can_ we do?”
“There is one thing I want you to do,” said mamma, promptly, knowing by
long experience that when children are begging for something to do,
nothing seems very attractive, if offered as a choice. The same thing,
given as something from which there is no appeal, will be done
cheerfully.
“I want you both to go and see Emily Drayton for a little while this
afternoon. It is Hilda’s last chance. Eunice and Edith went yesterday.
Go about three o’clock. She’ll be delighted to see you, if she is at
home.”
“That will be jolly. I hope she’ll be in. Must we make a regular call,
mamma, or can we plain go and see her?”
“‘Plain go and see her,’” said mamma, smiling. “Only go and put on your
Sunday dress. It will be more polite to dress especially for it,” added
wise mamma, knowing the process of dressing would help fill up the
afternoon. Papa had planned to take all the children for a long drive
this afternoon, but as he was unexpectedly called away, it had to be
given up, and the girls were thrown on their own resources.
At three, the two younger girls, in their Sunday best, started in high
feather for their call. It was a long walk to Emily Drayton’s, but the
children enjoyed the crisp, cold day and the brisk exercise.
Unfortunately, when they arrived at their destination, they found that
Emily was out with her mother, and would not be home till late in the
afternoon. Therefore there was nothing to be done but to turn around and
travel home again.
“This isn’t very exciting, after all,” said Cricket, mournfully. “Here
it’s nearly four o’clock, and most of your last afternoon is gone
already. What let’s do next, Hilda?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I wish we’d gone to the museum with the girls. What’s
the matter, Cricket?”
Cricket had suddenly stopped, and was poking at a crack in the sidewalk.
“I thought I caught a glimpse of something shiny in that crack. I _did_!
See, Hilda!” and Cricket extricated something, triumphantly, and held it
up.
Her own amazement grew as she looked.
“_What?_ Not _really_, Cricket?” cried Hilda, and the two heads clashed
over the treasure-trove.
It was a ring with a fairly good-sized diamond.
Cricket whooped, there and then, in her excitement. Fortunately the
street was a quiet one, and no one was near.
“A diamond ring, Hilda! A really, truly diamond! Hooray! It’s as big as
the one papa gave mamma on her birthday. I wonder if he’ll let me wear
it.”
“But somebody has lost it,” said Hilda, in her practical way. “You’ll
have to find the owner.”
[Illustration: THE DIAMOND RING.]
“Why, so I will! How silly of me. I suppose papa will advertise it. It’s
just like our finding Mosina; we never thought that somebody owned her.
Let’s hurry home and show papa.”
The children skipped home briskly, in the excitement of so great a
discovery, and burst into Doctor Ward’s office eagerly. He had just come
in for something he needed, and was on the point of going out again.
“Found what? A diamond ring?” he asked, putting down his hat, and taking
the ring that Cricket put in his hand.
“H’m. Where did you find this?” he asked, turning it to the light.
Cricket told him about it. Doctor Ward, as he listened, took down a tiny
vial from one of his shelves, and put a drop of its contents on the
ring, watching the effect.
“It’s gold, but I’m a little uncertain about the diamond,” he said.
“It’s not worth advertising, if it’s not real,” he said, putting back
the bottle. “You may take it to the jeweller’s, if you like, and get his
opinion.”
“_Not_ a diamond?” cried the disappointed children, in a breath.
“I think it’s only paste, my dear. However, you can run around to the
jeweller’s and find out. I must go now.”
“Oh, dear me!” sighed Cricket, sorrowfully; “I thought we surely had
found some excitement. Well, come on, Hilda; let’s go to Spencer’s and
find out. If it isn’t a real diamond, may we have it, papa?”
“Yes,” answered Doctor Ward, absentmindedly, turning to find something
else he wanted.
At Spencer’s the clerk took the ring with a smile.
“No, it isn’t a diamond,” he said, after giving it a careless glance.
“Found it? No, it isn’t worth advertising.”
The two girls, who had still clung to the hope that they had found a
diamond, looked immensely disappointed at this decision. They took the
ring and walked slowly homeward, discussing the affair.
“If it isn’t a real diamond, and if it isn’t worth advertising, we might
sell it for what it is worth,” suggested Hilda, brilliantly, at last.
“Let’s go into the first jeweller’s store we come to, and ask him to buy
it.”
“Could we?” said Cricket, doubtfully. “Is it ours enough for that?”
“Of course, goosie. Your father said we might have it, didn’t he? Of
course we have a right to sell it and keep the money. He wouldn’t care,”
urged Hilda.
“No, I s’pose not,” returned Cricket, hesitating. “How much do you
suppose we’d get for it?”
“Oh, twenty or thirty dollars, I suppose, or something like that. Rings
cost a lot,” answered Hilda, vaguely. “What shall we do with the money?”
“Buy a bicycle,” said Cricket, promptly. “Let’s each buy one. I’m crazy
for a ‘bikachine,’ as Kenneth says.”
“So am I. What kind would you get?”
“They say the Humber is a pretty nice wheel,” said Cricket,
reflectively; “but I guess that they cost too much, for I heard Donald
say that he wanted one but couldn’t afford it. Perhaps we couldn’t get
one of them, but we might each get a Columbia. Archie and Will have
Columbias. Do you know how much they cost?” asked Cricket, who never had
any more idea of the value of things than a cat. She had probably heard
the price of a good bicycle mentioned scores of times, without its
making the slightest impression upon her. Hilda, who, living alone with
her mother and grandmother, never heard bicycles talked about, really
did not know.
“I think the Columbias would do for us to learn on,” she said,
patronisingly. “You can’t ride, can you?”
“Yes, I learned last fall on some of the girls’ wheels at school. It’s
just as easy as pie. It’s so funny that people make so much fuss about
learning. I like a boy’s wheel best, though. Wish I was on one this
minute,” said Cricket, with a little skip.
“Now what else shall we get with the rest of the money?” asked Hilda.
“A bicycle for Eunice,” answered Cricket immediately. “Of course, mine
would be part hers, but we couldn’t both ride at a time, unless I hung
on behind, somehow. I suppose I might get a tandem.”
“Then you _never_ could ride without somebody on behind,” said Hilda,
sensibly; “and you might not always want it. No, I’d get a single wheel,
if I were you. I think I’ll get a gold thimble with the rest of my half
of the money.”
“I want a lot of new books,” said Cricket, characteristically. “I wish
somebody would invent a book, that as fast as you read it would turn
into another book that you haven’t read. Then you’d always have a new
book to read. Will you get anything else?”
“I want a lot of things more, but I guess I’ll put the rest of my money
into the savings bank. I’ve got three hundred dollars in the savings
bank already.”
“I tried to make money, once, to buy a bicycle,” said Cricket,
meditatively. “I had a store on the dock at Marbury for one day. Sold
peanuts and lemonade. It was pretty tiresome though, and I didn’t make
very much. Auntie said I didn’t make anything, but I never could
understand it, somehow. I had twenty-one cents to put in my bank at
night. I had fifty cents in the morning, but we spent it buying things
to sell. Business is so queer. I should think men’s heads would _burst_,
finding out whether they are making money or losing it.”
“It’s a great deal nicer not to make money, but have somebody leave you
plenty, then you don’t have to bother,” said Hilda. “Here’s a store;
let’s go in here.”
The two little girls marched up to the first clerk they saw.
“We want to see if you’ll buy this ring of us,” said Cricket, holding it
out. “We want to sell it, please, and please give us all you can for
it.”
The clerk stared and smiled.
“I’ll have to see the old gentleman about buying the ring,” he said.
“You wait here a moment,” and with that he went off with the ring,
leaving the children looking after him hungrily, and a little uncertain
whether they would see their treasure again. However, the clerk returned
in a moment.
“Mr. Elton says he can’t buy it unless you bring a note from your father
or somebody, saying it’s all right about your selling the ring, for he
doesn’t want to be let in for receiving stolen property.”
The clerk meant this for a joke, but the horror-stricken children did
not understand this kind of humour.
“I said I _found_ it,” said indignant Cricket at last, finding her
voice.
“Oh, it’s all right, I dare say,” said the clerk carelessly; “you run
along and get a note from somebody, and that will do.”
The children walked out of the store in a state divided between
indignation and bewilderment.
“I _said_ I found it,” repeated Cricket. “I don’t see what he wants a
_note_ for.”
“Let’s go somewhere else and sell it, and _then_ they’ll be sorry,” said
Hilda, tossing her head.
“Yes, we’ll go somewhere else, but first we had better go home and get a
note from papa. Somebody else might ask for one,” returned Cricket,
learning wisdom by experience. “You see, papa said we could have it if
it wasn’t a real diamond, and it isn’t.”
They rushed up to the library and to the office, but papa was still out,
and would not be back until dinner-time, the waitress told them. Then
they went for mamma, but she had not returned either.
“Let’s write a note ourselves,” said Hilda. “Any kind of a note will do,
I suppose. You see, it’s really ours. Your father said so.”
“Yes, I suppose it is. What shall we say? Let’s make up something.”
“All right! You take the ring,—now give it to me, and I’ll put in the
note that a friend gave it to me, and I don’t like it, or something, and
that we want to sell it. That will be regularly story-booky.”
After much writing and giggling and rewriting, the following note was
concocted:
_Dear Sir_: I received this ring from a friend and it’s too big for
me, and I send my daughter with it; and what will you give me for it?
Your friend,
J. JONES.
The “J. Jones” was actually a flight of fancy on Hilda’s part. She
thought it would be still more “story-booky” to sign an assumed name,
and Cricket finally consented.
“It looks very well,” said Cricket, surveying the effusion with much
pride, when it was neatly copied in Hilda’s pretty writing on mamma’s
best note paper. “And ‘J. Jones’ might be anybody, you know. Oh, Hilda!
I _hope_ we’ll get lots of money for it!”
“We _ought_ to. The gold is worth a good deal, I suppose.”
“When we get the money, we might go straight down to the bicycle place,
and buy a bicycle right away, this very day,” proposed Cricket, with a
skip of delight, as the children went out again. “Just think of calmly
walking into the house at dinner-time, with a bicycle under our arms! I
mean, of course—well, you know what I mean.”
“Wouldn’t everybody be surprised? Where will you keep your wheel,
Cricket?”
“In the basement hall, probably. What shall you name yours, Hilda?”
“_Name_ it?” queried Hilda.
“Yes. I don’t see why they shouldn’t be named as well as a horse. Don’t
you think Angelica is a good name? Oh, bicycle, so nice and dear! I wish
you were this minute here! Why, that’s a rhyme, isn’t it?”
“Here’s a jeweller’s,” said Hilda, glancing at the window of a store
they were passing. “It isn’t very big, but it looks pretty nice.”
A clerk with very black hair and a very big nose came forward to wait on
them.
Cricket produced the ring for his inspection.
“It isn’t a really-truly diamond,” she said, lifting her honest eyes to
his face, “but we’d like to sell it for what it’s worth. And here’s a
note,” she added, producing it with a fluttering heart. Would he just
say it was a joke, and not do anything about it? They waited
breathlessly.
“Not a diamond?” said the clerk, taking it carelessly. He turned it over
and looked at it closely, glanced at the children, read the note, and
then said:
“No, it isn’t a diamond. I should say not. We’ll give you—let me
see—well, I’ll have to ask the boss,” and he went off.
“They always have to _ask_ somebody. Oh, Hilda, how much do you think
they’ll give?” whispered Cricket, eagerly, squeezing Hilda’s hand.
“Probably thirty dollars, at _least_,” answered Hilda, returning the
squeeze. “Hush! here he comes.”
“Boss says,” began the clerk deliberately, “that the diamond isn’t real,
but if it’s all right about the note,”—the children gasped,—“that he can
allow you, well, as much as seventy-five cents for the ring.”
Two wide-open mouths was all the clerk could see as he glanced down. The
children were too amazed to speak for a moment.
“Seventy-five cents!” faltered Cricket, at last.
“Seventy-five cents!” echoed Hilda, blankly.
And they turned and stared at each other, not knowing what to say next.
“Come, do you want it?” asked the clerk, yawning. “Don’t be all night
about deciding.”
“Is—is that _all_ it’s worth?” at last ventured Cricket, her round
little face really long with the disappointment.
“Really, now, that’s a pretty liberal offer,” said the clerk, assuming a
confidential air. “Come, decide,” tapping the ring indifferently on the
counter.
“Wouldn’t any one give me any more for it?” persisted Cricket.
“Hardly think it. Why, like as not the next person you go to might not
offer you a cent more than fifty. We always do things of honour here.
Liberal old bird, the boss is,” with a sly wink that half frightened the
children. “Highest prices paid here for second-hand jewelry. Don’t you
see the sign?” with a backward wave of his hand toward a placard on the
wall.
Hilda and Cricket exchanged glances. Hilda nodded, and Cricket said,
with a sigh that came from her very boots:
“Very well, we’ll take the seventy-five cents, if that’s all you can
give us for it.”
“Positively all. Fortunate you came here, or you wouldn’t have gotten
that,” said the clerk, counting out three new quarters into Cricket’s
hand.
“Shine’s thrown in,” he said, facetiously, as the children soberly
thanked him and walked out of the store, feeling very uncomfortable
somehow.
“What a horrid man!” exclaimed Cricket, as they reached the sidewalk and
drew a long breath. “Wasn’t he the most winkable creature you ever saw?
I suppose he thought he was funny.”
“Greasy old thing!” returned Hilda, both children being glad to vent
their disappointment on some convenient object. “His finger-nails were
as black as ink.”
