PREFACE
PREFACE

I often run down to Badgertown and into the little brown house to talk things over with the Peppers,
and every single time they one and all tell me they don’t think I have told enough about David.
It quite cut me to the heart the other day to hear Polly say mournfully, “You’ve made a book about
Ben and one about Phronsie, and you’ve told all about Joel’s Adventures, and stories that I made up;
and you never let Davie have a book—and he is our Davie.”
“Oh, I will, Polly — I will!” I promised. And she laughed gleefully, and Ben smiled in great
satisfaction, and Joel said: “Whickets! Now, Dave, you’re going to have a book all to yourself.” And
Phronsie crowed and gurgled, and made a cheese right in the middle of the old kitchen floor. As for
Mother Pepper, the look she gave me, well—wasn’t I glad that I had promised!
But David ran up to me and whispered, “I’d rather you made another book about Joel.”
“I can’t, Davie,” I whispered back, “the children all over the country have been teasing me for years
to give them a book about you. And now as all the rest of the Pepper family want it, why, you see, I
just must write it.”
“O dear!” said David.
Polly ran over to our corner. “Dear Margaret Sidney,” she begged, clasping her hands, “please tell all
about Davie when he was a little boy. That’s what we want; because you see you told ever so much
more about the rest of us than you did about him. And Davie was always just splendid! Why, he was
our Davie!”
So now here is “Our Davie Pepper,” just as the Little Brown House people wanted me to write it.
Margaret Sidney.
CHAPTER I DAVIE AND OLD MAN PETERS
CHAPTER I DAVIE AND OLD MAN PETERS

“MY sakes! David Pepper, you can’t get it in.”
“Perhaps I can, Mrs. Peters.”
“No, you can’t. There, give it to me. You’re all het up, runnin’ on arrants for Mr. Atkins. He
shouldn’t ’a’ told you to hurry clear down here from th’ store.”
David sank down on the wooden box turned upside down outside the Peters kitchen door, and
watched Mrs. Peters’s vigorous efforts to crowd a long woolen coat, very much frayed on the edge,
one sleeve gone, and various other dilapidations that might be noticed, into a round, splint-bottomed
basket. “Your ma c’n do th’ mendin’ better’n me,” she said, during the process, and dropping her
voice as her eyes roved anxiously. “I put th’ pieces underneath. O my!” she whirled around suddenly,
her back to the basket, and brought up a red face. “How you scar’t me, Tildy!” as the kitchen door
was flung wide and a head thrust out.
“’Tain’t Pa—you needn’t be afraid.” Yet Tildy looked over her shoulder and grasped her apron
tighter over something huddled up within its folds, as she skipped over the big flat stone. “You know
as well as I do that he’s well off toward the south medder.”
“’Tain’t nothin’ to be certain sure of, if your pa is headed for th’ south medder, that he won’t see
what we’re doin’ here,” said her mother hopelessly. “Well, what you got in your apron?”
Matilda knelt down by the basket on the grass, and flung her apron wide. “It’s some o’ my quince
sass.”
“You ain’t goin’ to give that away!” cried Mrs. Peters in alarm, and resting both hands on her knees.
“Gracious, your pa—”
“Let Pa alone, can’t you?” cried Matilda lifting the coat-edge to tuck in the big glass jar. “I guess he
won’t rage an’ ramp no more at th’ sass, than your lettin’ Mis Pepper mend this coat.”
“Well, I d’no. Sass is sass, an’ your pa knows how many jars you put up—O dear me, Matilda!” She
gazed helplessly off toward the south meadow.
Davie got off from the wooden box. “Oh don’t, Mrs. Peters,” he begged in great distress, “send the
jelly to Mamsie.”
“’Tain’t jell—it’s sass,” said Matilda, pushing the jar in further, and flapping the coat till it bulged
over the basket. “An’ I guess I ain’t goin’ to let your ma have all them measles to your house, an’ not
do nothin’. There—” She jumped to her feet. “You got to carry it careful, Davie. It’s too bad there
ain’t no handle.” She twitched the frayed cord that served as one, “I’ll get another string.”
“Come back here, Tilly,” cried her mother. “Ain’t you crazy! Your pa’ll be back. Let Davie go.”
Matilda turned away from the kitchen door. “Ain’t you silly, Ma!” yet she came back. “Well there,
run along, Davie, an’ carry it careful.”
“An’ you tell your ma,” said Mrs. Peters, “we’re sorry she’s got all the measles to her house, an’ she
c’n mend my coat better’n me, an’ she mustn’t tell no one it’s for Mis Peters, an’—”
“Land, Ma, th’ boy can’t remember all that,” said Matilda, giving David a little push.
“I guess I can—I’ll try to,” said David, grasping the old worn string with both hands.
“You go along,” said Matilda, with another push, “an’ if you see Pa comin’ along anywhere, you set
th’ basket in behind th’ bushes till he gits by. Remember, David Pepper!”
“Yes,” said David. “I’ll remember.”
“Well, now come along, Ma Peters,” said Matilda; “he hain’t spilled th’ things yit, an’ he’s turned th’
road. We’ve got to git back to work.”
“’Twouldn’t be so bad ef you hadn’t put in that quince sass, Tildy,” mourned her mother, picking up
her worn calico gown to step over a puddle of water from a broken drain-pipe. “But I’m awful
skeered about that.”
“Oh, Ma, you make me sick.” Matilda gave her a little push into the kitchen, slipped in after her, and
slammed the door; but her hand shook as she took up the broom. “I’m goin’ to work anyhow. You
c’n set an’ worry about Pa, ef you want to. I’m glad for my part, that Mis Pepper’s goin’ to have that
basket o’ things.”
“So be I,” cried Mrs. Peters. “Land sakes! I guess I’m as glad as you be, Tildy Peters. An’ I s’pose
Davie’s gittin’ along towards home pretty fast by this time.”
Matilda shook her head and pursed up her lips as she went out to sweep the back entry. “All the
same, I wish Davie Pepper was safe home to the little brown house,” she said to herself.
The old cord cut into Davie’s fingers as he trudged along the winding road, the basket wobbling
about from side to side; but every step was bringing him home to Mamsie, and he smiled as he went
along.
“Hey there!” a sudden turn of the road brought him squarely before a tall gaunt old man leaning
against the stone wall on the other side of a scrub oak.
“Where you ben?” demanded Old Man Peters.
“Just—just—” began David.
“Jest where? Stop your hemmin’ an’ hawin’. Where you ben?”
Davie clutched the basket with trembling fingers and a wild despair that it was now too late to
consider bushes.
“You ben down to my house, I know.” Old Man Peters’s little eyes gleamed fiercely. “Well, what
you got in that basket?” pointing to it.
“It’s—it’s—”
“It’s—it’s— Didn’t I tell you to stop hemmin’ an’ hawin’, you Pepper Boy! I’ll give you somethin’
to hem an’ haw for pretty soon, ef you don’t look out.” He broke off a stick from the scrub oak.
Davie clutched the old string tighter yet.
“Let’s see,” said Old Man Peters, drawing close to poke up a corner of the coat with the stick.
“You mustn’t,” said Davie, drawing back, and putting one hand over the top of the basket.
“Mustn’t,” roared Old Man Peters, shaking the stick at him.
“No,” said Davie. “You mustn’t,” and he tried to edge off farther; but the stick came down across his
little calico blouse.
“I’ll give you somethin’ to make you see that you can’t say ‘mustn’t’ to me,” said Mr. Peters,
bringing the stick down again. “There, you take that!”
Davie was whirling around now so fast that Old Man Peters preferred to try the stick on the little legs
instead of the small shoulders in the calico blouse, while he roared, “I’ll make you dance. drop that
basket, will you!”
“Here—what you doin’?” somebody called out, and a young man leaped the stone wall. “Hulloa, old
Peters, you stop that!”
Old Man Peters turned around. He would have dropped the stick, but the young man saved him the
trouble by seizing it to break it into two pieces and toss them into the dusty road.
“He’s ben a-sassin’ me,” cried the old man, pointing to David, who had sunk down on the grass by
the side of the road, still hanging to the basket.
“Well, you ain’t a- goin’ to beat up any boy in Badgertown. Now I tell you, Peters! And who
wouldn’t sass you, I wonder. Here you, get up,” he said, going over to David.
But David showing no inclination to get up, the man turned his face over.
“Well, I’ll be blowed, ef tain’t one o’ th’ Pepper children,” he exclaimed, starting back. “You’ve got
to take somethin’ from me, now I tell you, Old Man Peters!” He pushed up his gray cotton shirt-
sleeves and advanced on the old man, “for beatin’ up one o’ Mis Pepper’s boys.”
“You git away—tain’t nothin’ to you, Jim Thompson,” cried Mr. Peters, “an’ I’ll have th’ law on
you, ef you tetch me!” He put up both horny hands and tried to huddle back of the scrub oak.
“Th’ law’s got to deal with you, Old Peters, first, an’ it’ll fall pretty heavy for hurtin’ one o’ them
Pepper children,” declared Thompson, dragging him by an angry hand back to the road side.
“David—David Pepper!” screamed the old farmer, “you tell him. I ’ain’t hurt ye. Tell him, David.
Ow! you let me be, Jim Thompson!”
David looked up and tried to speak. Oh, if Mamsie were only here! Then his head fell down on the
dusty road.
“Look at that boy, you old scoundrel!” roared Thompson, cuffing Old Man Peters wherever he got a
good chance. Then he flung him to the middle of the road. “Lie there till I can ’tend to you.” But the
old farmer preferred to attend to himself, and without waiting to pick up his hat that had fallen off in
the scuffle, he slunk off as fast as he conveniently could.
“Don’t hurt him,” begged Davie feebly, as Thompson bent over him. “Oh, I want Mamsie!”
“You’re a-goin’ to her—I’ll take you.” The young man lifted him up to his shoulder, Davie still
clinging to the basket. “Where did he hurt you?” he asked anxiously.
“I’m not hurt much,” said Davie, trying not to cry.
Jim Thompson set his teeth hard. “Here, give me that basket,” and holding Davie fast by one arm, he
strode off, first kicking Old Man Peters’s hat into a neighboring field where it landed in a bog.
“Mamsie—somebody’s coming, and he’s got a big bundle—how funny,” cried Polly, looking out of
the window.
“A pedlar, most likely,” said Mrs. Pepper, over in the window, trying to finish a coat to go back to
Mr. Atkins at the store. The measles were making it extra hard to keep the wolf from the door.
“Well, he won’t sell anything here,” said Polly with a laugh, and running to the old green door. “Why
—” as she flung it open.
It was all over in a minute, and Mrs. Pepper had her boy in her arms. Davie trying to say, “I’m not
much hurt,” and Polly running for the camphor bottle, while Jim Thompson set down the basket on
the floor, where it rolled over and out flew the “quince sass” from the protecting folds of the coat.
“Old Man Peters was a- beatin’ him up,” said the young farmer, working his hands awkwardly
together and wishing he could help.
“Mamsie,” said Davie, both hands around her neck, and cuddling up to lay his white cheek against
her face, “I didn’t let him have the basket—and you are to mend the coat. You can do it so much
better, she says, than she can.”
“Mrs. Peters, Davie?”
“Yes, and Miss Matilda sent the jelly—no, it isn’t jelly—but—I forget—”
“Yes, I know, dear. Now let Mother see where you are hurt.”
“Oh, Mamsie!” Polly, flying back with the camphor bottle, was aghast as Mrs. Pepper stripped off the
calico blouse.
“Put down the camphor, Polly,” said Mother Pepper. Her lips were set very tightly together, and a
bright spot burned on either cheek. “Bring Mother the oil bottle and get the roll of old cotton in the
lower bureau drawer. Be careful not to wake up Phronsie. Thank you, Mr. Thompson, for bringing
home my boy,” as Polly ran off.
“I guess I’ll go back an’ lick Old Man Peters,” said the young farmer, turning off to the door.
“Oh, no,” Mother Pepper spoke quickly. “Say nothing to him. I’ll take care of the matter.”
“I’d love to,” said Mr. Thompson longingly.
“No—No—” Mrs. Pepper shook her head decidedly. And he went off.
“Oh, Mamsie, that wicked Old Man Peters!” Polly clasped her hands, and her brown eyes blazed. “I
just want something dreadful to happen to him,” and she hovered over David bolstered up in
Mamsie’s rocking chair, his legs and little shoulders bound up in old cotton bandages.
“Polly,” said Mother Pepper sternly, “never let me hear you say anything like that again.”
“I can’t help it,” said Polly, fighting with the tears. Then she gave it up and ran over to throw herself
down on the floor and lay her head in Mother Pepper’s lap, “to think of Davie being hurt. Oh,
Mamsie!”
“I’m not much hurt,” said Davie, poking up his head from the pillow against his back, “only my legs
—they’re a little bad. Don’t cry, Polly,” he begged, dreadfully distressed.
“Our Davie!” sobbed Polly, huddling down further in her mother’s lap, “just think, Mamsie,—our
Davie!”
Mrs. Pepper shut her lips together, but she smoothed Polly’s brown head. “Mother will see to it,” she
said, “and you must never say anything like that again, Polly. Now wipe your eyes; here comes Dr.
Fisher.”
“Well—well—well—” cried the little Doctor, coming in cheerily. He was very happy as Ben was
getting along splendidly, while as for Phronsie, why she just got better and better every day. Oh, the
measles wasn’t so very bad after all to fight. But now, here was Davie bolstered up in the big calico-
covered chair. O dear, that was too bad!
“Well, my boy,” the little Doctor got over to the chair and looked down at him with keen eyes behind
the big spectacles, “what’s the matter with you?”
“I’m not much hurt,” said Davie, “only my legs—they feel the worst.”
“Eh?” said Dr. Fisher. Then he set down his bag and looked over at Mrs. Pepper. So then the story
had to come out. When it was all told and Dr. Fisher became quiet, for he was almost as bad as Polly
in his indignation, and Davie’s legs and shoulders had been taken care of, “You don’t need to do
anything, Mrs. Pepper,” he said, “I’ll take care of that brute of a man.”
And Mother Pepper said just as she had told the young farmer, “Oh, no, I will see to the matter
myself.”
“Oh, goody—I got the wood all piled at Deacon Blodgett’s.” In rushed Joel. “Come on, Dave,” and
he was scurrying over to Mamsie’s big chair, when he spied the basket on the floor, for nobody had
thought or cared about it. And there was the jar of Matilda’s “quince sass” that had rolled off by
itself. “Oh,” he pounced upon it, “may I have some—may I?” He ran with it to Mrs. Pepper, nearly
upsetting the little Doctor on the way.
“Look out there,” cried Doctor Fisher; “here, don’t run me down, Joe,” and then Joel saw Davie
propped against the pillows. Down went Matilda’s “quince sass” on the kitchen floor, and he threw
himself into the chair on top of Davie, poor bandaged legs and all.
The little old kitchen then was in a hubbub. It all had to be explained to Joel, who made things so
very dreadful that finally Doctor Fisher said, “I’ll take him off, Mrs. Pepper. Hold on to that boy,
Polly, till I’ve had a look at Ben up in the loft. If Phronsie is asleep, she’s all right. Then, Joel Pepper,
you shall hop into my gig.”
CHAPTER II MRS. PEPPER ATTENDS TO THE MATTER
CHAPTER II MRS. PEPPER ATTENDS TO THE MATTER

PARSON HENDERSON shut the gate with a firm hand, and stepped out into the road.
The parsonage door opened, and the minister’s wife ran down the path. “Here, Adoniram, take this to
Mrs. Pepper.” She put a clean folded napkin, from which came a nice smell of something newly
baked, into his hand. “Oh, I do hope Mrs. Pepper will let you see that horrible Mr. Peters,” she began
anxiously.
“Mrs. Pepper always knows her own mind,” said the parson, “and if she wants to attend to the matter,
it’s not for us, Almira, to interfere.” He handled the napkin bundle gingerly and moved off.
“It was perfectly dreadful, Jim Thompson said, and you know he tells the truth, husband.” She
pattered after him. “Do see if you can’t persuade her to let you see Mr. Peters. You know you want
to.”
“That I do!” declared the parson, his eyes flashing. “Well, don’t you worry, Almira; it will be
attended to.”
“He ought to be driven out of town—that old creature had,” cried his wife, with very red cheeks.
“Everybody hates him. Now I hope this will make him leave Badgertown.”
“Softly there, Almira,” the parson patted one of the red cheeks. “Badgertown must be careful what it
does. There are his poor wife and Matilda to consider.”
“Oh, I know it,” groaned Mrs. Henderson. “Well, do try and get Mrs. Pepper to let you fix the matter
up.” She hurried over the old flat stone. There in the doorway stood Miss Jerusha.
“I sh’d think Adoniram had enough to do, without taking up with Mis Pepper’s troubles,” she said
tartly.
“Oh, it’s his business to do what he can for Badgertown people, Jerusha,” said Mrs. Henderson.
“Badgertown people!” sniffed Miss Jerusha. She set her spectacles straighter, and glared at the
parson’s wife. “You’ve all gone mad over that little brown house family,” she said. “For my part, I
hate shiftless folks who expect to be looked out for all the while.”
“Don’t you ever call the little brown house people shiftless again in my presence.” The parson’s wife
got as tall as she could, even up to her tiptoes. “Anybody with a heart would be sorry for that poor
brave woman, and those dear children who are trying to help her. I can’t think, Jerusha, how you can
be so—so—”
She left the last word to look out for itself, her voice trailing off. But she marched with a high head
past the long angular figure, and the door of her husband’s study closed with a snap.
“Let me see ’em—let me see ’em!” Joel prancing around in the little brown house kitchen, stopped
suddenly and twitched the small calico sleeve.
“No,” said David, edging off. “I don’t want anybody to see ’em.”
“I’m going to,” declared Joel, holding on with both hands to the blouse as David whirled around. “I
saw ’em yesterday, and I’m going to see ’em again. Hold still, Dave. Zip!”
“There, now you’ve torn it!” Davie gave a small cry of distress.
Joel’s stubby hands dropped and he stood quite still in dismay.
“’Tisn’t torn—torn—much,” he said quite aghast.
“It’s torn—and now Mamsie will have to work and mend it. O dear!”
With that the tears fell, and Davie threw himself on the floor, and sobbed as if his heart would break.
“What is the matter?” cried Polly, rushing in from the bedroom, where she had been giving Phronsie
her breakfast of mush. For once there was some real milk, for Doctor Fisher had set a bottle on the
kitchen table after his visit to see how the measles were coming on. “Oh, Davie!” She threw herself
down beside him. “Where are you hurt?”
Mrs. Pepper hurried over the steps from the provision room, where she had been looking over the
potatoes to see how long they would last.
“I tore—tore—” said Joel, in the middle of the kitchen floor. His face was working dreadfully and he
twisted his hands together trying not to cry.
“What did you do, Joe?” cried Polly, running over to him.
“Mamsie,” cried Davie, throwing his arms around her, “he didn’t mean to.”
“There—there,” said Mrs. Pepper, taking him up to her lap. “Joel, come here and tell Mother all
about it.”
“He didn’t mean to,” began Davie again, wiping up his tears.
“I don’t believe Joey did mean to, Mamsie, whatever it is,” said Polly, pulling him along. He was
digging one small fist into first one eye and then the other, and saying at every step, “I didn’t mean to,
Mamsie,” and he threw himself down and burrowed his face on top of Davie’s legs in Mrs. Pepper’s
lap.
“Stop saying you didn’t mean to, Joel, and tell Mother what you did to Davie,” said Mrs. Pepper
firmly.
Joel put out a shaking hand and felt for the torn place in the little calico blouse, Polly hanging over
them in great anxiety. “There,” he said, “I didn’t mean to do it, Mamsie.”
“He means he’s torn Davie’s jacket,” said Polly with a little gasp. “O dear me, Joel, you’ve scared us
almost to death!”
“Mamsie will have to work and mend it,” howled Joel. With that Davie began again to cry, and to
burrow deeper against Mrs. Pepper’s neck.
“For shame, Joel!” cried Polly. “It’s ever so much worse to cry now than it was to tear Davie’s
jacket.”
“Is it?” cried Joel, bringing up his head suddenly and gazing at her out of two black eyes; the tears
trailed down over his snubby nose. “Is it really, Polly?”
“Indeed it is, Joe,” she said decidedly.
“Then I’m not going to cry any more,”, declared Joel, wiping off the last tear with the back of one
brown hand, and jumping up.
“Now, that’s Mother’s good boy,” said Mrs. Pepper approvingly.
“Whatever made you tear Davie’s jacket, Joe?” cried Polly, very much puzzled and running after
him.
“I wanted to see the red things on his legs,” said Joel. “Oh, I’d ’a’ made Old Man Peters squinge and
squinge if I’d been there! This is the way I’d have done.” Joel ran over to the corner and seized the
broom, and landed about him so savagely that Polly flew off laughing, and Davie joined in with a
merry shout, until the little old kitchen fairly rang with the noise.
“Yes—sir-ee!” said Joel, prancing madly around, “that’s the way I’d ’a’ squinged him if I’d been
there.”
Davie slid out of Mother Pepper’s lap and ran after him, the torn bit of calico flapping at the end of
his blouse.
“Let me, Joel,” he cried, trying to reach the broom as Joel pranced on.
“You couldn’t do it,” said Joel. “I must squinge Old Man Peters myself,” holding the broom very
high. Then he saw Davie’s face. “You may have it,” he said.
Polly ran into the bedroom and came back on her tiptoes. “Phronsie’s asleep,” she said. “Now I’m
awfully glad, for I can clean out the stove. Then I can get the bread in.” She ran over and knelt down
before the old stove, and presently there was a great to-do with the brush and the little shovel and the
old woolen cloths.
Mrs. Pepper sighed as she rolled up in a newspaper two coats that she had just finished. “I don’t
know what I should ever do without you, Polly,” she said, looking over at her.
“Don’t you, Mamsie?” cried Polly in great delight, and sitting back on her heels, she brought up a
countenance with long black streaks running across it. “Don’t you really, Mamsie?”
“No, I don’t,” said Mrs. Pepper, “and that is a fact. Mother wouldn’t know what to do without you.
But dear me, child, what a pair of black hands—and your face, Polly!” as she went into the bedroom
to put on her bonnet.
Polly looked down at her hands. Then she burst out laughing. “I brushed back my hair,” she said, “it
tumbled into my eyes so,” and she jumped up and ran to the cracked looking glass hanging over in
the corner. “My! what a sight I am!”
“Let me see,” cried Joel, rushing over. “Don’t wash it off, Polly, let me see!”
David flung down the broom and tumbled after. “Let me see, too, Polly.”
“I look just like that old black man who used to come after rags,” said Polly, turning around on them
and holding up her hands.
“Oh, you do—you do!” howled Joel in huge delight, while Davie crowed and clapped his hands.
“You do, just exactly like him, Polly!”
“Wait a minute,” said Polly. She rushed out and came running back with Ben’s old cap on her head
and her arms in his coat. “Now wouldn’t you think I was that old black man?” she said, stalking up
and down the kitchen crying out, “Any rags, Mam?” and she swung the big potato bag at them.
“Oh, Polly,” screamed Davie in a transport, “you are that old black man,” while Joel marched after
echoing, “Any rags, Mam?” and swinging an imaginary bag at every step he took.
Suddenly Polly stopped, tore off the cap and the coat. “Take back the potato bag into the provision
room, Joel,” she said, tossing it to him. “I forgot the stove, and the bread has got to go in. O dear
me!” She flew over to the sink, and presently back she came. “There now, I’m scrubbed clean, but
I’ll get all black again, I suppose,” and she kneeled down again before the stove.
Mrs. Pepper came out of the bedroom and stopped a minute by the green door to smile at them all.
Then she went out with her bundle to take to Mr. Atkins at the store; but first there was another
errand of importance to attend to, so she turned off at the cross-road. The smile had dropped away
from her folded lips, as she stepped swiftly along toward the Peters farm.
“Here she comes—here’s Mis Pepper!” cried Matilda. “Do stop wringin’ your hands, Ma. You hain’t
done nothin’ else sence yesterday. Mis Pepper can’t blame us.”
“O dear,” mourned Mrs. Peters. “’Twas th’ quince sass that made all th’ trouble.”
“’Twarn’t th’ quince sass at all,” contradicted Matilda flatly. “Pa never said a word about it. Do stop
—Mis Pepper’s at th’ door.”
“Rat-tat!” went the old iron knocker. Matilda jumped, all her nerves askew, while Mrs. Peters sank
down in the nearest chair.
“O dear, there ain’t time to git on a clean apurn.” Matilda opened the big door—her tongue clapped
up to the roof of her mouth, and she couldn’t find a word to say.
“Is your father in?” asked Mrs. Pepper pleasantly. Then she looked into the scared face. “Don’t feel
badly—you couldn’t help it,” she said.
Matilda twisted her hands in her dirty apron. “We feel dreadful—Ma an’ me,” she said, and burst out
crying.
“There—there,” said Mrs. Pepper soothingly, trying to pat the nervous hands. “Don’t, Matilda; your
mother will hear you. Can I see your father?” She stepped in and shut the door.
“He’s in there.” Matilda twitched out one hand from beneath the apron, and pointed a shaking finger
to the little room that old Mr. Peters called his office. Mrs. Pepper knocked at the door.
“You better go right in ef you want to see him,” said Matilda in a loud whisper, “for he’ll sneak out
th’ back door, ef he knows it’s you.” So Mrs. Pepper opened the door, and none too soon. Old Man
Peters was crowding his long legs out of the big chair where he sat behind his desk, his eyes on the
door leading out to the back yard.
“Oh, come in, Mis Pepper,” he mumbled, his long face getting redder and redder. “Take a chair an’
set.”
“I do not wish to sit down, Mr. Peters,” said Mrs. Pepper. “What I have to say will take but a few
moments. I have come to see you about my boy.”
“Yes—yes—” grunted the old man in a terrible alarm. “Well, p’raps ’twas a mistake,” he twitched
the papers on his desk with nervous fingers, then finally ran them through his shock of grizzled hair.
“I didn’t mean to hurt th’ boy none. But mebbe ’twas a mistake. You better set, Mis Pepper.” He
pointed to a broken-backed chair, the only one provided for his farm-hands when they went to
wrangle over their hard-earned wages.
“It was more than a mistake, Mr. Peters,” said Mrs. Pepper in a clear voice, and ignoring the
invitation.
“Well—mebbe—mebbe,” said the old man, wriggling around in his big chair. “See here now,” he
suddenly stopped and looked in a tremor into her black eyes, “I’ll give you some money, an’ that’ll
fix it up. How much do ye want?” he asked in an anguished tone.
“Money could never fix up a thing like this,” said Mrs. Pepper. Her tone was quiet, but the black eyes
blazed. Old Man Peters’s hand fell in relief from the handle of his money drawer, but he slunk down
in his chair.
“The only reparation you can make, Mr. Peters,” Mrs. Pepper went on, “is to be very sure that you
will never lay a hand again on a Badgertown child; not only upon my child, but upon any child. You
understand that?”
“Ye—yes,” mumbled the old man.
“And one more thing. That is, that you will treat your wife and Matilda as women should be treated.”
“They’re well enough off,” declared Old Man Peters suddenly. Then he snarled out, “An’ what
bus’ness is it of yours, Mis Pepper, I’d like to know.”
“Very well. If you don’t promise this, I shall see that the injury to my boy is atoned for. I shall give
the matter into the hands of the town authorities, Mr. Peters.”
“Here—here—” screamed the old man, flinging out both hands, as she moved off. “Stop, Mis Pepper!
I didn’t mean to say I wouldn’t promise. Yes—yes—I do! Will you stop! I say I will!”
“And Badgertown will see that you keep that promise,” said Mrs. Pepper. Then she opened the door.
Matilda, who had a shaking eye at the keyhole, nearly fell over backward on the entry oilcloth.
“Oh, Mis Pepper,” she gasped, seizing the strong arm. “Ma’s takin’ on somethin’ awful in th’ sittin’
room.”
“She won’t do that long,” said Mrs. Pepper grimly. “Come, Tildy.”
“Oh me—oh my!” old Mrs. Peters was throwing herself from one side of the rickety sofa in the
sitting-room and moaning, with her fingers in her ears, when they came in.
“She’s got th’ high-strikes,” declared Matilda with big eyes. “I must go up garret and git some
feathers an’ burn ’em right under her nose.”
“Come back—no need for that, Matilda.” Mrs. Pepper sat down on the sofa and drew the poor gray
head into her arms. “There—there,” she said, just as if one of the Five Little Peppers was cuddled
within them. “You’re going to see better times, Mrs. Peters. Your husband has promised to treat you
and Matilda as women should be treated.”
But Mrs. Peters not understanding, wailed on, burrowing deeper into the kind arms.
Tildy jumped to her feet. “Oh my soul an’ body—did you make Pa say that?”
“Mr. Peters promised it,” said Mrs. Pepper with a smile.
“Glory be!” Tildy set up a trot to the other end of the room, coming back to snap her fingers in glee.
Then the joy went out of her face. “Pa never’ll keep that promise in all the world,” she gasped,
drooping miserably.
“There is no doubt that the promise will be kept, Matilda,” said Mrs. Pepper. “And if it isn’t, why you
just come to me.” Then she laid Mrs. Peters’s head back on the old sofa and went out and shut the
door.
CHAPTER III THE DARK CLOUD OVER THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE
CHAPTER III THE DARK CLOUD OVER THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

“YOU don’t say!” Old Man Beebe turned around on his little ladder where he was reaching down a
pair of number six shoes for a customer. “Sho’ now, I am beat, Mis Brown! Mebbe ’tain’t true.” He
held the shoes aloft, the long strings dangling down.
