“The whole wide world for Jesus.”
“The whole wide world for Jesus.”
This meeting filled Marty with the greatest enthusiasm and she felt as though she could do anything for missions.Shewould not forget the subject for a single day, she was sure.
“Oh Miss Agnes,” she said, “I sha'n't forget missions. I'll study the subjects every week and learn lots of missionary verses. I'll save all the money I can; and I'll tellsomebody, if it's only Evaline, all I know about missionary work. I'll tell her the first thing when I get there. To be sure she can't have a band all by herself, but it may do good somehow.”
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“Here's your train!” said Mr. Ashford, hurrying into the waiting-room where he had left his wife and children while he purchased their tickets. “I'll carry Freddie. Come, Marty.”
While they were waiting their turn to pass through the gate Marty and her mother were jostled by the crowd against two small, ragged, dirty boys, who had crept by the officers and were looking through the railings at the arriving and departing trains.
“Lots of these folks are goin' to the country, where 'ta'n't so hot and stuffy as 'tis here,” said the larger boy. “Was you ever in the country, Jimmy?”
“Naw,” replied the other, a thin, pale little chap about seven, leaning wearily against an iron post. “Never seed no country, but Iwantsto.”
Marty and her mother, who heard what was said and saw the wistful look on the small boy's face, pressed each other's hands and exchanged a sorrowful glance. Then they were obliged to move on; but after going through the gateMarty pulled her hand out of her mother's and, running back, took a couple of cakes from a paper bag she carried and passed them through the fence to the boys. How their faces brightened at this little act of kindness!
“Marty, Marty!” called her father, who had not seen what she did and was afraid she would get lost in the crowd, “where are you? Hurry up, child!”
Then, when he had made them comfortable in the car and was about bidding them good-by, he said,
“Now, Marty, when you change cars stick closely to your mother and don't be running after strangers, as you did a moment ago.”
“Why, papa,” Marty protested earnestly, “they weren't strangers; at least I know that littlest boy with the awfully torn hat. He is Jimmy—”
“Well, well, I can't stop now to hear who he is, but I didn't know he was an acquaintance of yours. However, don't run after anybody, or you will get lost some of these days. Good-by, good-by. Be good children, both of you.”
“Who was that boy, Marty?” asked Mrs. Ashford presently.
“He's Jimmy Torrence, and he lives in Jennie's house. Don't you remember I told you that one day, when we were all in Mrs. Scott'sroom singing to Jennie, a little boy came and leaned against the door-post and listened? Mrs. Scott told him to come in and took him on her lap. She gave him a cup of milk, and after he went away she said he had been sick with a fever and his folks were very poor. There's a good many of them, and they live in the third-story back-room.”
“Oh, yes, I remember. So that is the boy. Poor little fellow! He looks as if he needed some country air.”
“Doesn'the!” said Marty. “O mamma, don't you think that society Mrs. Watson belongs to would send him to the country for a week? That would be better than nothing.”
“I fear they cannot, for Mrs. Watson told me the other day that there are a great many more children who ought to be sent than they have money to pay for.”
“Iwishhe could go,” said Marty.
The boy's pale, wistful face haunted her for a while, but in the excitement of the journey it faded from her mind.
After the rush and roar of the train how perfectly still it seemed in the green valley where stood Trout Run Station! How peaceful the mountains! how pure and sweet the air!
“Mamma,” said Marty almost in a whisper, “everything is exactly the same as ever.”
“Mountains don't change much,” replied Mrs. Ashford as she seated herself on one of the trunks and took Freddie on her lap.
“But I mean this funny little station and the tiny river and the old red tannery over there, and the quietness and everything! And oh, there's Hiram! He looks just as he did summer before last, and I believe he's got on the very same straw hat!”
Hiram, Farmer Stokes' hired man, who had come to meet the travellers, now appeared from the rear of the station, where he had been obliged to stay by his horses until the train had vanished in the distance. His sunburnt face wore a broad smile, and though he did not say much, Mrs. Ashford and Marty knew that in his slow, quiet way he was very glad to see them. He seemed to be particularly struck by the fact that the children had grown so much, and when Freddie got off his mother's lap and ran across the platform, Hiram gazed at him in admiration, also seeming highly amused.