But Cricket could not stay crushed long. In a moment the smiles began to
creep up to her eyes, and spill over on to her cheeks, and finally
reached her mouth.
“Oh, Hilda! it’s _too_ funny,” she cried, with her rippling laugh. “We
were going to take our bicycles home under our arms all so grand! Shall
we order them to-night?”
“_I’m_ just too mad for anything,” answered Hilda, whose sense of humour
never equalled Cricket’s. “Seventy-five cents! the _idea_! for that
_beautiful_ gold ring!”
“I’ve another idea,” said Cricket, stopping short suddenly. “It isn’t
worth putting seventy-five cents in the bank, is it? Let’s stop at that
old peanut-woman’s stand and get some peanuts with the money. I think
we’ll get a good many for seventy-five cents.”
And they certainly did. The old woman stared at the munificent order,
but began to count out bags with great speed, lest they should change
their minds.
“Five cents a bag,” she said; “seven—eight—that makes quite a many
bags—nine—ten—where will I put this?—eleven—twelve—here, little miss,
tuck it in here,—thirteen—can you hold it up here?”
“We have enough, I think,” said Cricket, rather amazed at the quantity
of peanuts you can get for seventy-five cents.
“That ain’t but thirteen, honey. Here, put this ’un under your arm. Got
to go fur?”
“Not very. Well, Hilda, I never had all the peanuts I wanted at one time
before, I do believe. I should think these would last a year. Oh, that
one’s slipping off! Fix it, please. Thank you, ever so much.”
“Hollo, Madame Van Twister! Are you buying out the whole establishment?”
said a familiar voice behind them, and turning they saw Donald.
“I guess she’s pretty glad to sell out,” said Cricket, seriously. “I
know, for I kept a peanut-stand once in Marbury; the one I was telling
you about, Hilda. It wasn’t much fun. It looks so, but it isn’t.”
“Buying her out from philanthropic motives?” queried Donald.
“No, we’ve been selling diamond rings,” said Cricket, carelessly, “and
we had a lot of money, so we thought we’d buy peanuts. Want a bag, Don?
we have plenty.”
“You’re a regular circus, you kid,” laughed Donald. “Where do you get
your diamond rings?”
Cricket told him the whole story. Donald laughed till he had to hold on
to the peanut-stand.
“J. Jones! Well, you certainly showed great originality in the name!” he
said. “Sorry I can’t escort you home, youngster, and carry a few dozen
of those bags for you, but I’m due elsewhere,” and Donald went off,
still laughing.
If you want to know whether the family had enough peanuts, I will simply
remark that by bedtime, that night, there were only two bags left,—and
shells.
“After all, we girls didn’t eat so many,” said Cricket, meditatively.
“Will and Archie ate ten bags. I counted. Boys are so queer! The more
they eat, the more they want.”
Doctor Ward was out to dinner, and did not hear the end of the story of
the ring till the next day.
“Do you mean you actually sold it, you little Jews?” he said. “Then I
shall be obliged to go and buy it back.”
“_Papa!_ why, we’ve spent the money!” cried Cricket, alarmed. “Besides,
you said we could have it, didn’t you? I thought we could do anything we
liked with it,” entirely forgetting that the proposition to sell it had
not come from her.
“I believe I did say something about your having it if we couldn’t find
an owner, or if the diamond was not real. However, I want to be sure on
that point for myself. Sometimes mistakes are made. I must see about
it.”
“Suppose they won’t sell it back,” suggested Cricket, looking
uncomfortable.
“Perhaps they won’t, but I think I can induce them.”
“But we haven’t the seventy-five cents,” repeated Cricket, piteously,
“and we’ve eaten up all the peanuts, so we can’t send them back and get
the money.”
“Where are the peanuts, which we got for the seventy-five cents, which
we got for the diamond ring, which we found on the street! Now, Miss
Scricket, you’ve got to go to jail,” said Archie, cheerfully. “Where is
the jail, which holds Miss Scricket, which ate the peanuts, which cost
seventy-five cents, which she got for a diamond ring, what belonged to
somebody else! Regular House that Jack Built.”
“You can pay for the peanuts you ate, then,” retorted Cricket. “That
will be pretty nearly seventy-five cents.”
“That identical seventy-five cents it will not be necessary to return,”
said Doctor Ward, pinching her cheek. “I’ll supply the money, and report
at luncheon.”
At luncheon Doctor Ward held up the ring.
“I went, I saw, I got the ring, after an hour’s hard work. I suspected
it was really a diamond as soon as the old Jew opened his lips.”
“It _is_ a diamond?” cried every one, in chorus.
“I won’t keep you in suspicion, as Cricket used to say. It _is_ a
diamond, though not of the first water. The old fellow first pretended
he knew nothing about the matter. I had the clerks called up. He only
had two. One of them—”
“Did he have a big nose?” interrupted Cricket, eagerly.
“And greasy hair and black finger-nails?” added Hilda.
“All those,” said Doctor Ward. “Well, it took an hour, but finally I got
it back. Then I took it to Spencer’s—”
“The very place we went to,” interrupted Cricket again.
“Yes, and I happened to see the very clerk. The moment I held it out he
looked surprised; I told him I wanted it tested,—not merely glanced at.
He took it off, and came back, presently, looking very sheepish, and
told me, as I said before, that it is a diamond, though not a very
valuable one for its size.”
“Why didn’t he look at it more carefully at first?” asked Mrs. Ward.
“He said something about thinking it was a joke that the children were
putting up, and—”
“As if we would put up a joke on a perfect stranger!” cried Cricket,
indignantly.
“Of course not, pet, but he didn’t know that. It was no excuse for him,
though. He should have given it the proper attention. However, we have
the ring safe now, after all its adventures, and we’ll advertise it.”
“Papa,” asked Cricket, dimpling suddenly, “if nobody ever claims it, may
I have it for my own,—not to sell it, I mean,—but just to wear it when
I’m grown-up?”
“Can’t promise. You’d probably pawn it the first time you wanted
peanuts,” teased Doctor Ward.
That was several years ago, but the ring, which is still in mamma’s
jewel-box, is now called Cricket’s.
CHAPTER XIV.
SCHOOL THEATRICALS.
It seemed very lonely the next day, when Edith and Hilda had gone. The
spare room was shorn of its two cots, and was restored to its usual
dainty order. Will and Archie left also, as their school began the next
Monday, and they went to board, in the neighbourhood of their house,
till Edna was sufficiently recovered for them to be at home. She had had
a very light attack of scarlet fever, fortunately, and was already
improving. As soon as the boys left, Eunice and Cricket returned to
their own domains. College opened and Don was off. On Tuesday, the
girls’ school, St. Agatha’s, was in session again, so now they all
settled down to the busy time that lies between Christmas and Easter.
At the close of the half-year at St. Agatha’s, early in February, came
the great excitement of the year. This was an exhibition, consisting of
a play, given in French by some of the older girls, and a short play in
English by some of the children in the junior department. As only the
girls whose scholarship was high, and deportment uniformly good, were
allowed to take part in the plays, of course it was one of the chief
honours of the year to be selected. The announcement of the favoured
girls was eagerly awaited.
The French play was learned as class work during the fall term by all
the senior girls in the French classes. The list of those chosen to give
the plays was read on the first day of school after the Christmas
holidays.
Much rehearsing and genuine hard work on the part of the actors, as well
as of the teachers, went into this yearly exhibition, but the honour
paid for all the extra hours, and the names of the girls who took the
parts were preserved in the school year-book.
As Marjorie had been in the French play the year before, she could not
be in it again, this year, although her marks were well up. Since Eunice
and Cricket had only entered St. Agatha’s this year, they never thought
of the possibility of either of them being in the play. Therefore you
can imagine Eunice’s blank amazement when her name was read among the
others:
“Miss Eunice Ward is assigned the part of Sallie, the maid.”
“_Eunice?_” said Cricket, right out loud, her eyes shining like two
stars. “Oh, do you think she _can_?”
Apparently Eunice’s teachers thought she could, for they had given her
the very good part of a little housemaid. The “cast” were requested to
wait after school, to be given their books and be instructed in their
parts.
Cricket was on tiptoe with excitement when Eunice came home, trying to
look unconcerned and every-day-ish. Cricket flew at her with a little
shriek of delight, and squeezed her eagerly.
“Eunice! _Eunice!_ think of your being given a part in a _real_ play!
What will you wear? Will it be hard to learn? When do you have to know
it? Do they begin rehearsing soon? Could I go to the rehearsals, do you
think?”
“I don’t know _every_thing yet, Cricket. I don’t know what I’m to wear.
We must know our parts perfectly in one week, and next Tuesday will be
our first rehearsal. I don’t know about their letting you in, but I’m
afraid they won’t. I don’t think they let anybody be there but Miss
Raymond and Miss Emmet, and us actors,” with supreme importance.
“How horrid! I’ll just go somewhere and _peek_, then. I _must_ see you.”
“I’ll ask Miss Emmet if you can’t come, though. She knows we are always
together. But, you see, if they let in one outside girl, any number may
want to come in,” said Eunice, wisely.
“That’s so,” said Cricket, with a sigh. “You tell them I’ll make myself
_very_ small and not get in anybody’s way. Where’s your book?”
“Here it is. Sallie is my part, you know.”
Cricket took the book and dropped down on the window-seat.
“Isn’t this _delicious_? ‘Curtain rising, discloses Sallie dusting.’ Oh,
what cunning little short sentences you have to say!” After a moment’s
silence: “Eunice, this won’t be anything to learn. I just about know the
first page already,” and Cricket rattled it off.
For a week the family had to lunch and dine on the famous play. A
stranger could not have told which was to take part, Eunice or Cricket,
for the two knew it equally well. Indeed, in a week’s time, Cricket knew
the whole play by heart, from reading the other characters, when she was
hearing Eunice. The play was short, of course, only being about
twenty-five minutes in length. The children declaimed it on the stairs;
they spouted it in the parlour after dinner, and they interlarded their
conversation with quotations from it. They talked professionally of
entrances and exits, of wings and flies and scenery and cues, till their
long-suffering family protested in a body.
Eunice had a private interview with Miss Emmet, the principal, regarding
Cricket’s presence at the rehearsals. At first Miss Emmet said
positively, as Eunice had feared she would, that it was against the
rules for any one to be present save herself and the teacher who drilled
the girls. But Eunice’s pleading face, as she urged that she and Cricket
were always together in everything, and she could do it _so_ much better
if Cricket were there, because she could rehearse it with her at home,
finally made Miss Emmet say, smiling:
“Well, my dear, on second thoughts, we’ll admit Jean. Only please do not
tell the girls that you asked for her to be present.”
Eunice promised, radiantly, and flew off to Cricket with the coveted
permission.
The rehearsals went on swimmingly for a time. Then, after the novelty
was over, the little actors began to realise that the extra time
required of them interfered, now and then, with their own plans for
amusement. There began to be absences from rehearsals. The rehearsals
themselves began to be a bore, for any one who has ever trained children
for any exhibition knows the tiresome repetition of scenes and sentences
that is necessary to ensure success in the simplest performance.
Eunice and Cricket felt it, with the others. They wanted to go skating,
to go down-town with mamma, or made plans with their schoolmates, only
to remember, at the last minute, that there was a rehearsal that
afternoon.
Eunice was very faithful, however, for her mother would not permit
anything to interfere with these rehearsals. Cricket, of course, was
free, but, as her father said, she would “never desert Mr. Micawber.”
“No; you agreed to take a part in the play, dear,” said mamma firmly,
when the children begged to “cut just _once_, for the other girls did
sometimes,” since something unusual had come up; “what you agreed to do,
you must do, at any cost of inconvenience or disappointment to yourself.
No amusements, of any kind, must prevent your being punctual at every
rehearsal.”
“Just sometimes, mamma,” begged Eunice.
“Not even once. Your teachers are taking all this trouble for your
benefit, and the least you can do is to be depended upon for your
punctual presence. You know how provoking you say it is when any one is
absent, and how badly the rehearsal goes on then.”
“That’s so: like a chicken on one leg,” said Cricket, thoughtfully.
“Everything hitches. But I do wish I were _in_ the play. I know all
Isabel Fleming’s part _much_ better than she does. Miss Raymond scolds
her all the time.”
“How did she get in if she is stupid?” asked Marjorie.
“She isn’t stupid. I believe she’s lazy. She just stumbles along, and it
makes me so mad when she gets all mixed up in her best speeches. There’s
one part, with Eunice, that she spoils entirely, every time. That about
the bonnet, Eunice, when you come in and find her trying it on. She’s
all alone before the glass first, and she has some awfully funny things
to say, and she just forgets half of them, every time.”
“You do it lots better, Cricket,” said Eunice. “She really does, mamma.
She’s practised it with me, you know, up-stairs. Let’s do it now,
Cricket.”
And Cricket, nothing loath, jumped up, and the children went through the
scene. Cricket was always such an enthusiastic little soul about
everything she did, that she made herself literally the character she
was acting.
“Oh, I’m just pining away to be in the play,” she said, sinking down on
a couch and fanning herself, amid the applause of the family.
“You look pretty healthy for one who is in that state,” said Doctor
Ward.
They were all in the parlour for the jolly half-hour after dinner.
“I don’t show it much, I suppose,” said Cricket thoughtfully, “but,
really, it just pines inside all the time.”
“Do you remember, mamma,” put in Marjorie, “how Eunice, when she was a
little thing, used to like to sit up at the piano and sing, and pretend
to play her accompaniments? There was one particular song she always
tried. It had a chorus, ‘Maggie, dear Maggie, I’m _pinning_ for thee!’
as Eunice used to say it. Cricket might sing now, ‘Oh, Nancy, dear
Nancy, I’m pining for _thee_!’”