“There ain’t no morsel o’ doubt about it,” said Mrs. Brown decidedly. “I’ve jest come from the store,
an’ Mr. Atkins himself told me. I can’t wait all day, Mr. Beebe; an’ I said gaiters. I don’t want no
shoes.”
“You said shoes,” said Mr. Beebe. “However did I git up here, ef you hadn’t asked for ’em.”
“I don’t know nothin’ about th’ workin’ o’ your mind, Mr. Beebe,” said Mrs. Brown, “I said gaiters
as plain as day—and do hurry!” She whipped the ends of her shawl impatiently around her gaunt
figure.
“I d’no’s I have any gaiters—that is—that’ll fit you,” said the little shoemaker, putting the “number
sixes” into their box, and slowly fitting on the cover. “P’raps I have a pair on the lower shelf.” He got
down laboriously from the ladder, put it in the corner and began to rummage his stock.
“An’ there’s my bread waitin’ to go in th’ oven, an’ I’ve got cake to bake for the sewin’ s’ciety,—do
hurry, Mr. Beebe.”
“I s’pose they’ve got to have rubber sides,” mused Mr. Beebe, getting down on his knees, to explore
behind the chintz curtains that fell from the lowest shelf.
“Why, of course,” said Mrs. Brown, impatiently, “gaiters is gaiters, ain’t they? An’ I never saw a pair
without them rubber sides to ’em, did you, Mr. Beebe?”
“I d’no’s I did,” said the little shoemaker, his head under the curtain. “Well, now here’s a pair, I do
believe,” and he dragged out a box, whipped off the cover and disclosed a pair with elastic sides.
“Them’s Congress gaiters,” he said, “an’ they look as if they’d fit like your skin.”
“I’m sure I hope so,” said Mrs. Brown, putting out her generous foot. “An’ do hurry an’ try ’em on,
for mercy’s sakes!”
“I’m hurryin’ as fast as I can,” said Mr. Beebe, coming over to the bench where the customers always
sat for the shoes to be tried on, “but you’ve upset me so about that bad news. Sho’ now!—to think
that anythin’ should happen to the little brown house folks.”
“What’s that—what’s that, Pa?” Mrs. Beebe’s head appeared in the doorway between the little shop
and the sitting-room. She had been frying doughnuts and she carried one in now on a blue plate, as
she always did while they were nice and hot. “What’s th’ matter with th’ little brown house folks?
Oh, how do you do, Mis Brown?”
Mrs. Brown’s nose wrinkled up appreciatively at sight of the doughnut.
“I hope nothin’, Ma,” said Mr. Beebe, not looking at the plate.
“You always have such luck with your doughnuts, Mis Beebe,” said Mrs. Brown longingly.
“Well, what is it, anyway?” demanded Mrs. Beebe, setting down the plate on the counter that ran on
one side of the little shop, and coming up to the shoe-bench. “What was you sayin’, Pa, about th’
Pepperses?”
“Polly’s got the measles now.”
“Good land o’ Goshen!” exclaimed old Mrs. Beebe. Then she sat down on the other end of the bench
and folded her plump hands.
“P’raps ’tain’t true,” he said, with trembling hands pulling on the gaiter.
“That’s too tight,” declared Mrs. Brown, wrenching her mind from the doughnuts and twisting her
foot from one side to the other.
“’Twon’t be when th’ rubber ’lastic has got stretched,” said Mr. Beebe.
“Yes, an’ then the ’lastic will be all wore out, an’ bulge,” said Mrs. Brown discontentedly. “Hain’t
you got another pair, Mr. Beebe?”
“Not your size,” said the little shoemaker.
“Well, if Polly Pepper’s got th’ measles, I’m goin’ right down to the little brown house,” declared old
Mrs. Beebe, getting up from the shoe-bench. “I’ll set out your dinner, Pa, the cold meat an’ pie, and
there’s some hot soup on the stove. I’m goin’ to stay an’ help Mis Pepper,” and she waddled out.
“Well, for mercy’s sake, Mr. Beebe, try on th’ other gaiter. I’ve got to git home some time to-day,”
said Mrs. Brown crossly, all hope of a doughnut coming her way now gone entirely.
The little shoemaker stood by the door of his shop thoughtfully jingling the silver pieces in his hands,
after his customer had gone out.
“To think o’ Polly bein’ took! O dear, dear! I declare I forgot to give Ma some pink sticks to take to
the childern.” He hurried out to the small entry, took down his coat and old cap and rammed his
hands into his big pockets.
“Here they are, just as I saved ’em for Joel.” Then he locked up his little shop and ambled down the
cobble-stones to overtake old Mrs. Beebe on her way to the little brown house.
But she got there first and opened the old green door without knocking. Mrs. Pepper was coming out
of the bedroom with a bowl and a spoon in her hands. Her face was very white, but she tried to smile
a welcome.
“Land alive!” exclaimed old Mrs. Beebe in a loud whisper. “Is Polly took?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper.
“Well, I never!” Mrs. Beebe sank down in Mother Pepper’s calico-covered chair. “That beats all—to
think that Polly’s took! Whatever’ll you do now!”
“Take care,” warned Mrs. Pepper, “she’ll hear you,” and she pointed to the bedroom.
“I’m whisperin’,” said old Mrs. Beebe, holding her plump hands tightly together.
Mrs. Pepper hurried up to the loft to see how Ben was getting on.
And in came the little shoemaker, his round face quite red, he had hurried so.
“Is she bad?” The whisper was so much worse than that of old Mrs. Beebe, that she got out of the big
chair and hurried over to him. “Pa, you mustn’t—she’ll hear you.” She pointed to the bedroom and
twitched his sleeve.
“I ain’t a- talkin’, I’m whisperin’,” he said. “Is Polly bad, Ma?” He pulled out his bandanna
handkerchief and wiped his anxious face.
“Oh, I d’no,” said Mrs. Beebe disconsolately. “Everything bad that Mis Pepper gits, deary me!”
“Well, I brought some pink sticks for Joel and Davie,” said old Mr. Beebe, pulling out the paper from
his pocket. “There Ma,” he laid them down on the table. “Where’s th’ boys?” he peered around the
old kitchen.
“They’re over to Deacon Blodgett’s, I s’pose,” said Mrs. Beebe. “O dear me, they’ve got to work
worse’n ever, now Ben’s sick.”
“Sho, now!” exclaimed the little shoemaker, dreadfully upset. “Where’s Mis Pepper?”
“Up there,” old Mrs. Beebe pointed to the loft stairs.
“I d’no what Mis Pepper is goin’ to do now that Polly is took with th’ measles,” said Mr. Beebe in a
loud whisper. “Hem! O dear me!” and he blew his nose violently.
“Hush, Pa! You do speak dretful loud,” as Mrs. Pepper came down the loft stairs.
“It’s good of you to come, Mr. Beebe,” she said, hurrying into the bedroom and closing the door.
“Mamsie,” cried Polly, flying into the middle of the bed; the tears were racing down under the
bandage that Dr. Fisher had tied over her eyes that morning. “Whatever will you do now that I’ve got
’em—Oh, Mamsie!” She threw her arms around Mother Pepper.
“Polly—Polly, child!” Mrs. Pepper held her close. “You mustn’t cry. Don’t you know what Dr.
Fisher told you. There—there,” she patted the brown hair as Polly snuggled up to her.
“I can’t help it,” said Polly, the tears tumbling over each other in their mad race down her cheeks. “I
don’t mind my eyes, if only I could help you. Oh, what will you do, Mamsie?”
“Oh, I will get along,” said Mrs. Pepper in a cheerful voice. “And just think how good Joel is.”
“It’s good Joey hasn’t got the measles,” said Polly, trying to smile through her tears.
“Isn’t it?” said Mrs. Pepper. “And Deacon Blodgett says he does splendidly working about the place.
And Davie, too—oh, Polly, just think what a comfort those two boys are.”
“I know it,” said Polly, trying to speak cheerfully, “but I do wish I could help you sew on the coats,”
she said, and her face drooped further within Mother Pepper’s arms.
“It’s just because you have sewed so much that your eyes are bad.” Mrs. Pepper couldn’t repress the
sigh.
“Mamsie, now don’t you feel badly,” Polly brought her head up suddenly. “Oh, I wish I could see
your face—don’t you, Mamsie?” She clutched her mother tightly, and the tears began to come again.
“Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, “now you and I have both got to be brave. It’s not time for crying, and you
must just be mother’s girl, and lie down and keep warm under the clothes. That’s the very best way to
help me.”
“I’ll try,” said Polly, as Mrs. Pepper tucked her in under the old comforter.
But although old Mrs. Beebe was kind as could be, and Grandma Bascom hobbled over every now
and then, and Parson Henderson and his wife helped in every imaginable way, a black cloud settled
over the little brown house. And one day Badgertown heard the news: “Joel Pepper is took sick with
th’ measles, and he’s awful bad.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Mr. Atkins, turning off with the jug he was filling from the big barrel of
molasses for a customer, “that boy can’t be sick.”
“Well, he is,” declared the customer. “Look out! th’ ’lasses is all a-runnin’ over th’ floor!”
“Thunderation!” The storekeeper jumped back and picked his foot out of the sticky mess, while he
thrust the jug under the bunghole. “Hold your tongue, Timothy Bliss! Joel Pepper was in here
yist’day—no, that was David bringin’ back th’ coats Mis Pepper had sewed—’twas day before
yist’day Joe came runnin’ in, smart as a cricket. He warn’t goin’ to have no squeezles, he said, No,
Sir!” Mr. Atkins turned off the spigot sharply, and set the jug on the counter with a thud.
“He’s got ’em now at any rate,” said Mr. Bliss solemnly. “An’ Mis Beebe says they wouldn’t wonder
ef he was goin’ to die.”
“Die!” roared the storekeeper. “Ain’t you ’shamed, Timothy Bliss, to stand there sayin’ sech stuff!
Joel Pepper can’t die.” Yet Mr. Atkins gripped the counter with both hands, while everything in his
store seemed to spin around.
“Mis Beebe said—standin’ in th’ door o’ th’ shoe-shop as I come by,” began Mr. Bliss, leaning up
against the counter.
“Don’t tell me no more,” interrupted the storekeeper, waving both sticky hands excitedly; “it’s
scand’lous startin’ such tales.” Then he rushed over to the small door connecting with his house. “Ma
—Ma,” he screamed, “Joel Pepper’s awful sick with the measles!”
“You don’t say!” Mrs. Atkins came to the top of the stairs, her sweeping-cap on her head and a dust-
brush in her hand. “O me, O my!” she mourned. “What will Mis Pepper do now, with both of her
boys took sick?”
“Well, she’s got Davie,” said the storekeeper, determined to get some comfort, and hanging to the
newel post.
“Davie’s so little.” Mrs. Atkins sat down on the upper stair. “He’d help all he could, but he’s so
little,” she repeated.
“David’s awful smart,” said Mr. Atkins.
“I know it; they’re all smart, them Pepper childern, but Joel’s so up an’ comin’, you can’t think of
Davie somehow as takin’ hold o’ things. Seth Atkins, you’ve got ’lasses all over your trousers!”
She ran down the stairs and peered anxiously at her husband’s legs.
The storekeeper twitched away. “That’s Timothy Bliss’ fault. He scaret me so about Joe,” and he
darted back into the store.
“I’m goin’ to help Mamsie.” David stood in the middle of the kitchen, twisting his hands together
anxiously. “I’m getting to be real big now, Mrs. Beebe,” and he stood on his tiptoes.
“Bless your heart!” exclaimed old Mrs. Beebe, making gruel on the old stove, “so you be, Davie.”
“And pretty soon I’ll be as big as—as Joel.” Then he swallowed hard at the sound of Joel’s name.
“So you will—so you will,” said Mrs. Beebe. “An’ you help your mother now, Davie boy.”
“Do I?” cried David. A little pink spot came on each cheek, and he unclenched his hands, for he
wasn’t going to cry now.
“To be sure you do,” declared Mrs. Beebe, bobbing her cap at him. “Your Ma told me yest’day she
depended on you.”
“Did she?” David ran over to clutch her apron, the pink spots getting quite rosy. “Oh, I’m going to do
just everything that Ben and Joel did—I am, Mrs. Beebe.”
“Well, you look out, you don’t work too hard, Davie,” Mrs. Beebe stopped stirring a minute, and
regarded him anxiously, “that would worry your Ma most dretful. There, that’s done.” She swished
the spoon about a few times, then poured the gruel into a bowl. “Now, then, I’ll give it to Ben.”
“Oh, let me,” cried Davie, putting up both hands eagerly.
“You’re too tired—you’ve ben a-runnin’ all th’ mornin’,” began Mrs. Beebe, yet her stout legs ached
badly.
“I’m not tired,” cried Davie, and in a minute he had the bowl and was going carefully up the loft
stairs.
“Now that blessed child is just like the rest o’ th’ childern,” mused old Mrs. Beebe, sinking down in a
chair. “Davie’s quiet, but he get’s there all the same.”
And Davie’s little legs “got there all the same” through the dark days when Joel went deeper and
deeper into the gloom. And the little brown house people held their breath in very dread of the
coming hours. And good Doctor Fisher lay awake every night after the day’s hard work, going over
and over in his troubled mind how he might save Mrs. Pepper’s boy.
“O dear me!” a voice broke in upon the woodshed, where Davie sat on the chopping-block. His legs
ached dreadfully, but he wasn’t thinking of them. He was awfully afraid he was going to cry after all,
and he twisted up his small cheeks, and held his hands together oh, oh so tightly!
“Just as I expected,” Miss Jerusha Henderson put her head in, “all this talk about the Pepper childern
workin’ to help their mother is just rubbish,” she sniffed and came up to the chopping-block; “there
you set, you lazy boy, you.”
“I’m not a lazy boy,” said David, getting off from the chopping-block. “Mamsie told me there wasn’t
anything to do now.” His little cheeks burned like fire.
“Anything to do!” Miss Jerusha raised her long fingers and waved them about. “Did I ever—and look
at all this messy place! Why ain’t you choppin’ wood, I sh’d like to know?”
“Mamsie told me not to do anything till she called me.” His head ached dreadfully, and he wanted to
run, but he stood his ground.
“If ever I saw a woman who spoiled her childern, it’s your Ma,” said Miss Jerusha, sniffing again.
“It’s no wonder she has trouble.”
David swallowed hard, then he looked up into her snappy little black eyes. “I wish you’d go away,”
he said quietly.
“Of all the impertinent boys!” exclaimed the parson’s sister, an angry flush spreading over her gaunt
face. “Well, I’m not going, I can tell you that. And I shall come every day and do my duty by you,
David Pepper.”
“No,” said David, “you mustn’t come any more.”
“And I am going to speak to your Ma now, and tell her what a naughty boy you are.” Miss Jerusha
picked up her gingham gown and went off on angry feet out of the woodshed.
David ran past her, and up to the door of the little brown house. When she got there he was holding
the latch with both hands.
“You get off that door-step!” cried Miss Jerusha, now in a towering passion, and seizing his little
calico blouse, “I declare I just ache to give you a whipping!” She raised one long hand threateningly.
“You don’t get any with that silly mother of yours. Get off that door-step, I say! It’s my duty to speak
to your Ma.”
“You can’t,” said Davie stoutly, “because you can’t get in.” He gripped the latch tighter, and his blue
eyes flashed just like Mother Pepper’s black ones.
“Can’t, hey?” Miss Jerusha’s hard hand was laid not very gently on David’s little ones holding the
old latch. Her other was raised threateningly. “Let go of that latch, or I’ll box your ears.”
Davie clung tighter than ever to the latch. Down came Miss Jerusha’s hand on his small ear. An
angry red spot was on her cheek, and she struck again.
“What’s this—what’s this?” Doctor Fisher came briskly up the path. The parson’s sister turned
suddenly, her hand falling to her side.
“This boy has been very naughty,” she said, the blood rushing over her gaunt cheeks.
Dr. Fisher set his big spectacles straight, and regarded her keenly.
“He has sassed me by holding this door, an’ I’m goin’ in to see his Ma.”
“Davie’s just right,” said the little doctor. He turned to give an approving smile to him still clinging
to the old latch.
“Jest right!” screamed Miss Jerusha, in a towering passion. “Do you know who I be? I’m Parson
Henderson’s sister.”
“Yes, I know,” said Doctor Fisher, “and I’m dreadfully sorry for the parson. I wish I could help him.
But as for David here, he’s got my permission to keep out anybody he wants to. Mrs. Pepper isn’t to
be worried by visitors.”
“I shall report you to the Parson,” said Miss Jerusha, getting off from the flat stone.
“Yes, do,” said Doctor Fisher, as she stalked down the path. Then he went into the little brown house
to battle for Joel’s life.
CHAPTER IV SUNLIGHT THROUGH THE CLOUD
CHAPTER IV SUNLIGHT THROUGH THE CLOUD

DEACON BLODGETT exclaimed, “’Tain’t no use, I can’t set myself to work on nothin’,” and then
leaned helplessly against the barn door.
Mrs. Blodgett sighed. She was far beyond words. At last she threw her apron over her head. When
she did that, the Deacon knew she was pretty far gone.
“Don’t, Ma,” he begged, “take on so. Hem!” He swallowed hard and smote one big hand across the
other. “’Twouldn’t be so bad ef I c’d jest see David a-runnin’ in to pile wood. Land! how smart that
boy works to try to take Joel’s place!”
“Don’t speak of Joel, Pa,” said Mrs. Blodgett in a muffled voice. “Mercy me, ef he sh’d die!”
“Joel ain’t a-goin’ to die,” declared Deacon Blodgett, stoutly, “don’t you think it, Ma.”
“I d’no,” Mrs. Blodgett shook her head till the apron flapped dismally. “No mortal man c’d do
more’n Doctor Fisher. Do look down th’ road, Pa, an’ see ef his gig is comin’.”
“Dr. Fisher won’t leave the little brown house to-day till Joel’s better,” declared the Deacon, not
moving; but his eyes roved anxiously up and down the thoroughfare.
“I wish you’d go over to Mis Pepper’s, an’ find out how Joel is,” Mrs. Blodgett’s voice came out in a
thin little quaver from behind the apron.
The Deacon braced up firmer yet against the barn door. Then he said, “You better go yourself,
Mother.”
“Mercy!” ejaculated his wife with a shiver, “I’m about sick as ’tis now, I couldn’t never face Mis
Pepper—O dear me!”
“Neither can I—an’ all is, I’m goin’ to work.” Deacon Blodgett brought himself suddenly away from
the barn door and strode off.
“Where you goin’, Pa?” Down fell Mrs. Blodgett’s apron from her head.
“Down to th’ east paster,” said the Deacon, not turning his head. “I can’t stand still no longer an’
think o’ nothin’ but that boy.”
“Well, I ain’t a-goin’ to stay to home,” declared Mrs. Blodgett. “Nobody to talk to but Mary Ann, an’
she keeps harpin’ on the Pepperses. I’ll go down an’ see Grandma Bascom.”
So she tied on her bonnet with trembling fingers and hurried off. When she left the main road and
struck the little lane that led down to Grandma’s house, she stopped abruptly. “O dear me! that’s
almost as bad as to go to Mis Pepper’s, for Mis Bascom’ll take on somethin’ dreadful. My! what’s
that in th’ bushes!”
A little crackling noise struck her ears, and one or two small branches stirred in the shrubbery
alongside the road. There wasn’t any wind to speak of, and Mrs. Blodgett paused in fright, her fingers
on her lips; but being no coward, she marched up and shook the nearest bush.
“We don’t want no tramps in Badgertown,” she began. Then she burst out, “Why, David Pepper!”
There on the ground, his face grubbing into the grass, lay David squirming back and forth, his little
hands clenched.
“You poor little creeter, you!” Mrs. Blodgett got down on the ground beside him, and fairly gathered
him up to her ample bosom. “You couldn’t cry in the little brown house, an’ so you’ve come out
here. Poor lamb!”
“Joel!” ’Twas all that Davie was capable of.
“There—there—now you jest stop!” Mrs. Blodgett spoke sharply, she was so scared, for the sobs
were shaking David from top to toe; but to stop was beyond him, so she laid him down on the grass.
“Now I’m jest goin’ to your house an’ see how things is, Davie. Then I’ll come back an’ tell you.”
She got up with difficulty and shook her calico gown free from the dirt and mold.
“Don’t—don’t!” screamed David, sitting up. “Oh, Mrs. Blodgett, don’t!”
“Yes, I’m goin’, Davie, an’ you better come along of me.” She held out her hand. “Your ma would
want you to.” “’Tain’t half so bad as to let him stay here an’ be scared to death in them bushes,” she
reflected.
“Would Mamsie want me to?” asked Davie, blinking at her through the tears that ran down his
cheeks.
“She certainly would,” declared Mrs. Blodgett. “O my!” she cried, pricking up her ears. “Well, you
wait here a minute. I’ll come back for you.”
She darted down the road, if such locomotion as she set up could be called darting, and presently she
saw just ahead Dr. Fisher’s old gig.
“Wait!” she tried to scream, but her tongue flapped up to the roof of her mouth and stuck there, as she
panted on.
A farmer’s boy in an old wagon coming around the corner thrust his fingers in his mouth and gave
such a whistle that the little doctor thrust out his head.
“Lady wants you—she’s a-runnin’ fit to split,” said the boy, pointing to the Deacon’s wife pounding
the dust up dreadfully at every step.
Dr. Fisher pulled up the old horse and hopped out of the gig.
“Good gracious, is that you, Mrs. Blodgett!” he exclaimed, hurrying to meet her.
The Deacon’s wife was beyond speech, only being able to puff, her hand at her side and her face very
red. So the little Doctor began the conversation.
“Do you know where David Pepper is?” he asked anxiously.
That made Mrs. Blodgett find her tongue. “He’s in them bushes,” she said, pointing a shaking finger
back down the road.
“Get in—get right in,” said Dr. Fisher joyfully, taking hold of her fat arm, and hurrying her to the
gig, “and we’ll get Davie—his mother’s awfully worried about him.”
Mrs. Blodgett had no chance to speak further until the gig was well under way for David’s bush. “He
don’t look as ef Joel was worse,” she said to herself, peering into the little Doctor’s face, “but I’m
mortal afraid to ask.”
“And now that Joel is going to get well,” said Doctor Fisher, “why we must get David home to his
mother.”
“Joel goin’ to git well,” screamed Mrs. Blodgett, nipping his arm, and turning her red face toward
him.
“Yes, indeed!” declared the little Doctor. “Praise God—Joel is saved to us all!” His face was very
grave, but there was a light in the eyes back of the big spectacles that made the Deacon’s wife say
brokenly, “Bless th’ Lord!”
“You may well say that,” said Dr. Fisher brokenly.
“An’ you too—I say bless you!” cried the Deacon’s wife heartily, “for I guess th’ Lord Himself can’t
do much ef folks won’t help, too. Well, here’s David in that bush there.”
Dr. Fisher pulled up the old horse sharply, tossed the reins over the dashboard and leaped out over
the wheel.
“Hulloa, David!” he cried, pushing back the branches. “Well—well!”
Davie shivered and shrank back further under the bush.
“Oh, Joey is going to get well,” said the little Doctor cheerily, poking his big spectacles in under the
branches.
David sprang up and threw his arms convulsively around the little Doctor’s neck.
“There—there—good gracious, you hug worse’n a bear, Dave,” cried Dr. Fisher, bundling him up in
his arms. “Now then, hop in with you!” He deposited him on the old leather seat, and jumped into the
gig beside him. “We must get you home to your mother before you can say Jack Robinson!”
If David’s legs had a hard time of it when Joel was so sick, it was nothing to the way they had to run
now that the dark cloud had passed over the little brown house.
Up and down the loft stairs where Joel tossed impatiently on the shake-down, Davie toiled to suit
Joel’s demands, who wanted something every minute. At last Mrs. Pepper interfered. “You mustn’t,
Joey,” she said; “Davie will be worn out.”
“I’ve been sick,” declared Joel, with an important air, “and Dave likes to get things.”
“Yes, I do,” said Davie eagerly, and lifting a pale face. “Do let me, Mamsie.”
“There, you see,” said Joel triumphantly.
“No,” said Mother Pepper, “you mustn’t send him over the stairs so much, Joey. He’s very tired.”
“I’m not much tired,” said David, wishing that Mamsie wouldn’t keep him from waiting on Joel.
“Yes, you are, Davie child. You’ve been mother’s boy all these weeks, and worked so hard.”
A pink flush crept all over David’s pale little face. He folded his hands, and stood quite still.
“I’m mother’s boy, too,” declared Joel, “ain’t I, Mamsie?” He rolled over in the shake-down, and
fastened his black eyes on her.
“Indeed you are,” declared Mrs. Pepper warmly, “both of you. But, Joel, I want you to remember
how hard Davie has worked all the time that Ben and you have been sick. You must never forget that,
Joey.”
“I won’t forget,” said Joel, “and I want to get up.” With that he gave his legs a fling, and ran his toes
out of bed.
“Oh, Joel,” cried Mother Pepper in alarm, “you mustn’t do that. It is the very worst thing that could
happen to a boy with the measles—to get his feet cold.” And she tucked him in again snug and tight.
“My toes are hot,” said Joel, wriggling worse than ever, and making the old comforter bulge up at the
side.
“I’ll sit on it, Mamsie, and hold it down,” said Davie, getting on the edge of the bed. “There.”
“Ow! No, you don’t,” declared Joel, bouncing up so suddenly that Davie slid off to the floor in a little
heap.
“Joel—Joel!” reproved Mother Pepper.
“Well, he was sitting all over my toes,” declared Joel, throwing his legs about, so that Mother Pepper
had to tuck him all up again.
“Can’t you pin him in, Mamsie?” asked Davie, picking himself up, to hover over the bed. “I will get
your big shawl-pin,” and he started for the stairs.
“Hoh! I ain’t going to be pinned in bed,” cried Joel in a dudgeon. “Mamsie, make him come back,”
he whimpered. “Don’t let him get the pin, I’ll be good.”
“See that you are then, Joel,” said Mrs. Pepper. “Come back, Davie,” as he was half-way over the
stairs. “Joel is going to be a good boy, and keep his feet in bed.”
“O dear,” grumbled Joel, flouncing all over the bed as David ran back, “I want Polly to come up and
tell me a story.”
“Polly can’t come now,” said Mrs. Pepper. There was a little white line around her mouth; she had
her back to the bed, so that Joel could not see her face.
“She never comes,” grumbled Joel. “Oh, I’m so hot. Why can’t she come, Mamsie?”
“Can’t I tell a story?” said David, coming close. “I will, Joey.”
“Phoh!” Joel bent his black eyes on him. “You can’t tell a story, Dave Pepper.”
“Now I think Davie could tell a story very nicely,” said Mother Pepper with a smile for David.
“I can try,” said Davie, his heart beating dreadfully at the mere thought. But something had to be
done to keep Joel from finding out that Polly’s eyes were so bad.
“All right,” said Joel ungraciously, “but I know it won’t be good for anything.”
“Now that’s very nice of you, Davie, and I know it will be a good story, Joel.” Mrs. Pepper gave a
final tuck-in to the old comforter, and went quickly down-stairs.
“Get up on the bed, Dave,” said Joel, beginning to feel better about the story, since Mamsie thought it
would be a good one. So David hopped on the foot of the shake-down and folded his hands, and
wondered how in the world he was ever going to begin.
“Well, begin,” said Joel impatiently.
“Well once,” said David, “there was—”
“Yes,” said Joel, “go on.”
“There was—”
“You said that before.”
“I know it. Well, there was—”
“Stop saying there was,” cried Joel crossly.
“But there really was,” insisted David, feeling sure that in another moment he should certainly jump
off from the bed, and fly over the stairs.
“Well, go on. Was what?” roared Joel, flinging back the comforter.
“Oh, you mustn’t do that,” cried David, sliding along on the bed, still feeling that he would rather do
the tucking up than to tackle the story. “Mamsie said you must keep the clothes up,” and he pulled
the comforter up around Joel’s neck.
“Go away,” cried Joel, “and you can’t tell a story any more than—than—an old hopper-toad.”
“I’m not a hopper-toad,” cried David, a little pink flush coming over his face.
“Yes, you are, Dave Pepper, a bad old hopper-toad,” insisted Joel vindictively, “and you don’t know
any story, you old hopper-toad, you!”
David’s face worked dreadfully. “I ain’t—and I won’t tell you any story.” He got off from the bed
and marched to the stairs.
“Oh, you must,” cried Joel in alarm. A bad story was better than none. “You promised, and you’ve
got to, or I’ll call Mamsie, and tell her.” He tossed off the old comforter again.
“Don’t call Mamsie,” cried Davie, hurrying back.
“All right,” said Joel. Then he snuggled down in the bed, and drew the long-suffering bed-clothes up
so that only his ears were sticking out. “Go on.”
“Well,” said David, climbing on the foot of the bed again and beginning very slowly, “Once there
was—”
“Don’t say that again,” commanded Joel, sticking up his face from the folds of the comforter.
“A boy,” said David hurriedly.
“How big was he?” asked Joel with faint interest. But it was just as well to get the age settled on in
the beginning.
“Oh, about as big as—” David hesitated.
“Have him as big as me,” said Joel, “and his arms as big,” he thrust out one, “and his legs just as
exactly as big,” and he stuck out his foot.
“Oh, get back, Joe,” cried David, frantically pushing up the bed-clothes.