“I can't believe this tall girl's Marty, and as for the little boy—why, he was carried in arms the last timeIsaw him!”
“Two years makes a great difference in children,” said Mrs. Ashford.
“That's so,” Hiram assented. “Well, I reckon we'd better be moving.”
“How I dread the steep hills,” said Mrs. Ashford as they were being helped into the wagon after the baggage had been stowed away. “I do hope your horses are safe, Hiram. Now, Marty, be sure to hold on with both hands when we come to the worst places.”
“Don't you be 'fraid, Mrs. Ashford; there isn't a mite of danger,” said Hiram, gathering up the reins. “Get up!”
“Get up!” cried Freddie, who had watched the process of getting started with the greatest interest, and who was now holding a pair of imaginary reins in one tiny fist and flourishing an imaginary whip with the other.
Hiram laughed aloud. That Freddie could walk was funny enough, but that he could talk and make believe drive was too much for Hiram. It was some time before he got over it.
“How's Evaline?” asked Marty. “Why didn't she come to meet us?”
“She's spry. She wanted to come along down, but her ma was afraid 'twould crowd you.”
They approached an open, level place from which there was a magnificent view. Page 113
After a drive of about three miles among the mountains, the winding road gradually ascending, with here and there a somewhat steep incline, they approached an open, level place from which there was a magnificent view of what Marty called the “real mountains.” Forthese wooded or cultivated hills they were driving among were only the beginnings of the range. Here was a cluster of houses and a white frame “hotel” with green blinds.
“They've been doing right smart of building in Riseborough since you were up,” said Hiram to Mrs. Ashford. “You see the hotel's done, and Sims has built him a new store, and Mrs. Clarkson's been building on to her cottage.”
“Is the hotel a success?” asked Mrs. Ashford.
“First-rate. Full all last summer, and Dutton expects a lot of folks this season. A big party came up t'other day.”
They had a chance to see the guests at the hotel, ladies on the piazzas and children playing in the green yard, while Hiram stopped to do an errand at the store, which was also the postoffice.
Nearly another mile of up-hill brought them to their destination—a brown farmhouse with its red barns and granaries standing in the midst of smiling fields and patches of cool, dark woods, while in the distance rose grand, solemn mountains.
There was Evaline, seated on the low gatepost, and Mrs. Stokes and her grownup daughter, Almira, in the doorway, all on the lookout and ready to wave their handkerchiefs the moment the wagon appeared.
“It's more like going to see some cousins or something than being summer-boarders, isn't it, mamma?” said Marty.
“Here we all are, Mrs. Stokes!” cried Mrs. Ashford from the wagon. “Quite an addition to your family.”
“The more the merrier! I'm right down glad to see you,” said good-natured Mrs. Stokes, coming to lift the children down and kissing them heartily.
The travellers were very tired after their long day's journey. Mrs. Ashford and Marty were ready to do justice to the good supper provided, but Freddie was only able to keep his eyes open long enough to eat a little bread and milk. The next morning, however, he was as bright as a button, and took to country life so naturally that he was out in the yard feeding the chickens before his mother knew what he was about.
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Marty so enjoyed being back at the farm, and there was so much to see and to do, that for four or five days she could think of nothing else. She and Evaline raced all over the place, climbing trees and fences, playing in the barn or down in the wood, paddling in the little brook, riding on the hay-wagon, and going with the boy to bring home the cows.
In short, the delights of farm life for the time being drove everything else out of Marty's head, and it was not until Sunday morning that she gave a thought to missions. Perhaps she would not have remembered even then had not her mother said,
“Marty, here are your ten pennies. I forgot to give them to you yesterday.”
“There!” thought Marty. “In spite of what Miss Agnes said the very last thing, I've forgotten all about missions. I've never told Evaline a breath about them, and I haven't prayed or done anything.”
She got out her box and put in it her tenth, and four pennies for a thank-offering for thehappy time she had been having. She also got the list of subjects Miss Walsh had furnished her with, and some of her books; but there was no time to read then, for her mother had said she might go to church with Mr. and Mrs. Stokes, and she must get ready. Evaline was not at home, her uncle having called the previous evening and taken her to spend a couple of days at his house.