“By the way, what is that ghostly song you are so fond of singing about
the house, Marjorie?” asked Doctor Ward, looking up from his evening
paper. “I only can make out the chorus, ‘Repack, repack, repack my body
to me,—to me.’”
There was a shout of laughter that nearly drowned Marjorie’s astonished
protest that she never sang anything so sepulchral.
“You certainly do, often,” insisted Doctor Ward. “This very afternoon,
not long before dinner, I heard you and two or three of your friends, in
the music-room, singing, and one of the things you sang was that very
song, only you sang it this way: ‘Repack my body to me,—same old body.’”
There was another shout.
“Oh, papa, you _funny_!” cried Marjorie. “It isn’t _body_ at all. It’s
‘Bring back my _Bonny_ to me.’ It’s a girl’s name. The first line is,
‘My Bonny lies over the ocean!’”
“That’s it,” said the doctor. “When you sang, ‘My _body_ lies over the
ocean,’ I thought it was a strange thing to mislay.”
Whereupon Marjorie went to the piano and insisted on playing the whole
thing through, and having Eunice join her in singing it.
The next rehearsal day, Eunice and Cricket were promptly on hand.
Presently all the girls were there but Isabel Fleming. Miss Raymond, the
elocution teacher, came in, herself, at the last moment.
“I was unexpectedly detained. All here? Isabel Fleming isn’t missing
again to-day, is she? What a provoking child! This is the third time she
has been absent, and she really needs more drill than any one of you,
for she is so careless.” Miss Raymond’s black eyes snapped impatiently,
and the girls were glad they were not the delinquent Isabel. “Wouldn’t
she catch it the next day?” the girls’ silent exchange of glances said.
“Here _I_ leave pressing work to come here and drill you, for your own
benefit and advantage, outside of school hours,” went on Miss Raymond,
indignantly; “I often give up engagements that I wish to make, for
ungrateful girls who are not even responsible for what they undertake.
You ought to be as ashamed to break an engagement as you would be to
tell a lie.”
“That is very true,” said Miss Emmet quietly. “However, we won’t scold
the girls who _are_ here, on account of those who are not. I will see
Isabel to-morrow.”
“They all need a talking-to, though,” cried irate Miss Raymond. “They
all happen to be here to-day; but I believe every one of them has missed
rehearsals, with the exception of Eunice Ward.”
“Mamma won’t let me,” said Eunice honestly.
“Your mother’s a sensible woman, then,” said Miss Raymond. “Now, Miss
Emmet, what are we to do? It spoils the play so, to have me read
Isabel’s part. I can’t drill them properly, and they don’t do justice to
their own parts.”
“If you like, Miss Emmet, I will take Isabel’s part,” said Cricket, in
her bright, unconscious way, after a telegraphic despatch to Eunice,
with her eyebrows.
“But you don’t know it, child, and it’s the reading it at all that I
object to. Not acting it, puts the others out,” said Miss Raymond,
pulling off her gloves.
“I mean, I can say it,” explained Cricket. “I can’t act it very well, of
course, but perhaps it would do. I know all the part.”
“Do you? Well, then, you can try it. It won’t be worse, at any rate,
than my reading it, and keeping my eye on the girls at the same time.
Stand here, and be ready for your cue.”
The speech was ungracious, for Miss Raymond was always sharp-tongued,
but she patted Cricket’s cheek, approvingly.
The rehearsal began. Cricket was excited, but she had her wits about
her, for this work was what she loved.
“You are doing very well, child,” said Miss Raymond, when she went off
the stage. Cricket was so eager to fill in just right, that she never
thought of herself. The little play was rehearsed twice through, and the
second time Cricket did still better. Of course not as well as the girls
who had been drilling for two weeks already, for she did not always get
the right position on the stage, sometimes turned her back to the
imaginary audience, did not leave at the right moment, every time, and
never spoke loud enough.
Nevertheless, on the whole, the rehearsal was very satisfactory.
Miss Raymond said a few words to Miss Emmet while the children were
resting. Miss Emmet nodded assent. When the girls were leaving, Miss
Emmet detained Eunice and Cricket a moment.
“Miss Raymond and I spoke of replacing Isabel Fleming two or three days
ago,” she said. “I told her, the last time she was absent, that I should
fill her place if she failed again. Now, Jean, I wish you would ask your
mother if she has any objection to your taking the part of Nancy. You
know the part already, and we can soon train you in the acting.”
Cricket’s eyes grew bigger and bigger. To act a part in that wonderful
play!
“Will your mother permit her, do you think?” Miss Emmet asked Eunice.
“Jean is rather younger than the girls are when they first take part,
usually, but I think she will do.”
“Yes, indeed, I think mamma will be willing,” beamed Eunice.
“I come to all the rehearsals now,” said Cricket, eagerly, “and I know
the part perfectly, and I am sure mamma will let me.”
The girls almost danced down the street.
“I’d rehearse every day in the week, and all night too,” said Cricket,
fervently, to mamma, when the latter warned her again that she must not
let anything interfere with rehearsing. “We will not ask to shirk it
once, no matter what we want to do.”
“That’s the only condition you can undertake it on,” said mamma. “If you
do it at all, you must do it thoroughly, you know.”
The condition seemed a very small one to the children, as only a week
remained before the eventful Friday night. The rehearsals were never
more than an hour long, and generally not more than three-quarters of an
hour at a time, but they came every other day.
It was Monday afternoon,—the Monday before the play. A rehearsal was
appointed for three o’clock. As the girls came out into the street from
school, one of their friends joined them, begging them to come and see
her in the afternoon. Her mother, she said, had just come home from New
York, and brought her many pretty things, as well as a great box of
Huyler’s candy. She wanted Eunice and Cricket to see the things and help
eat the candy. Eunice, remembering the rehearsal, said no very firmly,
though her resolution was somewhat shaken when she learned that most of
the candy was chocolate.
“It’s so far over there that we wouldn’t have time to come before
rehearsal, but we might go over at four, couldn’t we, Eunice?” asked
Cricket, hopefully.
“Oh, how provoking! You see, I have a music lesson at four, and Mr.
Schwarz is _so_ cross if I’m a minute late; and I know there won’t be
anything left of that candy to offer you, after the children get hold of
it. Can’t you skip rehearsal, just once?”
“No, we’ve engaged not to,” said Eunice. “It would be nice, but we
mustn’t, Elsie. Good-bye. Cricket, we’ll be late to luncheon if we don’t
hurry.”
It chanced that mamma had an engagement at the dentist’s, and had to
hurry away from the luncheon table.
“And I shan’t be home till late in the afternoon, girls,” she added,
“for, after I leave the dentist, I have several people to see on Guild
business. Be prompt with Miss Raymond, my little maids, and do well.”
She was hardly out of sight when a group of little school friends
trooped up the steps. Eunice and Cricket, standing in the window, saw
them coming, and flew down to the hall to meet them.
“Get your things on right away,” they cried, in a chorus. “They say
there is splendid skating on the lake, and we’re all going out there. It
will probably be gone by to-morrow, they say. Do hurry, girls!”
“Oh, jolly!” cried Cricket, flying away. Then she stopped short, and
looked at Eunice.
“We can’t go, girls,” said Eunice, soberly. “We have rehearsal at
three.”
“Oh, cut for once! All the girls have cut sometime, you know. You can’t
be there always.”
“It’s such a nuisance when everybody isn’t there, though. But I’m just
dying for a skate,” said Cricket, wistfully. “How I wish we _could_ go!”
“Come, _do_ cut,” some one urged. “Let Miss Raymond scold. Ask your
mother. She’ll let you.” Eunice wavered. Wouldn’t mamma let her if she
only knew about this? Such a _very_ special occasion! They had been so
very punctual and regular,—not a single time had they missed rehearsal,
and they knew their parts perfectly. Indeed, this was an extra
rehearsal, appointed for the special benefit of some girl who had been
absent twice. _Could_ not they let it go for once? Eunice and Cricket
looked at each other wistfully.
“I believe—” began Eunice, slowly.
“Oh, goody! fly up-stairs _fast_, and get your things on. It’s getting
awfully late, now, to get off.”
Eunice still hesitated; then she suddenly braced herself.
“No,” she said, backing off, with her hands behind her back, as though
there were something she was forbidden to touch. Then she spoke very
fast, lest her determination should waver again.
“We can’t possibly go. We’ve promised mamma we wouldn’t shirk once, no
matter what came up, and we can’t. We’re awfully sorry, but we can’t.
You go on, girls. It’s getting late.”
It certainly required much resolution to say this, in the face of those
glittering skates and beseeching eyes, but Eunice’s tone was so firm
that the girls wasted no further coaxing, and went off with many an
expression of regret.
Eunice and Cricket each drew a long breath, and looked at each other
resignedly.
“Now let’s get ready to go straight off before anything else happens,”
said Eunice, with assumed briskness.
“I don’t feel as if the self-denying part of me could do that again.
It’s most worn out,” said Cricket, mournfully, as they went up-stairs.
“Think! the skating will surely be gone to-morrow! It never lasts but
two or three days.”
As they finally shut the front door behind them and went down the steps,
Mrs. Drayton’s carriage drew up before the house, and Emily’s eager head
popped itself forward.
“Girls! girls! where are you going? I’m _so_ glad I’m in time to catch
you. I want you to go for a drive.”
“Oh, _Emily!_” cried Eunice, despairingly. “Don’t say one word about
anything. I’m just about crazy! _Every_thing nice is happening this
afternoon, when we’ve just _got_ to go to rehearsal.”
“_Must_ you go?” said Emily, disappointedly. “I’d made up my mind to
have a nice, long drive. I’ve had such a cold that I have not been out
for a week, but to-day is _so_ clear and bright that mamma said I might
come out and get you both, and I want you _so_ much!”
“I’m _just_ as much disappointed as you, Emily,” sighed Eunice. “I’m
tired to death of rehearsals, but we _must_ go, because we promised
mamma we wouldn’t shirk.”
“You can get some one else to go with you, Emily,” said Cricket, who had
waited, younger-sister fashion, for Eunice to decide the matter.
“Of course I can get plenty of people,” said Emily, petulantly; “but I
want _you_. Oh, _do_ come! We’ll stop at the school and say I wouldn’t
let you get out.”
Emily was very used to having her own way. Eunice opened her eyes wide.
“Oh, we couldn’t tell Miss Raymond _that_!” she exclaimed, in great
surprise. “Please don’t coax, Emily. It makes it so hard.”
“There’s three o’clock now,” put in Cricket, as the hour struck from a
neighbouring tower. “Rehearsal is at three, and we’ve never been late
before.”
Emily looked ready to cry.
“It’s too bad of you. You might come if you wanted to. You’d rather go
to a mean old rehearsal than come with me. I know you would.”
“Emily, how silly!” cried Cricket, in despair. “As if we wouldn’t rather
go with you a billion times,—yes, a virgintillion. Don’t you see? We’ve
_promised_.”
“Please don’t be cross about it,” begged Eunice. “You can get somebody
and have a lovely drive, and we have to miss everything and be scolded
for being late, besides. We _must_ go, Cricket, or we’ll have our heads
taken off.” And Eunice, as she spoke, sprang up on the carriage steps
and kissed her little friend, coaxingly.
Emily sighed.
“Can you drive to-morrow then? I’ll come early.”
“If we don’t have rehearsal. We’ll ride with you now as far as the
school, if you’ll take us.”
“All this trial and temptation,” sighed Cricket, soberly, as they went
up the school steps, “and probably being scolded for being late into the
bargain.”
Fortunately, however, when they reached the room, Miss Raymond herself
was late, having been detained by some lesson. All the girls were
already there, and soon they were at work.
“This has been a thoroughly satisfactory rehearsal,” said Miss Raymond,
with unusual cordiality. “Everybody is on hand, and you’ve all done
well. I thought last Saturday you would have to rehearse every day this
week, but now we will do no more till the dress-rehearsal on Thursday.
You’ve done _splendidly_.”
Praise from Miss Raymond was so rare that the girls beamed.
“_Isn’t_ it fortunate that we didn’t cut?” said Eunice, as they went
homewards. “Now we can go to-morrow with a clear conscience, and this
afternoon we would have felt guilty all the time.”
“Yes, and had to rehearse to-morrow, too, if we’d cut this afternoon.”
The eventful Friday evening arrived in due course of time, and an
enthusiastic and expectant audience crowded the schoolroom at St.
Agatha’s. The juniors’ play was first on the programme. Eunice, in her
part of maid, was very taking in her becoming costume, with its little
mob-cap and jaunty apron. Cricket, as saucy Nancy, who was always
listening behind doors, and getting into trouble, made a decided hit.
The other girls were all so good in their parts that it was hard to say,
after all, which was best. Everything went smoothly, as it should with a
well-trained, well-disciplined set of girls. The French play was
beautifully given by the seniors.
The programme closed with some pretty drills and marches, for which they
had been trained by their teacher of physical culture, as part of their
school work. For this they had had no other preparation than their
regular daily half-hour in the gymnasium.
“All this means much work on your part, Miss Emmet,” Mrs. Ward said,
appreciatively, to the head of the school, as people were congratulating
her on her beautifully trained girls.
“And much on the girls’ part, as well,” answered Miss Emmet, cordially.
“They learn many valuable lessons, during the time we take to prepare
all this, besides their school work.”