“Well, go on,” said Joel, huddling down again.
“And this boy was going along one day—”
“What was the boy’s name?” asked Joel suddenly.
“I don’t know,” said David helplessly.
“Don’t know,” Joel gave another kick to the clothes, and snorted, “Hoh!—you’re a great one, Dave
Pepper, to tell a story about a boy and not know his name.”
“Well, it was—” David floundered helplessly, “Peter,” he brought out finally.
“All right,” said Joel, quite satisfied. “Now go on.”
“Well, one day, he was going to school.”
“Oh, don’t have him go to school,” whined Joel, dreadfully disappointed that a boy with such a
satisfying name as Peter should waste time over books. “Make him going to shoot something—Go—
Bang!” Joel threw up his arms, and screwed up one eye over an imaginary gun.
“All right, I will,” said David accommodatingly. “Well—but you must put in your arms, Joel.”
“Go on,” said Joel, huddling back in bed again, “go on, Dave.”
“Well, so Peter was going to school, and—”
“No—no,” interrupted Joel, “he was going out to shoot something; you said so, Dave.”
“So I did,” said Davie. “Well, Peter was going out to shoot something, and—”
“What was he going to shoot?” demanded Joel.
“I don’t know,” said Davie helplessly.
“O dear,” grumbled Joel, “you don’t know any story, and you won’t let Peter do anything,” and he
flounced all over the bed.
“Oh, I will—I will,” cried Davie in great distress. “I’ll let Peter shoot anything you want—I will
truly, Joel.”
“I’d rather have a bear,” said Joel, stopping his tossing about; “no, two bears. Make it two bears,
Dave,” he cried, very much excited.
“I will,” said David, thinking it just as easy to deal with two bears, as long as he didn’t know in the
least what to do with one. “Well, Peter was going to school—I mean out to shoot something, and he
went down the road—”
“With his gun over his shoulder,” interrupted Joel.
“Yes, with his gun over his shoulder, and—and then he turned down the corner.”
“Don’t have any corner,” said Joel, “he went right straight into the woods, slap bang!”
“Oh, yes,” said David, “he went into the woods, and—”
“And have the bear—no, the two bears, come right now this very minute.”
“Yes,” said David, “I will. Well, Peter went into the woods, and he saw a big tree, and—”
“Ow! Don’t have any tree,” howled Joel. “Make a big hole for the bears to live in.”
“I won’t have any tree,” said David.
“Peter heard an awful noise,” and Joel growled fiercely, “and all of a sudden—gee whiz! and Peter
looked up at a big pile of stones—no, let’s have it a cave, an awful big cave.”
“Yes, let’s,” said David, leaning forward in great delight from his post on the foot of the bed.
“Oh, such a big noise!” and Joel gave another growl, so much worse than the first that Davie gave a
little scream, and a delightful shiver ran up and down his small back, as Joel showed all his little
white teeth, “and Peter put up his gun, for the two bears were looking out of the cave just like this—”
Joel’s black eyes were simply dreadful, they were so big, and he bounced up to sit in the middle of
the bed.
“Oh, Joey,” exclaimed David in great distress, “do lie down. Mamsie won’t like it— Oh, Joey!”
“O dear!” Joel tumbled back. “I can’t shoot the bears lying down.”
“Well, you’ve got to,” said Davie, tucking him up again, “for Mamsie would feel dreadfully to have
you sit up. Now go on about the bears.”
“Well, the two bears—no, one bear, jumped out of the cave first, and Peter put up his gun, and Bang!
and over went the bear, and—”
“Oh, Joey!” cried Davie, in his post again on the foot of the shake-down, his blue eyes aflame, “did
Peter kill the bear?”
“Yes, of course,” said Joel, “just as dead as dead could be, and the other one, too—oh, no,” he cried
suddenly, “I’m going to have the other bear chew Peter.”
“Oh, no, Joel,” exclaimed David in horror. It was bad enough for a boy to be kept from school and
turned into the woods, without being chewed up by a bear. “Don’t let him, Joe,” he begged, clasping
his hands in great distress.
“Well, he won’t chew him all up,” said Joel unwillingly, “only his legs and—”
“Oh, don’t let the bear chew Peter’s legs,” cried David, leaning over close to Joel’s face; “then Peter
can’t run away.”
“I’m not going to have Peter run away,” declared Joel, bobbing his black head decidedly.
“Oh, yes, I will, too,” he cried joyfully, and clapping his hands. “I’ll have the bear chew him a little
on one leg, and then when Peter runs, the bear can chase him, and chew him on the other, and—”
“Joel,” exclaimed David, with very red cheeks, “I think that bear is a bad old bear, and I don’t like
him.”
“And then he can chew Peter all up, every teenty speck,” cried Joel, with sparkling eyes. “Yes sir!”
smacking his lips.
David tumbled quickly off from the bed, and made for the stairs. “I’m not going to stay here, if you
have Peter chewed up,” he declared, his blue eyes flashing.
“Dave, don’t go.” Up went Joel’s head from the pillow, “I won’t let him be chewed up. You can have
that bear for your own. Don’t go, Dave.”
“Can I have him for my very own?” asked David, drawing near the bed.
“Yes, you may,” promised Joel, swallowing hard, “if you’ll come back.”
“I sha’n’t let Peter be chewed up,” said Davie, clambering on to his old place on the bed once more,
“and I sha’n’t have him shoot the bear either.”
“What will you do?” cried Joel in great astonishment.
“I’m going to have the bear go right into his hole again; and Peter is going to school,” said David
with great decision.
“O dear me!” Joel rolled over in terrible disappointment.
“He’s my bear,” said David, “you gave him to me, and—”
“Well, Peter isn’t yours,” said Joel, interrupting. “I’m going to have Peter, so there!”
“You may have the bear, and I’ll take Peter,” said David eagerly.
“You may. I don’t want Peter—you won’t let him do anything,” said Joel. “I’d a great deal rather
have the bear,” he brought up in great satisfaction.
“Well, how nice that is, Davie, for you to tell Joel a story.” Mother Pepper coming up the stairs to the
loft, beamed approvingly at him.
David’s cheeks got very hot. “I didn’t tell the story,” he said, and his face fell.
“He had Peter,” said Joel quickly.
“Joel had two bears, and he told all about ’em,” said David; “I didn’t tell any story,” he said again in
a sorry little voice.
“And—and—he told about Peter, and he’s going to school,” Joel brought up with a wry face.
“Well, now,” said Mother Pepper, “I think that must have been a very good story, and how nice that
you two boys could tell it together.”
CHAPTER V ON THE MAYBURY ROAD
CHAPTER V ON THE MAYBURY ROAD
PHRONSIE crept up to the wood-pile and peered around it. “Are you sick, Davie?” she asked in a
soft little voice.
David jumped up, tossing the soft waves of light hair from his forehead. “I’m not sick a bit,” he said.
“What makes you cry then?” persisted Phronsie, picking up her pink calico dress to clamber over the
wood.
Davie turned his back and wiped his hot cheeks.
“I see some tears,” said Phronsie in a distressed little voice; and stumbling on over the wood, a big
stick slipped down against her toes.
David whirled around. “Don’t come!” he screamed, making frantic dives over the wood-pile. Away
went two or three sticks, carrying Phronsie with them.
It was all done in a minute, and he had her out from under them. When he saw the blood on her little
arm, his cheeks went very white, and his legs wobbled.
“I’ve got to get Mamsie,” he said, and rushed for the kitchen door.
“I’m going to get Mamsie,” wailed Phronsie after him.
David lent speed to his feet, and burst into the old kitchen where Polly was brushing up the floor.
“Phronsie’s hurt!” he screamed. “Do come, Polly. I’ve spilled wood all over her.” With that he
rushed into the bedroom. “Mamsie—why where—”
Polly dropped the broom and flew out of doors, Davie at her heels.
“I can’t find Mamsie,” he panted.
“No, she’s gone to Mrs. Blodgett’s,” Polly threw over her shoulder as she ran on. “Where is
Phronsie? Oh, Davie, where is she?”
“By the wood-pile,” gasped David, flying back of the shed.
But when they both got there, Phronsie was nowhere to be seen. To find Mamsie was her one
thought, and since she knew that Mother Pepper was helping Mrs. Blodgett, why of course the hurt
arm must get there as soon as possible. So she wiped up her tears on her small pink apron, and
trudged on past the lane that led to Grandma Bascom’s, and into the high road.
Polly and David pulled the wood about with frantic hands, Davie saying all the while, “She was here.
Oh, Polly, she was.”
“Now, David,” Polly seized his arm, “you must stop saying that for she can’t be under here. See,” she
pointed to the sticks of wood sprawling about.
“But she was here,” declared David, pawing wildly in and out among the sticks.
Polly darted off into the shed and hunted in each corner, calling Phronsie at every step. Then she ran
out to comfort David, and to keep up the search.
“I declare to goodness, John, ef here ain’t a little girl on th’ road!”
A woman in an old high farm wagon twitched her husband’s arm. “Do stop an’ take her in. My
sakes! ain’t she a mite, though!” pushing back her big sunbonnet in order to see the better.
But before the old white horse lumbered up to the mite, down went Phronsie in a small heap in the
middle of the dusty road.
“John—John!” screamed his wife. “Stop! You’re a-runnin’ over her!”
“Land o’ Goshen! ain’t I stoppin’?” roared her husband at her. The old horse almost sat down on his
tired haunches at the sudden twitch on the reins. Then the farmer leaned forward and stared ahead
down the road.
“Ef you ain’t goin’ to git out an’ pick up that child, I am, John Brown. Sech a mortal slow man I
never see,” snorted his wife scornfully.
“An’ sech a flutter-budget as you be, no man ever saw,” Mr. Brown found time to say as he got
slowly down over the wheel.
“Somebody’s got to flutter-budget in this world,” said his wife after him, as he walked slowly over to
the small pink heap, “or everybody’d go to sleep. Bring her to me, John.— Oh, do hurry! Bring her to
me!”
“I want Mamsie,” said Phronsie, as Mr. Brown leaned over her.
“Hey?” said the farmer, bringing his rough face with its stubby beard close to her little one.
“I’m going to my Mamsie,” said Phronsie, her blue eyes searching his face, “and my foots are tired.”
With that she put up her arms.
“I’ll be blowed!” exclaimed Mr. Brown. Then he saw the little blood-stained arm and he started back.
“Take me,” said Phronsie, as she clutched his shaggy coat, “please, to my Mamsie.”
“Where’d you git hurt?” asked Mr. Brown, with no eyes for anything but the small arm with its
bloody streak.
Phronsie looked down and surveyed it gravely. “My Mamsie will make it well,” she said confidently.
“John—John!” screamed his wife, from the high wagon, “are you goin’ to stay all day with that child
in th’ middle of the road, or do you want me to come an’ look after her?”
“You stay where you be, Nancy,” said Mr. Brown. “I don’t know no more’n th’ last one,” this to
Phronsie, “where ’tis you want to go to. But I’ll take you there, all th’ same. Now, says I, hold tight,
little un.”
“I will,” said Phronsie in a satisfied little voice, putting her arms around his neck. So he bundled her
up in his great arms and marched to the high wagon.
“Give her to me,” cried his wife, hungrily extending her hands.
“I wouldn’t ef I didn’t have to drive,” said Mr. Brown, as he clumsily set Phronsie on the broad lap.
“She’s hurt her arm. Be careful, Mother,” as he got into the wagon and began to drive off.
“My soul an’ body!” exclaimed Mrs. Brown, pausing in the hugging process now set up, to regard
the little bloody arm. “Oh, how’d you get that?”
“I’m going to my mamsie,” announced Phronsie joyfully, and ignoring the injured arm. Then she
laughed, showing all her little teeth, and snuggled against Mrs. Brown’s big shawl.
“Ain’t she too cunnin’ for anythin’!” exclaimed Mrs. Brown. “Did you ever see th’ like? But how’d
you git hurt?” she demanded, turning to Phronsie again.
“It was the wood,” said Phronsie, gravely regarding her arm again. “And I’m going to Mamsie.”
“She keeps a-sayin’ that,” said Mr. Brown. “Now, how in thunder will we know where to take her?”
“Don’t swear,” said his wife.
“‘Thunder’ ain’t swearin’,” retorted Mr. Brown with a virtuous air. “I c’d say lots worse things.”
“Well, git out and say ’em in th’ road, then,” advised his wife, “an’ not before this child. Where’d
you say you was a-goin’?” She bent her large face over the small one snuggled against her ample
bosom.
“To my Mamsie,” said Phronsie, so glad that at last she was understood.
The wrinkles in Farmer Brown’s face ran clear down to his stubby beard, as he slapped one hard
hand on his knee.
“Oh, yes—yes,” said his wife, nodding her big sunbonnet.
“Don’t pretend you understand her, Mother,” Mr. Brown turned to his wife, “for you don’t—neither
of us do, no more’n th’ dead.”
“You let me be, John,” said Mrs. Brown, “an’ I’ll attend to this child.”
Farmer Brown whistled and looked off up to the clouds; perhaps something might come down to
illuminate the situation.
“Now, where is Mum—Mam—whatever you said?” began Mrs. Brown, patting Phronsie’s yellow
hair with a large red hand.
“Off there.” Phronsie pointed a small finger off into space.
“I see,” said Mrs. Brown, nodding her sunbonnet again. The puckers were beginning to come in her
face. Mr. Brown, taking his gaze off from the clouds, looked at her and grinned.
“Well, now let’s see,” said Mrs. Brown reflectively, and with a cold shoulder for the farmer;
“Mamsie—”
“Yes.” Phronsie gave another little laugh and wriggled her feet. It was so lovely that they understood
her; and she was really on the way to her Mamsie.
“Let’s see—now what road did you say you want to go to git to this—Mamsie?” began the farmer’s
wife, smiling encouragingly at her.
“Why, don’t you know?” Phronsie lifted her head suddenly to gaze into Mrs. Brown’s face. “Off
there.” Again she pointed to space.
“You keep still.” Mrs. Brown thrust her elbow into the farmer’s side, as she saw his mouth open.
“You’re more care than th’ child. I’ll find out—you keep still!”
“Hem!” said Mr. Brown loudly.
“And please have us get to Mamsie soon,” begged Phronsie, beginning to look worried.
“Yes—yes,” Mrs. Brown promised quickly. “Well, now let’s see—how does Mamsie look?” she
began.
“Why, she’s my Mamsie, and—”
“She?” screamed the farmer’s wife. “Oh, my soul an’ body! I thought ’twas a house.”
“Thunder!” ejaculated Mr. Brown; “now we’re in a fix, ef it’s a woman. Th’ Lord knows how we’ll
ever find her.”
“Where’d you come from?” Mrs. Brown now found it impossible to keep the anxiety from running
all up and down her big face. Phronsie put up her trembling little lips and pointed off, still into space.
“John,” his wife burst out, “we are in a fix, an’ that’s th’ solemn truth.”
The farmer took off his old cap and scratched his head. “Well, anyway, we’ve got th’ little gal, an’
you’ve always wanted one, Nancy.”
“Ef we can only keep her.” Mrs. Brown hugged Phronsie hungrily to her breast. “Oh, my little lamb!”
she kept saying.
“I want my Mamsie!” said Phronsie, nearly smothered. “Please take me to my Mamsie!” and she
struggled to get free.
“Don’t you want to go to a nice house?” began the farmer’s wife in a wheedling way, as she set her
upon her knees.
“There—there.” Mr. Brown whipped out a big red handkerchief and wiped off the tears from the little
face. “Ma, she’s a-cryin’,” he announced in an awful voice.
“There are chickens,” said Mrs. Brown desperately, “and—”
“Are there little chickies?” asked Phronsie, as Mr. Brown gave her face another dab with the big
handkerchief.
“Yes—yes, awful little ones,” cried Mrs. Brown; “just as little as anythin’, an’ yellow an’ white an’
fluffy.”
Phronsie clapped her hands and smiled between her tears.
“An’ there’s pigs, little ones,” broke in the farmer, to hold all advantage gained, “an’ you can scratch
their backs.”
Phronsie tore off her thoughts from the little chickens, yellow and white and fluffy, to regard the
farmer. “Ooh! I want to see the little pigs,” she cried, leaning over to look into Mr. Brown’s face,
“and I’m going to scratch their backs right off.”
“So you shall—so you shall,” he cried, “when you get to my house.”
Phronsie’s lip fell suddenly, and she flew back to Mrs. Brown’s arms. “I want to go to the little brown
house,” she wailed, casting herself up against the kind breast.
“John, can’t you let well enough alone?” scolded his wife. “She was took with the chickens. There,
there, child, don’t cry.”
“She liked my pigs best,” said the farmer sullenly. “G’long there!” slapping the leather reins down
smartly on the back of the old white horse.
“I want to go to the little brown house,” Phronsie wailed steadily on.
“Well, that’s where you’re goin’,” said the farmer. He turned suddenly. “That’s jest where we’re a-
takin’ you to, the Brown house.”
“Are you?” cried Phronsie, her wails stopping suddenly.
“Sure,” said Mr. Brown decidedly. “Now, Ma, we’ll take her home with us. We’ll inquire all along
th’ road ef anybody knows who she is,” he said in a low voice over Phronsie’s head. “She’ll be all
right when she sees them pigs an’ chickens.”
“An’ ef we can’t find where she b’longs, why, we’ll adopt her, an’ she’ll be ours,” finished his wife,
all in a tremble. “Oh, you sweet lamb, you!” She kissed Phronsie’s yellow head.
Phronsie, quite contented now that she was on the way to the little brown house where Polly was and
Mamsie would soon come, presently began to hum in a happy little voice, and the old white horse
and big high wagon went jogging on over a short cross-road leading to Maybury, where the farmer
and his good wife lived.
Meantime Polly and Davie were having a perfectly dreadful time searching everywhere, even turning
an old barrel, afraid that Phronsie had pulled it over on herself, and scouring every inch of the ground
around the little brown house. Then Davie dashed off at top speed, down over the lane leading to
Grandma Bascom’s, sure of finding Phronsie there.
But Grandma, feeding her hens from a tin pan of potato and apple parings, shook her cap hard when
Davie stood on his tiptoes and screamed into her ear all about Phronsie.
“Oh, the pretty creeter!” she mourned, and the pan in her hands shook so that it fell to the ground,
and the hens clattered around and scratched and fought till every bit of the potato and apple skins was
gobbled up.
Davie rushed off from the tangle of hens about Grandma’s feet, with only one thought—to get to
Deacon Blodgett’s as fast as he could. And flying down the lane, he ran into the main road, just after
the old white horse and big high wagon had turned the corner leading to Maybury, carrying Phronsie
off to the Brown house.
“Whoa—there—Great Saint Peter!” shouted somebody at him. Davie was so blind with the drops of
perspiration running down his face that he couldn’t see, and besides, by that time his small legs were
so used to running that they kept on, even after the young man in the top buggy had pulled up in
astonishment.
“Ain’t you ever goin’ to stop?” roared the young man, leaning out of the buggy and staring at him.
“I can’t,” panted Davie, pausing a moment.
“What’s th’ matter? Goin’ for th’ doctor?”
“I’m goin’ for Mamsie,” said Davie, rushing on.
“Hold on! Who you’re goin’ for?” roared the young man.
“Mamsie,” panted Davie, whirling around.
“I d’no what in th’ blazes that is,” the young man took off his cap and scratched his head. “Well,
what are you goin’ for, lickety-split like that! Come here, you boy!”
Davie came slowly up to the side of the buggy. Somehow a note of hope began to sing in his small
heart that maybe the young man might help.
“I let my sister get wood spilled all over her,” he said, his face working dreadfully, “and she’s lost,
an’ I’m going to Mamsie.”
“I can’t make head nor tail of it at all,” said the young man. Then he put on his cap, since scratching
his head did no good. “Well, your sister’s lost, you say?”
“Yes,” said Davie, hanging to the wheel. “Oh, have you seen her, Mr. Man? She had on a pink dress
—”
“Hey? Oh, thunder an’ lightnin’!” he slapped his knee, with a red hand, “was she a little gal?”
“Yes—yes,” cried Davie, with wide blue eyes. “Oh, have you seen her, Mr. Man?”
“I think likely,” said the young man, bending over till his face nearly touched Davie’s hot cheek, “an’
then again, mebbe I hain’t. I’ve seen a little gal in a pink dress, but she may not be your sister. How
big was she?”
Davie released his clutch on the wheel, to bend down and measure where Phronsie’s head would
come if she stood there in the road before him, the young man leaning out to critically watch the
proceeding.
“I b’lieve as sure as shootin’, that’s th’ little gal.” Then he whistled and slapped his knee again.
“Oh, Mr. Man, help me to find her!” Davie grasped the wheel once more and held on for dear life.
“Well, I can’t as long as you hang on to that ’ere wheel,” said the young man. “Now you hop in, and
I’ll catch up with that young one in three shakes of a lamb’s tail.”
Over the wheel went Davie, to sink down in a small heap on the old leather seat.
“Yes, sir—ee!” declared the young man again. “I seen her in Mis Brown’s lap as sure as shootin’. It’s
lucky she’s fell in such good hands. Well, I’ll catch up with that old white plug of a horse. G’lang!”
He whipped up, passing the turn in the road where Phronsie was being carried off in the high wagon
on the “short cut” to the Brown house in Maybury.
CHAPTER VI BACK TO MAMSIE
CHAPTER VI BACK TO MAMSIE
“TH’ beef’s biled ’mos’ to nothin’,” said Mrs. Brown, sticking a long iron fork into the pot of corned
beef, surrounded by bubbling heaps of cabbage. She had thrown off her sunbonnet on the old sofa in
the sitting-room, and hurried into the bedroom where she had deposited Phronsie, fast asleep, on the
gay patched bedquilt.
“There, you sweet lamb, you!” Then she hurried out to see about the belated dinner.
“John,” she called, as she ran out to the barn, “come, dinner’s ready.”
Farmer Brown turned as he was leading the old white horse to his stall. “Is she awake?” pointing with
his thumb to the house.
“No,” Mrs. Brown sped back to the kitchen.
“What’ll we do with that little gal?” the farmer’s face puckered all up with dismay as he reflected:
“Nobody on th’ road knows th’ fust thing about her, an’ I s’pose her Ma’s cryin’ her eyes out.” He
slouched up to the kitchen door.
“I thought you was never comin’”; his wife set the big blue platter with the corned beef and its
generous fringe of cabbage on the table; then down went the dish of potatoes and the loaf of bread.
“Th’ beef’s all biled to pieces,” she said, getting into her chair.
“What beats me,” said Mr. Brown, sitting down heavily, and taking up the horn-handled carving
knife and fork, “is, what are we to do with her.” He pointed with carving knife to the bedroom.
“I d’no,” said his wife; “do help out that beef. It’s all biled to death,” passing her plate.
“It will eat just as good,” said the farmer, cutting off a scraggy strip, and dishing up a generous
spoonful of cabbage to go with it to the waiting plate. “Well, Nancy, I’m beat to know what we’re
goin’ to do with her.”
“Do stop talkin’ about her,” cried his wife. “She’s asleep now. And I’m as nervous as a witch.”
“I s’pose we might as well eat,” said the farmer, helping himself liberally. “Mebbe we can decide
what to do better after we have eat.”
“I can’t think why I didn’t set that pot clear back on the stove,” said Mrs. Brown in vexation. “I
might ’a’ known ’twould bile too fast when we went to Badgertown. I didn’t s’pose we’d be gone so
long.”
“Well, ef we’d got home sooner we wouldn’t ’a’ come up with the little gal,” observed the farmer
philosophically, while his portion of beef and cabbage was going rapidly to its last resting-place.
“What good will it do that we found her?” said his wife discontentedly. “We’ve got to give her up.”
“Well, I s’pose so,” said Mr. Brown slowly. “Hem! Ain’t I ever goin’ to have no tea?” he asked in an
injured voice, looking hard across at his wife.
“Oh, mercy!” Mrs. Brown hopped out of her chair. “I don’t wonder that I forgot th’ teapot. Th’ Angel
Gabriel couldn’t never remember anythin’ on sech a mornin’ as we’ve had!” She whipped her
husband’s big blue cup off from the dresser, bringing it back full and steaming hot.
“I guess th’ Angel Gabriel hain’t ever had much to do with tea,” said Mr. Brown, putting in a good
spoonful of brown sugar, and all the cream that would get safely into the cup; “he’s got enough to do
a-blowin’ that horn o’ his’n. Well, don’t worry, Ma. Do set down an’ take it easy. Th’ little gal hain’t
got to go yet.”
“But we’ve got to start after dinner about it.” Mrs. Brown played nervously with her knife and fork.
Then she threw them down on her plate, jumped up and turned her back on the farmer, dinner and all.
“My soul an’ body!” cried Mr. Brown, his knife half-way to his mouth. He stopped to stare aghast at
her. “You hain’t never acted like this, Nancy.”
“Well, I hain’t never had nothin’ like this to set me goin’,” said Nancy, her voice trembling. “To
think that child should ’a’ sprung up to-day, an’ I’ve always wanted a little gal—”
Farmer Brown shook all over. Down fell the knife to the kitchen floor. He glared all around the big
kitchen as if somehow that were to blame. Then he cleared his throat two or three times. “P’raps
they’ll let us keep her, Nancy,” he managed to get out at last.
But Nancy, sobbing in her apron, was beyond the sound of comfort.
“You know as well as you set in that chair that they won’t,” she sobbed. “O dear, why did we find her
—and I want a little gal so!”
“Hush!—somebody’s comin’,” warned the farmer. Round the corner of the house came two figures,
and pretty soon “Rap—Rap!” on the old door.
“Set down, Nancy!” cried her husband; “for goodness sake, all Maybury will think you an’ me’s ben
quarreling!”
“They couldn’t think that, John,” cried Mrs. Brown in dismay, and hurried back to the dinner table.
“When they see you a-cryin’, you can’t tell what they’d think,” said the farmer grimly, and taking his
time about opening the door.
“I ain’t cryin’,” said his wife, wiping all traces of the tears from her large face, and sitting very
straight in her chair, as she got her company face on.
“Oh!” Mr. Brown flung wide the big door. “How do, Hubbard.” Then his eye fell on a very small boy
with big blue eyes, who was crowding up anxiously, and, not waiting to be invited, was already in the
kitchen and staring around.
“You must ’xcuse him,” said Young Hubbard, “he’s lost his sister.”
The farmer’s wife jumped out of her chair, and seized the boy’s arm. “We’ve got her,” she said;
“don’t look so; she’s all safe here.”
“I must take her to Mamsie,” said Davie, lifting his white face.
“Yes—yes,” said Mrs. Brown, while the old farmer and the young one stood by silently. “You come
in here, an’ see for yourself how safe she is.”
Davie rushed into the bedroom and gave one bound over to the big bed. Phronsie was just getting up
to the middle of it, and wiping her eyes. When she saw Davie she gave a little crow of delight. “I’m
going to Mamsie,” she announced, as she threw her arms around him.
“Yes,” said Davie, staggering off with her to the kitchen.
“You’re goin’ to have your dinner first,” said the farmer’s wife in alarm. “Gracious me—th’ very
idea of goin’ without a bite,” she added, bustling about for more dishes and knives and forks.
“We can’t,” said Davie, struggling along to the door. “I must get her to Mamsie.”
“Young man,” roared Farmer Brown at him. “You set down to that table. Now, Ma, dish up some hot
meat an’ taters.”
“And a glass of milk,” said Mrs. Brown, hurrying into the pantry.
“I want some milk,” cried Phronsie, hungrily stretching out her arms. So before David hardly knew
how, there she was sitting on the big family Bible that Mr. Brown placed on one of the chairs, before
the dinner table. When she saw it was really and truly milk with a frothy top, she was quite overcome
and sat looking at it.
“Drink it, little gal,” said Farmer Brown, with a hand on her yellow hair.
Phronsie laughed a pleased little gurgle, and set her small teeth on the edge of the mug, drinking as
fast as she could.
“Hulloa—hold up a bit,” said the farmer, with a big hand on her arm. Phronsie’s blue eyes over the
cup-edge turned on him inquiringly. “Go slower, little gal.” Mr. Brown took the mug and set it on the
table. “Th’ milk will wait for you.”
“It is nice,” said Phronsie, beaming delightedly at him.
“So ’tis,” said the farmer, wiping off the milk streaks from her face. “An’ you shall have th’ rest by
an’ by.”
“Shall I?” asked Phronsie, looking at the mug affectionately.
“Sure,” declared Mr. Brown.
Meantime the farmer’s wife was having a perfectly dreadful time with David, who stood impatiently
off by the door, his hand on the latch.
“For mercy’s sakes!” she exclaimed, “do you set down an’ eat dinner, Jed,” to the young farmer, “an’
p’raps th’ boy will listen to reason an’ eat some too.”
“Now see here, young man,” Farmer Brown stalked over to David, as Jed Hubbard, nothing loath,
slipped into his chair to tackle the corned beef and cabbage, “how d’ye s’pose you’re goin’ to git that
little gal to your Ma—hey?”
“I’m going to carry her,” said David, “and we must go.” He clasped his hands and turned a pleading
face up to the farmer.
“You carry her?” repeated the farmer.
“Hoh—Hoh!” he threw back his head and laughed.
“Don’t laugh at him, Pa,” begged Mrs. Brown, piling on more food to Farmer Hubbard’s plate; “he’s
awful distressed,” as Davie begged, “Do let us go—Mamsie will—”
“You’re a-goin’,” Mr. Brown interrupted; “I shall take you an’ th’ leetle gal in th’ wagon, as soon as
you’ve et somethin’.”