There was preaching that Sunday in the schoolhouse at Black's Mills, a village between four and five miles distant in the opposite direction from Riseborough. It was quite a novelty to Marty to go so far to church, but it was a lovely drive and she enjoyed it extremely. It certainly seemed strange to attend service in the battered little frame schoolhouse, without any organ or choir, and to eat crackers and cheese in the wagon on the way home, as Mrs Stokes was afraid she would be hungry before their unusually late dinner. But Marty was so charmed with country life and all belonging to it that she considered the whole thing an improvement upon city churchgoing.
In the afternoon she took her Bible and some missionary leaflets, and going into a retired place in the garden read and studied for more than an hour. The missionary spirit within her was fully awake that day. She longed to talkwith Evaline and could hardly wait until it was time for her to come home. But by Tuesday, when she did come, Marty's head was full of other matters, such as a discovery she had made in the wood of a hollow in an old tree which would be a lovely playhouse, and an expedition to Sunset Hill that was being talked of. So in one way or another nearly two weeks of vacation had passed before this Missionary Twig, who had been so ardent to begin with, had redeemed her promise of trying to interest somebody in the work.
But in the meantime she had thought of Jimmy Torrence. The way he was brought to her mind was this. She was with her mother on the side porch, Monday morning, when Mrs. Stokes, coming out of the kitchen with floury hands, inquired,
“Mrs. Ashford, did you see the little boy in the carriage that just passed 'long?”
“Yes,” replied Mrs. Ashford.
“Well, you just ought to have seen him when they brought him up here three weeks ago—his folks are boarding over at Capt. Smith's; such a pale, peaked childInever saw! Had been awful sick, they said, and now you see he looks right down well.”
“Why, yes, he does,” said Mrs. Ashford. “I should never imagine he had been ill very recently.The country has certainly done him good.”
“That's just it!” said Mrs. Stokes. “There's nothing like taking children to the country a spell after they've been sick. Makes 'em fat and rosy in less than no time.”
“Oh! mamma,” exclaimed Marty. “That makes me think of poor little Jimmy. I wish we could do something to get him sent to the country.”
“I wish we could, but I don't see any way to do it. I have given all I can afford this summer to the different Fresh-Air Funds.”
“Can't you think of anything, clothes or such things, that you were going to get me, and that Icoulddo without, and send the money to Mrs. Watson?” pleaded Marty.
“I can't think of anything just this minute,” answered her mother with a gentle smile, “but if you will bring Freddie in out of the hot sun, and get something to amuse him near here, I'll try to think.”
“Oh! do, please. And mind, mamma, it must be something for me to do without—not you.”
Marty ran down the yard to where Freddie, with red face and without his hat, was rushing up and down playing he was a “little engine.”
“Freddie,” she called, “don't you want to come and make mud pies?”
This was a favorite amusement of the small boy, and instantly the little engine subsided into a baker. Marty led him up near the porch, where there was a nice bed of mould—“ clean dirt,” Mrs. Stokes called it—and they were soon hard at work on the pies.
Marty enjoyed this play as much as Freddie, and it was some time before she thought of asking,
“Mamma, have you thought of anything yet?”
Mrs. Ashford smiled and nodded.
“What is it?” exclaimed Marty, bounding up on the porch.
“I don't know whether you will like the plan or not, but it is the only thing that occurs to me. Your school coat will be too short for you next winter, and I was going to get you a new one. But the old one could be altered so that you might wear it. I have some of the material, and could piece the skirt and sleeves and trim it with braid. As it always was a little too large for you about the shoulders, it would fit next winter well enough that way. Doing that would save about five dollars as near as I can calculate.”
“Then we should have five dollars for Jimmy?”
“Yes.”
“But would it be much trouble to you to alter the coat?”
“It would be some trouble, but I am willing to take that for my share.”
“Oh! then let's do it,” cried Marty.
“Wait, wait,” said her mother. “You must think it over first. You know when you do things in a hurry, sometimes you regret them afterwards.”
“I know I sha'n't regret this,” Marty protested; “but I'll go and think a while.”
She went and sat down on her last batch of pies, resting her head on her knees, with her eyes shut. In a very short space of time she was back at her mother's side.
“Oh! you have not thought long enough,” said Mrs. Ashford. “I meant for a day or two.”