“Certainly lessons in self-denial and persistency and promptness,” said
Mrs. Ward, smiling. “My little girls have certainly learned the
necessity of keeping engagements, no matter what more interesting things
come up.” And she told Miss Emmet of the Monday before, and its
accumulation of disappointments.
Miss Emmet laughed, but she looked sympathising, also.
“That’s exactly what I mean. It all goes into character-building.”
CHAPTER XV.
A DAY IN THE NURSERY.
Have I said that George Washington—and, of course, Martha—had
accompanied the children to town when they returned home? He became as
much an institution at No. 25——Street as at Marbury. He had his
apartments in the nursery, and behaved himself very haughtily to the
kitchen cat, when the latter was occasionally brought up from the
regions below for a visit.
George Washington had grown up to be a big, black, lustrous creature,
with emerald eyes, and a bit of white fur under his chin, just like a
cravat. The boys called him the bishop for his stateliness. He no longer
played with Martha, nor chased her around. Unmolested, she waved proudly
over his back in a stately curve.
George Washington was moderately obedient, but went his own way just
often enough to assert his perfect independence. He submitted with quiet
dignity to the many performances that the children put him through, yet
if they went a step too far, he would look at them so severely with his
emerald eyes that the mere glance would immediately make them change
their minds and pretend they meant something altogether different.
Thursday was Eliza’s afternoon out. On this particular Thursday,
Marjorie was left in charge of the nursery. Mamma was obliged to attend
some important club meeting, and Eunice and Cricket had gone to see
Emily Drayton. It was a damp, drizzling day, so that the little nursery
people could not get their usual walk, and they all missed it. Zaidie,
particularly, was always very dependent upon the out-of-door exercise,
which her vigorous little body needed.
Marjorie, who often took charge of the nursery in Eliza’s off-days, sat
reading by the broad window, curled up on the window-seat, while the
children played about the room. As they were always used to entertaining
themselves, and were usually left, as far as possible, to their own
devices, the person in charge only needed to keep a general oversight.
The twins were playing church, which was one of their favourite
amusements. George Washington was the minister. He was clad in a doll’s
petticoat, fastened about his neck for a surplice, and a black ribbon
for a stole. He was sitting up in state behind a pile of books that
served for a lectern. He knew his part perfectly, and sat as still as
any bishop. By pinching his tail very slightly and carefully, he could
be made to mew at the proper moments, without disturbing him much.
Helen played the mother, bringing her child, Zaidie, to church. Zaidie,
of course, pretended she was a naughty girl, and talked out loud in
service. Kenneth played the father, who was to take Zaidie out of
church, when she grew _too_ naughty. It was also his business to pinch
George Washington’s tail at the right time,—which was whenever Zaidie
gave him orders. Just a _little_ pinch, most carefully given, was all
that was required, but now and then Kenneth forgot, and gave too hard a
squeeze. When this happened, George Washington turned and slapped at
them with his paw, with a very emphatic mew, which plainly meant, “I am
quite willing to do my part towards your amusement, but if you take too
many liberties, I won’t play.”
On one of these occasions, Zaidie suddenly stopped in the midst of a
pretended roar at having her ears boxed by Helen,—very tenderly
boxed,—and listened.
“I don’t think that George Washington has his usual kind of mew to-day,”
she said, criticisingly. “Don’t you think he _squeaks_ a little?”
Helen listened, with her head on one side.
“Pinch him again, Kenneth,” she said. “Just a little, _very_ carefully.
Yes, I think he _does_ squeak. Do you think he is getting rusty inside?
He drinks a lot of water, and it made the sewing-machine all rusty when
you poured water over it.”
Here George Washington mewed again vigorously, in response to Kenneth’s
invitation.
“Where does the mew come from, I wonder,” said Zaidie, thoughtfully,
surveying the cat. “Is it in his mouth, or down in his throat?”
She poked her fingers in his mouth, and felt around a little. George
Washington rebelled.
“Don’t scratch me, George. I aren’t hurting you a bit,” said Zaidie,
reprovingly. “I want to know where your mew is, cause, if it’s getting
rusty, I’m going to oil you, same as ’Liza does the machine.”
“Can _cats_ be oiled?” asked Helen, doubtfully.
“Oh, yes, I ’xpect so,” returned Zaidie, cheerfully. “Don’t you think
so? Don’t you s’pose they get dried up inside sometimes? Kenneth’s
little squeaky lamb does. I’ll get the machine-oiler.”
Marjorie, curled up on the window-seat, did not heed the children’s
chatter. Zaidie got the little machine-can, which once, in an evil hour,
Eliza had shown her how to use.
“Mew again, George Washington,” ordered Zaidie, “so I can find out where
it comes from. If he mews in his mouth, I can put the oil on his
tongue.”
A slight pinch immediately brought an answer from George Washington.
Zaidie listened carefully, with her ear close at his head.
“It isn’t in his mouth,” she said, positively. “I think it’s down his
throat. How can I oil him down there? I’m afraid I’ll hurt him if I
stick this long end down.”
“Do you s’pose those little holes in his ears are oil-holes?” asked
Helen, brightening.
[Illustration: IN THE NURSERY.]
Zaidie immediately experimented with her tiny finger, much to George
Washington’s disgust.
“They go pretty far down,” she said, soothing and petting him.
“Never mind, I’m not going to hurt you,” she said, reassuringly. “I’m
just going to put some nice, soft oil down your little oil-holes, and
then you’ll feel so _better_, you can’t think! Your voice is all rusty.
’Liza says things won’t go if they’re rusty, and bimeby your voice won’t
go, and you’d be sorry, for you like to talk, you know.”
As she spoke, Zaidie tried to poke the oil-can down his ears. George
Washington jerked away.
“Here, Helen, you hold his hands, and Kenneth, you hold his feet tight.
That’s right. Don’t let go,” ordered Zaidie, getting her assistants into
place. “Now, George, I won’t hurt you much, and it’s for your own good,
you know,” with a funny imitation of Eliza’s tone.
Zaidie tipped the little oil-can and poked it carefully down into George
Washington’s unwilling ear. It tickled him, and he shook his head
impatiently. The children held him rigidly, and Zaidie let the cold oil
trickle down. At the first touch of it, George Washington gave a wild
yelp, and with extended claws and uprising fur, he sprang from the
children’s grasp, leaving such a dig in Kenneth’s soft little hand that
he immediately set up an unearthly howl, which brought Marjorie to the
rescue.
The astonished twins stood staring at each other. Marjorie took up
Kenneth in her arms, kissed the hurt place, and asked the children what
they had been doing to excite George Washington to such an unusual pitch
of wrath.
“We only tried to _oil_ him in his little oil-holes in his ears, ’cause
he squeaked so, Marjorie,” explained bewildered Zaidie, “and I don’t
_believe_ he liked it. But his voice was _dreffully_ rusty,—truly it
was.”
“_Oil_ him?” said Marjorie. “You absurd child! Animals don’t need
oiling.”
“Yes, they _do_,” insisted Zaidie. “’Liza oiled Kenneth’s baa-lamb the
other day. The big woolly one, up there, you know. She oiled it down in
its squeaks. And she rubbed something greasy on my chest when I had the
croup. Don’t you remember how my breath squeaked? She said she oiled me.
There!”
“Oh, you funny little things!” said Marjorie, laughing at them. “Well,
don’t try it again, anyway, on George Washington. He doesn’t like it,
you see, and you don’t want to be scratched, do you? Don’t cry any more,
baby, dear. You’re a little man, and men don’t cry for a scratch like
that, you know.”
Marjorie set the children playing something else, and then returned to
her book. She was usually a capable and efficient guardian in the
nursery, eldest-daughter fashion, but this afternoon she was deep in a
fascinating book that must go back to the library to-morrow. In two
minutes she was absorbed in it again, to the exclusion of her little
charges.
Zaidie looked around for pastures new. The children were not usually a
mischievous set, but now and then, like grown people, they delighted in
the unexpected.
As Helen wanted a drink, all three trooped into the nursery bathroom,
which opened off the nursery. It was a pretty bathroom, with the walls
covered with blue and white sanitary paper, in a pretty tile-pattern,
each tile having on it a Mother-Goose figure. A big, white, fur rug lay
by the white porcelain bath-tub. A small water-cooler stood on a shelf,
low enough for the children to help themselves to water.
After the little flock had been watered all around, Zaidie’s quick eyes
spied a bottle of vaseline on the wash-stand. It had been left there by
mistake. All those things were generally put away in a little medicine
closet, safely out of the children’s reach. It was quite a good-sized
jar, and entirely full. Zaidie took out the cork.
“I think I’ve got a sore spot on me somewhere,” she said, feeling
carefully all over her face. “I think I need some vasling on it. Do you
see a sore spot on me, Helen?”
Helen looked, but could not find any place that seemed to need vaseline,
even after the closest study of Zaidie’s round, satin-cheeked little
face.
“Put it on anywhere,” she advised. “Perhaps it may get sore, and then
the vasling will be already on.”
Smearing vaseline all over Zaidie’s face led, of course, to bedaubing
Helen and Kenneth, also, with a liberal plaster of the sticky stuff.
“Doesn’t it stay on _beautifully_? Let’s paint the bathroom with it?”
suggested Zaidie, “and make it all pretty. We can take our
teeth-brushes.”
This idea was an inspiration. In a moment, arming themselves with their
tooth-brushes, the children fell energetically to work. In five minutes
the bathroom was a perfect bower of vaseline, and the small workers were
sticky from head to foot.
Meanwhile Marjorie read on, obliviously.
“Doesn’t it make the room look _beautiful_?” cried Zaidie, rapturously.
“I guess ’Liza’ll be pleased when she sees how pretty we’ve made it. And
see the wood, too. It shines splendidly.”
Here an unguarded flourish on Kenneth’s part left a long smear of
vaseline on Zaidie’s short, smooth locks.
“Oh, it makes it look like mine!” exclaimed Helen, struck by the yellow
gleam on Zaidie’s black hair.
“Does it?” asked Zaidie, eagerly. Each little girl was smitten with a
boundless admiration of the other’s hair, for Helen’s fluffy corn-silk
mop was a great trial to her quiet little soul, and she admired Zaidie’s
smooth, silky black hair, with all her heart; while Zaidie, on the other
hand, longed to possess Helen’s golden tangle.
“Put vasling thick all over my head,” she demanded, instantly, “to make
it yellow. Perhaps mamma will let me wear it all the time, and then
perhaps it will grow yellow like yours. I’d love that.”
“Then I wish I could make mine black like yours,” sighed Helen,
wistfully. “Couldn’t I paint it, do you suppose?”
Zaidie clapped her hands over this delightful idea.
“Then we would have changed hairs! What fun! Let’s find something to
paint it with, Helen. Here’s ’Liza’s shoe-blacking. Wouldn’t that do? It
makes her shoes so shiny and black.”
At the sight of the black liquid, dainty Helen shrunk back a little.
“It—it wouldn’t get on my face, would it?” she asked, doubtfully. “I’d
like to paint my hair, but I don’t want my face painted too.”
“Pooh, no!” said Zaidie, drawing out the sponge. “We’ll be careful. Now
hold _very_ still, Helen.”
The little hair-dresser drew a long dab with the dripping sponge over
Helen’s yellow curls. Helen held her breath. Zaidie repeated the dabs,
growing more reckless, till a careless flirt of the sponge sent a
liberal spatter down Helen’s face, and on her white apron.
“Ow! ow!” wailed Helen, who could bear a scratch better than dirt, or a
stain. She instinctively put up her hands to her face, to rub it dry,
and, of course, her hands were all streaked, also.
“There, Zaidie!” she half sobbed, “you _have_ painted my face, too, ‘n’
I’m afraid it won’t come off, and I’ll have to go round looking like a
little nigger-girl!”
At this tragic picture, Zaidie looked frightened, and instantly applied
her wee handkerchief, with dire results to the handkerchief, and no good
effect on the face.
“See how her looks!” cried Kenneth, gleefully, with his hands deep in
his small trousers’ pockets.
Helen wailed. There were large tracts of shoe-polish on her pearly skin,
and her tears chased little furrows along them. Zaidie scrubbed harder
and harder with her handkerchief, but she began to grow rather
frightened at the results of her painting.
“It doesn’t come off _very_ well,” she admitted at last, pausing in some
dismay. “And I don’t think I like your hair painted, anyway, Helen. It
looks so _mixy_, you know.”
Truly, poor little Helen was a spectacle. Her soft hair was plastered
down in black patches on her forehead, and big drops of blacking,
gathering on the end of each plastered lock, dropped down on her nose
and cheeks. Of course it did not stick where the vaseline had been
rubbed, so her face was well smeared with a mixture of greasiness and
shoe-polish. Her white apron was well spattered, and her hands were, by
this time, like a little blackamoor’s.
“Her won’t ever get white any more, I ’xpect,” said Kenneth, cheerfully.
“I blacked my Noah’s Ark once, and it didn’t ever come off. Don’t you
remember?”
Here the children’s feelings completely overcame them, and Zaidie and
Helen set up a shriek in concert that brought Marjorie to the bathroom.
“Oh, you naughty, naughty children!” she cried, in blank despair. “How
shall I ever get you clean? _Shoe-polish?_ Oh, horrors!”
Marjorie was really frightened lest the stain should not come out of
Helen’s hair.
Zaidie roared louder, and Helen sobbed, while Kenneth, suddenly overcome
by sympathy, added his voice to the uproar.
“Children, how _could_ you?” said Marjorie again, walking around Helen,
and wondering where to get hold of her best.