“Will you really take us to Mamsie?” cried Davie, the color coming quickly into his white cheeks.
“Sure,” promised the farmer heartily, as David flew into the chair that Mrs. Brown had dragged up to
the table.
“Now get him a good plateful, Ma,” said the farmer, getting into his own chair. “Land—I hain’t
worked so hard for many a day— Whew!”
But although David had a “good plateful” before him, it was impossible for him to eat to the
satisfaction of the good people, as he turned anxious eyes upon Farmer Brown and then to the door.
“I don’t b’lieve he’ll swaller enough to keep a crow alive,” said Mrs. Brown in dismay.
“Pa, wouldn’t it be best to do up some vittles in a paper, an’ he can eat on the way.”
“I’ve come to the conclusion it would,” said her husband grimly.
“An’ I’ll put in some cookies for th’ little gal,” said his wife, darting into the pantry to the big stone
jar.
“An’ I’ll harness up,” said Mr. Brown, going to the big door.
The young farmer looked up from his dinner. “You better take my horse, Mr. Brown,” he said.
“Kin you spare her?”
“Yes—an’ take th’ buggy too. You can have it all as easy as anything. You an’ me are such close
neighbors, I can come over an’ git it to-night.”
“Now that’s real kind,” said Farmer Brown, going out.
“Th’ buggy?” repeated Mrs. Brown, coming out of the pantry with the bundle of cookies. “Well, I’m
goin’, too, Jed. I don’t b’lieve there’s room for us all to set comfortable.”
Jedediah looked her all over. “’Twill be a close fit, maybe, but the wagon’s so heavy. Must you go,
Mis Brown?”
“Jedediah Hubbard,” Mrs. Brown set down the cookies on the table, and looked at him hard. “I ain’t
a-goin’ to give up that little gal a minute sooner’n I’ve got to,” she said decidedly. “An’ I’m goin’ to
see her Ma.”
“All right, Mrs. Brown,” and Jedediah returned to his dinner.
But when the starting off arrived, there was a pretty bad time—Farmer Brown protesting there wasn’t
“enough room to squeeze a cat in.” Mrs. Brown ended the matter by saying “There ain’t goin’ to be
no cat,” and getting in she established herself, Phronsie on her lap, on one half of the leather seat of
the top buggy.
“Where’s the boy goin’ to set?” demanded her husband, looking at her.
“I d’no about that,” said his wife, wrapping her shawl carefully around Phronsie. “Yes, you can carry
the cookies, child. Men folks must look out for themselves,” she said coolly.
“It’s all very well for you to set there an’ tell me that,” said Farmer Brown in a disgruntled way, as he
got in over the wheel, “but then, you’re a woman.”
“Yes, I’m a woman,” said Mrs. Brown composedly. “Oh, th’ boy can set on a stool in front. Jed, just
bring out that little cricket from th’ settin’-room, will you?”
David, with the paper bag containing slices of corned beef between pieces of bread, not caring where
he sat so long as he was on the way with Phronsie to Mamsie, settled down on the cricket that young
Mr. Hubbard brought. Then he looked up into the young farmer’s face. “Good-by,” he said, “and
thank you for bringing me here.”
“Oh, good-by, youngster,” said Jedediah, wringing a hand that tingled most of the way home. “Well,
I hope to run across you again some time. If you ever lose your sister, you just call on me.”
“We aren’t ever going to lose Phronsie,” declared David, bobbing his head solemnly, as the top
buggy and the young farmer’s horse moved off.
Mrs. Brown didn’t utter a word all the way to Badgertown except “How d’ye s’pose Jedediah ever
found that we had the little gal?”
“Let Jed Hubbard alone for findin’ out anythin’,” said Farmer Brown. He was so occupied in gazing
at Phronsie, carefully eating around the edge of each cooky before enjoying the whole of it, that the
smart young horse went pretty much as he pleased. Finally Mr. Brown looked down at Davie on his
cricket.
“Ain’t you ever goin’ to eat your dinner, young man?” he said. “Ef you don’t we’ll turn an’ go back
again,” he added severely.
“Oh, I will—I will,” cried Davie, who had forgotten all about his dinner in his efforts to measure the
distance being overcome on the way home to Mamsie. And he unrolled the paper bundle.
When it was all exposed to view, the corned beef smelt so good that he set his teeth in it, and gave a
sigh of delight.
Farmer Brown winked across to his wife over Davie’s head and presently the bread, and even a cold
potato well sprinkled with salt, disappeared, and only the empty paper lay in Davie’s lap.
“Throw it out in th’ road,” said Farmer Brown, well satisfied that the dinner was at last where it
should be.
“Oh, no, no,” said David, holding the paper fast.
“’Tain’t no good—throw it out, boy.”
“Mamsie wouldn’t like me to throw papers in the road. It scares horses.”
“Sho—now!” Farmer Brown pushed up his cap and scratched his head. “I guess your Ma’s all right,”
at last he said.
When the little brown house popped into view, David flew around on his cricket excitedly. “There
’tis—it’s there!”
“I see it,” said Farmer Brown. “Set still—we’ll be there in a minute.”
“It’s my little brown house,” cried Phronsie, trying to slip out from Mrs. Brown’s lap.
“Oh, you lamb—do wait. Little gal, we’ll take you there in a minute. Set still, child.”
“And I see Mamsie—oh, I want my Mamsie!” cried Phronsie, struggling worse than ever, her little
legs flying in her efforts to be free.
David stood straight, his head knocking the buggy top. “Polly, we’re coming!” he shouted.
“Hold on—don’t you jump!” roared the farmer, catching his jacket, as Polly dashed up to the buggy
and ran along by its side, the brown waves of hair flying over her face.
“Mamsie!” called Phronsie, leaning as far as she could from Mrs. Brown’s lap, “see my arm,” as Mrs.
Pepper drew near, and she held it up with its bandage soaked in opodeldoc that the farmer’s wife had
tied on.
“Whoa!” Farmer Brown brought the Hubbard horse up with a smart jerk. “You might as well git out
here,” he said, “for I’ll never keep you two in this buggy till we git to th’ house.”
“I never can thank you,” Mother Pepper was saying, as the farmer’s wife got heavily out of the
buggy, “for all your goodness.”
Mrs. Brown’s mouth worked and she tried to speak. “I wish—” she looked off to the little brown
house, but she couldn’t finish what she had been composing all the way along—“you’d let me have
this little gal for a while, anyway; you’ve got so many children; and I haven’t got one.” So she only
kept on wobbling her lips and twisting her hands.
“Hem!” Farmer Brown cleared his throat. “I’ll come over an’ git them two,” pointing a rugged
forefinger in the direction of Davie and Phronsie, “ef you’ll let ’em come over an’ pass th’ day with
us some time.”
“He’s got chickies,” said Phronsie, raising her head from Mrs. Pepper’s arms.
“And pigs,” said Farmer Brown, “little uns—don’t you forgit them.”
“And dear sweet little pigs—oh, Mamsie, and I am going to scratch their backs.”
“An’,” Farmer Brown whirled around on David, “this young man’s comin’, sure! He’s a right smart
boy, an’ I’ve took a fancy to him.”
“They shall go,” said Mrs. Pepper, with a bright smile. “And Phronsie will never forget you, dear
Mrs. —”
“Brown,” said the farmer promptly, seeing his wife couldn’t speak.
“No, she will never forget you, dear Mrs. Brown.” Mother Pepper got hold of the big hand, twisting
its mate.
The farmer’s wife clutched it. “You see I always wanted a little gal,” she whispered close to Mrs.
Pepper’s ear.
Then Mother Pepper did a thing the children had never seen before. She leaned forward and kissed
the large face.
“We must be goin’,” declared Farmer Brown, whipping out his big red handkerchief to blow his nose
loudly. “Hem! Come, Ma.”
“Did Mamsie cry when we didn’t come home?” asked David anxiously, as they all filed off toward
the little brown house.
“No. Oh, I’m so sorry you worried, Davie,” cried Polly. “You see I ran down to Deacon Blodgett’s to
tell Mamsie, and Mr. Atkins saw me go by, and he called out that a Mr. Hubbard had you in that very
buggy you came home in.”
“Yes, he did,” said David.
“And he said he knew you were going after Phronsie.”
“Yes, we did,” said David.
“And then he told us that a man in the store said that some folks over at Maybury—real good folks,
had Phronsie in their wagon, and—”
“Yes,” said David, “they did.”
“So we knew everything was all right,” Polly ran on gayly, “and Mamsie said all we had to do was to
wait patiently, and not stir Ben and Joel up where they were at work in Deacon Blodgett’s south
meadow, so—”
“Polly,” cried Davie excitedly, as they ran into the little brown house, “I like that big Mr. Brown very
much indeed.”
CHAPTER VII “GOOD-BY, CHILDREN”
CHAPTER VII “GOOD-BY, CHILDREN”
“I MUSTN’T cry again,” said David to himself the next morning. He stopped a minute picking up the
chips, before he threw them into the old basket. “Maybe I’ll get to school some time and learn
things.”
Then he threw the chips into the basket until it was full enough to empty into the wood-box behind
the old stove in the kitchen.
“Mamsie,” cried Joel, rushing in at dinner-time, “’twasn’t any fun piling wood at Deacon Blodgett’s
without Dave.”
“Davie can’t pile wood to-day, Joel,” said Mrs. Pepper, “he had such a hard time yesterday going
after Phronsie.” She glanced over at him affectionately, as she went into the pantry for the cold
potatoes to fry.
David began eagerly, “Oh, Mamsie—” then he stopped when he saw her face.
“O dear,” grumbled Joel. “It’s awful hard work piling wood without Dave. Isn’t dinner ready?” he
asked, impatiently.
“It will be in a few minutes,” said Mrs. Pepper, slicing the potatoes over by the table. “See, Joey, I’m
going to give you fried potatoes to-day.”
“Oh, goody!” exclaimed Joel, rushing over to the table and smacking his lips. “See, Dave, fried
potatoes!”
David tried to smile as he turned off.
“And I shall fry them brown,” said Mrs. Pepper, cutting the last potato into thin strips.
“She’s going to fry ’em brown,” announced Joel in great excitement, and running over to pull
David’s jacket, “real crispy brown, so they’ll crack in your teeth. Won’t you, Mamsie,—really crispy,
cracksy brown,” deserting David to rush over to the table again.
“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, smiling at him, as she went over to the stove to set on the frying-pan.
“Where’s Ben? It’s time that he was here.”
“I forgot,” said Joel, a flush spreading over his round cheeks; “Deacon Blodgett said Ben wouldn’t
come home.”
Mother Pepper paused with the frying-pan in her hand. “Did Deacon Blodgett say why?”
“They’re going to take something to eat in a basket,” said Joel, beginning to look very injured, “and
they wouldn’t take me. They told me to run home and tell you.”
“Oh, Joey, and you forgot a message,” said Mrs. Pepper reprovingly.
“I didn’t mean to,” said Joel, hanging his head.
“Didn’t mean to, doesn’t excuse such a thing,” said Mrs. Pepper. Then she set the frying-pan at the
back of the stove and stood quite still.
“Mamsie—I didn’t,” cried Joel, running over to hide his head in her gown, “I truly didn’t,” he
howled.
“No, he didn’t mean to,” echoed David, drawing near in great distress.
“I know, Davie,” said Mrs. Pepper, stroking Joel’s stubby black hair as he burrowed in her gown,
“but it is a very bad thing to forget a message.”
“I won’t ever do it again,” whimpered Joel, his brown hands holding fast to her gown.
“I hope not, Joel.” Then she glanced over at the thin slices in the dish on the table. “Ben does like
fried potatoes so much! That’s the reason I was going to have them to-day.”
“He can have mine,” said Joel, twitching his head away from Mother Pepper’s gown, and not looking
at the potato-dish, for his mouth watered dreadfully.
“And give him mine,” said Davie, hurrying over to Mrs. Pepper.
“No, children, there is enough for all, and I will fry some for Ben at another time. Run down and see
if Polly and Phronsie are coming from the store.”
“O dear, my legs are tired,” said Joel crossly, and tumbling on the kitchen floor, he waved them in the
air.
“I’ll go—I’ll go,” said Davie, running to get his cap.
“No,” said Mother Pepper. “You are not to go, Davie.”
“Dave wants to go,” said Joel, rolling over to look at her with his black eyes.
“Davie is very tired since yesterday,” said Mrs. Pepper. “Get up, Joel, and go to the gate at once.”
“Polly’s always late,” grumbled Joel, getting up to his feet.
“Polly is never late,” said David stoutly. “She’s always and ever here,” and his face got very red.
“There—there, boys,” said Mrs. Pepper. “Run along, Joel.”
“Mamsie,” David ran over to her, as the big green door banged, “I’m not tired. Please let me help
about things.”
“You must be tired, Davie,” Mrs. Pepper beamed affectionately at him, “and it won’t do for you to
run your legs off for I depend so much on you.”
David looked down at his legs. Then he straightened up. “Do you really depend on me, Mamsie?”
and the color ran all over his little cheeks.
“Indeed I do,” said Mother Pepper heartily. Then she glanced up at the clock. “Polly and Phronsie
ought to be here.”
“They’re coming,” shouted Davie gleefully, and rushing to the big green door, he swung it wide. In
jumped Joel, swinging the molasses jug, and after him Polly and Phronsie.
“Whoop!” screamed Joel, “isn’t dinner ready? We’re going to have fried potatoes,” he announced to
Polly.
“Fried potatoes!” exclaimed Polly in astonishment. Then she ran over to the old stove. “Oh, Mamsie,
fried potatoes!” wrinkling up her nose at the sizzling in the old frying-pan.
“I like it,” said Phronsie, clutching a little paper bag; “let me smell it, Polly, do!” standing on her
tiptoes.
“I thought Ben was coming home to dinner, and he does so like fried potatoes,” said Mrs. Pepper in a
low voice, as she turned the slices.
“Isn’t Ben coming to dinner?” asked Polly.
“No—hush, Polly!” with a glance over at Joel, coming out from the pantry where he had put the
molasses jug. “Ben’s gone somewhere with Deacon Blodgett. Now hurry and get on Phronsie’s
eating-apron.”
“Joel was awfully good—he took the molasses jug from me,” said Polly, tying on Phronsie’s checked
eating-apron.
“I’m glad he thought to do it,” said Mother Pepper, with a smile. “Now sit down, children, the
potatoes are done.”
“And Mr. Atkins gave Phronsie a whole lot of peppermints,” said Polly, when the meal was half
over, and the plates were scraped clean from all trace of potato slices.
“Yes, he did,” said Phronsie, bobbing her yellow head, and taking off her gaze from the dish where
the delightfully brown crackly things had been. When she had been obliged to relinquish her little
paper bag, after the eating apron was on, she had insisted that it should be kept in her lap. So now she
patted it lovingly.
“Oo! Peppermints!” screamed Joel. “Let’s see, Phronsie,” and he hopped out of his seat.
“No, no, Joey,” reproved Mother Pepper.
“She said peppermints,” said Joel, slipping into his chair.
“I will give you some,” said Phronsie, with another little pat on the paper bag, “and Davie too,”
beaming across the table at him.
“Oh, now—give ’em now,” cried Joel, thrusting out his hand, his black eyes sparkling.
But Mother Pepper said “No,” again; that they must all wait till after dinner, and the dishes were
washed up and the floor swept. Then if Phronsie wanted to divide her peppermints, why, that would
be the best time of all.
So there was a merry bustle to see who would get through the part of the work that belonged to each
one. And there was so much fun and laughter that any one peering in at the little brown house would
really have supposed that play was going on. At last it was all done, and Mamsie, over in the corner
sewing on one of the coats that Polly had brought home in the bundle, declared that everything was
very nice, and that she couldn’t have done it any better herself.
“Now the peppermints,” cried Joel, running away from the sink where he had been scrubbing his
hands and polishing them on the big roller towel. “Now, O goody!” He ran over to Phronsie, still
clinging to her paper bag.
“Let’s all sit down on the floor,” proposed Polly. So down the whole four of them got in a ring, each
one drawing a long breath of anticipation.
“I’m going to give Mamsie one first,” announced Phronsie, slowly beginning to open the paper bag.
“Let’s see how many you’ve got, Phronsie,” said Joel, putting out an impatient hand.
“Don’t, Joey,” said Polly, seizing his hand; “let Phronsie open her own bag.”
“I’ll open my bag,” hummed Phronsie, suiting the action to the word. Then she drew out a
peppermint drop, a pink one.
“She’s so slow,” said Joel, impatiently. “Turn up the bag, do, Phronsie.”
“Let her do it her own way, Joey,” said Polly; “they are her peppermints and we must all wait.”
“O dear!” groaned Joel, holding his hands tightly together, his black eyes on the peppermint drops.
It took some time in this slow way for Phronsie to get them all out. She hummed in a soft little voice
as she drew them forth, one by one, and laid them in Polly’s lap. There were nine—five white ones,
and four pink ones.
“Aren’t there any more?” cried Joel. “Let me shake the bag—maybe there’s another one.”
But all the vigorous shaking that Joel administered couldn’t produce another peppermint drop.
“I shall give Mamsie this one,” said Phronsie, picking up one of the pink drops and running over to
Mrs. Pepper’s chair. “Please open your mouth, Mamsie.”
And the pink peppermint being dropped into Mother Pepper’s mouth, Phronsie ran back in great
satisfaction.
“Now me,” cried Joel, sitting back on his heels, and holding out his hands.
“Oh, Joey, Ben ought to have one saved for him,” said Polly reprovingly.
“I shall give Bensie this one,” said Phronsie, patting another pink drop.
“Ben wouldn’t care,” began Joel. Then he stopped, seeing Polly’s brown eyes.
“That’s fine,” said Polly, smiling at Phronsie. “Now I’m going to put this peppermint drop up on the
table, and you shall give it to Ben when he comes in.”
“I shall give it to Bensie when he comes in,” hummed Phronsie. “And this one is for you.” She held
up the third pink peppermint to Polly’s mouth.
“Oh, no, child,” said Polly, shaking her head. “You must save those other two for yourself, you
know.”
“Then there won’t be any pink peppermints,” broke in Joel, awfully disappointed, “and I wanted
one.”
“But Phronsie must save some for herself,” said Polly; “she just loves pink candy.”
“I will give you a pink one, Joey,” said Phronsie, beginning to look worried as she saw his face.
“No, Joel, you oughtn’t to,” said Polly.
“But I don’t want an old white one,” grumbled Joel; “mean old white one.”
“Then you’d better not take any,” said Polly coolly. “No, Phronsie, you must keep those two pink
ones. Mr. Atkins would want you to.”
“Would Mr. Atkins want me to?” asked Phronsie doubtfully.
“Yes, of course,” said Polly decidedly. “Now, Davie, it’s your turn, as Joel doesn’t want any.”
“Oh, I do—I do!” screamed Joel. “I do want a peppermint, Polly Pepper.”
“All right, then give Joel a white one, Phronsie, and then one to Davie. There, now isn’t that too
splendid for anything!” as the two boys began at once to crunch their peppermints.
David suddenly stopped. “You haven’t any, Polly.”
“Oh, Phronsie is going to put a white one in my mouth,” said Polly gayly, and opening her mouth
very wide.
“I’m going to put one in your mouth, Polly,” laughed Phronsie. So Polly bent her head down, and in
went a white peppermint drop.
“Now says I—in goes one in your own mouth, Phronsie,—a pink one,” and in it went.
There was such a crunching of peppermint drops going on that no one heard the big green door open,
until Mrs. Pepper said, “Why, how do you do?” Then they all whirled around. There was Mr. Tisbett,
the stage-driver, whip in hand.
Immediately he was surrounded by all the four children, Joel howling, “Oh, I know you’ve come to
take us in the stage-coach,” and trying to get the whip.
“No, I hain’t, not this time. You let my whip be, Joel,” and in the midst of the clamor, he marched
over to Mrs. Pepper. “I’ve come for you, ma’am.”
“For me?” exclaimed Mrs. Pepper.
“Yes’m. Ef you don’t stop, Joel Pepper, scrougin’ for my whip, I’ll—” Mr. Tisbett didn’t finish, but
he looked so very fierce that they all fell back.
“Hoh!” exclaimed Joel, “I ain’t afraid of him,” and he swarmed all over the big stage-driver. “I’m
going on the stage. Let me sit up in front with you, Mr. Tisbett,” he begged.
“Yes’m,” Mr. Tisbett tucked the big whip under his arm, and turned his twinkling eyes toward Mrs.
Pepper. “Old Miss Babbitt has broke her hip, and—”
“O dear me!” exclaimed Mrs. Pepper, dropping her work to her lap.
“Fact; fell down th’ cellar stairs; stepped on th’ cat, an’ away she went.”
“Did she kill the cat?” cried Joel, tearing off his attention from the whip.
“Land o’ Goshen! You can’t kill a cat,” declared the stage-driver; “never heard o’ such a thing in all
my born days. Well, she set up a screechin’ for you, Mis Pepper.” He whirled around again to Mother
Pepper’s chair.
A look of dismay spread over Mother Pepper’s face.
“She’s in an awful bad fix,” said Mr. Tisbett solemnly, “an’ there ain’t a neighbor that’ll go nigh her.
An’ she keeps a-screamin’ for you,” and Mr. Tisbett leaned against the table.
“Polly, child, come here.” Mrs. Pepper was already folding up her work.
“What is it, Mamsie?” as the group made way for her, the stage-driver regarding them all with a
relieved air as if responsibility of the whole affair was now off his mind.
“Do you think that you could get along without Mother for a little while?”
“For over night?” asked Polly, in an awe-struck tone.
“Yes,—can you do it, Polly? Poor old Miss Babbitt needs me; but I won’t go if you can’t manage
without me.” She rested her black eyes on Polly’s flushed cheeks.
“You’ve never been away all night,” began Polly, her cheeks going very white.
“I know it,” said Mrs. Pepper, a little white line coming around her mouth. “It hasn’t been necessary
before. But now, it seems as if the poor old woman needs me. And you’re a big girl, Polly, and then
there’s Ben to help you. Well, what do you say, child?”
“She’s an awful cross old woman,” said Polly grudgingly, not being able to look into her mother’s
face.
“That doesn’t make any difference,” said Mrs. Pepper. “She needs me.”
Polly drew her shoe back and forth across the floor, still not looking into her mother’s face.
“It shall be as you say, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper quietly. Meantime the stage-driver had drawn off
into a corner, the three children surrounding him.
“O dear me!” began Polly, with a long breath and twisting her hands; then she burst out, “Mamsie,
I’m awfully wicked—but I don’t want you to go.”
“Very well,” said Mrs. Pepper, “then I will tell Mr. Tisbett that I cannot go,” and she began to get out
of her chair.
“But supposing,” said Polly, with a little gasp, seizing her mother’s arm, “nobody had come to help
you when my eyes were bad?”
“Yes, just supposing,” said Mother Pepper, sitting quite still.
“And now it’s worse, for she’s an old, old woman.”
“Yes, Polly.”
“Then,” said Polly, feeling sure she was going to cry, “I think you ought to go, Mamsie. O dear!”
“Are you quite sure, Polly child?”
“Yes-es—yes, Mamsie!” and Polly swallowed her sob. When she found that she could do that, she
threw her arms around Mrs. Pepper’s neck. “Oh, Mamsie, I do want you to go—really and truly, I do,
Mamsie—and I’ll take care of the children.”
“I know you will, Polly. Now that’s my brave girl,” and Mother Pepper gathered her up in her arms
and held her close.
“And I’ll pack the bag,” said Polly, running off on happy feet to drag out the old carpet-bag from the
closet in the bedroom.
And pretty soon the kitchen was in a great bustle, the children getting in each other’s way to help
Mrs. Pepper off. And Mr. Tisbett kept saying, “Well, I never!” and slapping the big whip against his
knees, making Joel drop whatever he was doing to run over at the enchanting sound. And Phronsie
had to tie on Mamsie’s bonnet—and every one hurried to help her into the stage.
“Good-by,” said Mother Pepper, as all four tried to get on the step for a last kiss. “Be good, children,
and obey Polly!”
“I’m going to be good,” declared Joel stoutly.
“I’ll try,” said David.
“Let me tie your bonnet again,” said Phronsie, with pleading hands.
“Oh, Phronsie, you can’t tie it again,” said Polly. “Mr. Tisbett has got to go,” as the stage-driver up
on the box was cracking his whip impatiently. “You can kiss Mamsie once more.”
“I can kiss my Mamsie again,” said Phronsie, as Polly held her up.
“Good-by, children,” said Mrs. Pepper to them all, as the big stage lumbered off. But her last smile
was for Polly.
CHAPTER VIII “OLD FATHER DUBBIN”
CHAPTER VIII “OLD FATHER DUBBIN”
THE four Little Peppers went in and shut the big green door.
“I want my Mamsie.” Phronsie stood still in the middle of the kitchen floor.
“So do I,” howled Joel.
Davie began, but stopped at sight of Polly’s face.
“Now see here,” cried Polly, running over to throw her arms around Phronsie, “we must all be good.
We promised Mamsie, you know.”
“I want her back,” cried Joel, in a loud voice, as Phronsie wailed steadily on.
“How would you like to play ‘Old Father Dubbin’?” cried Polly, in a shaking voice. “Wouldn’t that
be just too fine for anything!”
“Can we really?” cried Joel, his shouts breaking off suddenly.
“Yes,” said Polly. “Now, pet, we are going to play ‘Old Father Dubbin.’ Don’t you want to,
Phronsie?”
Phronsie showed her little white teeth in a merry gurgle. “I do want to play it ever so much, Polly,”
she said, smiling through her tears.
“Hurrah! Hurrah!” screamed Joel, hopping about. “Come on, Dave, we’re going to play ‘Old Father
Dubbin!’ We haven’t played it for ever and ever so long,” he added in an injured tone.
“Of course not,” said Polly, bustling about. “Now, boys, come and help me get ready.”
No need to tell them this, as they scampered after her.
“Old Father Dubbin” was saved, since Polly made up the game, for very special occasions like the
present when it was absolutely necessary for the children to be diverted. So now the kitchen rang
with the noise, and they all spun around till tired out, for of course the one idea was to keep
everybody from a chance to cry.
At last Polly looked up at the old clock. “Oh, my goodness!” she exclaimed, brushing her brown hair
out of her eyes. “We’ve got to stop. We can’t play all the time. Dear me! I haven’t got a bit of breath
left.”
“I have,” declared Joel, “and we haven’t played more’n half of all the time. Don’t stop, Polly—don’t
stop!” He came whirling up to her.
“Don’t stop,” echoed Phronsie, dancing up. “I want ‘Old Father Dubbin’ some more.”
“I very much wish,” said Davie with red cheeks, “we could play it again, Polly.”
“No,” said Polly decidedly, “it’s five o’clock, and we must all set to work now. Besides, Ben will get
home soon.”
“O dear!” grumbled Joel. “What’ll we work on, Polly?”
“Well,” said Polly, “you and Davie can go and chop some kindlings for to-morrow morning.”
“We’re always chopping kindlings,” said Joel, peevishly.
“Of course,” said Polly, in a cheery voice, “because we’re always wanting them. Now go along,
boys. I must sweep up, for we’ve made such a dust playing ‘Old Father Dubbin,’” and she dashed off
after the broom.
“And I’m going to sweep up, too,” cried Phronsie, running over to the corner where her little broom
was kept behind the wood-box.
“Come on, Dave, we’ve got to chop those old kindlings,” said Joel, gloomily, going over to the door.
“I’m going to bring in a lot,” said Davie, spreading his arms wide.
“I’m going to bring in enough for two hundred—no, five hundred mornings,” declared Joel, as they
ran out to the woodshed.
“Now, Phronsie,” said Polly, when the sweeping up was all done, and the chairs placed back neatly
against the wall, “I think you and I better set the supper-table. Ben will be here soon, you know.” She
gave a long sigh and gazed out of the window. Oh, if Ben would only hurry and come! It was getting
dark, and the hardest hour of all the day to have Mamsie away was drawing near.
“Bensie will be here soon,” hummed Phronsie, running over to help Polly lay the table cloth.
“Yes,” said Polly. “Now, that’s a good girl, Phronsie. You see—”
“I’ve got the most,” cried Joel, staggering in at the doorway, his arms full of all sorts and sizes of
sticks. “Whickets! See me, Polly!”
“Oh, Joey, I don’t want to see you when you say such words,” said Polly reprovingly.
“I won’t say ’em any more. Now look—look!” Joel swelled up in front of her, and brandished his
armful.
“O my!” exclaimed Polly, “what a nice lot! And Davie, too! Dear me, how you two boys do help!”
“I haven’t got so much,” said David, drawing slowly near with both arms around his kindlings.
“His sticks are better than mine,” said Joel critically, as the boys stood before Polly.
“Yes,” said Polly, her head on one side to view them the better. “I believe they are, Joel. Well, it’s a
nice lot altogether, anyway. Now put them all in the wood-box.”
“Now what shall we do?” asked Joel, fidgeting about, the kindlings all dumped in the wood-box, and
going over to Mother Pepper’s big calico-covered chair, his round face very sober.
“I believe,” said Polly meditatively, “we’d better light the candle—it’s growing dark.”
“Why, Polly Pepper! Light the candle!” exclaimed Joel. “Mamsie wouldn’t light it so early.”
Phronsie stopped suddenly in putting her blue and white plate on the table. “I want my Mamsie,” she
said soberly. Then she sat down in a little bunch on the floor, and put her head in her lap.