“There's no use thinking any longer, for I know I'll think just the same. I've thought all about how the coat will look when it's pieced, and how all the girls will know it's pieced, and how I'd a great deal rather have one that isn't pieced. Then I thought how pale and sick Jimmy looks, and how much he wants to go to the country, and how much good it would do him to go, and how he has no nice times as I have, and, I declare, I'd rather wear pieced coats all the rest of my life than not have him go.” Shewinked her eyes very hard to keep back the tears.
“Very well,” said Mrs. Ashford, stroking the little girl's flushed cheek, “we will consider it settled. I will write to Mrs. Watson this afternoon, inclosing the money, and telling her about Jimmy.”
By Saturday a reply came from Mrs. Watson saying that arrangements had been made to send Jimmy to a kind woman in the country, who would take good care of him, and it was probable the money Marty had sent would pay his board there for nearly three weeks. She also said that Jimmy had been very poorly again. Dr. Fisher, finding him in Mrs. Scott's room one day when he called, had seen how miserable the boy was, and had given him medicine, and had said, when he heard he was going to be sent to the country, that it would be just the thing, better than any amount of medicine. The letter also stated that Mrs. Fisher had fitted Jimmy out in some of her little boy's clothes. So he would be very comfortable.
“Could anything be nicer!” exclaimed Marty. “I'm so glad of it all!”
The same mail that brought Mrs. Watson's letter brought Marty's little missionary magazine, which she always wanted to sit right down and read.
“Now,” said her mother, after they had got through talking over the letter, “I wish you would mind Freddie while I write some letters.”
Marty took her magazine into the back yard where Freddie was playing with his wheelbarrow under the lilac-bushes. She sat down by the big pear-tree to read, though not forgetting to keep an eye on her little brother's proceedings. Missions seemed as interesting as ever as she read. Presently she saw Evaline coming out of the kitchen with a pail of water and brush to scrub the back steps.
“Evaline,” she called, “when you get through your work come down here where I'm minding Freddie, wont you? I want to tell you something.”
“Yes,” replied Evaline, “I'll come pretty soon. This is the last thing I've got to do.”
She soon came and threw herself on the grass beside Marty, who forthwith began showing her the magazine and telling her in a rather incoherent way about mission work in general and their band in particular. She told how many belonged to the band, what they did at the meetings, how much money they had, and what they were going to do with it; how this band was only one of hundreds of bands that were all connected with a big society; and how the object of the whole thing was to teach theheathen in foreign lands about God and try to make Christians of them.
“That must be the same thing that Ruth Campbell was talking so much about a while ago,” said Evaline when Marty stopped, more to take breath than because she had nothing further to say.
“Who's Ruth Campbell? and what was she saying?”
“Why, the Campbells live in that house that you can just see the top of from our barn. Ruth's as old as our Almiry, but she knows a heap more, for she went to school in Johnsburgh. She taught our school last winter, and is going to again next. She told us about something they have in Johnsburgh, and it sounds very much like yours, so it must be a mission-band. She said she wished we could have one here, but none of us paid much attention to it.”
“Oh, I think you would like it ever so much,” said Marty; “only maybe there wouldn't be enough children round here to make a band,” she added doubtfully.
“How many does it take?” asked Evaline.
“Oh, bands are of different sizes. I s'pose youcouldmake one of four or five.”
“There's a sight more children than that on the mountain,” said Evaline with some contempt. “But then some of 'em mightn't wantto send their money away to the heathen; and anyhow, I don't know where they'd get any money to send. Folks up here, 'specially children, don't have much.”
“Why, I thought the country was just the place to make money for missions,” cried Marty. “There's 'first-fruits' and such things that are a great deal easier got at in the country than in town. And I have heard of children raising missionary corn and potatoes, and having missionary hens that laid the very best kind of eggs regularly every day, that brought a high price.”
“Yes, but who's going to buy the things up here? Folks all have their own corn and potatoes and hens. And how'd we children get a few little things miles and miles to market?”
Marty was rather taken aback by this view of the subject. “The children I read about gotsomebodyto buy their things,” she said.