“You ought to have come here and told us to don’t,” sobbed Zaidie. “We
always don’t when ’Liza tells us to. You readed and readed all the time,
and you never told us to don’t.”
“Don’t shriek so, Zaidie; I’m not deaf,” said Marjorie, ignoring the
other point for the present. “Don’t cry so, Helen. You may get the
blacking in your eyes. Stand still, and I’ll try to strip your clothes
off. Don’t touch me, dear, or you’ll stain my things.”
“Whatever’s the matter, Miss Marjorie?” said Eliza’s voice from the
doorway. “Oh, you naughty children! How have you been and gone and
gotten yourselves into such a mess?”
“Oh, _’Liza_!” cried Marjorie, thankfully. “I’m so glad you’ve come!
Will this black ever come out of her hair?”
“Land knows! Did I ever see such a place in all my born days?” casting a
hurried glance around at the sticky, shiny bathroom.
“She readed all the time, and she didn’t ever tell us to don’t,” said
Zaidie, pointing a reproachful finger at Marjorie, and thereby easing
her own small conscience of a load.
“I jest guess you knew better’n that yourself,” said ’Liza. “But how
_could_ you let ’em do so, Miss Marjorie?”
“I was so interested in my book,” stammered conscience-stricken
Marjorie. “They’re usually so good, you know.”
“When you take care of children, you’ve got to _take_ care of children,”
returned Eliza, somewhat tartly. “’Taint _all_ their badness. I dunno
what their mother will say to it all. You go on, Miss Marjorie. I’ll
tend right up to ’em now, myself. Shoe-polish, of all things! Hope to
goodness I’ll get it out of that child’s hair.”
Eliza’s deft, experienced fingers flew while she talked. Only stopping
to throw off her out-of-door things, she had turned the water on in the
bath-tub, had taken a cloth and wiped off the sides of the tub, which
were reeking with vaseline, and had gotten hold of Helen at arm’s length
and stripped her clothes off. She plunged the sobbing, frightened child
in the tub, and began scrubbing her vigorously.
Marjorie retreated, feeling very low in her mind, because she had so
neglected her little charges in the nursery. Mrs. Ward was always strict
about the thorough, conscientious performance of any duty, and would
never overlook any carelessness or neglect, either from children or
servants. Besides the thought of her mother’s displeasure because she
had not been faithful, she was really dreadfully worried lest the black
stain should not come out of Helen’s hair. Kenneth was only just
beginning to look like himself again, after his last-summer experience
with the fire. It would be such a shame if Helen had to lose her lovely
hair, too.
An hour later the nursery door opened and Helen, fresh and sweet and
clean, ran joyfully across to Marjorie’s room.
“See! I’m all un-painted, Marjie! I’m never going to try to get black
hair again,” she cried. “Look! it’s all out!” holding up with both hands
her silken topknot, which, washed and dried, was shining again like spun
gold.
“’Liza said she scrubbed me nearly out of the roots, but it’s all dry
now, and the vasling is all off too. ’Liza doesn’t like the bathroom
that way, either. She’s scrubbing the vasling off that now. I can’t stay
any longer, ’cause ’Liza said only stay two minutes, else I’d get into
some mischief here,—but I wouldn’t, truly.”
Marjorie winced, but there was nothing to be said. She kissed Helen and
sent her back.
CHAPTER XVI.
A GOAT EPISODE.
Eunice sat curled up in a little bunch on the floor. Her forehead was
very much knit, and her eyes were very much screwed up. She was fussing
busily with a piece of red ribbon and a red Tam o’Shanter.
“What are you doing, Eunice?” asked Marjorie, looking in, in passing the
door.
“I’m fixing my Tam,” Eunice replied, cocking her head critically on one
side, and surveying the cap as she held it up on her fist. “It doesn’t
fit my head very well, and I thought I’d poke it up on one side with a
red ribbon bow and this red quill, like May Chester’s.”
“I don’t think Eunice has a very _Tammy_ head,” struck in Cricket, from
the window-seat. “Her Tam never stays on a minute; her hair’s so
slippery. Frousy hair like mine has _one_ advantage.”
Cricket’s curly topknot kept her scarlet skating-cap always in the right
place, but Eunice’s satin-smooth hair did not afford a good foundation
for her hats.
“I _can’t_ get it right, though,” said Eunice, despairingly. She was hot
and tired, and if the truth must be told, a little cross. “This ribbon
won’t go in the right place, somehow.”
“I tried to make a rosette, but it wouldn’t _rosettate_,” said Cricket,
putting down her book and coming forward to help look on. “Let Marjorie
do it, Eunice. It looks so un-stylish the way you have it.”
“No, I don’t want to,” said Eunice, holding on to her cap. “I want to do
it myself. Marjorie doesn’t know what I want.”
“Yes, I do, child,” said Marjorie, trying to take the ribbon. “I can do
it in a moment. Let me have it.”
“No, I won’t,” said Eunice, decidedly. “I can do it myself.”
“But why won’t you let me?” urged Marjorie.
“I haven’t any reason. I just want to _won’t_,” answered Eunice, half
laughing. “There, go away, Marjorie. I’m so cross that I want to bite
nails.”
Eunice was always an independent little body, so Marjorie, with a pat on
her head, left her struggling with the Tam. Cricket went back to her
book, and Eunice worked on for ten minutes in silence.
“There!” she said at last, in a tone of triumph, holding up her cap on
her hand. “It’s done. That looks all right, too, doesn’t it, when I put
it on? You see, when it’s on crooked, then it’s straight. Do you see
that quirk? That’s very stylish,” and Eunice paraded up and down before
the glass.
“_Isn’t_ it quirky?” said Cricket, admiringly. “Let’s go down to the
library now for mamma. You know she wanted us to go before this
afternoon with those books. You can wear your cap.”
“Exactly what I meant to do, Miss Scricket. Get the books and come on.”
It was Saturday morning. The night before had been rainy, but it had
cleared off bright and very cold, leaving all the sidewalks covered with
a glare of ice. Ashes and sand were liberally sprinkled, but walking
was, nevertheless, a matter needing some care.
The girls went carefully down the front steps, which were somewhat
slippery, although they had already been scraped.
“And there comes Johnnie-goat, prancing along as if he were on his
native rocks,” said Eunice, looking personally injured, as the big,
white goat came sauntering abstractedly down the street, in the
distance.
“I don’t think he looks as goatified as usual, though,” said Cricket,
glancing over her shoulder. “Poor old Johnnie! I haven’t seen him for
ages. Let’s get another picture of him, sometime, Eunice.”
The camera had by no means been forgotten all winter. Many pictures had
been taken, although the girls had never developed any more by
themselves. They had taken many pretty views of different things. They
had the twins in nearly every possible attitude, and numberless pictures
of each other. Only the out-door views were much of a success, though,
and they were looking forward with great anticipation to Kayuna, next
summer, where they meant to photograph every stick and stone.
Eunice and Cricket walked along rather slowly, swinging hands. Each had
a library book under the outside arm. Cricket was describing very
vividly something she had seen on the street, the day before.
“It was the _funniest_ thing! Those two ladies, all dressed to kill,
came flying out of the house and down the steps, signalling to the
street-car to stop; and just at the same time a cart was going by, with
some long planks on it that waved way out behind. And the lady was
looking so hard at the car that she never noticed the planks out behind,
and as soon as the cart itself was past her, she rushed for the car, and
then she struck the planks just _plump_, and went right over them, and
hung there. Her head and arms were waving on one side—just _waving_—and
her legs on the other, and she hung over it; and the cart man didn’t
know it, and just went on serenely. I felt _awfully_ sorry for her, but
oh, she looked so funny! just like a turtle.”
“Didn’t she hurt herself dreadfully?” asked Eunice, with interest.
“I don’t know. Well, the car stopped, and then it went on, for I suppose
the conductor saw that the lady couldn’t get unhitched from the cart
right off, and the cart trundled on, and the other lady ran after it,
calling the man to stop, and _he_ thought they were calling to the car
all the time, and he waved too, and called out, ‘Hi, there! lady wants
yer to stop!’ and the conductor called back, ‘Stop yourself, you old
lummox, and let off your passenger,’ and all this time the poor lady
just sprawled over those planks. I was so sorry for her! but the sorrier
I got, the more I laughed, but I ran after the cart, too, and called it
to stop, and some small boys ran after it, and called to the man, too,
and the other lady kept calling—”
But just here, without a word of warning, Cricket suddenly went down
with a thump on her knees, to her intense surprise. It was not icy just
there, and there was no apparent reason for Cricket’s sudden humility.
“Upon my word, wasn’t that queer?” she said, getting up slowly, and
ruefully rubbing her knees.
Eunice had gone off into fits of laughter, after a glance behind her.
“I never saw anything funnier,” she gasped. “Talk of your lady! she
isn’t a circumstance to you. Oh, _dear_!” and Eunice fairly doubled up.
“What _could_ have been the matter? I went down as quick as a wink, and
it isn’t icy here, either,” said bewildered Cricket. “Somehow my knees
just went forward. I should think they had hinges on them. I just—”
[Illustration: A SUDDEN DOWNFALL.]
And here she straightway went down on her knees again. Eunice leaned
against a lamppost, breathless with laughing.
“Oh, oh! don’t you see? It’s only—_oh_, dear! my sides ache so! it’s—”
and Eunice went off again into a peal of laughter.
Cricket was up by this time, more puzzled than ever.
“Do you suppose I’ve got anything the matter with me? I declare my knees
feel cracked. Do you suppose I’ve got to go all the way to the library
bumping along on my knees? Something seemed to _whang_ into my back
knees, and I—oh, _Johnnie-goat_! was it you? Eunice, was it
Johnnie-goat?”
Eunice nodded weakly. She had no breath left for words. Johnnie-goat
stood placidly behind Cricket, wagging his long beard socially, and
making little corner-wise motions of his solemn head, as he always did
when he was playfully inclined.
“He just walked right up and bunted you under the knees, and down you
went. I believe he did it for a joke,” gasped Eunice. “See! he doesn’t
seem angry a bit.”
“_He_ doesn’t seem angry?” asked Cricket, somewhat indignantly. “I
should say he’d better not. I don’t know what should have spoiled _his_
temper. _I’m_ the one to be angry, I should say. You wretched old
Johnnie-goat! breaking my knee-pans, and making everybody laugh at
me,—only there isn’t anybody around.”
“Yes, there are three children up in that window, across the street,”
said Eunice. “They’re laughing as if they’d kill themselves.”
“I’m glad there’s something to amuse them,” said Cricket, cheerfully.
“Oh, Eunice! that’s the very house my lady came out of yesterday! Well,
I laughed at her, and those children are welcome to laugh at me. Tell me
how he did it.”
“Just as I told you,” said Eunice, breaking out into a peal of laughter
again, as they walked along. “He simply came up and bunted you under the
knees, and the first thing I knew, you were on the ground, and then he
did it again.”
“Go home, Johnnie-goat,” said Cricket, turning and shaking her finger
reproachfully at the goat, who was stalking solemnly on behind, trailing
his bit of rope, which, as usual, he had eaten through, in order to make
his escape. “You’ve distinguished yourself enough for to-day.”
“If we wanted to, I could call a policeman and have you arrested,” added
Eunice.
“I’m ashamed of you, Johnnie-goat, when we’ve always been such friends,”
went on Cricket, “and I’ve scratched your head between your horns lots
of times, where you can’t reach it yourself. Go straight home and think
how sorry you are, and maybe I’ll forgive you,—only you’ll have to
behave yourself pretty well, else you won’t _stay_ forgiven.”
Johnnie-goat stood still and meditated a moment. Then, with the air of
one who is somewhat bored by circumstances, he turned and wandered
slowly back, with a meditative cock to his short tail.
“He always means mischief when he looks mildly and meekly playful like
that,” Cricket said, turning to watch him, and to guard against another
attack in her rear.
“Cricket, where is your library book?” asked Eunice, presently.
“I don’t know,” said Cricket, stopping short. “Oh, that Johnnie-goat! I
dropped it when he butted me, I suppose. We’ll have to go back. It was
just around the corner. I hope nobody has picked it up.”
The children turned and quickened their steps. As they went around the
corner they saw a knot of little gamins collected further down the
street, an evidently excited crowd, but the book lay where Cricket had
dropped it a few minutes before.
“What are these boys doing?” asked Cricket, curiously. “I wonder if
anything has happened. Just hear them hoot!”
“They’re up to some mischief, probably,” said Eunice. “Come on,
Cricket.”
But Cricket lingered, with her head over her shoulder.
“They’re certainly teasing something, Eunice,” she said, in sudden
excitement. “Some animal,—perhaps it is a cat—no, it isn’t—it’s
Johnnie-goat! Those horrid wretches!” as an unmistakable bleat rose long
and loud. “Eunice, I must stop them!”
Bang went the book on the pavement, and off darted Cricket.
“Come back, Cricket! Don’t go there,” called Eunice, urgently. “They
might hurt you. You can’t stop them. _Cricket!_”
But she called to deaf ears, for Cricket flew on, and Eunice, with the
instinct never to desert Mr. Micawber, picked up the library book, and
followed in much trepidation.
Cricket dashed into the centre of the group like a small cyclone, and
the little gamins fell back, right and left, in sheer amazement. Her
scarlet Tam was on the back of her head, her curls were rampant with the
wind, and her eyes were blazing with indignation like two stars.
Poor Johnnie-goat was indeed in trouble. A tin can dangled from his
short tail, and on his horns were two similar ornaments, which bumped
and clattered as he made ineffective plunges at his enemies. Besides
these, stout strings were tied to each horn, so that his head could be
jerked this way and that, as he jumped about, half frantic with rage and
terror. One of the boys prodded him with a sharp stick.