“O dear me!” cried Polly in dismay. Would Ben ever come! “I wonder if you don’t all want me to tell
you a story.”
“Oh!” screamed Joel and David together, “we do—we do!” running over to her.
“Well, I can’t tell a story ever in all this world while Phronsie is crying,” said Polly, at her wits’ end
what to do next.
“Phronsie—stop crying!” Joel rushed over and shook her pink calico sleeve. “Polly can’t tell a story
while you’re crying. She won’t stop,” he announced wrathfully.
For Phronsie kept on in a smothered little voice, “I want my Mamsie.”
“Phronsie,” Davie kneeled down on the kitchen floor beside her. “Please stop. Polly wants to tell a
story. You’ll make Polly sick if you don’t stop crying.”
Up came Phronsie’s yellow head, and she wiped off the tears with one fat little hand. “Do I make you
sick, Polly?” she asked, in a tone of deep concern.
“Yes, I think I shall be,” said Polly gravely, “if you don’t stop crying.”
“Then I will stop,” said Phronsie brokenly. “I don’t want you to be sick, Polly. Please don’t be.”
“Now if ever there was a good child, it’s you, Phronsie,” cried Polly, seizing her to smother the little
face with kisses. “Well, come on, boys, we must sit around the fireplace, and I’ll tell you a story.”
“There isn’t any fireplace,” said Joel, as Polly led the way over to the stove.
“Well, I’m going to pretend there is,” said Polly, getting down on the floor in front of the stove, “and
a splendid fire, too. My! don’t you hear the logs crackle, and isn’t this blaze perfectly beautiful!” and
she spread out both hands.
“You’re always pretending there are things that ain’t there,” grumbled Joel.
“Of course,” said Polly gayly, “that’s the way to have them.”
“I think the blaze is beautiful, too,” declared Davie, throwing himself down by her side and spreading
his hands.
“Well, I guess I’m going to have some of the blaze,” said Joel, in an injured tone, and he crowded in
between Polly and David.
“Well now, Phronsie, put your head in my lap,” said Polly. But she turned a cold shoulder to Joel.
Joel fidgeted about. “Dave, you can sit next to Polly,” he whispered.
“That’s right,” Polly flashed him a smile over Phronsie’s yellow head.
“You may have the place,” said Davie, trying not to want it very much.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Polly, “how would it do for each of you to have the place half of the time,
and I’ll tell you when to change?”
A smile ran over David’s face.
“All right,” said Joel, folding his little brown hands. “Now begin.”
“Well, now, I’m going to tell you about—” said Polly.
“Oh, the circus story!” shouted Joel wildly. “Do tell about the circus story, Polly.”
“Do you want the circus story, Davie?” asked Polly.
“Say yes, Dave. Do say yes,” said Joel, nudging him.
“Yes, I do,” said Davie in great satisfaction.
“And you’d like to hear about all the animals, Phronsie, wouldn’t you?” asked Polly, bending over
the yellow head in her lap.
“Polly,” asked Phronsie, lifting her head in great excitement, “is that about the dear, sweet little
monkey?”
“Yes, Pet,” said Polly, “it is.”
“Then,” said Phronsie, clapping her hands, “I should like to hear about it very much indeed. Please
begin right straight off, Polly,” and she laid her head down in Polly’s lap again.
“Well, you see,” began Polly—would Ben never come!
“Don’t say, ‘you see,’” interrupted Joel impatiently; “do tell about the animals, and have a bear—no,
two bears—”
“You’re always having a bear,” said Polly, with a little laugh. “Well, there were lots of bears in this
circus I am going to tell you of.”
“How many?” demanded Joel.
“Oh, fifty,” said Polly recklessly.
“Whickets!” cried Joel in amazement.
“Now, Joel, I can’t tell any story if you’re going to say such naughty words.”
“I won’t—I won’t,” cried Joel in alarm at losing the story. “Were there really fifty bears, Polly?” He
crowded up close to her.
“Yes,” said Polly, bobbing her brown head. “And the circus man said he was thinking of buying two
more.”
“O dear me!” cried Joel, quite overcome and snuggling down against her arm. “Well, go on.”
“Well, there was a hip-hip-pot-amus,” Polly finally brought the whole out with great pride.
“Yes, yes,” said Joel.
David clasped his hands in silent rapture, and kept his gaze on the black stove that was a crackling
fire on the hearth.
“And a rho-do-den-dron,” added Polly, “and—”
“What’s a rho-rho-do—what you said?” interrupted Joel, his head bobbing up again.
“Oh, a great big creature,” said Polly.
“How big?” demanded Joel.
“Oh, my goodness—I can’t ever tell how big he was,” said Polly.
“I want to know how big he was,” grumbled Joel. “So big?” he spread his arms wide.
“O dear me!” cried Polly, with a little laugh. “Why, that isn’t anywhere near as big, Joey Pepper, and
he splashed into the water, and—”
“Where did he splash into the water?” cried Joel; “say, Polly, where did he?”
“Why, there was a pond next to the circus tent,” said Polly, going on wildly, her gaze on the window
to see when Ben came around the corner of the little brown house.
“As big as the pond over at Cherryville?” demanded Joel.
“Yes, just as big as that,” said Polly, willing to make it any size.
“Dave,” cried Joel, poking his face over David’s shoulder, “it was just like that great big pond over at
Cherryville. Only Mr. Tisbett wouldn’t let us go near it,” he said resentfully; “he wouldn’t, Polly,
when he took us over on the stage. Well, go on,” and he threw himself back against Polly once more.
“Make him splash, and splash, that great big thing. What was his name, Polly?”
“Rho-do-rho-do-den-dron,” said Polly, wishing she never had seen the picture in the animal book on
Mrs. Blodgett’s center-table. “Well, now, it’s time for you and Davie to change places, Joel. Why!”
“Hulloa! So you’ve got a rhododendron, Polly.”
“Oh, Ben!” every one of the children jumped to their feet. Polly got to him first and threw wild arms
around his neck.
“We’ve been playing ‘Old Father Dubbin’,” announced Davie.
Ben choked off what he was going to ask, “Where’s Mamsie?” If “Old Father Dubbin” had been
played, something pretty bad must have happened, for Polly to rescue the little brown house from
gloom with that game. “Well, now,” he said, “I suppose we’ve got to have that story finished.”
“Yes, yes, we have,” howled Joel, dancing about. “Go on, Polly, do,” and he flopped down in front of
the stove and thrust out his hands. “There’s a big fire on the hearth,” he said to Ben.
“And hear the logs crackle,” said Davie, sitting down by his side and spreading his hands, too.
“Oh, I see,” said Ben gravely. “Now come on, Phronsie, and we’ll hear the rest about that wonderful
rhinoceros,” and he sat down, pulling her into his lap.
“No, no, that wasn’t his name,” contradicted Joel; “’twas—oh, what was it, Polly?” and he wrinkled
up his face.
“’Twas what Ben said,” Polly hung her head.
“Your name is prettier than mine, anyway, Polly,” said Ben. “Well now let’s hear the rest of the
story.”
So Polly, quite happy now that Ben was actually there, ran her arm in his, and launched into such a
merry account of what that rhinoceros was capable of that even Joel was satisfied and David wasn’t
conscious of breathing.
A gentle pull brought Polly to suddenly. “Tell about my dear, sweet little monkey, do, Polly,” begged
Phronsie.
“To be sure,—how could I forget you?” cried Polly remorsefully.
“Oh, I don’t want a monkey,” screamed Joel; “we can have him any day. Do go on about that—that
—”
“See here, Joe,” Ben gave him a small pat on his back, “it’s time to rest that rhinoceros. He’s awfully
big, and he gets tired easily.”
“Does he?” cried Joel.
“Yes.”
“Well, then, go on about the monkey.”
“I’m going to have my dear, sweet monkey now,” whispered Phronsie in Ben’s ear.
“Yes, I know,” Ben whispered back. “Well, go on, Polly.”
So the monkey went through all the antics that belonged to one, and a good many more that hadn’t
anything to do with a monkey at all.
At last Ben looked up at the old clock. “Whew! Well, Polly Pepper, I should say it was time for
supper!”
At that they all jumped up, and in the scuffle to get to the table first, Polly drew Ben aside. “Mamsie’s
gone to old Miss Babbitt’s,” she whispered. “Mr. Tisbett came for her. Miss Babbitt has broken her
hip.”
“Whew!” said Ben again.
“And how shall ever we get the children to bed,” said Polly, in a distressed little voice, “without
Mamsie?”
Ben looked all around the old kitchen with a sober face. “Same’s you’ve done all the afternoon—
keep ’em busy.”
“We can’t play ‘Old Father Dubbin’ again,” said Polly. “We must save that for next times when
things are bad.”
“That’s so,” said Ben; “then it must be blind man’s buff, or puss-in-the-corner, I suppose.”
“What are you whispering about?” cried Joel, coming up curiously. “You’re always getting off into a
corner and whispering things.”
“Well, that’s because we can’t talk unless we do get into a corner. You’re always poking around so,
Joe,” said Ben. “Come on now, all hands to supper!”
He swung Phronsie up to his shoulder and then into the chair that he had made high enough for her
by nailing a board across two strips of wood. “Now says I, here you go, Puss!”
They were all so tired when they got through with blind man’s buff, the supper dishes first being well
out of the way, that Phronsie, who wanted to be “Puss,” fell asleep on the little cricket before they
could get her into the corner. So Polly bundled her off to the trundle-bed and tucked her up with a
kiss.
“Now the worst is over,” she said, coming out of the bedroom, to Ben.
“And you two boys—it’s time you were off,” said Ben, pointing to the loft, “or you’ll tumble asleep
like Phronsie.”
“I’m not sleepy,” said Joel, digging his knuckles into his black eyes and trying to keep awake.
“I am,” said Davie, “and my legs are tired.” And he stumbled off to the loft stairs.
“Hoh!” exclaimed Joel, following slowly, “I ain’t sleepy a single bit. And Polly and you are going to
talk over secrets after we’re gone,” and he turned half-way up the loft stairs to show an injured face.
“Well, you wouldn’t hear any secrets if you stayed,” declared Ben coolly, “so you might as well take
yourself off, Joe.”
CHAPTER IX THE OLD BOOK BOX
CHAPTER IX THE OLD BOOK BOX
MRS. PARSON HENDERSON for once left her breakfast dishes unwashed.
“It’s no use—I must get over to the little brown house at once.” She took down her sunbonnet from
its nail in the entry and stopped to put her head in the study doorway.
“You’ll be surprised to see the kitchen if you go out there,” she said, “and the morning work not
done.”
“Jerusha isn’t here, so no matter,” said the parson, looking up from next Sunday’s sermon with a
smile.
“I can’t keep away from those poor Pepper children, since you heard down at the store that their
mother was away last night at Miss Babbitt’s.”
“Almira, I’m glad enough that you’re going over to see Polly. I thought it would be as much as my
life was worth to suggest it till those breakfast dishes were washed.” He laughed now like a boy.
“There are some things more important than breakfast dishes,” observed his wife grimly. Then she
hurried off, cross-lots, to the little brown house.
Nobody was in the old kitchen; that she saw through the window. So she hurried around the house
and there under the scraggy apple-tree was Polly before the big tub on its bench, scrubbing away on a
pile of clothes and trying to sing, but it was a quavering little voice that the parson’s wife heard.
“Go and get your little tub, Phronsie,” said Polly, breaking off from the poor little song, “and wash
Seraphina’s clothes.”
“I want my Mamsie.” Phronsie, a picture of woe, stood quite still under a sheltering branch of the old
apple-tree.
“Oh, Phronsie,” said Polly, trying to speak gayly, “just think of Seraphina, poor dear, wanting her
clothes washed. Only think, Phronsie!”
“I want my Mamsie,” said Phronsie, not offering to stir. Her lips trembled and Polly knew in another
moment that the tears would come in a torrent; so she flung her hands clear of the soap suds and
started to run over to her. Instead she plunged into the parson’s wife just making up her mind to come
around the corner into full view.
“O dear!” gasped Polly in dismay, her soapy hands flying up against the clean blue print dress.
“Never mind,” said Mrs. Henderson, “soap never hurt any calico dress,” seizing the wet hands. “O
my!” and she hurried over to Phronsie, too scared at Polly’s plunge to cry.
“Well—well.” Then as Polly ran to get a dry cloth to wipe off the front of the clean print dress, the
parson’s wife sat down on one of the big stones that Ben and the other boys had brought into “the
orchard” to play tea-party with whenever the much-prized hours from work would allow.
Phronsie came slowly to her. “I want my Mamsie,” she said, patting Mrs. Henderson’s gown to
attract attention. “I want her very much indeed, I do.”
“Yes, I know.” Then the parson’s wife lifted her on her lap. “So does Polly want Mamsie—and
Davie. Where is Davie?”
Phronsie pointed a small finger up to the branches of the apple-tree.
“Oh, Davie, are you there?” Mrs. Henderson cocked up one eye. There sat Davie huddled up in a
crotch of the tree, his head in his hands. “Dear me. I thought it was a big bird!”
“Davie is a big bird,” echoed Phronsie, smiling through the tears that were just ready to roll down.
“Isn’t he,” said the parson’s wife with a little laugh. “Well, now, come down, big bird.”
“Come down, big bird,” cried Phronsie, clapping her hands and hopping up and down, as Polly ran
out with the clean cloth.
“Now that is as good as ever,” declared Mrs. Henderson, as Polly wiped off all trace of the soap suds.
“Well, here comes Davie,” as he slid slowly down from branch to branch.
“That’s a good boy, Davie,” said Polly approvingly, the sparkle coming back to the brown eyes.
“Isn’t he?” said Mrs. Henderson. “Well, now, Davie, I wonder if you won’t come over to the
parsonage and help me this morning?”
“Can I help you?” asked Davie, raising his swollen eyes to her.
“Yes, indeed; ever so much,” declared Mrs. Henderson quickly. “I’ve some work to have done in
setting up my attic, and you can help me.”
“Then I’ll come,” said Davie, with a long breath of satisfaction.
“Now that’s good,” said the parson’s wife.
“I want to go, too,” said Phronsie, laying hold of Mrs. Henderson’s gown.
“Oh, no,” said the parson’s wife, “you must stay and help Polly. Poor Polly—see how busy she is!”
pointing over to the wash-tub where Polly was splashing away for dear life.
Phronsie’s hand dropped from Mrs. Henderson’s gown. She ran over unsteadily to the big tub on its
bench. “I’m going to help you, Polly,” she said, standing on her tiptoes.
“So you shall,” said Polly, flashing over a bright smile to the parson’s wife. “Run and get your little
tub, and see if you can get Seraphina’s clothes washed as quickly as these,” she doused one of the
boy’s little calico jackets up and down in the suds.
“But I want to help on these things,” said Phronsie, patting the big tub with a disappointed little hand.
“Please, Polly, let me.”
“No,” said Polly decidedly, “there isn’t room for more than one here. Besides Mamsie wouldn’t like
it.”
“Wouldn’t Mamsie like it for me to help in the big tub?” asked Phronsie.
“No, she wouldn’t,” said Polly decidedly.
Phronsie slowly let her hand drop to her side. “Would Mamsie want me to wash dolly’s clothes?” she
asked, her blue eyes fastened on Polly’s face.
“Yes, indeed, she certainly would,” declared Polly decidedly. “There now, that’s clean, until Joey
gets it dirty again,” and she wrung out the little calico blouse.
“Then I shall wash my dolly’s clothes,” declared Phronsie, marching off to the woodshed where her
little tub was kept.
“And you come with me, David,” said Mrs. Henderson, “for I must get to work in my attic. Polly,
don’t worry, child—we’ll find some way to get your mother back here,” she whispered on the way
out of the yard. And taking David’s hand, the parson’s wife went swiftly home, hoping at every step
that no parishioner had caught sight of those unwashed breakfast dishes.
“I’m going to wipe them dry,” said David, as she poured the boiling water into the dish-pan. “May I,
Mrs. Henderson?”
“You certainly may,” said the parson’s wife, setting the big iron tea-kettle back on the stove. “Now
that’s a good boy, Davie Pepper. Get a clean towel in the table-drawer.”
So Davie ran over and fished out a clean towel, and the dishes were soon done and piled on the
dresser. And none too soon! Here came around the corner of the parsonage, Miss Keturah Sims to
borrow a colander to strain blackberries in.
“I’ve got to make jell this mornin’,” she announced, coming in without the formality of knocking,
“an’ my colander’s bust.” Her sharp black eyes, the sharpest pair in all Badgertown for finding out
things, as the parson’s wife knew quite well, roved all over the kitchen.
“You shall have it,” cried Mrs. Henderson, running into the pantry on happy feet. “Oh, Davie
Pepper,” she cried, as the door closed on Miss Sims, “you don’t know how you’ve helped me!” She
stopped to drop a kiss on the soft light hair.
“Have I?” cried David, very much pleased. “Have I helped you, Mrs. Henderson?”
“Indeed you have!” she declared. Then she stopped in the middle of the kitchen. “I remember what
your mother once said.”
David drew near, holding his breath. To hear what Mamsie said was always a treat not to be lightly
put one side.
“She said,” repeated Mrs. Henderson, “that if any one felt bad about anything, the best way was to
get up and do something for somebody. And so you stopped crying and worrying Polly and came
over here. And you don’t know, David Pepper, how you’ve helped me! Well, we must get up into the
attic.” She hurried over to the broom closet. “Get the dust-pan, David, behind the stove.”
“I will,” cried David, clattering after it.
“And the little brush.”
“Yes—I will.”
“And the dust-cloth, hanging on the back entry nail,” Mrs. Henderson’s voice trailed down the attic
stairs. And Davie, gathering up the various things, hurried up after her.
“Dear me, how hot it is!” exclaimed the parson’s wife, hurrying over to open the window at the end.
“I’ll open it,” cried David, depositing his armful so hastily that down the stairs rattled the little brush
and the dust-pan, and only the dust-cloth remained.
“No, no, Davie, I must open it,” said Mrs. Henderson, suiting the action to the word. “And remember,
dear,” as he brought back the truant articles, “you must wait patiently till I tell you what to do.”
“I’m so sorry,” said David penitently, still holding the runaway broom and dust-pan.
“I know, dear—and next time, remember to wait until I tell you what I want you to do. Well, the first
thing, now that the window is open, and we have some fresh air to work by, is to get these trunks and
boxes out from this corner.” She was over there by this time and down on her knees under the eaves.
“I’ll pull ’em out,” began Davie; then he stopped and looked at her, “if you want me to.”
“That’s a good boy,” Mrs. Henderson turned and looked at him. “You’ve no idea what a comfort it is,
David Pepper, to have any one who wants to help, wait till he’s told what to do! Well, you mustn’t
even attempt to pull these trunks and boxes about. We will each take hold of a handle, then it will be
easy to shove them out.” She got up suddenly. Rap! went her head against a low-lying beam.
David stared at her in dismay. “O dear!” he exclaimed, quite aghast.
“Yes, that did hurt,” said the parson’s wife, feeling of her head, “and it was all because I was in too
big a hurry. Now I’m going down stairs to bathe it, and you may—” She hesitated and looked about.
“Why there is that little box of books, David. You may take them out and dust them, for somebody
has left the cover off. There it is now, behind that table.” She pointed to an ancestral piece of
furniture with one leg missing. “Take your dust-cloth, child, and begin, then pile the books neatly in
the box, and set the cover on,” and she went swiftly down the stairs.
David ran over and picked up the dust-cloth where he had thrown it on the floor. Books!—to think
there were books in that box! His small fingers tingled to begin, and he threw himself down on the
floor beside the box, and peered in. There were green books, and red ones, and very dull gray and
black ones, all more or less dilapidated.
He drew a long breath, his blue eyes widening as his hands clutched the sides of the box. “I better
take ’em all out first,” he said to himself, and lifting the upper layer very carefully, he laid them
down, one by one, on the floor beside him. A red-covered book, the back of the binding almost in
tatters, slipped from his fingers and fell to the attic floor.
“O dear me!” he was going to exclaim, when his gaze fell upon the pages before him. There was a
big picture on one side and a whole lot of reading on the other page.
David leaned over to stare at the picture. Then he rested his elbows on the attic floor and stared
harder than ever. The picture showed a boy seated before a desk, bent over a slate, on which he was
writing, and opposite to him the book said, “I must get my lesson for to-morrow,” in great big letters.
David knew very well what these big letters said, for Mother Pepper had often told Polly to lay down
her work when she was trying to help Mamsie on the coats for Mr. Atkins, telling her, “You have
sewed enough, Polly child. Now get the big Bible from the bedroom, and read aloud. And then you
can teach the children, Polly,” she would always add.
So Davie had picked up everything he possibly could about any big letters that were likely to come
his way.
“The boy is going to school,” said David, unable to tear his eyes from the picture, “and he’s going to
learn a lesson. O dear, I wonder when I shall ever go to school! And he’s got a slate and pencil.”
At that David was so lost at the idea of any boy being rich enough to own a slate and pencil, that he
sat perfectly still, and a big spider hurried out of her web and ran along the eaves, to stare down at
him. Finally seeing that he didn’t stir, she slipped down swiftly on her gossamer thread, and landed
right in the middle of the book with the dilapidated red binding. This woke David up. And of course
Mrs. Spider then ran for her life.
“I’m going to see if there are other boys with slates and pencils,” said David, turning the leaves.
There lay the dust-cloth beside him, but he never thought of that. And as he couldn’t read very much,
but had to study each letter carefully, he didn’t get on very fast, especially as there was a picture on
every other page. And of course he must see what the big letters opposite said it was all about.
The first thing he knew there were some steps coming up the attic stairs.
David’s head came up suddenly, and the old book slipped away from his grasp.
“My mother says you are to come down to dinner,” said Peletiah, coming slowly up.
David stared at him. Then his little face got hot all over.
“My mother says you are to come down to dinner,” said the parson’s son.
“I—I can’t,” said David miserably, and his head hung down.
“My mother says you are to come down to dinner,” Peletiah said, exactly as if giving the message for
the first time.
“No, no,” said David, unable to see anything but the idle dust-cloth lying on the floor.
“My mother says—” began the parson’s son, not moving from his tracks.
“Da—vid!” called a voice over the attic stairs, “come, child, to dinner. You must be hungry, working
so hard.”
David crouched down by the side of the box. “I haven’t worked,” he said, “and I can’t have any
dinner.”
“My mother says—”
“Yes, come, child,” called the voice over the attic stairs, “and, Peletiah, you must come down, too.”
Peletiah, considering the last command to come to dinner much more to his taste and more binding
than the message he was sent up to the attic to deliver, shut his mouth as he was just going to begin
on his message once more, and went down the stairs.
David looked wildly around as he was left alone, with no one but the big spider now in her home web
once more. To get to the little brown house and to Polly was now his only thought! He would be
carrying disgrace there—but he must go. Then jumping to his feet, he ran as fast as he could down
the attic stairs to the back entry. The knives and forks were going pretty fast as he dashed past the
dining-room. Oh, how jolly it all sounded, and a most enticing smell of all things good was in the air,
as he dashed past and out into the parsonage yard.
“What’s that?” asked Parson Henderson, and he laid down the big carving knife and fork just as Mrs.
Henderson was saying, “I wonder why Davie Pepper doesn’t come down to dinner. I’ve neglected the
poor child, for when Mrs. Jones came to see me about the Sewing Society, I couldn’t get back to the
attic.”
Peletiah got out of his chair and went to the window, followed by Ezekiel. “There’s David Pepper,”
he said, pointing with a slow finger to a small boy running blindly on across the parsonage yard.
CHAPTER X MARY POTE HELPS
CHAPTER X MARY POTE HELPS
DAVID rushed into the old kitchen in a whirlwind of distress. There was no one there, and stumbling
over to Mamsie’s big calico- covered chair, he flung himself down and buried his head on the
cushion.
“Now, Phronsie,” said Polly, running in, “you’ve been such a good girl, I’m going to give you a piece
of that gingerbread dear Mrs. Beebe gave us the other day. Shut the door, child.”
Phronsie obediently pushed the big green door to, and pattered after Polly.
“You see,” said Polly, running her head into the old corner cupboard, “Ben and Joel will have a good
dinner at Deacon Blodgett’s, and Davie is at the parsonage—I’m so glad he was such a good boy to
help Mrs. Henderson.”
“Ugh!” came a noise from the corner over by Mrs. Pepper’s big chair.
“What was that?” cried Polly, pulling her head out of the cupboard. “Don’t be afraid, child,” as
Phronsie huddled up to her.
“But I am, Polly,” said Phronsie, snuggling up closer than ever, “very much afraid.”
“Mamsie said we weren’t to be afraid at things, but to see what they were, so I’m going to.” Polly ran
across the old kitchen, Phronsie hanging to her.
“Why, David Pepper!” cried Polly, nearly tumbling over him as she ran around Mother Pepper’s big
chair. Then she turned very white.
“What is it, Davie? Oh, where are you hurt?” she asked, while Phronsie with a little wail, threw her
arms around him, too.
“I’m not hurt,” sobbed David. “O dear, dear!”
“Not hurt!” gasped Polly, hanging to the chair.
“I’ve been a bad boy,” cried David in a spasm of grief, and holding to the old cushion with desperate
little hands.
“Oh, never, Davie,” exclaimed Polly, “you couldn’t be ever in all this world. Why, you are our
Davie.”
At this Davie’s despair was greater than ever, and he burrowed his face deeper in the old chair.
“You see, Davie,” Polly ran on, “Mamsie trusts you, so you couldn’t be bad.” Phronsie meanwhile
had sunk to the floor, and was silently gazing at the misery, lost to everything else. “No, you couldn’t
be bad, because Mamsie trusts you so,” she repeated.
This was so much worse that David began to scream, and without any more words, Polly lifted him
up and sitting down in Mamsie’s chair, she held him tightly in her lap.
“Now, David Pepper,” she said sternly, “you’ve just got to tell me what you’ve done.”
“I—I—can’t,” David hid his wet little face on her shoulder.
“Mamsie tells us not to say ‘can’t,’” said Polly decidedly. “Begin and tell me.”
“She—told—me—” began David in a shaking voice.
“Mrs. Henderson?”
David bobbed his head.
“Go on.”
“She—told—me—to—”
“Yes.”
“To dust—the—books—and—”
“Well, go on.”
“And I didn’t—O dear!”
“And you disobeyed dear Mrs. Henderson! Oh, David Pepper, how could you!” Polly turned very
white again, and cold little shivers ran up and down her back. To think that the parsonage people
should ever have one of the Pepper children disobey them!
When Polly said, “David Pepper, how could you!” it wasn’t to be lightly borne. So now Davie raised
such a despairing little face that Polly hastened to say, “Well, you must tell me all about it.”
“There was a boy in the book—”
“What boy?” said Polly, very much puzzled.
“I was going to dust him, and the other books.”
“Oh, you mean you were going to dust the books,” said Polly, beginning to see a little light.
“Yes,” said David, trying to keep back the sobs.
“Well, stop crying and tell me all about it—every single thing.” Polly gathered him up more closely.
“Now then, Davie, you began to dust the boy.”
“No, I didn’t,” said Davie in a fresh anguish; “I didn’t dust him a bit; not once, Polly—O dear!”
“Why?” asked Polly.
“He had a slate and pencil, and—and—he was going to school,” said Davie in another outburst of
grief.
“Oh, I see,” said Polly with more light, “and you wanted to read about him?”
“Yes, I did,” said Davie; “it told all about him.”
“Well, why didn’t you dust the books just as Mrs. Henderson told you? It didn’t take long, I’m sure,
to find out about that boy.”
“I wanted to see if other boys were going to school, and had slates and pencils—O dear!” he sobbed.
“Well, now I guess I know all about it,” said Polly. “Phronsie, you must stop crying,” for Phronsie
was softly wailing on the floor in front of Mamsie’s old chair. “You forgot about dusting the books,
Davie?”
“Yes, I did,” said Davie. “O dear!” and he burrowed further than ever in her arms.
“Well, that was bad,” said Polly, “when she told you to do it. But it’s worse to cry about it now—
because crying doesn’t help it any. Well, now, is there anything else to tell me?”
“Peletiah came up in the attic, and told me to come down to dinner. And Mrs. Henderson called me
and—”
“And you didn’t go?” cried Polly in astonishment.
“No, I couldn’t have any dinner, I’d been bad—and I ran home.”
“O dear—dear!” exclaimed Polly in great distress. To have one of the children lacking in politeness
was a terrible thing, and here was a blow that quite unnerved her. When David saw that, he was quite
overcome, and he cried on steadily.
“Something must be done,” thought Polly. “O dear, if Mamsie were only here.”
“David,” she said, “you must go straight back to the parsonage, and beg Mrs. Henderson to forgive
you.”
David shrank into a little heap. “Oh, I can’t do that, Polly; she’ll make me stay to dinner.”
“That would never do,” said Polly.
So she hopped out of the big chair and set him on his feet. “I’ll get you something to eat, and then
you can tell her you have been to dinner if she asks you.” And presently David was seated before the
old table, and eating, as well as he could for his tears, a cold potato well sprinkled with salt and a
generous slice of brown bread.
But he didn’t get to the parsonage after all, for just as he was swallowing the last mouthful, in walked
the parson’s wife.
“I want you to come over to-morrow, Davie,” she said, just as if nothing in the world a bit unpleasant
had happened, “and you and I will work in the attic.”
“Dear Mrs. Henderson, Davie has something he wants to say to you,” Polly began in a trembling
voice.
David got out of his chair and went over on unsteady feet to her.