She was rather discouraged because Evaline was not more enthusiastic about missions, and thought there was no use trying to further the cause in this region; but fortunately she happened to tell Almira what they had been talking of, and she took up the subject as warmly as Marty could wish, saying she thought it would be very nice to have a missionary circle of some sort.
“Ruth has talked to me about it,” she said,“and I promised to help, but we can't seem to get the children interested.”
“Aren't thereanyinterested, not even enough to begin with?” inquired Marty.
“Well, there are Ruth's two brothers and sister, and I think Joe and Maria Pratt, who live just beyond Campbell's, might be talked into it. Then there's Eva, but she doesn't seem to care much about it.”
“I care a great deal more since I heard Marty tell about her band,” Evaline declared, “and I wouldn't mind belonging to something of the kind, only I don't see where I'd get any money to give.”
“We'd try to manage that,” said Almira.
After that for a few days there was a good deal of talk among them all on the subject, and some reading aloud afternoons from Marty's missionary books. Finally Mrs. Stokes said she thought it would be a very good thing for the young people in the neighborhood to have a society, and proposed that Almira and the little girls should go over and spend the next afternoon with Ruth, when they could talk the matter over.
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“I am very glad Marty came up here this summer, for I do believe, with her to help us, we shall get the mission-band started at last,” said pretty, blue-eyed Ruth Campbell, after they had all been talking for an hour or so as hard as their tongues could go.
When she had learned what her visitors' errand was, she had called her sister and brothers and had sent Hugh over for Maria and Joe Pratt. Then they had quite a conference on the shady porch, Ruth sewing busily all the while.
“I'm afraid I can't help much,” said Marty.
“Why, you have helped and are helping ever so much. You've got Evaline all worked up, and Maria too, and by telling us what you do in your band you have given us many hints for ours.”
“Now, Ruth,” said Evaline, “let's begin the band right away, so that we can have some meetings while Marty's here. You must be president, of course.”
“Evaline has it all settled,” said Ruth, laughing. Then turning to Almira she asked,“Which do you think would be best—just start a kind of temporary band and wait until school opens to organize, or organize now, trusting to persuade others to join?”
“I think it would be best to organize now. It will be easier to get them to join a band already started than it will be to get them stirred up to begin,” was Almira's opinion.
Then she wished to know what they would do about her. She wanted to belong, but then she was not a child.
“Do you know of any band, Marty, that has both children and young ladies?” she asked.
“No,” replied Marty. “In our church the young ladies have a band themselves.”
“But this isn't a church band; it's a neighborhood band,” Ruth interposed; “and as we haven't many folks up here, I think it will be well not to divide our forces, but to include all in one organization. Of course Almira must belong. I think, though, before organizing we had better see and invite some of the other neighbors. Effie, couldn't you and Maria go over to McKay's and see what they think of it?”
Effie, a gentle girl of thirteen, just as pretty and blue-eyed as her sister, thought she could.
Joe Pratt said he knew a boy he thought might come.
“How about the Smiths, Evaline? Do youthink any of them would be interested?” Ruth inquired.
“Sophy might,” Evaline replied rather doubtfully.
“Well, you see her, wont you? They are not far from you.”
It was finally resolved that as everybody was so busy through the week during this harvesting season, a meeting should be held the next Sunday afternoon. The place chosen was a grove which was just half way between Mr. Stokes' and Mr. Campbell's. If, however, the day was not suitable for an out-door meeting, they were to assemble in Mr. Stokes' barn, a fine, new affair, much handsomer than his house, and occupying a commanding situation from which there was a beautiful view.
When everything was settled the children ran off to play, and Almira helped Ruth and her mother to get supper.
The next Sunday was a lovely day, not too warm, and the meeting in the grove was a decided success. Altogether there were fourteen present, though two were visitors, Marty and one of Capt. Smith's summer boarders, who came with Sophy. Ruth had a nice little programme made out, and after the exercises they organized. Ruth was elected president, Almira, for the present, secretary, and Hugh Campbell,treasurer. They decided as long as the weather remained pleasant to meet every Sunday afternoon. In winter, of course, they could not get together so frequently.
They had already had, and continued to have, many discussions about ways of earning their missionary money. One thing the boys thought of was to gather berries and sell them to the people in the valleys, mountain blackberries being esteemed very delicious. There would be plenty of work about that—first climbing the heights and then carrying their burdens for miles.