“You shameful wretches!” rang out Cricket’s clear tones. “I wish some
big giant would come and torment _you_, so! How dare you!” she snatched
the strings from the boy’s hands, and held them firmly in her own strong
little fingers.
“Where is your knife?” she said, imperiously, to the biggest boy.
He took it from his pocket and awkwardly held it out to her.
“No, open it, and cut those cans off. _You_, boy, hold his head still.
_Gently_, mind. Poor Johnnie-goat!” With one hand she grasped a jerking
horn, and with the other she rubbed the sensitive little place on his
head. Johnnie-goat almost instantly stood quiet, with drooped head.
“A fine thing for you great boys to torment a poor, helpless animal,”
Cricket said, scornfully. She flung the tin cans into the street.
“Now, be off with you, every one,” she ordered. “I’ll take Johnnie-goat
home. _Go_, I say,” stamping her foot imperiously, as the boys showed
signs of lingering. They had actually said not a single word, so amazed
were they all at the valiant onslaught of the little maid.
Her finger still pointed unwaveringly down a neighbouring alleyway, and
slowly the boys, one after another, slouched off. Any sign of indecision
on the part of Cricket, and they would have refused to go. But, with her
shoulders well back, and her head erect, she stood steadily pointing
down the alley. She watched them round a corner, and never stirred till
the last one, with many a sheepish glance backward, had disappeared.
“Got my book, Eunice?” said Cricket, briskly. “I’m going to take
Johnnie-goat home myself, and can’t we go to the library round that way?
’Tisn’t much further. Gracious! how hot I am!” and Cricket unbuttoned
her long coat and threw it open. “Do you mind carrying my book for me,
Eunice? I’d better hold Johnnie-goat with both hands. He seems sort of
excited.”
CHAPTER XVII.
A SCRAPE.
One Saturday morning towards the end of March, Marjorie and Eunice and
Cricket were all in mamma’s room. Mrs. Ward had not come home from
market yet, and Cricket was watching for her from the window, eager to
ask permission for something she wanted to do.
“There’s Donald!” she suddenly exclaimed. “How funny! What can he be
doing here at this time?”
She ran to the hall, and hung over the banister, calling down a greeting
as Donald let himself in. To her surprise, he made her no answer, but
with a curt word to Jane to tell his father that he was in the study and
wanted to see him as soon as he came in, he bolted into his father’s
private room behind the office, and shut the door.
Cricket came back and reported, with much amazement.
“I _hope_ he isn’t going to have mumps again,” said Eunice, anxiously.
“Or, perhaps it’s scarlet fever. Did Donald ever have scarlet fever,
Marjorie?”
“Yes, I think so. Oh, I don’t suppose he’s going to have any more baby
diseases,” said Marjorie. “There’s papa now!”
Doctor Ward entered the house, and the listening girls heard the maid
deliver Donald’s message. He removed his coat in his leisurely way,
whistling softly in a fashion he had, and went into his office for a
moment. Then they heard him go into his study.
The girls waited, breathlessly, but they only heard their father’s
cheery:
“Well, my son?” and then the door closed.
The room was directly under them, and they could hear the faint, steady
murmur of voices, but nothing more.
Presently Mrs. Ward came home, and the children flew to meet her.
“Donald here, and talking with his father? Well, my little maids, what
is the mystery in that? Sick? Oh, I dare say not. Probably he only wants
advice from your father about something. Whatever it is, we’ll know
presently, if it’s any importance.”
A little later, mamma was called into the conference. She did not stay
very long, however, and she soon came out, leaving the door open. The
girls, who were now down in the back parlour, could hear their father’s
voice distinctly.
“There’s nothing to do but stand it, my son. I’d rather you’d be
suspended for a _year_ than have you clear yourself at others’ expense.
Loyalty is paramount in this instance, and I’ll support you in the stand
you’ve taken.”
“Jove! father, you’re a brick!” said Donald, gratefully. “I was jolly
afraid you’d cut up rough, for it’s pretty tough on you to have your son
rusticated.”
“A trifle tough on you, my lad,” returned Doctor Ward. “But there are
worse things than rusticating for a time. One is—deserving it.”
“The Faculty think I do,” answered Donald.
“Never mind that. Suppose those of you who can, do clear yourselves.
That fastens the blame definitely on the few, where now it is
distributed among twenty. And the whole thing is not serious in itself,
only the Faculty had promised to suspend the next offenders and to expel
the ringleaders, if they could be found.”
“This is the next time, as it happens,” said Donald, gloomily. “Worse
luck!”
“Yes, worse luck for you. But you are entirely right. Don’t prove your
alibi. Do you all stand by the others; you fellows can, as you say,
stand three months’ rusticating better than the half-dozen could stand
expulsion.”
Donald drummed his heels together. He was seated on a corner of the
library table, throwing up a paper-weight, and catching it carefully.
“Oh, we’ll stand by the men,” he said. “See here, dad, you know I didn’t
mean to let on all this even to you. I only meant to tell you that your
promising son is suspended. But,” he added, ruefully, “somehow I forgot
you weren’t one of the fellows.”
Doctor Ward gave his big son a crack on the shoulder that nearly sent
him under the table.
“I _am_ one of the fellows, old boy. I wasn’t a college man for nothing;
and though it’s twenty-one years since I graduated, I haven’t forgotten
college-feeling.”
“And yet,—I _did_ hate to have you think I’d disgraced you,” said
Donald, lifting honest eyes to his father’s. “I haven’t done wonders, I
know, but still I haven’t done so very badly. And I suppose this will
spoil my chances of getting on the team. Hang it all!”
“I’d like to see Professor Croft casually in a day or two, and find out
the attitude of the Faculty in the matter. This morning was the sentence
read?” And here the door shut again.
The girls looked at each other in horror. What dreadful thing had
happened to this big, handsome Donald of theirs, of whom they were so
proud? They did not understand all that had passed; and that their
father plainly sympathised with Donald did not remove the stubborn fact
that he was in some dreadful disgrace.
Eunice and Cricket looked at each other with bated breath. Marjorie flew
to her mother.
“Did he say he was going to be—_suspended_?” faltered Eunice.
“Yes,—or rusty-coated,” said Cricket, her eyes getting large and dark.
“Eunice, do you suppose it hurts?”
“I don’t know. Oh, Cricket, isn’t it _too_ dreadful! What can he have
done? But papa doesn’t seem to think he’s to blame, anyway,” added
Eunice, hopefully. “He said he’d stand by him.”
“But—_suspended_, Eunice!” repeated Cricket, with a direful vision of a
dangling rope. “It—it wouldn’t be by the _neck_, would it? How long
would they keep him there? Oh, Eunice! my heart is all jumpy.”
“It couldn’t be by the neck,” said Eunice, positively. “Because then
he’d be regularly—hung, and they only hang people for murder and those
things. I’m sure of that.”
“But papa said he might be rusty-coated, and he said that wasn’t the
worst thing that could happen. What is it, Eunice?”
“I don’t know,” answered Eunice, miserably. “Do you suppose it _could_
be like being tarred and feathered like Floyd Ireson?” she added, almost
below her breath.
“Eunice, I won’t let them!” cried Cricket, springing up furiously.
“Don’t let them dare to touch my brother! I’d scratch them and I’d bite
them and—oh, Eunice! papa _wouldn’t_ let them, would he?”
“Perhaps he couldn’t help it. If the President said he had to be
rusty-coated, perhaps it would _have_ to be done,” said Eunice,
wretchedly, for she had an exalted idea of the authority of the powers
that be. Eunice was a born Tory.
“I don’t care if five billion presidents said so,” cried Cricket,
defiantly. She was a born Radical, though her sweet temper and wise
training had saved her from any desire to revolt. Now all the love and
loyalty of her stanch little soul surged up.
“I’d kick him and I’d bite him,” repeated Cricket, “and I’d—don’t you
remember that I made those big boys stop teasing Johnnie-goat?”
“Yes, I know,” returned Eunice, who had been very much impressed by that
short scene.
“What _can_ Don have done?” queried Cricket, recurring to the
starting-point. “Oh, dear! I wish Faculties would be reasonable!” With
this modest desire, she pounded viciously on the window-sill.
“I’ll be _so_ ashamed to have the girls know,” said Eunice. “There’s May
Chester. Her brother is in the same class.”
“Perhaps he’ll be suspended, too,” said Cricket, hopefully. Misery loves
company. “But—_suspended_, Eunice,” with a fresh wave of dejection. “And
I’m _so_ afraid it will hurt.”
Here the luncheon-bell rang. Directly after, the study door was thrown
open, and Doctor Ward and Donald came out. The father’s arm was thrown
across his tall son’s shoulder, in a boyish fashion that the doctor
often used.
“Don’t tell the kids more than you can help,” said Donald, hurriedly, as
they came out, not aware that the children knew anything.
“Well, Lady Greasewrister and Madam Van Twister, her ladyship’s sister,”
he called out, as he entered the dining-room, with the assumption of his
usual teasing manner. Doctor Ward had stepped into his office for a
moment, and the others had not yet come down. To his immense surprise
and embarrassment, Eunice instantly burst out crying.
“Hallo, Waterworks! what’s wrong?” he exclaimed, in dismay. Tears were
rare with any of the children.
“Oh, Donald, I can’t stand it! Will it hurt you?” wailed Eunice,
completely overcome by the sight of the big, handsome fellow, and
associating him suddenly with Cricket’s image of a dangling rope. “How
long will you have to do it?”
“Do _what_?” stared Donald.
“And will you have to be rusty-coated, _too_?” burst in Cricket, very
red as to her cheeks and very shiny as to her eyes. “How do they put it
on? Donald, I don’t care if the President himself does it, I’ll bite him
till he’s all chewed up!”
“Hal-lo!” whistled Donald. The others not having arrived yet, the three
were still alone. “What have you two kids got in your heads?”
“We heard what father said when the door was open,” confessed Eunice,
honestly. “We couldn’t help it. He said you’d have to be suspended—”
“Or rusty-coated,” put in Cricket.
“And what is it all about? and will it hurt? Oh, Don, tell us!” and
Eunice threw a pair of imploring arms around his neck, while Cricket,
with a gush of defensive affection, hugged one of his legs.
“_We’ll_ stand by you, too, Don, whatever it is, and papa will, for he
said so. Don, don’t go back to that nasty old college, _ever_. Go to
Princeton. It has such pretty colors. I always loved that black and
orange,” urged Eunice, tightening her clasp.
Donald, much touched, swept both his loyal little sisters into his
muscular arms, and sat down on the window-seat.
“See here, you monkeys, I didn’t mean to tell you, but I must now. There
was a jolly row on Wednesday night, and one of the professors caught on,
and about twenty of us were hauled up. We’re suspended for the rest of
the year,—that is, can’t go back till college opens in the fall. We’re
not going to be hung, as you evidently think, if that’s what you’re
fussing about.”
“Oh, is _that_ all?”
“But Don, _you_ didn’t do anything?”
“And if you’re rusty-coated, will that hurt you?”
“We thought maybe you’d be tarred and feathered.”
“And suspended! I _did_ think it was some kind of hanging up.”
“Why don’t you tell the President you didn’t do anything?”
Donald put his hands over his ears as the girls poured out their chorus,
one on each side. Just then the rest of the family arrived.
“It’s very nice for Donald to have a vacation again,” said mamma,
patting her big boy’s shoulder as she passed him. The younger fry fell
on him rapturously. Donald was always popular among them.
CHAPTER XVIII.
AN EXPEDITION.
But Eunice and Cricket were not altogether satisfied yet. They were very
silent during luncheon, which was rather an uncomfortable meal, in spite
of the older people’s efforts to make it as usual.
Whatever face he put on it, to be rusticated under any circumstances was
a hard thing for a proud fellow like Donald, to say nothing of his
athletic aspirations.
After luncheon, Donald stepped into his father’s office for another word
or two, while the others went up-stairs. A few minutes after, Mrs. Ward
sent Cricket back to the kitchen with a message to the cook. The office
door was still open, and Donald’s voice was plainly audible.
“Yes, this is terribly hard on Chester, for he has had the reputation of
being a regular daredevil, and the Faculty immediately put him down for
one of the ringleaders, whereas, you see, he wasn’t in it at all. A
great chum of his _was_ concerned, and the Faculty have pretty well got
hold of that, and there’s still a chance that three or four of them may
be expelled. Of course he won’t peach, for the only thing that will save
anybody is for us all to hold our tongues.”
“And Chester was with you, you said?”
“Yes. We were especially lamb-like that night,—calling on Miss Vassar.
It was so pleasant that we started to walk home, and met another fellow
who rooms in town, and turned in for a smoke. We left him about twelve.
We fell in with some others on the way out, who had likewise been in
town, and then we suddenly got into the crowd of the others, and were
all pounced upon together. Of course, sir, I can’t give the names of
those who were really guilty.”
“By no means. And old Chester takes it hard, you say?”
“He will, when he knows of it. I’m sorry for Chester. He’s a good
fellow,—first-rate stuff,—but he’s chuck-full of mere mischief. You see,
after that other row in the winter, his father swore that if he got into
any rumpus again, he’d take him out of college, and put him in the
office; and Chester hates that like poison. And old Chester isn’t like
you, dad. He never was a college man, and he doesn’t understand.”
“I suppose not. H’m! I’m sorry for Chester. I like the lad. It would be
rough on him to spoil his career.”