“I didn’t mean to be bad,” he said, his poor swollen little face working dreadfully.
“I know, dear,” said the parson’s wife, bending over him sympathetically, and stroking the soft, wavy
hair with a kind hand.
“But it was bad,” said Polly, “for him to forget, and not obey you.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Henderson.
“And I’m sorry,” said Davie, his hands twisting together.
“And you’ll come to-morrow, and help me, and that will show that you are sorry,” said the parson’s
wife.
“I’ll go to-morrow,” said David, with a crooked little smile.
“And Peletiah and Ezekiel are going away to their grandmother’s again to- morrow,” said Mrs.
Henderson, “just as they did to-day. So, you see, I shall need you very much, Davie.”
“Now, how in the world can I find any one to take Mrs. Pepper’s place nursing Miss Babbitt?” The
parson’s wife puckered up her forehead all the way down the road with anxious thought. “If here
doesn’t come Dr. Fisher!” as the old gig swung into view at the turn of the road.
Dr. Fisher pulled up suddenly. But she didn’t wait for the old horse to stop. “Dr. Fisher,” she began,
hurrying up to the side of the gig, “can’t we find some one to take Mrs. Pepper’s place over at Miss
Babbitt’s?”
Dr. Fisher looked out at her gloomily. “I’d give a good deal if we could,” he said. “That idiot of a
Bunce woman—she was there when Miss Babbitt fell down the cellar stairs, and she began to scream
for Mrs. Pepper. And she rushed out—the Bunce woman—and caught Mr. Tisbett going by on the
stage, and sent him for Mrs. Pepper. And now Mrs. Pepper won’t desert Miss Babbitt.” He switched
the whip gloomily from side to side, his face getting more and more sober every moment.
“But she must desert Miss Babbitt,” declared the parson’s wife frantically.
“You know Mrs. Pepper will never desert any one in trouble.” The little doctor slapped the whip into
its socket and glared at her through his big horn spectacles.
“There’s Polly doing her best to keep things together,” cried Mrs. Henderson; “’twould go to your
heart, Dr. Fisher, to see her!”
“It’s gone to my heart a good many times,” said the little doctor, relapsing into gloom again, “to see
her. But what can we do? There isn’t a woman fit to take care of Miss Babbitt, who’d be willing to
go.”
“There’s Mary Pote,” said the parson’s wife suddenly with a brightening face.
“Mary Pote? — well, Miss Parrott owns her, soul and body.” Dr. Fisher set his big spectacles
straighter on his nose and glared at the parson’s wife worse than ever.
“’Twouldn’t do any harm to try,” said Mrs. Henderson. “Maybe Miss Parrott would let her go.”
The little doctor sniffed scornfully. “Well, will you try?”
Mrs. Henderson looked off to the distant fields, an awful feeling at her heart. Then she swallowed
hard. “Yes, I will,” she said, “if I can get over to Miss Parrott’s.”
“No trouble about that,” cried little Dr. Fisher joyfully. “Hop right in, Mrs. Henderson,” and before
her resolution had time to cool, there she was in the doctor’s gig and well along on the way to the
estate of the aristocratic Miss Parrott.
When the gig turned into the handsome stone gateway, the parson’s wife had all she could do to keep
from jumping out over the wheel. Suppose she should anger the only rich parishioner of her
husband’s! But she was there on the big stone steps, and the butler was opening the heavy oaken
door. There was nothing to do but to go in, Dr. Fisher driving off to call for her later. And presently
she was ushered into the long drawing- room, with its rich carpeting, its ancestral furniture and
portraits, all shrouded in the gloom of an apartment little used, and left to her wildly beating heart for
the only sound to entertain her.
And there presently broke in the rustle of a stiff black silk gown advancing toward her, and in the
gloom she saw the tall and haughty figure of the rich Miss Parrott.
How she told her story, she never could remember, but it was all out at last. And Miss Parrott sat
erect, without uttering a word until the parson’s wife thought as she told her husband that night, “I
should go through the floor.”
At last Miss Parrott broke the silence. “It’s those little brown house people you want to help?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Henderson, unable to get out another word.
“And you want me to let Mary Pote go to take care of Miss Babbitt?”
“Yes,” said the parson’s wife faintly, “at least till they can get Miss Babbitt’s niece to come.”
“Um—” There wasn’t another sound in the room except the wild beating of Mrs. Henderson’s heart,
until Miss Parrott got her long figure out of the high-backed chair, and the stiff black silk gown
rustled over to the bell-cord.
“Send Mary Pote to me,” said Miss Parrott to the stiff old butler who appeared.
And again there was silence in the long gloomy drawing-room. Mrs. Henderson couldn’t tell, for the
life of her, whether or no she had harmed her husband’s interests, perhaps driven him from
Badgertown parish. At last in came Mary Pote, a round, roly-poly person, half seamstress—half
dressmaker, solely devoted to the spinster’s interests, who lived in a small cottage on the Parrott
estate. Who ever thought of asking for Mary Pote’s services!
“Mary Pote,” said Miss Parrott, “you may get your bonnet, and pack your bag. You are to go to take
care of some tiresome old person who had nothing better to do than to fall down the cellar stairs and
break her hip.”
“But I was making over your black batiste, Miss Parrott,” began Mary Pote with the privilege of an
old servant.
“When I want my black batiste finished, I will tell you so, Mary Pote. Do as I bid you. Oh, one thing
more. You are going so that a Mrs. Pepper—she’s the mother of some children living in a poor old
brown house in Badgertown—”
“I know them,” said Mary Pote, turning back.
“Don’t interrupt me—well, their mother has gone to take care of that odious old Miss Babbitt, and
you are to take her place.”
“Now I’m glad enough to go,” cried Mary Pote joyfully, “for that Mrs. Pepper of all folks is the best
woman, and—”
“There, there,” said Miss Parrott, waving her off with long fingers on which ancestral rings shone.
“Get along, Mary Pote, and do as I say. One thing more—tell Simmons to get the brougham ready
and drive Mrs. Henderson and you down there.”
The parson’s wife got out of her chair. “Dr. Fisher brought me, and he will take me back,” she said.
Miss Parrott waved her back with the long fingers.
“I know nothing about how you got here,” she said; “it doesn’t interest me in the least. I am taking
charge of the case now, and not Dr. Fisher, nor anybody else.”
CHAPTER XI “I’D TRY TO LEARN”
CHAPTER XI “I’D TRY TO LEARN”
“NOW, David, it’s your turn.” Mr. Atkins leaned both hands on the counter. “What did you want?”
“Three pounds of Indian meal, if you please.”
“That’s easy got, an’ it’s fresh an’ sweet.” The storekeeper went over to the big box in the corner.
“Thought I never should get round to wait on you. Beats all how some women trade. That Miss Pride
’ud finger everything in the place, an’ finally buy a lemon. Well, here you be!” He twisted up the
paper bag with an extra twirl and handed it over the counter. “Well now, how’s things over to the
little brown house?”
David reached up with a shaking hand for the paper bag.
Mr. Atkins picked up the knife and cut off a snip from the big yellow cheese, and began to chew it.
“He’s too little,” he said to himself; “no, I’ve got to find some other way to help ’em. Hem! well—”
and he cut off another snip, “I s’pose Polly finds it pretty easy to keep the little brown house goin’
these days, don’t she?”
David’s face turned quite white. If he could only forget how he had run out that very morning to get
the kindlings behind the wood-pile, and Ben and Polly were talking!
“It’s every bit,” said Ben, turning his old leather purse upside down, “ten cents, Polly.”
“O dear—dear! What shall we do, Ben? The potatoes are ’most gone and everything is so much
worse!”
“Don’t feel so bad, Polly. Things will get better, I guess,” said Ben.
And then Davie, peering around the wood-pile, saw him pat Polly’s shoulder.
“Ben,” said Polly, and she threw her arms around his neck, “we must think up some more ways to
help Mamsie. We must, Ben.”
Ben held Polly closely, but he said nothing, for he couldn’t for his life think of a word of comfort,
and his face worked dreadfully.
“O dear me!” cried Polly in dismay when she saw that; “don’t look so, Ben. And you mustn’t feel
bad.”
“Polly,” said Ben, drawing a long breath, “we’ll both think hard, and meantime, you and I mustn’t
stop our work. We ought to be at it this very minute.”
“That’s so,” said Polly, breaking away from him, “and Mamsie told me to send Davie down to the
store for some Indian meal.”
At that Davie ducked behind the wood-pile, and then ran after Polly into the little brown house. And
now here he was in all his misery, standing before the counter, with Mr. Atkins asking this dreadful
question!
“Hem!” said the storekeeper again. Seeing Davie’s face, he couldn’t keep eating cheese all day, so he
threw down the knife, and before he knew it, he was saying, “How would you like to come here an’
help me keep store a little while every now and then?”
Davie’s blue eyes flew open at their widest, and he had all he could do to hang to the paper bag of
Indian meal.
“You could set here an’ watch things,” Mr. Atkins ran on, surprised to find how very much he needed
a small boy for that very thing, that hadn’t occurred to him before. “An’ then when I want to go to
dinner, I’d admire to have th’ store kep’ open.” At last he stopped suddenly. “What d’ye say, Davie?”
Davie found his voice after swallowing very hard.
“Could I really help you, Mr. Atkins?” he burst out, standing on his tiptoes, the very idea making him
quite tall.
“Sure!” declared the storekeeper, slapping his thigh. “Beats all why I didn’t think of it before. Well,
what d’ye say, David?”
The color rushed all over David’s face till it became rosy red. “Oh, Mr. Atkins,” and he dropped the
bag, “can I come here and help keep the store?” and he clasped his hands.
“That’s what I been a-sayin’ to you,” cried the storekeeper, his pale green eyes sparkling.
“Can I really?”
“Sure as shootin’—I’d like it first rate. You’d be an awful help. You see, you could find out what
folks wanted, an’ come an’ call me when I’m in th’ house.” Mr. Atkins pointed his big thumb over to
the door that shut off the place where he ate and slept.
“Yes,” cried Davie, eagerly, “I could, Mr. Atkins.”
“An’ then you—you could hand me th’ string when I wanted to tie up th’ bundles.”
“Yes, I could.”
“An’ then,” said Mr. Atkins, casting about in his mind for the other things that now loomed up as
most important in which he was to be helped, “why then, you could hand me th’ paper.”
“Yes,” said Davie, “an’ couldn’t I sometimes tie up bundles, Mr. Atkins?” he asked anxiously.
“I shouldn’t wonder if you could,” cried Mr. Atkins; “you’re so smart, Davie Pepper, you’d learn real
easy,” and he slapped his thigh again.
“I’d try to learn,” cried David in a glow, “and then I could help you, couldn’t I, Mr. Atkins, keep
store when I could tie up bundles?”
“You’d help me splendid before you learn to tie up bundles,” declared Mr. Atkins just as excited,
“just bein’ here an’ waitin’ on me.”
“And I’m going to learn to tie up bundles,” cried David in a transport. Then he looked down at the
paper bag of Indian meal at his feet, and he hung his head. “I’m so sorry,” he faltered. Oh, now Mr.
Atkins wouldn’t want him, of course. A boy who dropped bundles all over the place wasn’t to be
trusted; and this splendid chance to help Mamsie was gone.
“’Tain’t such a dreadful thing to do,” observed the storekeeper, leaning his long figure over the
counter to take note of the trouble. “I dropped bundles when I was a boy, Davie.”
“Did you?” said David, greatly relieved that a boy who grew up to be such a smart man as the village
storekeeper did such a thing; and he picked up the paper bag with hope once more springing in his
heart.
“Sure!” declared Mr. Atkins, “I was a great deal bigger than you be.”
“How much bigger, Mr. Atkins?” asked David, clutching his bag.
“Oh, I guess ’most a foot taller,” said Mr. Atkins, scratching his head, “an’ once I dropped a ’lasses
jug.”
“Oh, Mr. Atkins!” exclaimed David, quite overwhelmed.
“Yes, I did,” said the storekeeper, delighted to see the comfort this revelation gave. “An’ ’twas in th’
dusty road. Just think of that, David Pepper!”
“Can I help fill molasses jugs when people want them?” asked Davie suddenly. If that could ever be
allowed, his happiness would be complete indeed.
Mr. Atkins whirled around. “Well—p’raps,” he began slowly. Then he saw David’s face. “Now I
shouldn’t wonder ef you could before long learn to fill them jugs. An’ that would be a most dreadful
help, David, for it’s slow work as stock still, I tell you. Now run along an’ ask your ma ef you can
come an’ help me in th’ store a little now and then. You never must go into anythin’, you know,
without askin’ her.”
“An’ ef ever I see a boy run,” reported Mr. Atkins that day at dinner to his wife, “’twas Davie Pepper,
Ma; when I said that, his legs jest twinkled.” And the storekeeper sat back in his chair to laugh. He
even forgot to ask for a second helping of pie.
“Mamsie!” Davie sprang into the little brown house, swinging his bag of Indian meal, nearly
upsetting Phronsie coming to meet him, Seraphina upside down in her arms.
“Goodness me, Davie!” exclaimed Polly, coming out of the provision room, the tin pail of bread in
her hand, “what is the matter?”
“Where’s Mamsie?” cried Davie, his blue eyes shining, and turning a very red face on her.
“She’s gone to Grandma Bascom’s,” said Polly, dropping the pail to seize his little calico blouse,
“and do give me that bag, Davie.”
Davie gave up the bag and tore himself away from Polly’s hold. “I must ask Mamsie,” he shouted,
running to the door.
“My senses!” cried Polly, “what is the matter?” She wanted to rub her eyes to see if it really was
Davie who stood before her. “Wait! Mamsie’s coming home in a few minutes. Why, here she is
now!” glancing out of the window.
David sprang out. “Oh, Mamsie,” he precipitated himself upon Mother Pepper half-way up the path.
“He wants me to help him, and I’m going to learn to tie up bundles, and he said he thought some time
I could fill molasses jugs, if you’d say yes. Can’t I, Mamsie?”
“Dear me!” Mrs. Pepper held him by both little shoulders. “What is it all about, Davie? No, no, don’t
try to speak now,” she added, seeing his face. “Come in and tell Mother.”
And pretty soon, over by her big old calico-covered rocker, the story got out, Polly hanging over
them both, and Phronsie, who had dropped Seraphina on the way, leaning, perfectly absorbed, against
Mother Pepper’s knee.
“To think of my boy being wanted to help Mr. Atkins!” cried Mrs. Pepper with shining eyes. “Oh,
Davie!”
“Can I—can I?” cried David, feeling as if he couldn’t wait another minute for the “yes” that all his
hopes were hanging upon.
“Can you? Yes, yes, Davie.” Mrs. Pepper gathered him up into her lap. “Oh, what a help you’ll be to
Mother, if you are a good boy and learn to do everything in the store that Mr. Atkins tells you!”
Polly ran down the road a good piece to meet Ben when he came home from Deacon Blodgett’s. Joel
had scampered on ahead. “Where are you going?” he had screamed as Polly flew past.
“Going to walk home with Ben,” she had shouted, flying along.
“My goodness, Polly,” cried Ben, as she rushed up to him, “is the house afire?”
“Mercy no!” Polly gasped for breath. “You can’t think,” she panted.
“Hold on!” Ben pounded her on the back. “You’re going like a steam engine, Polly.”
“Well, I feel like a steam engine,” said Polly, with another gasp. “Oh, Ben, you—can’t ever guess—
what’s happened.”
“Come on over here.” Ben dragged her off to the stone wall. “There now, tell me all about it.”
“Well, in the first place,” said Polly, sitting down on the wall, Ben by her side, and drawing a long
breath, “I don’t ever mean to be so bad as I was this morning, Ben.”
She folded her hands in her lap, and a sorrowful little look came into her brown eyes.
“You weren’t bad,” contradicted Ben stoutly; “and anyway, if you were, I was worse.”
“Oh, no, Ben,” said Polly quickly; “you are never as bad as I am, and you always see something
better ahead.”
“Indeed I don’t, Polly,” declared Ben, “you’re the one to pretend that things are good, and you have
such splendid plans. I never can think of anything. Well, anyway, tell what’s happened at home.”
“Ben,” said Polly, suddenly lifting her face, the color rushing all over it, “just when the potatoes are
all gone, and there isn’t much bread in the pail, what do you think—you can’t guess, so I’ll tell you.
Mr. Atkins has asked Davie to come now and then to help him in his store.”
“Not our Davie!” exclaimed Ben, nearly tumbling off the stone wall; “why, he’s too little. You must
be dreaming, Polly.”
“Indeed I’m not dreaming,” declared Polly indignantly; “and Davie wouldn’t ever say things that
aren’t so. You know that, Ben Pepper.”
“Yes, I know,” said Ben—but he looked very puzzled.
“And anyway, even if we don’t understand it,” said Polly wisely, “why it’s so. And just think what a
help to Mamsie. And it’s come when I was so bad this very morning.”
“You weren’t bad,” declared Ben again. And there they had it all over again.
“But you will be—we shall both be,” he wound up with a laugh, “if we sit here on this stone wall
much longer.”
“That’s so,” said Polly, with a little laugh, and hopping off from the wall, they both ran off, hand in
hand, down the road to the little brown house.
When they got there everything was in a truly dreadful state. There lay Joel, face down on the floor,
crying as if his heart would break. “I want to go to help in the store,” he screamed over and over, till
nobody else had a chance to be heard. David was hanging over him in the greatest distress, saying, “I
won’t go, Joey—you may go, Joey.”
Mrs. Pepper shook her head, and said quietly, “Oh, yes, Davie, you must go; you have promised Mr.
Atkins.”
“I want to tie up bundles,” screamed Joel, kicking his heels on the floor. “O dear—dear—boo—hoo
—hoo!”
“Perhaps,” Davie ran over to Mother Pepper’s chair, “Mr. Atkins would let Joey come and help him
instead of me,” he said.
“No, Davie,” said Mother Pepper, shaking her head worse than ever, “Mr. Atkins asked you, and you
have promised. Always remember a promise once given must be kept,” and she patted his flushed
cheek. “Joel, come here!” It was impossible for Joel to stay on the floor kicking his heels and
screaming when Mamsie spoke in that tone, so he got up and drew slowly near to her, digging his
knuckles into his streaming eyes.
“Davie couldn’t ask Mr. Atkins to let you take his place, even if he hadn’t promised, for you are so
much bigger than Davie, that he isn’t strong enough to help Ben pile wood as you do. Why, you are
my big boy, Joey!” She patted his stubby black hair affectionately.
“So I am,” said Joel, as if a wholly new idea had struck him, and wiping off the last tear on the back
of his little brown hand. “You see, I couldn’t go, Dave, instead of you, to help Mr. Atkins in the
store, for I am so much bigger than you, and I’ve got to pile wood and help Mamsie.”
Davie drew a long breath of relief.
“So you have,” he said. Then he laughed gleefully.
“And I’m so hungry,” announced Joel, the matter all settled now comfortably. “O dear, isn’t dinner
ready?”
“Yes,” said Polly, running over to the stove, “and we’ve got mush to-day—Indian meal mush—just
think. Do get the molasses pitcher, Ben!”
“No, let me,” begged Davie, all aglow with the delightful visions of molasses jugs being filled by his
hands from the big barrel in Mr. Atkins’ store.
“So you may, Davie,” said Polly, putting the big dish of mush on the table.
CHAPTER XII HOP O’ MY THUMB
CHAPTER XII HOP O’ MY THUMB
“NOW, David, ef you warn’t here,” said Mr. Atkins, “I couldn’t go off this morning.”
“Couldn’t you, Mr. Atkins?” said David happily, over in the corner dusting the cans of peas and
beans piled on the shelves, and he whirled around, the dust-cloth in his hand.
“No, never in all this world,” the storekeeper smote his hands together smartly. “Now you see, Davie,
what a help you be to me.”
“I’m so glad I’m a help to you, Mr. Atkins,” cried Davie, the color all over his face, and his heart
going like a trip-hammer.
“I’ve got to go over to Simon Beeton’s farm to see about them potatoes,” said Mr. Atkins, “for he’d
cheat me out of my eye-teeth ef I bought ’em without seein’. An’ now I can leave so easy in my
mind, Davie, seein’ you are here.”
Davie’s bosom swelled, and he stood quite still. Oh, how glad Mamsie will be! And how good it was
that Mr. Atkins’ eye-teeth were now not in any danger.
“An’ you can take th’ orders, David,” said Mr. Atkins, hurrying over to the counter to pick up the
slate; “you can write so nice an’ plain now, that I’ll know all what folks want when I get back.”
David longed to ask, “Can’t I give ’em the things they want?” But Mother Pepper had told him the
first morning that he went to the grocery store, not to ask Mr. Atkins if he might do anything, but to
wait to be told.
“An’ some time—maybe the next time I go tradin’, you may wait on th’ customers,” said Mr. Atkins
encouragingly, “so you must learn all you can, David.”
David smothered a sigh, but he stood quite tall. “I’ll do everything I can, Mr. Atkins,” he said.
“That’s right, an’ ef anythin’ extry comes up, you run into th’ house for Mis Atkins.”
“Yes, I will,” promised David, feeling sure that he would understand if he gave his whole mind to it.
“Well, I must be off,” cried the storekeeper with an eye to the old clock on the shelf above the cans of
peas and beans, and the door slammed as he hurried into the house.
David stood still to draw a long breath and look around. He was actually left in charge of Mr. Atkins’
store!
For just one minute he couldn’t believe it, then the joyful truth rushed over him. He wanted to run
over and practise writing on the slate just as he had been doing every day when there wasn’t anything
that Mr. Atkins set as a task. But now to-day it was different.
“You dust down them shelves, Davie,” the storekeeper had said that very morning, “they look mortal
bad, an’ old Mis Shaw kept starin’ ’em all over yest’day, an’ she looked ‘shif’less,’ though she didn’t
say it, all th’ time she was in the store. An’ I’m afraid she’ll think everything dusty, jest because I
hain’t had no time to move them pesky cans.”
So as dusting the shelves was the task set for him now, why he must keep at it. And David turned his
back on the beloved slate lying on the counter with the slate pencil dangling off by its string.
“If I could only have a slate all my own,” said David to himself, as he began again on the lower shelf,
patiently chasing every bit of dust from it, and moving each tin can carefully to one side. “Perhaps I
will, some time.” He had finished that shelf and looked up to the next one. “I must get the step-
ladder,” he said, “for Mr. Atkins told me to dust ’em all.”
And presently he was mounted up there, dust-cloth in hand, when a voice back of him called, “Hello
—Hello, there!”
David whirled around on his step-ladder.
“Where’s Mr. Atkins?” cried a farmer, whip in hand, advancing into the store.
“He’s gone to buy potatoes,” said David.
“Well, who’s in charge o’ th’ store?” demanded the man.
“Mr. Atkins told me to put down on the slate what people asked for,” said David. He wanted
dreadfully to say that he was in charge of the store, but Mr. Atkins hadn’t said that.
“Oh—ho!” roared the farmer, throwing back his head to laugh. “Well, that is a good one—a little
Hop o’ my Thumb like you. Ho—Ho!” David’s cheeks got very hot, and his small legs trembled
under him, as he got down from the step-ladder, laying his dust-cloth on the top step, and went over
to the counter.
“Mr. Atkins told me to write down what the folks wanted,” he repeated, picking up the slate.
The farmer stopped laughing and drew up to the counter, looking at him curiously.
“You tell Atkins I’ve got apples as good as th’ next one, an’ I want he should give me some money
for ’em.”
David drew the slate pencil up into his fingers. O dear—what was he to write! This wasn’t anything
to do with orders; but the farmer’s cold eyes were on him, and he was just getting ready to laugh
again, so something must be done.
“What is your name?” he asked, raising his blue eyes.
“Jones—Simeon Jones,” said the farmer, his big mouth twitching under his heavy beard, as he looked
down at the small figure.
David began with a beating heart; but as he went on he forgot all about the farmer, thinking only of
Mamsie. He mustn’t break down, for if he did, he would get no more chance to keep store for Mr.
Atkins.
“Let’s see what you’ve ben writin’,” Mr. Jones slouched over the slate, as Davie laid it on the
counter. “Thunder, that ain’t th’ way to put it.”
“You said you wanted some money,” said Davie, standing his ground; but his legs trembled all the
same.
Mr. Simeon Jones held up the slate and squinted at the crooked letters, having hard work to keep
from running into each other. “Mr. Jones wants you to give him sum munny for his appuls.”
“I ain’t a-beggin’,” he said, “an’ besides, he hain’t bought th’ apples yet. I want him to buy ’em an’
pay me cash down.” He slapped the counter with his heavy whip, then tucked it under his arm.
David reached over and got the little sponge that had wandered off by itself, the storekeeper declaring
it got in the way when it dangled on the string alongside the slate pencil. Then he rubbed out
everything but “Mr. Jones,” and began again, the big farmer leaning against the counter to watch the
work go on.
“Mr. Jones wants munny for his appuls.”
“No—no,” roared Mr. Simeon Jones in such a tone that David, clinging to the slate pencil, jumped in
dismay. “I tell you he hain’t bought ’em yit. Here, give me that ere slate an’ I’ll write it myself.”
“No—no,” said David, clutching slate and pencil and all, and backing off to the end of the counter.
“Mr. Atkins said I was to write it.” He was in mortal terror that the farmer’s big hand, now raised,
would seize his last chance of ever being put in trust again in the store.
But Mr. Simeon Jones, not really being armed and equipped for much writing, either on a slate or on
anything else, decided that he didn’t care to undertake any job along that line; so his big hand
dropped.
“Well, you write it as I tell you,” he commanded gruffly, “or you won’t get no jobs in this store, when
I tell Atkins.”
Which being exactly what David was terrified about, he began once more: “Mr. Jones wants you to bi
his appuls—and—”
“Pay him cash,” shouted the farmer over David’s shoulder.
“Pay him Kash,” finished David, the pencil trembling in fear of more messages to follow.
“That will do,” said Mr. Jones, quite mollified; “it’ll clinch the business.” Then he drew off and
looked at David tucking the slate in its place on the counter. “Say—did you mind when I laughed at
you?”
David wanted dreadfully to stand up like a man and say “No,” but Mother Pepper had said, “always
tell the truth.”
“Yes,” he said slowly, “I did.”
“Thunderation!” exploded the farmer, and a dull red crept up into his swarthy cheek; one of his big
hands went into his pocket. “There, I ain’t a-goin’ to laugh at you no more,” and he held out a coin.
“You’re a real smart boy ef you ain’t any bigger’n a pint o’ cider. There’s a dime for ye.”
David jumped back as if shot, and put his hands behind him.
“Take it,” urged Mr. Simeon Jones, pushing the dime nearer.
“Mamsie wouldn’t like it,” was all that Davie could manage to say.
“Mamsie—who’s him?” demanded the farmer.
“She’s our mother,” said Davie, keeping his hands behind him.
“Saltpeter!” ejaculated Mr. Simeon Jones; “well then I s’pose you can’t take this ’ere dime, ef she
wouldn’t like it, eh?”
“No,” said David, quite happy that he was at last understood.
“Well, I shall tell Atkins you’ve done fust-rate,” said the farmer, slouching to the door. Then he went
out with another curious look at David, got into his big wagon and drove off.
Davie went back to the step-ladder, climbed up and wiped all the shelves. He wanted to sing, but that
wasn’t the way, he was quite sure, to keep a grocery store. So he shut his lips tightly together, but his
blue eyes shone as the dust-cloth went busily on its way into all the corners. At last it was all done,
and every one of the tin cans of peas and beans in neat rows were in their places. Then he got down
from the step-ladder and gazed at them all in great delight.
“Now I can practise my writing on the slate,” he cried joyfully. And scampering over to a barrel of
sugar standing by the counter, he got on it, slate in hand, and fell to laboriously forming all the best
letters that Polly had showed him how to make.
“I must be careful not to rub out ‘Mr. Jones,’” he said. So he laid a paper lying on the counter ready
for a bundle to be tied up, between the farmer’s message and his knees, and presently he was lost to
all but the blissful prospect of some time being able to write things as beautifully as Polly herself.
The first thing he knew the door to the grocery store was slowly opened, and Davie lifted his head.
A young man stepped softly in. He wasn’t the kind that was seen around Badgertown, and Davie
didn’t like his looks in the least.
“Well, old man,” said the newcomer, drawing near to David’s barrel and looking him all over with a
pair of evil eyes, “where’s the boss?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said David.
“Why, the boss who runs this store,” the young man flirted a pair of long and grimy fingers
comprehensively.
“He isn’t here,” said David, not taking his blue eyes from the face that now he liked less than ever.
“And he’s left you to take charge of the she-bang?”
“I don’t know what that is,” said David.
“The store—the store,” the visitor cried impatiently, and threw his dirty fingers about more recklessly
than ever. Then he snapped them in David’s face.
“He told me to write things that folks asked for on the slate,” said David.
The young man broke into a laugh as much more unpleasant than that of Mr. Simeon Jones as could
be imagined. Then he broke off suddenly to listen. “Somebody might be passing,” he muttered. “See
here, old man, there wasn’t any need for you to tell me about your boss. I saw him drive away and I
was coming in then to pay you a call; thought you might be lonesome,” and he chuckled under his
breath; “then that other old party hove along, so I couldn’t get here till now. Look here!” It was
impossible for Davie to obey this command any better, for he had never taken his blue eyes from the
face, now just above him, as he sat on the barrel, slate in hand.
“I ain’t going to have any fooling,” the young man was saying between his teeth, and he raised one
hand threateningly. “I’ll tell you that to begin with—I’ve come here for money. You can’t help
yourself, for the boss is away.”