Ruth was so much taken with Marty's plan of making tenths the basis of what she gave to missions that she concluded to adopt the same plan.
“That's easy enough for you,” said Almira. “You have your salary and half the butter-money, but I have no income. You know we don't sell much butter. I'll have to think of some other way to earn a little money.”
“Well, do hurry and think what we can do, Almira,” said Evaline fretfully. She depended on her sister always to do the thinking. “I'm afraid we wont have anything to give.”
“I am thinking,” said Almira.
The result was she asked her father if he would let her and Evaline have a strip of thefield adjoining the garden next summer, where they might raise vegetables. When he consented she asked Mrs. Dutton at the hotel if she would buy these vegetables. To this Mrs. Dutton, who knew the good quality of everything from the Stokes farm, and what a “capable” girl Almira was, readily agreed.
“There now, Eva,” said Almira, “by weeding and gathering vegetables you can earn your missionary money.”
“But, Almira,” said Marty, “how will you ever get the things down to the hotel?”
“Well, the evenings Hiram has to go to Trout Run to meet the market train, he can take my baskets for the next day along. Other days, if I can't do any better, I can harness Nelly and take them down in the morning myself before she is needed in the fields.”
“You'd have to get up awfully early.”
“Oh, yes!” said Almira, laughing. “I'll have to get up about three o'clock, I suppose, to have the things ready in time.”
“Three o'clock!” exclaimed Marty in dismay.
“There's going to be plenty of hard work about your missionary money, Almira,” said Mrs. Ashford.
“Oh, I'm willing to do the work,” replied Almira. “From all Ruth says, it is a cause worth working for.”
“Yes; but all that wont be till next summer—a year off,” objected Evaline. “How are we going to get any money sooner?”
But Almira had another plan.
“Father,” she said, one evening, “instead of hiring an extra hand this fall to sort and barrel apples, wont you let Evaline and me do it, and pay us the wages?”
“Do you think you could do as much work as a man?” inquired the farmer good-humoredly.
“I'll back Almiry for fast and good work against any manIever saw,” said Hiram emphatically.
Mr. Stokes laughed quietly. “Well,” he said, “'t will be hard work, with all else you have to do, but I'm willing you should try.”
“I can do it,” Almira answered determinedly.
After another spell of thinking she said to Evaline, “We might raise some turkeys next summer. They bring a good price.”
“Oh, turkeys are such a bother!” cried Evaline. “They take so much running after—always going where they might get hurt.”
She had had some experience in minding young turkeys.
“But just think of the money we'd have,” Almira reminded her. “And you know we'll have to work for our missionary money somehow.”
“That's so,” said Evaline, who was not fond of work. “It might as well be turkeys as anything else.”
“Mamma,” said Marty one morning, “Hiram says he'd like to join the band. But a great big man can't belong to a mission-band, can he?”
“He might be an honorary member,” suggested Mrs. Ashford.
“What sort of a member is that?”
“He could attend the meetings, take part in the exercises, and contribute money, but he could not vote.”
“Well, maybe Hiram would like to join that way. S'pose we ask him;” and off she and Evaline flew in search of Hiram.
They found him up by the barn.
“O Hiram!” said Marty. “I just now told mamma about your wanting to join the mission-band, and she says you might join as anhonorarymember.”
Hiram stuck his pitchfork in the ground, rested his hands on the top of it, and his chin on his hands.
“What's that kind of a member got to do?” he asked slowly.
“You may give money, but you can't vote,” Marty instructed him.
Hiram thought over it a good while, and then said very gravely, though his eyes twinkled,“Well, I guess giving money's the main thing after all, isn't it? I reckon I'll join if you'll let me.”
“We'll be ever so glad to have you,” said Marty warmly. She felt as if it was partly her band, and was interested in seeing it growing and flourishing.
They were nearly back to the house when Evaline suddenly stopped, exclaiming,
“You never told him he might come to the meetings!”
“Neither I did! How came I to forget that! We must go right back and tell him.”
When they reached the barn again, they saw Hiram at the foot of the hill, just entering the next field; but hearing the girls shouting, “Hiram! Hiram!” and seeing them running to overtake him, he strode back across the fence, and seated himself on the top rail to wait for them.