Here Cricket suddenly awoke to the fact that she was hanging on to the
banisters, listening with all her might. Much mortified, she flew on to
the kitchen and delivered her message, and then darted up-stairs to
share her story with Eunice.
“Eunice, _something_ must be done about it. Sidney Chester is awfully in
it, and Don says he didn’t do a thing, either. They were both calling on
Miss Gwendoline Vassar, the pretty one with red hair,—what Donald calls
Tissue hair,—he’s awfully struck on her, you know,—and the boys were
both there that very night.”
“Then they have only to tell the President so,” said Eunice, much
relieved.
“That’s just it. They won’t say so, and some others who were caught, and
didn’t really do anything, won’t say so either, because then the
President would know just who did it, and expel those very ones.”
“It’s all dreadfully muddled, seems to me,” sighed Eunice. “College
things are always so funny.”
“I think they’re very unsensible, myself,” said Cricket, decidedly. “I
think they _ought_ to tell. If the other fellows did it, let them say
so, and _be_ expelled. It’s like Zaidie, the other day. I was in the
nursery, and mamma told her not to run the sewing-machine, and Zaidie
did, and mamma tied a handkerchief around her hands. And yesterday,
Zaidie got at the machine again, when ’Liza wasn’t there, and then she
went and twisted a handkerchief around her own hands, and sat down in
the corner, and wouldn’t play with Helen and Kenneth for a long time. ‘I
just _wanted_ to run that machine again,’ she said, ‘and now I’ve got to
tie my hands up, ’cause I was naughty; but it was fun, anyway.’”
“That’s the way those boys ought to do,” said Eunice. “If they want to
go and do bad things, they ought to speak up like a man and say so.
Think of Don and Sidney Chester and the others being expelled, and they
just calling on Miss Vassar!”
“And Don’s just crazy to get in the team!” added Eunice, almost in tears
again. “Oh, Cricket, I _wish_ the President could know about it. I’m
sure he’d do something.”
Cricket sprang up with sparkling eyes.
“Eunice, let’s go and tell him! Come on, straight off, and don’t let’s
tell anybody till we get back, ’cause they wouldn’t let us, I suppose.
Grown people are _so_ funny. And somebody _ought_ to tell.”
Eunice stared helplessly at Cricket, aghast at this daring proposal. Her
younger sister’s rapidity of thought and action often took her breath
away.
“Go to the President’s house? Oh, Cricket, would you dare?”
“Of course I would,” answered Cricket, boldly. “He’s only a man. He
couldn’t eat us, could he? We’ll just tell him we’re Doctor Ward’s
daughters, ’cause he knows papa. Don’t you remember that papa dined with
him last week? And we’ll just tell him that Don and Sidney Chester were
calling on Miss Vassar, and that some of the others weren’t in it, too,
and ask him please to give them all another chance.”
Cricket was flying out of one dress and into another all the time she
talked. Eunice still stared.
“Would papa like it?” she hesitated.
“It won’t make any difference after it’s done; and if he doesn’t like
it, why,—I’ll never do it again. I’ll have the satisfaction of doing it
once, though. Come on, you old slowpoke. I’m nearly ready.”
“We don’t know where he lives,” objected Eunice, feebly, but getting up
and going to the closet.
“_I_ do. Or rather, I know the house when I see it, and anybody will
tell us the way. I know what cars to take from here, and the conductors
can tell us where to change. We’ll be all right,” finished Cricket,
confidently. “Do hurry, Eunice,” and Eunice hurried, feeling as if she
were pursued by a small cyclone.
A little later, the two girls went quietly down-stairs, and slipped out
of the front door.
“Will mamma be anxious, do you think?” asked Eunice, suddenly, feeling
very guilty, for the girls never thought of going out for a whole
afternoon without asking permission.
“Guess not. She’ll think we’ve gone to Emily Drayton’s. She said this
morning we might go, you know. There’s our car.”
The two girls, with fluttering hearts and excited faces, got on the car,
feeling as if they were bound for Japan or the North Pole. Cricket’s
buoyant, hopeful nature was serenely confident of gaining her end, while
Eunice’s more apprehensive temperament made her quake at the process.
“What shall we say, Cricket?” said Eunice, doubtfully.
“Just tell the President all about it,” answered Cricket, easily. “I
hope we can get him to let the other boys off, too. Perhaps he could
just rusty-coat them for just a week or two. They ought to be willing to
stand _that_; for, after all, what could you expect of _Freshmen_?” with
a tolerant air and accent that amused some ladies sitting by them
immensely.
“We change here. Come on,” and Cricket jumped up briskly. Eunice
followed more slowly. Generally, she was the leader in their joint
doings, even if Cricket was, as usually happened, the originator. To-day
both felt that Cricket was in command of the expedition.
They reached the house at last. Eunice quaked more and more, but
Cricket, though in a quiver of excitement, was as bold as a lion. The
feeling that she was going to rescue her beloved brother from the
clutches of that hawklike Faculty, who always hovered about, lying in
wait to tear unsuspecting Freshmen to bits, gave her unbounded courage.
Donald was in difficulty, and some curious code of honour kept him from
saving himself. Somebody else must do it, then. That was very simple;
and she was the person to do it. With this small maiden, as we know, to
think and to act were always in close connection,—so close that often
there was some apparent confusion of precedent. But now she was sure she
was right, and she valiantly went ahead.
Eunice was white with excitement. She, forming the rank and file of the
attacking army, had less to sustain her courage than General Cricket
had. Definite action is always easier than to await an issue. Then,
also, Cricket’s sublime unconsciousness that any one was particularly
interested or concerned in what _she_ did, saved her from the wonder,
“What will people think?” which so often nips one’s finest projects in
the bud.
“What shall we do if the President is out?” it suddenly occurred to
Eunice to wonder, as they rang the bell.
“Wait till he comes in,” answered Cricket, instantly. Having made her
plans, she proposed to fight it out on that line, if it took all summer.
“Suppose he doesn’t get home till evening? We would be afraid to go home
alone then.”
“He could get a carriage, and send us home,” said Cricket,
magnificently.
Eunice gasped. The children seemed to have changed places. Eunice was
generally the one who had the practical resources.
The maid opened the door. “Yes, he was in,” was the welcome answer to
the eager question. “But it’s afraid I am that he can’t see any one this
afternoon. He’s particular engaged.”
Dismay filled the children’s hearts. So near to their goal and not to be
able to reach it!
“Oh, please tell him we _must_ see him!” cried Cricket, imploringly.
“It’s dreadfully, awfully important, and we’ve come a long way; but
we’ll wait as long as he likes, till he’s quite through, but we _can’t_
go away without seeing him.”
The maid hesitated. Her orders were strict, but this was plainly
something out of the ordinary course. “I don’t know if I can tell him,”
she hesitated.
“We won’t take but just a few minutes. We’ll be very quick, and
something _must_ be done, and there’s nobody else to do it. Please ask
him to let us come in, and we’ll talk very fast, and tell him all about
Donald and the others, and—and I _can’t_ go away without seeing him!”
Cricket’s earnest voice grew almost to a wail as she ended, clasping her
hands entreatingly.
A door in the distance opened, and a gentleman came out.
“What’s the matter, Mary?” he asked.
“I want to see the President _so_ much,” pleaded Cricket, twisting her
fingers in her eagerness. “I know he must be awfully busy, for I suppose
presidenting is very hard, and takes lots of time, but _won’t_ you tell
him we’ll be very quick? And it’s _terribly_ important.”
The gentleman looked first amused, then interested.
“Come in, my little friends. I am the President, and I will very
willingly hear what you have to say, and help you if I can.”
At this announcement, Cricket, finding that she was really in the much
desired presence, drew a quick breath, feeling, for the first time, the
importance of what she was doing. The two girls, holding each other’s
hands tightly, followed their kindly guide to the pleasant library.
“My legs wobble so, I can hardly walk,” whispered Cricket to Eunice,
“and there’s _such_ a hole in my stomach! It feels all gone.”
The gentleman placed chairs for his little guests, with the utmost
courtesy of manner, and then seated himself.
“Now, what can I do for you?” he asked, pleasantly.
Cricket gripped her fast-retreating courage with both hands, drew a long
breath and plunged head foremost in her subject, as one might jump from
a burning steamer into the ice-cold ocean.
“It’s about Donald, and _he_ can’t tell, because it wouldn’t be quite
honourable to the others, and I found it out accidentally, and papa says
he’ll stand by him, though really Donald wasn’t in it at all, for he and
Sidney Chester were calling on Miss Gwendoline Vassar, that very
night,—that pretty Miss Vassar that all the boys are so stuck on, you
know,—and they stopped and smoked with another man coming home, and then
they met some other men, who hadn’t being doing anything either, and
then they all got mixed up with the ones who _did_ do something, but I
don’t know what, and they were all caught together, and none of them
would say a word, ’cause perhaps the right ones would be expelled if
they were known, and so they’re all going to be rusty-coated, or
suspended, or something, and that’s _dreadful_; and poor Sidney Chester,
who didn’t really do a thing this time, may have to leave college
entirely and go into his father’s office, and he hates it so, and he
really isn’t bad, only full of fun, and papa understands things better
than old Mr. Chester does, because he was at college himself, you know,
and he says he’ll stand by Don, for he must be loyal to the others, only
now perhaps Don can’t get on the team, and he hasn’t done wonders, but
he hasn’t done so badly in his work, and he’s such a dear fellow.”
Cricket drew a long breath here, and dashed on.
“And you see he didn’t really do anything himself, and nobody knows
we’ve come to you, and I guess papa would take my head off if he knew
it, but I knew somebody ought to do something, and you’d feel so badly
to punish somebody who didn’t do anything, and Donald didn’t even mean
to tell papa about it, but papa always understands, and, oh, dear, if
he’s—rusty-coated—I—can’t—bear—it!”
And here Cricket, perfectly unstrung by the nervous tension and the long
strain, suddenly surprised herself, and paralysed Eunice, by bursting
into convulsive sobs.
In a moment she was on the presidential knees, and her head was on the
august shoulder, where she wept a perfect flood of tears into a big
collegiate handkerchief which speedily replaced her small, drenched one.
Eunice was so overcome by the astonishing spectacle of Cricket in tears
that she sat wide-eyed with amazement, staring at her with bated breath.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE RESULT.
But so far as any surprise or discomfiture showed itself on his face,
the President seemed to be perfectly accustomed to having strange little
girls invade his sanctum, break in on his sacred quiet, pour forth an
incoherent tale, and end up by bursting into a flood of tears, and
submitting to be taken into his arms to be comforted. He mopped away
Cricket’s tears most scientifically, and presently pulled still another
handkerchief from some other pocket.
Soon the storm passed, and Cricket, spent with fatigue, found her curly
head nestled as confidingly against the President’s shoulder as if it
had been her father’s, with only a long-drawn, sobbing breath now and
then.
“Now, my little girl, I want to know more about all this,” said the
kindly voice, when she was quite calm and quiet again. “You see, I don’t
know who my little friend is, yet, either,” he added, smiling down into
the gray eyes, in which all the usual mischief and light were nearly
drowned out.
“Oh, I quite forgot,” exclaimed Cricket, apologetically, instantly
sitting up. “I beg your pardon, if you please. I meant to tell you the
very first thing that we are Doctor Ward’s daughters, and then I went
and cried, and I’m so ashamed, for, indeed, I’m not a cry-baby, truly
I’m not, and I _don’t_ see what made me cry.”
The earnest little voice and wistful eyes emphasised the words.
The President hid a smile.
“I’m sure you’re not, my little friend. So you are Doctor Ward’s little
daughters.” He held out his hand to Eunice, also, who immediately found
herself within the kind shelter of his encircling arm.
“Doctor Ward of——Street? Then I know your father very well indeed, and
am very glad to know the children of a friend I value so much; but I
wish it had been in some way pleasanter to them. But now let’s talk
business first,” with a smile. “Suppose I ask you some questions and you
answer them. That will be best.”
Every qualm gone now, and sure that they were in the presence of a
kindly judge, Cricket, who was still spokesman, answered the few clear,
direct questions that the President put. He was soon convinced of the
fact that the children’s own impulse was at the bottom of the
expedition,—that no older person had any knowledge of it, and that the
loving, loyal little hearts had carried out their undertaking,
instinctively feeling that here was a case where weakness was stronger
than strength.
Then came a few minutes of silence, during which the President
meditated, knitting his brow, and Eunice and Cricket gazed breathlessly
at him. What would he say? Donald’s fate seemed hanging in the balance.
At last the President opened his lips:
“Won’t you have a cup of tea with me? I usually take one about this
time, if I am at home.”
That was all. The girls exchanged startled glances.
The President intercepted them, and smiled down at the eager little
faces so tender and reassuring a smile that they felt the load roll off
their hearts. It was all right, somehow, they instantly felt.
Cricket smiled back with such glad confidence and good comradeship that
the President suddenly stooped and kissed the sweet, upturned little
face.
“Yes, we’ll make it all right somehow,” he said, answering her unspoken
thought; and then, gently putting her down, he went across the room and
rang a bell. The trim maid presently responded to the order given, with
a tray containing tea and fancy cakes.
The President put his little guests in low chairs, and served them
himself, talking all the time as if he were one of their intimate
friends. They soon chattered away fearlessly in response, telling him
about their school life and the theatricals, and their mother and
brother and sisters, and repeating some of the twin’s funny sayings and
doings, as if he had no other interests than theirs.