He put both dirty hands on the counter and vaulting over it, twitched open the drawer to rummage in
the till.
Davie sprang down from his barrel. “You mustn’t do that,” he screamed, “that’s Mr. Atkins’ money.”
“You shut your gab.” The young man, one fist full of silver pieces and pennies, raised his head, his
wicked eyes sparkling in anger.
“You mustn’t take it! It’s Mr. Atkins’ money!” David, his heart going like everything, beat on the
counter with one small hand. Oh, if some customer would only come in!
“See here—you’ll get the worst beating you ever had,” declared the young man, “if you don’t hold
your tongue.” He hissed out the last words and bent over the till again.

“He told me to write things that folks asked for on the slate,” said David.—Page 187.
David, in mortal terror that whatever he did, he couldn’t keep Mr. Atkins’ money from being carried
off, cast another imploring glance at the door for a possible customer. No one was in sight,
Badgertown street in front of the store being free from all pedestrians, and there wasn’t a wagon to be
seen. Then Mr. Atkins’ words flashed upon him, “If anythin’ extry comes up, you run into the house
for Mis Atkins.”
This was certainly “somethin’ extry,” and it was quite time to run into the house and call Mrs. Atkins.
He made one leap for the little door that shut off the storekeeper’s home, and the first thing he knew,
he was seized violently from behind and thrown in a heap to the floor.
David could not hear the words—he only knew that the awful eyes were glaring at him, and he shut
his own so that he could not see, as the young man hissed out something. At last he made out, “No,
you don’t, my fine sir. I’ll attend to you before I go.” Then he was dragged off to a corner, thrown
behind some bags of oats, and tied fast to a rope hanging from the neck of one. “I guess you won’t
run much with one of them bags at your heels,” and the young man surveyed his work with a grin.
“Da—vid!” rang out the voice of Mrs. Atkins. “Where are you?”
The young man on his way back to the till started and pricked up his ears.
“Oh,—she’ll be killed!” David screamed. “Don’t come in!” The little door was flung wide, and Mrs.
Atkins, all in a hurry as dinner was waiting, got herself into the store just in time to see a tall figure
flying past and out into Badgertown street.
“My sakes!” she ejaculated. Then she gave a wild look around. “David, where be ye?”
“Here,” said David, behind the bags of oats. “Oh, Mrs. Atkins, did he take any?”
“For th’ land sakes—David Pepper!” The storekeeper’s wife knelt down by his side. When she saw
the rope she was quite overcome, and she fumbled helplessly at the knots.
“Did he—did he?” implored Davie in great distress, “take any of Mr. Atkins’ money?”
“Money?” Mrs. Atkins hopped to her feet in great alarm, and scuttled over to get behind the counter.
“My soul an’ body!” she exclaimed, pawing among the loose dimes and nickels and pennies dropped
by the young man when he sprang for David.
“Did he?” implored Davie. “Oh, do tell me, Mrs. Atkins—did he take any money?”
“It looks as if he’d ben interrupted.” The storekeeper’s wife drew a long sigh of relief, as she settled
the coins back into the till, and slammed to the drawer. “I don’t b’lieve he got a single cent, David
Pepper,” she said, coming back to him.
“Oh, I’m so glad,” said Davie.
“An’ now I’ll untie you,” she said, getting down on her knees. “My gracious!” and she shook with
fright, “sech a risk as you’ve run!”
“I’m so glad he didn’t get any money,” breathed Davie blissfully.
“An’ you’ve saved it,” Mrs. Atkins, getting the last knot out, threw the end of the ropes off, “just
think of that, David Pepper!”
David’s blue eyes shone. “I wish I could have kept him,” he said, as he got up to his feet.
“Land!—don’t say that—you’ve done splendid!” said Mrs. Atkins, and she shivered as she got up.
CHAPTER XIII “DON’T HURT HIM”
CHAPTER XIII “DON’T HURT HIM”
MRS. ATKINS ran to the door. “Beats all how a man ain’t never on hand when he’s wanted,” she
exclaimed in vexation, peering up and down the street.
“Well, now, ef here ain’t Mr. Jones heavin’ along,” she cried joyfully, and picking up her calico
gown, she sped over the step, bawling out, “Do stop—Mr. Jones!”
“What’s th’ matter, Mis Atkins?” asked the farmer leisurely driving up.
“I’ll tell you, only do get out,” she cried excitedly.
“Hain’t nothin’ happened to that little feller, has they?” the farmer pointed his thumb in great concern
toward the store.
“No—no—but ef it hadn’t ben for Davie, Mr. Atkins would ’a’ ben robbed,” declared Mrs. Atkins;
then she thrust her head back into the store, “Davie, come here, an’ tell us all about it. We must catch
th’ man, or he’ll try it again, like enough.”
“Sho!” exclaimed Farmer Jones, as Davie ran out to the step. Then he whistled, “Whew! Hop o’ my
Thumb,” he was going to say. But remembering how the small boy hadn’t liked that, nor the laugh,
he whistled again, as he got slowly out of the wagon.
“Tell it, Davie,” Mrs. Atkins kept saying, “just exactly how it all happened.” And then a small knot
of farmers drew near, so there was quite a little crowd.
As Davie forgot to say much about himself, Mrs. Atkins and Farmer Jones were obliged to prod him
with questions. At last the story was pieced out.
“We must catch the fellow,” exclaimed one farmer, “else he’ll be trying the same game again.”
“Like enough we’ll be murdered in our beds,” said a woman, pushing her way into the center of
things, “an’ ’twon’t be safe to live in Badgertown.”
And a thin voice on the fringe of the crowd piped out, “I warrant it’s the same man that stopped to
my house this mornin’ for somethin’ to eat.”
“What did he look like, Grandsir Tibbs?” cried two or three.
“I dunno no more’n th’ dead,” said Grandsir querulously. His voice shook worse than ever, under the
excitement of the thing. “His cap was drawed over his face—I shet th’ door on him.”
“Well, we’ve got to catch th’ feller,” declared a stalwart farmer, “an’ this boy,” laying his hand on
David’s small shoulder, “is th’ only one who knows what th’ tramp looks like. Come on, youngster,”
and before he knew what was going to happen, Davie was lifted up and dumped into a wagon, the
owner jumping in and gathering up the reins.
“Stop!” cried the storekeeper’s wife, when she saw this, trying to break through the crowd.
“Catch th’ feller—come on—” the cry was taken up, and the other farmers in the wagons drove off
after the one carrying Davie, Mrs. Atkins running along as far as her breath would permit, crying,
“Stop — you mustn’t — take th’ boy! He’s David Pepper,” and sometimes she said, “He’s Mis
Pepper’s boy.” But no matter how she screamed it, the wagons rolled on, and at last she sank down
by the roadside.
“He’d take to th’ woods mos’ likely,” said the farmer who had David as a companion and thus was
the leader, pointing off with his whip as he stood up in the wagon and looked back at the procession.
“Yes—yes,” they called back. So to the woods they whipped up.
When they drew up to a thick grove of pines skirting Badgertown, they all tumbled out of the wagons
and peered cautiously in.
“One of us must set out here with th’ boy—we ain’t a-goin’ to drag him in.”
“I’ll set,” offered one man, coming up to Davie’s wagon.
“Yes, I know you’d offer,” said the farmer to whom that vehicle belonged, “but all th’ same, you ain’t
a-goin’ to have that easy part. Simeon Jones—you come an’ take keer o’ this boy, will you, till we
fetch out th’ feller?”
“All right,” said Farmer Jones, driving up. “Come, git in here;” he again came perilously near to
saying “Hop o’ my Thumb,” but he coughed and just saved himself.
David, being in that position where there was nothing to do but to obey, jumped out of his wagon and
into that of Farmer Jones, who received him gladly.
“Sho now!” began Mr. Jones, clearing his throat, “th’ tramp robbed Mr. Atkins—eh?”
“He didn’t get any money,” said David, folding his small hands.
“That’s good!” cried Farmer Jones, slapping his leg. “Well, I ’spect you kept him from it,” he said,
looking down admiringly at the little figure on the other half of the old leather seat. “Gosh! You ain’t
bigger’n a half a pint o’ cider, but I b’lieve you did it—eh?”
David fought shy of this question and said nothing. But it was no use. By little and little, Farmer
Jones, being a man who, to put it into his own words, “stuck to a thing like an old dog to a bone,”
wormed the story out of David, helplessly miserable at being obliged to tell it.
Suddenly the body of Badgertown citizens trooped out from the woods. In the midst of them was the
young man with the evil eyes, who had visited Mr. Atkins’ store.
Everybody was shouting in chorus, and Farmer Jones clapped Davie’s shoulder with a glad hand.
“Say, youngster, that’s th’ feller, ain’t it?”
David drew a long breath. But Mamsie, having often said, “Tell the truth,” he said, “Yes.” And one
of the young farmers, finding the capture a trifle dull, crowded roughly up against the prisoner. This
was the signal for the others, who began to wreak a little of the vengeance to come upon their man.
David stood straight up in the wagon. “Don’t hurt him,” he begged.
The young man with the evil eyes turned them upon Davie; but he said nothing.
“Easy there,” commanded Farmer Jones.
“We don’t want such fellers comin’ to Badgertown,” said the first young farmer. “Come on, boys, we
must give him a hustle before we fetch him to Cherryville jail.”
“You mustn’t hurt him,” said Davie in a loud voice. His cheeks were very red, and his blue eyes
flashed.
“What this boy says, goes,” cried Farmer Jones sharply. “D’ye understand?”
They did, Simeon Jones being a person to be reckoned with. And pretty soon the young man who had
visited Mr. Atkins’ store had his hands neatly tied together with a piece of rope, and he found himself
in a wagon, the horse being turned to the road leading to Cherryville jail.
“You tell that boy,” he nodded his head over toward David, “that ’tain’t his fault that I’m took, an’
I’m obliged to him for trying to save me.”
But David burst into tears and flung himself down on the floor of the wagon.
“I’ve got to hurry back and lock up th’ store,” Mrs. Atkins was saying about this time, getting up
from the roadside, “an’ then I must get over to Mis Pepper’s an’ tell her all about it. Goodness me—
how’ll I ever do it?”
But Mother Pepper had the news before the storekeeper’s wife reached the little brown house, for
Davie was there. Farmer Simeon Jones, aghast at the flood of tears, had hurried him home as fast as
the old horse could go.
“Your Ma’ll say you done right,” he kept repeating over and over. “Don’t you be afeard. An’ th’ man
ain’t goin’ to be hurt. An’ they give real good meals, I’ve heard say, over to Cherryville jail.”
But all this was no comfort to David, and he wailed steadily on.
“Well, I’m blest ef I ain’t glad to see that ’ere little brown house,” declared Mr. Jones, very spry at
getting out as the old horse stopped at the gate. David, half blinded by his tears, stumbled out and up
to the big green door. Mother Pepper opened it. “I couldn’t help it, Mamsie,” he cried, huddling into
her arms.
“I’ll tell ye, Marm,” said Farmer Jones, looking into her black eyes, “fust go-off, so’s you needn’t to
worry. This boy o’ yourn has done just fine.”
“I couldn’t help it, Mamsie,” Davie kept saying.
“There—there—Davie—” Mother Pepper held him closely, while one hand patted his soft light hair;
then she looked up inquiringly.
“Simeon Jones is my name, Marm,” said the farmer. “Might I come in—it’s kinder a long story.”
“Yes, indeed,” and once in the old kitchen, the farmer’s tongue took up the tale and ran it off glibly.
And just at the very end in hurried the storekeeper’s wife.
“Now, Davie,” said Mother Pepper, when at last it was all out, “you did just right.” How her black
eyes shone! And she kissed his hot cheek.
“But the poor man—he’s in jail,” moaned David.
“That had to be,” said Mrs. Pepper firmly. “Don’t you see, child, if he were allowed to go free,
Badgertown people wouldn’t be safe from robbers.”
“Mamsie, I don’t believe he’s going to steal any more,” said David, wiping up, the comfort settling
down into his heart, since Mamsie had said it had to be.
“We will hope not,” said Mother Pepper, with another kiss.
“Hoh!” Joel rushed in, his black eyes ablaze and his cheeks as red as could be. He had heard the story
at Deacon Blodgett’s, for all Badgertown was afire with it. “If I’d been there, I’d ’a’ smashed that old
burglar.” He doubled up his small fists and swung them in the air.
“Joel—Joel—” said Mrs. Pepper reprovingly.
“Ha! Ha!” laughed Farmer Jones, slapping his thigh.
Joel rushed up to him. “Well, I would,” he cried. “You needn’t laugh, you, Mr. Man.”
“Joel, come here.” When Mother Pepper spoke in that tone there could be no delay. So up to her
chair he marched, yet he had a backward eye on that old farmer who sat in that chair laughing at him.
“You’re pretty smart, Joel,” said the storekeeper’s wife, “but Davie did the best after all.”
“But I could ’a’ smashed him,” declared Joel, transferring his attention to her, “if I’d only been there.
Why ain’t I ever there when a burglar comes,” he cried in anguish. “Why ain’t I, Mamsie?”
“Well, I must be a-goin’,” said Farmer Jones, getting out of his chair. “You’ve got two smart likely
boys, Mis Pepper, but the little un is the most to my taste. Ef you’re goin’ home, Mis Atkins, I’ll take
you back.”
“I’m obliged enough, I can tell you,” said Mrs. Atkins, “for I hain’t run an’ ben scared to death in a
long spell like I’ve ben to-day. Good-by, David. You’ve took care of our store every bit as good as a
man.”
Davie kept in the little brown house for days after that; nothing could persuade him to venture on
Badgertown streets, where the folks were likely to waylay him, and want to know all about his
adventure in Mr. Atkins’ store. And when any one came to the little brown house, as many did, to
hear all about it, Davie would run out and hide behind the wood-pile until they had gone.
“You can’t do that all the time, Davie,” said Polly one day, finding him there. “I’m going down to
Mr. Beebe to get him to mend Mamsie’s shoes, and you come with me.”
“Oh, I can’t, Polly,” said Davie, shrinking back; yet his blue eyes were full of longing.
“Nonsense!” exclaimed Polly gayly. “Come along, I’ll race you to the gate.”
That was beyond Davie’s resistance. To race Polly was the children’s great delight. So off they ran,
and as luck would have it, David got to the gate first.
“That’s fine!” declared Polly, tossing back her hair from her rosy cheeks. “Well, now, come on for
another spin.”
They had almost reached Mr. Beebe’s little shop when an old lady coming out of a shop opposite
beckoned violently with her black satin parasol. The long fringe waved back and forth as she shook
the parasol with an air of command.
“It is Miss Parrott,” said Polly in an awe-struck voice. “You go in to Mr. Beebe’s shop and I’ll run
across to her.”
Davie, quite glad to escape and especially into dear Mr. Beebe’s shoe-shop, hurried over the cobble-
stones, while Polly flew across the street. His foot was on the step, when a voice said: “Bring the boy
—he’s the one I want to see.”
“You will have to come, Davie,” said Polly, hurrying back.
“Oh, I can’t,” said Davie, crowding up against the shoe-shop door; “don’t make me, Polly.” He
turned a distressed little face as she hurried up.
“Yes, you must,” said Polly. “Mamsie would say so.”
“Would Mamsie say so?” cried Davie, hanging to the big knocker. “Would she really, Polly?”
“Yes,” said Polly, “she would. Come on, Davie,” and she held out her hand. So together they went
across the narrow little street, David hanging back on lagging footsteps.
Miss Parrott’s big coach was around the corner. There she stood now, waiting for them.
“I want to hear all about what happened yesterday in Mr. Atkins’ store,” she said, “and I am going to
take you two children to drive, and then, David, you can tell me the story on the way.”
“Oh, Miss Parrott,” cried Polly, dismayed at Davie’s frantic clutch on her hand, “I have to take
Mamsie’s shoes for Mr. Beebe to mend.” Yet her eyes sparkled at the very thought of riding in that
Parrott grand coach!
“Run across then with them,” said Miss Parrott. “Come, David, you and I will get into the carriage,
and Polly will join us.”
“I’ll take the shoes over to Mr. Beebe,” cried Davie frantically, and he reached for Polly’s bundle.
“No, David,” said Miss Parrott, “Polly must do it. You come with me.” And there he was, his little
hand in hers, on the way to the coach waiting around the corner, and Polly flying across the street to
the little shoe-shop just as frantic to get back to him.
“Now then, we can be quite comfortable,” said Miss Parrott, having them all settled in the big stately
old coach, the order to drive given to the coachman, who matched up in dignity to the coach and the
Parrott estate, “and you shall give me the whole story. Begin at the beginning, David.”
CHAPTER XIV IN THE PARROTT PLAYROOM
CHAPTER XIV IN THE PARROTT PLAYROOM
MISS PARROTT looked the two children over carefully. Then her glance rested on David. He sat
tucked up in the corner of the green-leather seat, as far away from the keen dark eyes as he could get,
his hand tightly clasped in Polly’s.
“Now then,” said Miss Parrott, the investigation being over, “you must tell me everything about it. I
was unable to get a satisfactory account at Atkins’ store. Begin, little boy.”
Davie gave a sob, and ducked farther back into his corner. This was so much worse than being
waylaid for a recital of his adventure by the ordinary run of Badgertown citizens, that he couldn’t
conceal his dismay. To think of being fastened up in the Parrott coach and made to tell of what was
now a perfectly hateful thing since he was to be petted and praised for his part in it, made him sob
again; and he flung himself up against Polly and hid his burning face on her shoulder.
“Oh, Miss Parrott,” Polly broke out, “Davie cannot bear to talk about it. He only did what he ought
to.” She forgot that she was talking to the aristocratic lady, whose comings and goings in this same
stately coach to the little church on Badgertown green were eagerly watched for of a Sunday. She
raised her brown eyes pleadingly.
“That is where you are very wrong to encourage your little brother in refusing to answer my
questions. And I must insist on knowing all about what happened.” The tall aristocratic figure on the
seat opposite loomed up so forbiddingly that Polly had all she could do to keep from joining in
Davie’s distress. But this would never do. Besides, Miss Parrott was saying, “I am sure your mother,
whom I have heard brings you children up most excellently, would wish your little brother to answer
my questions.”
“Davie,” said Polly desperately, bending her head down to his ear, “you must sit up and tell Miss
Parrott about it. Mamsie would want you to.”
She had to say it over three times, “Mamsie would want you to,” for instead of sitting up, Davie
burrowed deeper against her shoulder. At last her tone was so decided, that anything being more
desirable than to lose Polly’s approval, David somehow got up into a sitting posture; and before he
quite knew what he was going to say, there he was doing his best to let Miss Parrott understand just
what happened in Mr. Atkins’ store. He must please Mamsie.
And to his great surprise and relief, Miss Parrott never said one word of praise for anything that he
did, and as for petting him, she still sat bolt upright at the conclusion of the tale, and only said,
“Thank you for telling me.”
David drew himself up, and began to enjoy himself. As for Polly, her brown eyes danced and the
color came back in her cheeks.
“I am going to take you home with me,” said Miss Parrott suddenly.
“Oh,” cried Polly, wrenched away from the bliss of actually driving in the Parrott coach, “we can’t
go. Mamsie doesn’t know where we are, and we ought to go home now.”
“I suppose,” said Miss Parrott reflectively, “that I ought to drive around and ask your mother.” But
she bit her lip, being accustomed to do all things as she chose without leave or license from anybody.
Still a woman should be asked about the movements of her own children. So she gave the order to the
old coachman, and the horses were soon turned in the direction of the little brown house.
Davie forgot himself and sprang out without a word of thanks, and rushed up to the old green door.
“Oh, do forgive him, Miss Parrott,” begged Polly in distress, “he didn’t mean to be rude.”
For answer Miss Parrott only said, “Will you ask your mother to come out here?” But she smiled, so
Polly knew that things weren’t so very bad, and she ran up the path, greatly relieved.
And presently Mrs. Pepper came out, with Polly, and to the great astonishment, said, “Yes, the
children could go,” and “Run in, and put a clean blouse on, Davie.”
“The boy looks well enough,” said Miss Parrott decidedly. “I’m sure you keep your children always
clean, Mrs. Pepper,—everybody says so.”
But Mrs. Pepper only smiled, and Polly ran into the house to get Davie ready. For when Mamsie said
a thing, she always meant it, and pretty soon out they came, Davie quite fresh in another calico
blouse and not entirely at rest in his mind as to the visit at the Parrott estate.
When they drove up with a flourish before the big front door with carved stone lions on either side,
Davie held Polly’s hand closely, and surveyed everything with wide blue eyes.
The butler, a dignitary resplendent enough in the children’s eyes to be the owner of many estates,
came down the wide hall. Miss Parrott gave him instructions concerning her guests, whom he viewed
with cold unconcern.
“Now, then, children,” she said, “I’m going to take you into the garden and leave you there. You will
be called when luncheon is served,” and turning off from the big hall to a narrow passage, they came
to a green lattice door.
Miss Parrott opened this. “Oh!” cried Polly, clasping her hands in delight. And Davie forgot his fright
and gave a little squeal.
“It’s so perfectly beautiful!” exclaimed Polly.
An old-fashioned garden, bright with hollyhocks and all sorts of dear, homely flowers, a little square
plot in the center, around which were stone seats, burst upon their view. All off in the distance were
terraces and lawns, with all manner of splendid trees, and pleasant paths intersecting.
Miss Parrott’s long gaunt face drew up into a pleasant smile that seemed to say, “Good-by to your
wrinkles.”
“Now run along, children, and enjoy yourselves,” she said. “You will be called when luncheon is
ready. Be sure that you come in at once.”
“Polly,” said Davie in an awe-struck voice, “do you suppose the lady can come in here every time she
wants to?”
“Of course,” said Polly, longing to hop up and down, but perhaps some one would see her and it
wouldn’t be considered proper. “Why, she lives here, Davie.”
Davie drew a long breath. To live in this beautiful place and come out in this wonderful garden! He
drew a long breath and stood quite still beside the green lattice door.
“Let’s go and sit down on one of those little stone seats,” said Polly.
So the children walked quite properly over and sat down on one of the seats in the little green square.
“Polly,” said Davie, “I very much wish that we could go over under those trees,” pointing to a bit of
greensward where the noonday sun was making cool shadows.
“Why, we can,” said Polly; “Miss Parrott said we could run about and enjoy it all.” She got off from
the little stone seat and held out her hand.
“Oh, Polly, can we really run?” cried Davie in great excitement.
“Yes, indeed,” cried Polly, finding her courage in David’s happiness. “Come on, I’ll race you to that
big pine-tree.”
“Now what does Miss Parrott want with the likes of them poor children,” exclaimed a scornful
housemaid, peering out of the green lattice door.
“Hevin knows!” cried the butler, raising both hands, “and they are actually to stay to luncheon.”
“Oh—oh!” ejaculated the housemaid with a sniff.
Up-stairs under the gambrel roof overrun with sweet-brier, Miss Parrott was sitting by her window,
listening to the childish peals of laughter, as Polly and David played hide-and-seek between the
ancestral trees.
“I haven’t felt so happy here,” placing her hand on her heart, “since Sister and I played there. Strange
that I dreaded asking children here.”
The butler flung open the green lattice door, and said harshly, “Come in to luncheon,” and started to
find Miss Parrott just behind him.
“That is scarcely the way to summon my guests,” she said.
“Beg pardon, Ma’am,” said the butler obsequiously.
“I want you to go out and treat them as you would any other of my friends,” said Miss Parrott.
And the butler with a sullen face but a back that expressed nothing but complete submission, stalked
down the garden path to the big trees whence the happy sounds proceeded. And the scornful
housemaid confided it all to the equally disdainful cook, who said never in her twenty-five years of
service on the Parrott estate had she seen such goings on.
When the three were seated around the luncheon table in the handsome dining-room, Davie was quite
overwhelmed at the array of silver and glass that shone upon the polished mahogany table. And Polly
turned pale and only hoped they should neither of them do anything to disgrace Mamsie.
But although they didn’t know what to do with all the knives and forks, Miss Parrott never appeared
to notice. Polly, who hadn’t been able to forget the disdainful butler, saw him back of Davie’s chair
scornfully survey the efforts to carry the food up nicely to the small mouth and the color flew over
her cheek. Then Miss Parrott said to him, “I sha’n’t require you any more. Bring me the bell—and I
will ring if I need you.”
And the butler quite humble once more, brought the little silver bell from the massive sideboard
heavy with ancestral plate, and went out of the room, his head lowered by several inches. Polly’s hot
flush died down on her cheek, and things began to get comfortable.
“Now,” said Miss Parrott, when luncheon was over, “I am going to show you some things that I
played with when I was a little girl.” She had a faint pink color on her sallow face, and she smiled as
if quite content. But still she didn’t know what to do with her guests to make them happy.
David wanted to ask, “Were you ever a little girl?” as he looked the long, angular figure up and
down, but he kept quite still.
“Oh, would you really?” cried Polly in delight.
“Yes,” said Miss Parrott, greatly pleased, “would you really like to see them?”
“Oh, we would—we would!” declared Polly.
“Come this way then,” and out into the big wide hall, and over a broad and winding staircase dim
with the shaded light of a tall Colonial window, they went, then down a narrow passage, at the end of
which were two cunning little steps.
“Here was our playroom—Sister’s and mine,” said Miss Parrott, pausing at a door, and taking a key
from her black silk bag, she fitted it in the lock. And presently there they all three were in a long,
low-ceilinged room. It had shelves on two sides filled with books and games, and dolls—and there
was a small table in the center, and little chairs scattered about.
Miss Parrott turned her back on it suddenly, and made as if she were going out. But she faced the
children in a minute and smiled, and again she put her hand to her heart.
“Now you can each pick out something, and I will tell you about it,” she said, seating herself on an
old-fashioned broad sofa.
Polly stood quite still before her with shining eyes. “Can we really touch the things?” she asked.
“Yes, all you like,” and Miss Parrott actually laughed.
“Davie,” Polly ran up to him, “we can choose something and take it to her and she will tell us about
it,” she said. Then she ran off to the corner where the dolls sat up in all their faded and old-fashioned
glory.
David went over to one of the book-shelves. At first he only gazed; then he put a timid finger on one
and another. At last he selected a worn old reader whose pages were interspersed with pictures, and
holding it closely, he marched up with it to Miss Parrott’s sofa, just as Polly came flying up with a
big rag doll in a little checked silk gown, a quaint neckerchief, and a big mob-cap.
“I will tell you about yours first,” said Miss Parrott, taking the doll. Then she laughed, “Well, you see
Sister and I both had the promise of a new doll. We were to own it together, because that was the way
we had everything,” and she waved her hand around the playroom. “Well, our mother had given the
order to have it made and dressed, and its face was to be painted by a real artist. Oh, you can’t think
how we watched for that doll. We were quite impatient for its arrival. The lady who was to dress it
kept sending word that she had been detained from doing the work, but that it was to be quite fine.
We were letting our imaginations run riot with all sorts of splendid ideas on just how that doll was to
look. Sister decided it would be dressed in a pink satin gown with a little pink cap,—but I hoped it
would be all in blue. Well, we used to watch at the window, a part of every day for the big box
containing that precious doll.
“At last one day Sister was at the window, and she screamed ‘Judith—Judith!’”
Davie forgot his awe, to burst out, “Was that your name?”
“Yes, dear,” said Miss Parrott, very much pleased that he had found his tongue. “I was named for my
grandmother.”
“Oh,” said David.
“And Sarah was my sister’s name; she was named for our mother.”
“Oh,” said David again.
“Well, we ran after the big box as it was carried into the sitting-room, and Mother had one of the
maids cut the heavy cord and then Sister and I were each to lift one end of the cover and take it off.
You can’t imagine, children, what that moment, so long waited for, was to us!”
Polly and Davie each side of Miss Parrott, the big rag doll on her lap, didn’t dare to breathe, so afraid
they should miss something of this great moment.
“We lifted the tissue paper with trembling fingers, and there lay this doll,” Miss Parrott lifted it, “and
we had watched every day for a pink or a blue satin one!”
Polly broke the silence first. “Oh, I think this one was the nicest to play with.”
“So it was, child, but we were silly little girls, and we had set our hearts on quite another kind of doll.
Well, what do you think we did? I am quite ashamed to tell you, but you shall have the whole story.
We threw ourselves down on the floor, our arms around each other, and declared we didn’t want that
doll.”
“O dear!” exclaimed Polly.
“And so our mother said ‘Very well,’ and she had the tissue paper all put back over the doll, the
cover put on and the box tied up. And then it was taken away and put up on a shelf over the linen
press.”
“O dear!” breathed Polly again.
“And that doll stayed up there all one year, and we never said we were sorry, and asked for her. And
one day an awkward servant in cleaning that shelf, knocked the box off, and then he became
frightened, so he opened it to see if he’d broken anything. And somebody calling him, he left the box
on the floor, and a little dog we had, a mischievous creature, ran into the linen-room and stuck his
nose in the box.”
“O dear!” exclaimed Polly and David together.
“And Towsle—”
“Was that his name?” asked Davie, pressing up to her black silk gown in great excitement.
“Yes, dear,” said Miss Parrott, smiling down into his blue eyes. “Well, Towsle nipped that doll up in
his sharp teeth, and ran off down- stairs with her. And Sister heard him coming and she called
‘Towsle—Towsle’ for she wanted him to come and play with her. But Towsle was going to have a
great deal more pleasure he thought with the doll, so he hid behind one of the big carved chairs in the
hall. And then when he thought she had gone safely by, he crept out. But she spied him, and she
screamed, ‘Oh, he’s got our doll!’ and Uncle John, who was in the sitting-room with Mother, ran out
with her. But Towsle—oh, there was no catching him then, for—”
“And didn’t they catch him?” burst in Davie with round blue eyes.
“Why, yes, dear,” Miss Parrott pointed to the doll in her lap.
“Oh, yes,” said Davie with a sigh of relief, looking down at it.
“But in flying down the long steps at last, Towsle caught one of his feet in the doll’s dress, and over
he rolled from the top to the bottom. But he wouldn’t give up the doll. And then I heard the noise,
and I ran out from the garden, and before Mother and Uncle John and Sister got there, I seized the
doll, and Towsle pulled and I pulled—and there,” Miss Parrott turned the doll over in her lap, “the
silk gown was torn. You can scarcely see the place, for our mother mended it so neatly.”
The Pepper children bent over to scan closely the rent in the back of the checked silk gown.
“I shouldn’t know it was mended,” declared Polly at last.
“No, would you?” said Miss Parrott, with bright eyes. “Our mother was a most beautiful sewer. Well,
we couldn’t help laughing, Towsle was so funny, and he tried to get that doll away from me after I
had at last torn it from him. And then Sister cried right out, ‘Oh, our poor doll!’—and then I cried
over her, and we petted her up. And we said we’d love her forever after.”
“That was nice,” said Polly, smoothing down her gown in great satisfaction.
“And we called her ‘Priscilla,’ and we took her to bed with us every night,” finished Miss Parrott.
CHAPTER XV “AND SEE MY SLATE”
CHAPTER XV “AND SEE MY SLATE”
“WAS Towsle your very own dog?” asked Polly breathlessly.
“Yes, Sister’s and mine,” said Miss Parrott. “You see one day he belonged to me, and the next to her.
And one night he slept on the foot of her bed, and the next on mine. And he never made a mistake—
when he saw us get into our nightgowns.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Polly, clasping her hands. David crowded up closely, almost forgetting the precious
book in his hands. To own a dog, and to have him sleep on your bed at night!
“Would you like to see a picture of Towsle?” asked Miss Parrott, with a keen look into each face.
“Oh, would you show it to us?” cried Polly eagerly.
Davie drew a long breath. It wasn’t necessary for him to ask, as long as Polly did.
“You hold the doll,” Miss Parrott laid Priscilla in Polly’s arm, “and stay there, children.”
So Polly and David waited by the big sofa and watched Miss Parrott go over to a cabinet on the wall.
And pretty soon back she came with an old-fashioned daguerreotype in her hand.
“You see, Uncle John wanted to have our pictures taken, and we begged to have Towsle between us.
So there we are!”
Miss Parrott pushed up the little spring and there were two small girls in checked high-necked
dresses, with ruffles around the necks, and hair brushed back and held by round combs. A small
fuzzy-wuzzy dog with eyes like black shoe buttons sat primly up between the two.
Polly and David gazed perfectly absorbed at the picture. At last Miss Parrott asked, “Now which of
these two little girls do you think is my picture?”
“Were you ever a little girl?” It was impossible for David to keep from asking the question now,
although the instant it was out, he knew that a terrible blunder had been made.
“Oh, Davie!” exclaimed Polly, greatly mortified.
“It’s no wonder that you ask, Davie,” Miss Parrott smiled at him, so he raised his head, “so many
years have passed. Well, which of those two little girls do you think I was?”
David considered slowly—then put his finger on one. There was something in the kind eyes that
made him think of Miss Parrott when she smiled at him.
“Which do you think, Polly?”
“I don’t know,” she said, “but I think this one,” and she chose the other little girl.
“Davie is right,” said Miss Parrott, with another smile for him. And Polly beamed at him, for it really
was nicer that he had guessed the right one.
“Did Towsle like to have his picture taken?” asked Polly.
“No,” said Miss Parrott, with a little laugh, “not at first. He barked dreadfully at the man who was
trying to take the picture, and he said at last that he couldn’t let the dog be in it. And Uncle John said
then nobody would have a picture taken at all.”
“O dear!—what did you do?” cried Polly.
“And wasn’t there any picture?” cried David, dreadfully worried.
“Why, yes—see—here it is.” Miss Parrott tapped it with a long hand, on which shone several
ancestral rings.
“Oh, I forgot,” said Davie, looking down at the daguerreotype in her lap.
“Oh, Miss Parrott, what did you do?” begged Polly anxiously.
“Well, the man went out and told his little girl to come in. They had just been making some molasses
candy, and she brought a piece. And he told her to hold it up, so that the dog could see it. And then he
got back of his little black thing over the picture machine, and he stuck up his head, and said, ‘All
right—sit still, children,’ and then something clicked, and we were all taken.”
“Towsle was good to sit still, wasn’t he, Miss Parrott,” cried Polly, with shining eyes.
“Yes, indeed. You see he knew it was candy that the little girl held. That was the way Sister and I
always made him keep still before we gave him any. So he never took his eyes off from it.”
“And did he get the candy—did he?” cried David in great excitement.
“To be sure he did,” laughed Miss Parrott, “and it took him ever so long to eat it, for he got his teeth
all stuck together. And Uncle John paid the man, and then he said, ‘Hasn’t that dog finished his candy
yet?’ for there was Towsle whirling around, putting up first one paw and then another to his face to
try to get his jaws apart. You see the candy was too soft.” Miss Parrott burst into a hearty laugh in
which Polly and David joined.
“And Towsle wouldn’t take any molasses candy when Sister and I offered it to him after that,” said
Miss Parrott, wiping her eyes. “Dear me, children, I don’t know when I have laughed so. Well, now I
must put the daguerreotype up.”
When she came back to the big sofa, she looked at David, the book tightly clasped in his hands.
“Now I must tell you about this. So you chose a book, Davie?” as he laid it in her hands.
“Yes,” said Davie, “I did.”
“Well,” Miss Parrott turned the leaves of an old First Reader. “Now this makes me very sad.”
“Oh, don’t tell about it, if it makes you feel bad,” cried Polly in distress. “You don’t want her to,
Davie, do you?”
Davie swallowed hard, trying to say, “No, don’t tell about it.”
But before he could get the words out, Miss Parrott said quickly, “I really should like to tell about it,
children. Well, you see, I wasn’t quick about learning to read, as Sister was, and our governess—”
“What’s a gover — what you said?” David broke in. He must know if he really were going to
understand about the book.
“Oh, Davie!” cried Polly reprovingly, “you mustn’t interrupt.”
“A governess was the lady who taught Sister and me our lessons. You see we didn’t go to school, but
studied at home.”
“Oh,” said Polly and David together.
“Well, Miss Barton, that was her name, had a good deal of trouble with me, I suppose. And one thing
that I was the slowest to learn, was spelling. I was quite dull at it. And one day—this is the part that
makes me sad, children, I was very naughty. I was determined I would spell my own way, and I
began at the word ‘From.’” She turned the next page, and there in the midst of a little story was the
word “From” beginning a new sentence, and around it were queer little crumpled-up places in the
paper.
“Those are the tears I shed afterward,” said Miss Parrott, pointing to them.
“O dear!” cried both children, quite overcome to see these tears that were cried out of Miss Parrott’s
eyes so long ago.
“You see, Miss Barton would have Sister and me stand up before her while she picked out words for
us to spell, and then she would have us read the story to which they belonged, and she gave me that
word,” Miss Parrott’s finger pointed to “From” in the midst of the crumply spots, “and I spelled it
‘Frum,’ and I wouldn’t spell it any other way, although she told me how. I kept saying, ‘Frum—
Frum’ over and over, and Sister tried to make me obey Miss Barton, but I shook my head, and kept
saying, ‘Frum’ and at last our governess had to call Mother.”
The room was very still now.
“Well, when our Mother came into the little room, I remember I longed to run into her arms and say I
was sorry, but something inside of me held me back, and Mother led me away, and Sister burst out
crying.”
“Well, children,” said Miss Parrott, after a pause, “I shall never forget how I suffered as I sat on the
little stool in a room by myself, which was our punishment when we were naughty, and thought it all
over. And I can never see the word ‘From’ that it doesn’t come back to me. Well now, Davie, so you
chose a book?” she added brightly.
“Yes, I did,” said David, still keeping his eyes on “From.”
“You like books pretty well, do you?” asked Miss Parrott, with a keen glance.
“Davie just loves books,” declared Polly impulsively, as Davie raised sparkling eyes.
“And there was another thing that Sister and I had to help us with our spelling. We each had a slate.”
“A slate!” screamed Davie. “Oh, did you really have a slate?”
“To be sure,” said Miss Parrott.
“All to yourself?” cried Davie, quite gone with excitement.
“Yes, indeed—we each had one. Do you want to see them?”
Davie’s eyes said “Yes” without the word. But he said it aloud nevertheless.
Miss Parrott went over to the same cabinet and put up the doll and the daguerreotype, bringing back
two small slates, with a pencil and a little sponge hanging to each.
“Sister’s had a green edge,” she said, holding first one slate up to notice, and then the other, “and this
one is mine—with a red border.”
“May I hold it?” begged David, longingly reaching up his hands.
“Indeed you may,” said Miss Parrott, giving it to him. “And, Davie, you may keep that slate. I can’t
give away Sister’s—I shall keep that always—but that one is mine. I hope you like red best?” she
asked anxiously.
“I do,” said Davie, clasping the slate hungrily. “Is it mine—all mine?”
“It’s yours to keep always,” said Miss Parrott decidedly, “and I am so glad that you like it. Well now,
Polly, I’m going to give you a little plant to carry home. I hope you like flowers.”
For answer Polly clasped her hands. It was all she could do to keep from hopping up and down in
delight. Seeing this, Miss Parrott took her hand. “We will go down and choose it,” she said.
David, hanging to his red-bordered slate, followed them down-stairs and out through the little green
lattice door.
When they reached the little green plot with the stone seats, Miss Parrott sat down, for all the unusual
happenings of this day made a little rest seem very sweet. But she looked at Polly’s and David’s
dancing feet, and said, “You run about, children, and I will come presently, and pick out a plant for
Polly.”
No need for a second invitation. Like little wild things, they were off up to the big green trees, David
hanging to his red-bordered slate for dear life.
“Put it down, Davie, do,” begged Polly, “under that tree. We can’t play tag with any fun if you hold
the slate.”
“No—no,” cried Davie in alarm, and grasping it tighter.
“Oh, well, never mind,” said Polly. “Now, come on,” with a pat on his shoulder, “you’re it.”
“She’s all tired out,” declared the housemaid, peering out of the green lattice door, “look at her a-
settin’ there. I sh’d think she would be with them childern round her all day.”
“Bad luck to ’em,” exclaimed the cross cook, coming up to look over the housemaid’s shoulder.
“Well, I never—jest look at ’em a-racin’ an’ a-chasin’ all over th’ place! Did anybody ever see sech
goin’s-on in this garden before?”
The butler didn’t dare, since his reproof in the dining-room, to join this conversation, but he shrugged
up his shoulders, as he kept on at his task of polishing up the family plate.
And Miss Parrott being nicely rested, more by hearing the happy voices and watching the flying feet,
than by sitting still on the little stone seat, got up presently. “Come, children,” she called, “we must
choose Polly’s plant,” and in almost no time at all, they both stood before her.
Around and around the old-fashioned garden bright with hollyhocks and all sorts of blossoms and
shrubs, they went, Miss Parrott with her finger on her chin, a way she had when she was thinking,
and Polly holding her breath whenever a stop was made before a little plant.
At last Miss Parrott paused before a row of little yellow primroses, lifting their bright faces as if to
say, “Take me—oh do, take me!”
“I really believe, Polly,” said Miss Parrott, looking down at them, “that you will like one of these. I
am sure they were great favorites of mine when I was a little girl.”
For answer Polly threw herself down on her knees, and laid her flushed cheek against a small cluster
of yellow blooms.
“You may pick out the one you like best,” said Miss Parrott.
“Oh, this one—if you please,” cried Polly, lifting a little pot. “I choose this one—and thank you, dear
Miss Parrott.”
“You may pick out the one you like best,” said Mrs. Parrott.—Page 234.
“I really believe you have made a good selection, Polly,” said Miss Parrott, the color rising to her
sallow cheek. It was so long since any one had called her “dear.” “Well now, I am sorry to say it is
getting time for me to send you home, for I have much enjoyed the day, but your mother will never
allow you to come again if I keep you too long,” and she led the way into the house, where Polly got
her hat and Davie his cap.
Miss Parrott led the way down the broad hall, with its rugs on the polished floor and the portraits of
her ancestors lining the walls. She looked back as she neared the big oaken door to see Polly standing
spellbound before the drawing-room, and Davie by her side.
“Would you like to go in, dear?” Miss Parrott came back and pointed within the long apartment.
“Oh, if I may,” said Polly, in an awe-struck little voice.
“Certainly, dear, and Davie, too.” Then she followed, curious to see what would first claim attention.
Polly went straight to the big grand piano standing half across two long French windows, and stood
quite still. David came softly after.
“If you can play, Polly,” said Miss Parrott, not thinking of anything else to break the silence, “I am
quite willing that you should, dear.”
“Oh, I can’t play,” said Polly, coming out of her absorption with a little laugh at the very idea.
“She plays on the table,” said Davie, looking up at Miss Parrott.
“Plays on the table?” repeated Miss Parrott in a puzzled way. “I don’t understand.”
“Just like this,” Davie having by this time quite forgotten to be embarrassed, went over to the big
mahogany center-table, and laying down his beloved slate, softly ran his fingers up and down the
shining surface.
“Oh, you mean instead of a piano she uses a table.”
“Yes,” said Davie, picking up his slate, and running back to stand by Polly.
Miss Parrott was quite still for a moment regarding Polly. Then she said, “Would you like to have me
play to you, Polly?”
Polly drew a long breath, and tore her gaze away from the big piano.
“Oh, if you would!” she cried with shining eyes.
So Miss Parrott sat down on the music-stool and drew her long figure up just as the music master had
instructed her years ago, and began to finger the keys, Polly, with her little plant in her hand, standing
in rapt attention, on one side, and David, with his slate, on the other.
At first the tunes didn’t go very well, Miss Parrott observing, “I don’t know when I have tried this
before,” and breaking into some other selection. But by degrees, the slender fingers began to run up
and down quite at their ease among the black and white keys, and the long somber drawing-room
seemed to glow with the trills and quavers.
“My soul an’ body!” exclaimed the cross cook to the housemaid, “ef she ain’t playin’ th’ pianner. I’m
scared to death, Mary Jane.”
Mary Jane’s florid face turned two shades paler. “I expect she’s going to die,” she whimpered.
And over in the big drawing-room, their mistress was just beginning to blame herself for keeping
them so long. She arose hastily from the music-stool. “And now it is good-by.” She laid a gentle hand
on each head. “Run out and get into the carriage,” for Simmons had been waiting all this time.
She opened the big oaken door, and waited to see them off—then turned back with a curious light on
her sallow face.
And Polly and Davie being set down at the gate of the little brown house, raced up to the big green
door, and burst in. “I’ve a plant—a dear, little plant,” announced Polly, raising it high.
“And see my slate,” Davie tried to reach higher than Polly, “and it’s all my very own, — it is,
Mamsie.”
CHAPTER XVI AT GRANDMA BASCOM’S
CHAPTER XVI AT GRANDMA BASCOM’S
“DAVIE must go over and sit with Grandma Bascom,” said Mrs. Pepper slowly. She looked worried
as she glanced up from her sewing by the window; then she smiled brightly over to him.
“Oh, Mamsie,” began Polly in dismay.
Davie laid down his slate carefully on the table, and ran over to Mother Pepper’s chair.
“You see, Davie,” said Mrs. Pepper, snipping off a little thread hanging from the sleeve to the coat
she was trying to finish, “no one else can be spared, and Grandma mustn’t be left alone, now that she
is sick.”
Polly took two or three quick little stitches in the other sleeve, then she threw down the needle. “But
Davie was going to help Mr. Atkins, you know, Mamsie,” she cried.
“Mr. Atkins told Davie he was only to come when not wanted for anything else, you know,” said
Mrs. Pepper, not pausing in her work.
“But, Mamsie,” began Polly again, at sight of Davie’s face.
“No, no, Polly,” said Mother Pepper firmly. “Davie must go to Grandma Bascom. And hurry now,
child, for work as we may, it will be much as ever we finish the coat in time.” She said no more to
Davie, who stood silently by her chair, and the kitchen became very quiet except for the ticking of the
old clock on the shelf.
“I’ll—I’ll go—Mamsie,” said Davie, swallowing hard.
“That’s Mother’s boy,” said Mrs. Pepper, beaming at him.
Davie wanted dreadfully to take his precious red-bordered slate along so that he could practise his
writing, but since no one said anything about it, he didn’t like to ask. So he took it off from the table,
and going over to the shelf, he stood up on his tiptoes and deposited it behind the old clock. Then he
went out and down the lane to Grandma Bascom’s.
Polly looked up a few minutes after and saw that the table was bare. “Well, I’m glad, anyway,” she
said, as she stopped to bite off a thread, “that Davie took his slate. Now he can practise on his
writing.”
“Don’t do that, Polly,” said Mother Pepper reprovingly; “never bite your thread. It’s bad for the teeth,
child.”
“My teeth are awfully strong, Mamsie,” laughed Polly, snapping her two rows of little white ones
together.
“You never can tell how strong teeth are if they are used to bite threads,” said her mother; “so be sure
you never do it, Polly.”
“I won’t,” promised Polly, stitching merrily away again; “only it’s so hard to remember. I bite off
threads before I think, Mamsie.”
“That’s about the poorest excuse a body can give,—‘don’t think,’” remarked Mrs. Pepper. “Well,
child, you sew better every day.”
“Do I, Mamsie?” cried Polly, a warm little thrill running up and down her whole body, and the color
crept into her cheek; “do I, really?”
“You do indeed,” declared Mrs. Pepper, “and such a help as you are to me!”
“Some day,” said Polly, sitting very straight and sewing away for dear life, “I’m going to do every
single bit of all the coats, Mamsie.”
“And what should I do then?” asked Mrs. Pepper with a laugh.
“You would sit right there in your chair,” said Polly, “but you shouldn’t take a single stitch—not
even the smallest, teentiest stitch.”
“O dear me!” exclaimed Mother Pepper, as her needle flew in and out.
“Because I’m going to do ’em all, every bit of every coat,” declared Polly positively, and bobbing her
brown head.
“Work isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a body,” observed Mrs. Pepper. “But to sit in a chair
with nothing to do—oh, Polly!”
Her look of dismay as she said, “Oh, Polly!” was so funny that Polly burst out laughing, and Mamsie
laughed, too, till the old kitchen became cheery at once, and the sun breaking out suddenly two bright
little spots danced out on the floor to have fun by themselves.
Davie hurried down the lane to Grandma’s and turned into the small patch before the kitchen door.
The hens had found an old beef-bone and were making an awful noise fighting bill and claw for its
possession.
Davie hurried on over the sill into the bedroom. There was Grandma in bed, the gay patched bedquilt
drawn up nearly to the big frill of her cap, showing eyes that were not in the least expressive of
comfort. When she saw Davie, she pushed off the coverlet. “O my Land!” she said. “Grandma’s glad
to see you!”
By the side of the bed, sitting stiffly on the edge of a cane-bottom chair, sat the parson’s elder son.
“My mother told me to ask how she is,” he said.
Grandma beckoned to Davie, and patting the coverlet, he climbed up. “He’s ben a-settin’ there an’ a-
settin’ there by the bed,” she said.
“My mother told me to ask how she is,” came from Peletiah in his chair, “and she won’t tell me. My
mother told me—” he began again.
“He won’t go home,” said Grandma, drawing Davie’s ear close to her mouth. “O dear me! an’ he’s
th’ parson’s son.”
“My mother told me—” began Peletiah once more.
Just then there was an awful cackle and clatter out in the kitchen. The beef-bone fight concluded,
every scrap of a mouthful being gobbled up, the hens had come tumbling in over the sill all together
to see what could be found, now that Grandma was sick in bed and couldn’t drive them out.
Davie told Grandma this. He had to say it over several times, his mouth under her cap-frill.
“My sakes!” she exclaimed, “you take th’ broom an’ shoo ’em out o’ the kitchen, Davie, an’ shet th’
door tight after ’em.”
So Davie slipped down from the bed, glad enough to have something to do.
“My mother told me—” began Peletiah.
“An’ you go with him an’ help drive out them pesky hens,” cried Grandma, rolling over in bed to
look at him. “An’ I’m well enough, so you needn’t come again, you tell your Ma.”
Peletiah never waited to hear more than the last sentence that told him what he had come to find out.
He got off from his chair in great satisfaction and went out into the little kitchen where Davie was
waving the broom over the wild fluttering tangle of hens, all squawking together, as he tried to drive
them out of doors.
“O dear! one’s running into the bedroom. Keep her out, Peletiah—hurry!” cried Davie in great
distress.
But Peletiah, never having hurried in his life, couldn’t understand why he should do so now. So the
hen had plenty of time to run around him and fluffed and squawked her way into the bedroom, where
she ducked under Grandma’s big four-poster.
“She’s gone under Grandma’s bed,” announced Peletiah, coming up to where Davie, leaning under
the big table, had seized one hen by the leg, and was wildly trying to catch another. At last he had
her,—but she turned and gave him a vicious little peck on his hand as he backed out holding on for
dear life to them both.
“There’s a hen gone under Grandma’s bed,” said Peletiah again.
“O dear—dear!” exclaimed Davie, trying to hold fast to the two struggling biddies.
But they flapped so violently that one got away, and thinking that where another Mrs. Biddy went, it
was easy to follow, this one ran around Peletiah’s slow legs, and there they were, two of them, under
Grandma’s big four-poster.
Davie shut the door on his vanquished fowl, and turned his hot tired face to the parson’s son.
“We must get them out.”
“We can’t,” said Peletiah. He might be slow, but he knew when it was impossible to accomplish a
thing. “You can’t get hens out from under a bed,” he said positively.
“We must,” said Davie in great distress—but just as decidedly.
“And she can’t hear ’em,” said Peletiah.
“But they can’t stay there,” persisted David. “You stand one side of the bed, and I’ll stand the other
with the broom, and drive ’em out.” And he ran and laid hold of the broom again.
“I want the broom,” said Peletiah, reaching a hand for it.
“Grandma told me to drive out the hens.”
“Well, she didn’t say with the broom.”
“Oh, yes,” cried Davie eagerly, “she said, ‘Take the broom and shoo ’em out.’”
“She said out of the kitchen—she didn’t say bedroom,” declared Peletiah, who was nothing if not
exact.
“So she did,” said Davie, giving up the broom with a sigh. “Well, you drive ’em away from your
side, but I must tell Grandma first.”
So he climbed up on the bed again and put his mouth close to the big cap-frill, and told what was
going to be done.
“Land alive! what’s come to your thumb,” cried Grandma in great consternation.
David looked down at his small thumb. The blood had run down and stiffened into a small patch of
red where Mrs. Biddy had nipped it. “It doesn’t hurt,” he said, trying to stick his thumb away from
the eyes under the cap-frill.
“Now to think that you sh’d ’a’ come over to take care of me, an’ got hurt,” moaned Grandma. “O
me—O my! what will your Ma say! Well, you must have some opedildoc on, right away. Run out an’
go to the cupboard, an’ you’ll find a bottle on th’ upper shelf. I put it there to be handy, ef any one
gets hurt. My son John mos’ had his leg took off one day when he was mowin’ in th’ south medder
an’ they come a-runnin’ for me.”
Grandma didn’t think to tell that the same bottle couldn’t be found on that occasion, but she had
always been under the impression that it had saved son John’s life.
“Can’t we drive out the hens first?” asked Davie, slipping off from the bed.
“Mercy no—th’ hens can wait—they’re comf’table under th’ bed. You run an’ get that bottle.”
So Davie ran out into the kitchen while Peletiah, leaning on the broom, waited by the side of the bed.
“You’ll have to git up on a chair,” called Grandma from the bed, “it’s on th’ upper shelf.”
So David pulled up a chair and climbed up on it. But even on his tiptoes he couldn’t reach, although
he tried and tried until his face got very red.
“I can reach with a box—there’s one,” he said. And jumping down he ran over to the corner, and
emptied out a few apples and deposited the box on the chair.
“Maybe it’s back of th’ teapot,” said Grandma. “I remember now that teapot got cracked, and I put it
up there. Look behind it, Davie.”
So Davie looked behind it, holding on to the edge of the shelf with one hand, and feeling around with
the other. But no bottle was in sight. There were some papers of herbs, and, as they got stirred about,
the little fine particles coming out of various holes made him sneeze.
“You’re ketchin’ cold,” said Grandma, who was getting dreadfully nervous. “Mercy me! what will
your ma say ef you got sick over here, an’ she’s had sech trouble with th’ measles. O dear—deary
me!”
David by this time was in great distress at not being able to find what he was sent for. And to think of
Grandma sick and worried—that was the worst of it—so he worked on.
“I remember now—it’s come to me—’twa’n’t on that upper shelf at all,” said Grandma. “I took it
down one day, ’cause thinks I ’twon’t be so easy for me with my rheumatics to stretch clear up there,
an’ I put it on the one underneath.”
“I’m glad it’s on the one underneath,” said Davie, joyfully. So he got down from his heights, and put
the box in the corner and the apples back in it again. Then he hopped up on the chair and peered all
along the bottles and various things cluttered up on the shelf.
“Is it a very big bottle?” he asked, his blue eyes roving anxiously over the array.
“O my land, no,” said Grandma; “’tain’t big, an’ it ain’t little. It’s jest a bottle.”
“Oh,” said Davie, trying to think what he ought to leave out in the search.
“You better bring me one or two that you think is it,” said Grandma at last.
So Davie picking off from the shelf some “jest bottles” hurried with them to Grandma’s bed.
“My sakes!” she said, not looking at them and lifting up her hands, “what a sight you be, Davie
Pepper!”
“You’re all dirt,” said Peletiah pleasantly.
“I didn’t s’pose I had any cobwebs in that cupboard,” said Grandma in a mortified voice. “An’ you’re
all a-runnin’ with sweat. Well, you’ve got to wipe your face—there’s a towel there on th’ bureau.”
“Here are the bottles,” said Davie. His eyes peered at her under his soft light hair where the herbs had
drifted down.
“Oh, yes, so they be,” said Grandma, taking them. “Well, ’tain’t th’ opedildoc—none of ’em ain’t.
You wash your face, Davie, first, an’ then you can look again. There won’t be no cobwebs on the
lower shelf.”
So Davie took the towel and ran out to the sink, and washed up. He shook his hair pretty well; but
some of the little green things stayed in the soft waves. Then he took the bottles away from the bed
where Grandma laid them, and brought away some more “jest bottles.”
But no opodeldoc appeared, and at last Grandma lay back on her pillows dreadfully disappointed.
“Can’t I look some other place?” begged Davie, climbing up on the bed to lay his mouth against her
ear.
“No mortal man would know where to tell you,” moaned Grandma.
“O dear!” exclaimed Davie, laying his hot little cheek against her wrinkled one. “There’s a bottle on
that little table.” He pointed over toward the big old bureau. “May I get it?”
“Yes, but it ain’t a mite o’ use,” said the old lady, hopelessly.
So Davie slid off from the bed once more, and went over to the small table by the side of the bureau
and brought the bottle and put it in Grandma’s hand.
“Land o’ Goshen, now it’s come to me! How glad I am I remember. I took that down from th’ shelf
th’ other day when I cut my finger peelin’ potatoes.”
“Is that the—what you said?” gasped Davie.
“Yes,—it’s th’ opedildoc.”
“Oh!” cried Davie, and his blue eyes shone, and he clasped his hands in bliss. He didn’t have to go
home and tell Mamsie he couldn’t find Grandma’s things when she was sick and he had come to
help.
“Now you go to the lowest drawer in th’ bureau,” said Grandma, “and get a roll of old white cotton,
an’ I’ll tie up your thumb.”
David looked down at his thumb. He had forgotten all about it in the general turmoil.
“It doesn’t hurt any,” he said, “and I washed the blood off.”
“That may be,” said Grandma, who wasn’t going to lose what she dearly loved to do: bind up any
wounds that presented themselves, “but a hurt is a hurt, and it’s got to be took care of. An’ there’s
some blood a-comin’ yet.”
A tiny drop or two making its appearance to her satisfaction, she made David sit up on the bed again.
And at last the little thumb was all bound up, and the cloth tied up with a bit of string she found in the
little table-drawer by her bed.
“An’ now you must go right straight home—an’ you tell your ma she don’t need to tetch that
bandage till to-morrow.”
“We haven’t driven out the hens,” said Peletiah, still standing by his broom.
“Hey?” said Grandma. “What does he say, Davie?”
“He says we haven’t driven out the hens. Oh, I forgot them, Grandma,” said Davie in a sorry little
voice. It was impossible to be more mortified than he was at this moment.
“Well, you can do it now,” said Grandma composedly; “it’s gittin’ late, and hens knows better’n most
folks when it’s along about time to go to bed. They’ll go easy—like enough.”
David lifted up the calico valance running around the bed, and Peletiah got down on his knees and
lifted up the part hanging down his side. There bunched up together were the two fat biddies. They
turned sleepy eyes on the two boys. And when Peletiah inserted the broom under the bed, they got
up, shook their feathers, and marched off to the kitchen, and so out of doors, much preferring to roost
respectably on a tree than under a feather bed.