“Zaidie is the _funniest_ child,” said Cricket, confidentially. “She has
the queerest ideas. The other day, ’Liza said to her, ‘Don’t wiggle so
when I’m dressing you, because I can’t get on your dress.’ And Zaidie
said, ‘If you’re dressing me when you put on my dress, when God puts
skin on people, is that called skinning them?’”
“She is young to be interested in etymology,” said the President,
laughing; “but that is certainly logical.”
“And the other day,” chimed in Eunice, “mamma had been reading the first
chapter of Genesis to the twins, and she asked Zaidie what God made the
world out of, and Zaidie said, ‘Out of _words_,’ and mamma asked her
what she meant, and Zaidie said, ‘He made it out of _words_, because He
said, “Let there be light and there was light,” and everything else like
that, so He must have made it out of the words, ’cause there wasn’t
anything else to make it out of.’”
“I want to make Zaidie’s acquaintance,” said the President. “She should
have a chair in a theological seminary one of these days. Now, my little
friends, it’s nearly five o’clock, entirely too late for you to go home
alone. I’ll send somebody with you—or stay—I’ll go myself. Could I see
your father a few minutes, do you think?”
“Couldn’t you come home to dinner?” said Cricket, eagerly. “You could
see papa, anyway, for he’s always home at half-past five. He doesn’t see
any office people then, either.”
“Some other day I shall hope to have the pleasure of dining with you,
and making acquaintance with those interesting brothers and sisters of
yours,” said the President, smiling his delightful smile, as he rose.
“To-night, however, I’ll just see your father for five minutes, as I
have an engagement, later.”
So, escorted by the President of the great university, homeward went two
ecstatic little maids, in a perfect tumult of triumph and happiness.
Cricket could hardly keep her elastic feet on the pavement.
“The hole in my stomach is all gone,” she confided to Eunice’s ear, “and
I’m so happy that I could walk straight up the side of that house.”
Mrs. Ward, who was watching from the parlour window for their
arrival,—not anxiously, however, as she supposed they were safe with
Emily Drayton,—was filled with amazement at the sight of their escort.
“Your little daughters have given me the great pleasure of a call,” he
said, courteously. “They will perhaps explain better than I can, but I
cordially hope it was a pleasure that may be soon repeated. And now, may
I see your husband for five minutes or so?”
And then, when the President was safely in papa’s study, the eager
children poured out the story of the afternoon to mamma’s astonished
ears.
CHAPTER XX.
OLD MR. CHESTER.
With the clue that the children had given the President, the affair was
more closely investigated. Donald was furiously angry at the children’s
exploit at first, as it certainly compromised him, but, with a little
management, the source of information was kept entirely a private matter
between the President, one or two of the Faculty, Doctor Ward, Donald,
and Sidney Chester. Donald and some of the others whom Cricket had named
were called up at a special meeting of the Faculty, but they still
steadily refused to say a word at the expense of their classmates. At
last, by much quiet management, the whole sentence was conditionally
repealed, and private interviews were held with those now pretty well
known to be the ringleaders. They knew that they owed their escape to
some private influence, and were well warned that the next offence would
give them the weight of this one also.
A few days later, old Mr. Chester came over to see Doctor Ward. He was a
stern old man, who had made his own way in the world, and he wanted his
son to have the education he had so sorely longed for and never had.
He had been puzzled and distressed that Sidney did not regard his
college course as a sacred privilege, and had been cut to the heart by
some of the lad’s previous escapades. He could not comprehend that the
boy was really doing good work, and was only working off his animal
spirits by all sorts of what his father called “Tom-fool tricks.” He
scowled upon athletics, which to his mind involved only an infinite
waste of time and money. That classroom lore is but half the value of
college life he could not in the least comprehend. At the last of
Sidney’s escapades, Mr. Chester had raged furiously, and vowed that the
next time the boy was caught in anything of the sort, it should end his
college career, and land him in the hated office.
When the old gentleman learned of the little girls’ part in the affair,
he came to Doctor Ward to express his gratitude that they had saved his
lad, as he put it.
“The obstinate young donkey would tell me nothing about the matter,” he
growled. “He would actually have let me take him out and put him to
work, without saying a word.”
But for all his scolding, the old man secretly felt a thrill of pride at
the loyalty—whether mistaken or not, it is not the place here to
discuss—which made this possible.
“Now, as for your little girls,” Mr. Chester said to Doctor Ward, “I
would like to do something for them—something they will remember this
by. I thought this might do, if you have no objections.”
“This” was a small morocco case which he slowly drew from a side pocket.
Then he produced a similar one from the other pocket, and laid them both
on the desk in front of Doctor Ward. Then he touched the springs, in his
deliberate way, first of one case and then of the other. The covers flew
back, and on the satin linings there lay two exquisite little watches.
Two little hunting-cases they were, with graceful monograms on the
respective covers.
“For my little piccaninnies?” exclaimed Doctor Ward, in astonishment.
“Indeed, Chester, that’s too munificent altogether. Why, I haven’t quite
settled in my own mind yet but that the little witches ought to be sent
supperless to bed for such a daring performance, without consulting
anybody. The accident of its having turned out well does not by any
means make up for their having taken matters into their own hands. Under
some circumstances, they might have done unbounded mischief. It’s too
serious a matter for such small hands to meddle with the affairs of
state, so to speak.”
The doctor laughed as he spoke, but he had been seriously in doubt, as
he said, whether to reprove or commend. He had finally compromised by a
long, serious talk with his little daughters, and they had promised
that, after this, they would duly consult the powers that be.
“All that is your affair,” answered Mr. Chester, grimly smiling. “I
can’t undertake to say what discipline other people’s children should
have. But on my own account, and because I like pluck wherever I see it,
I would like the children to have these watches. It _was_ a plucky
performance, doctor, you must admit that.”
“They certainly bearded the lion in his den,” answered Doctor Ward,
smiling also. “Yes, I think they _are_ plucky little women. But, my dear
Chester, some very much more trifling things will show your appreciation
just as well, and make me more comfortable.”
“Tut! tut! This is all in the trade, you know. I know my May was crazy
for a watch like these, so I thought they would suit your girls also.
And you must remember that, since I deal in these things, they are no
more to me than a bottle of physic would be to you.”
Doctor Ward admitted the truth of this argument, as Mr. Chester was at
the head of one of the largest jeweller’s stores in town, and he finally
agreed to accept the watches for the children, subject to his wife’s
approval.
Everything being satisfactorily settled, and Mr. Chester utterly
refusing to deliver the watches himself, the next morning, when Eunice
and Cricket came down to the breakfast-table, each viewed with
astonishment the little morocco case at her plate.
“Why, it isn’t our birthdays or anything,” said Cricket, wonderingly.
“Has anybody else anything?”
“This is your special celebration,” said mamma, gaily. “Open and see.”
The speechless children stared at what the little morocco cases held.
“What—where—why—” stammered Eunice at last, and their mother explained,
while the rest of the family looked on beamingly.
“A momentum!” shrieked Cricket, snatching up the golden, gleaming thing
from its pink satin pillow, and dancing around the room with a perfect
whoop of delight. “Mine? ours? that dear old duck! Eunice, let’s go and
thank him straight off. I want to hug him and kiss him, and I always
used to be so scared of him.”
She was bolting for the door, but her father called her back.
“He’d be ‘scared’ of you if you did. Write him a nice little note after
breakfast. He would much prefer that.”
“Aren’t they too deliciously sweet for words?” murmured Eunice, hugging
her treasure to her heart.
“See those dear little curly letters on the cover,” said Cricket,
rapturously examining them. “J. M. W.,—Jean Maxwell Ward. And
inside,—_oh_, Eunice! do you see? Here’s a date! It’s the day we went to
the President! Isn’t this the very loveliest momentum he could have
given us?”
“Memento, dear,” suggested mamma.
“Yes, memento. What did I say?”
“And Donald wants to give you the gold pins to wear them with. He is
going to take you down-town to-morrow afternoon,—to choose them
yourselves,—if you have no previous engagements.” Doctor Ward’s eyes
twinkled.
“Don’t tease, papa! Isn’t that lovely of Don. What fun to choose our own
pins, Eunice! And I love to go down-town with Don, anyway. He’s such a
treaty fellow. He always gives us ice-cream and candy.”
The pins were duly selected, after much comparing, choosing, and
rejecting. Donald quietly slipped a card into Cricket’s case, and when
she reached home and displayed their final choice, she found Donald’s
inscription with it.
To
Lady Greasewrister
and
Madame Van Twister
Her
Ladyship’s Sister.
This little “momentum”
For thanks have I sent ’em,
In closest resemblance to
Bright glaring brass;
For Brass it was took ’em
(Nor ever forsook ’em)
To give to the President
Some of their “sass.”
CHAPTER XXI.
BREAKING UP.
The June days had come again, and the children were beginning to look
forward to the summer exodus to Kayuna. Their school closed the second
week in June, and the flitting was to take place on the 11th. Eunice and
Cricket were to go to Marbury in July for a two weeks’ visit to their
grandmother. The Somers family were to be there, as usual, and Edna had
written imploring letters that the girls might be with her there for a
little while. Then Edna was to be with them in Kayuna the entire month
of August.
“Doesn’t it seem six years since last June, when we were all flying
around, and mamma was getting ready to go to Europe?” said Cricket on
the last night at the house in town. “Seems to me I was such a _little_
girl then.”
Indeed, Cricket, as well as Eunice, had grown much older in the last
year, and was more responsible and self-reliant in every way. Both girls
had grown tall, Cricket especially, for she had shot up within half an
inch of Eunice this winter.
Cricket was very proud of this, and was hugely delighted when people
took her to be Eunice’s twin, as they quite often had of late. But her
curly hair was getting to be a great grievance, as it still tumbled
about her shoulders, and wouldn’t grow long.
“Do you suppose my hair will _always_ stay short and curly?” she
asked, anxiously. She was sitting perched on her father’s knee. The
younger children were in bed, and the others were all in the back
parlour. The furniture was in its summer dress of brown holland, the
pictures had retired behind mosquito nets, and everything wore a
shut-up-for-the-summer expression, except the family.
“Just think how I’ll look when I’m eighty,” went on Cricket, in an
aggrieved tone, “going about with little flippy-floppy curls all over my
head, like old Mrs. Crazy-Beecher, round on Jones Street. Don’t you know
how her curls always jiggle up and down, because she nods all the time
like a Chinese mandolin?”
“Mandarin, dear. Yes. You might wear a wig then,” suggested mamma.
“Ugh! I’d hate to wear store hair.”
“Did you hear Kenneth’s latest? He watched Eliza this morning putting on
that funny jute braid she wears, and it seemed to strike him for the
first time, so he said, ‘’Liza, what makes you wear _cloth_ hair? Mamma
doesn’t.’”
“I don’t want cloth hair, either,” said Cricket, decidedly. “Papa, can’t
anything be done to straighten my curls out? Couldn’t you give me some
medicine for it? I’d like to put it up in plaster of Paris. Wouldn’t
that do it? It straightened out the little Smith boy’s leg.”
“We might put your mind up in plaster of Paris, to take some of the
kinks out of _that_,” observed Donald.
“My mind’s the best I’ve got, and you’ll please be respectful to it,”
said Cricket, with dignity. “You’re a model of sarcasticity, I suppose
you think. Anyway, I _do_ wish I had ‘plain hair,’ as Zaidie says.
Eunice just gives hers a good brushing in the morning, and braids it up
all smooth and nice, and there it stays. While mine!”—a gesture of
despair finished the sentence.
“I don’t know what I can do for you, little Gloriana McQuirk,” said her
father, tumbling the obnoxious curls affectionately over her face.
“There!” exclaimed Cricket. “Nobody would ever think of throwing
Eunice’s braid over her face, and it wouldn’t disturb it a bit if they
did, and nobody minds tossing mine every which way, as if I hadn’t a
feeling to my name.”
“Cricket’s trials with her hair are like Amy March’s with her nose,”
said Marjorie.
“Good idea,” said Donald. “Braid your hair into pig-tails, and put a
patent clothes-pin at the end of each one, Miss Scricket,” and only the
fact that none were to be found in the kitchen regions, whither Cricket
instantly repaired, prevented the suggestion from being carried out.
“How different things will be when we come back next fall,” Mrs. Ward
said, presently, when Cricket had resumed her place on her father’s
knee. “It will seem strange to have Marjorie gone, and the little ones
in school.”
For the next year was to see several changes. For one thing, Marjorie
was to go to boarding-school for a year. She would soon be seventeen,
and her father and mother wished her to have the training in
self-reliance and independence that a year away would give her. Marjorie
did not aspire to college life, but was eager to cultivate her musical
talent especially. Later, she was to have a year in Germany for that
purpose.
Eunice and Cricket were to be collegians, however, and were already
planning with regard to Wellesley days.
Next year, also, the twins were to be launched on their school career.
They had never been even to a kindergarten, for Helen had been too
delicate, and Mrs. Ward did not wish to separate the children. Now Helen
seemed to be growing stronger all the time, and Doctor Ward thought that
school would be quite feasible the next fall. Even Kenneth was to begin
at the kindergarten, and it was no wonder that Mrs. Ward, as she said,
began to feel that she really had a grown-up family.
The girls would miss Marjorie immensely next year, but, by way of
compensation, Eunice thought she would enjoy the dignity of being the
oldest daughter at home.
“And I think people really ought to begin to call me Miss Ward,” she
said, meditatively.
THE END.
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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
1. Silently corrected obvious typographical errors and variations in
spelling.
2. Retained archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings as printed.
3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
4. Enclosed blackletter font in =equals=.
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