“I forgot a most important thing,” said Marty, panting for breath. “Mamma says honorary members may attend the meetings.”
“Maybe I hadn't better attend them,” said Hiram with a quizzical look. “I might want to vote.”
“Oh, do you think you should?” asked Marty anxiously.
Hiram bit off a piece of straw and chewed it, slowly moving his head from side to side, appearingto meditate profoundly, while the little girls waited in suspense.
“Well,” he said, after he had apparently thought the matter over, “I suppose I can hold up from voting; and I reckon you can count on me to come.”
And come he did, the very next Sunday, appearing to take great interest in the proceedings.
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“Oh, look! Look over there!” exclaimed Marty. “What are those lovely white flowers?”
“Wild clematis,” replied Evaline.
“O Hiram, wont you please stop and let us get some?” pleaded Marty. “I'd like so much to take some to mamma.”
Hiram was obliged to go to Black's Mills on an errand that morning, and Marty and Evaline had been allowed to go with him for the ride. Returning he had driven around by another road, as he said one of the horses had lost a shoe, and this road, though longer, was less stony, and therefore easier for the horse than the other. Besides it would take them by McKay's blacksmith-shop, where he could get the horse shod.
It was when going through a valley, which the country folks called “the bottom,” that they saw the clematis. It was growing in the greatest profusion in the meadows and the woods on both sides of the road, rambling over bushes, rocks, fences, everything, with its great starry clusters of white blossoms.
“I don't think you had better go after any,” said Hiram in reply to Marty's request. “Them low places are muddy after the rain yesterday, and your ma might be angry if you was to go home with your shoes all muddied. Besides, theremaybe snakes under them bushes.”
“Snakes! Oh, dear!” said Marty with a shudder. “But I should like some of those flowers for mamma.”
“Well,” said Hiram, reining in the horses, “if you promise to sit still in the wagon and not be up to any of your tricks of climbing in and out, I'll get you some.”
“Oh, thank you ever so much! I'll sit as still as a mouse. But then I shouldn't like the snakes to bite you.”
“I reckon they wont bite me,” said Hiram, as he leaped over the fence, and taking out his knife proceeded to cut great clusters of flowers.
“Oh, just see the loads he is getting!” cried Marty.
Then as Hiram returned with a huge armful which he carefully laid in the back of the wagon, she said, “Thank you many times, Hiram. You are very kind. How pleased mamma will be! But half these are yours, Evaline.”
After this they had what was to Marty the pleasure of fording a small stream, where thehorses were allowed to stop and drink. Presently they had a distant view of a cascade, called Buttermilk Falls. As the road did not approach very near, only a glimpse could be caught of the creamy foam; but Hiram said that some day, if Mr. Stokes could spare him, he would drive them all down to that point, and they could walk from there to the falls.
“I reckon Mrs. Ashford would like to see 'em,” he said.
“Indeed she would,” said Marty.
Altogether the drive was what Marty considered “just perfectly lovely.” And she was delighted also to be able to go home with such quantities of pretty flowers. She was already planning with Evaline what vases and pitchers they should put them in. “How surprised the folks will be when they see us coming in with our arms full!” she said.
When they reached a little wood back of Mr. Stokes' barn, Hiram stopped the horses, saying,
“Now, I've got to go 'round to McKay's, and may have to wait there a considerable spell, so you'd better just hop out here and go home through the woods.”
He helped them out, gave them the flowers, and drove on. The girls sat down under a tree and divided the spoils. Marty contrived to make a basket of her broad-brimmed brownstraw hat, in which she carefully placed her flowers. Evaline's basket was her gingham apron held up by the corners.
When they came within sight of the grove where their missionary meetings had been held, Evaline whispered,
“Look, Marty! there are some ladies sitting on our log.”
Sure enough, there were three young ladies, evidently resting after a mountain climb, for their alpenstocks were lying beside them, and one, a bright, black-eyed girl wearing a stylish red jacket, was fanning herself with her broad hat. As Marty and Evaline drew near this young lady called out gaily,
“Well, little flower girls, where did you come from?”
“We've been to Black's Mills in the wagon with Hiram, and when we were coming through the bottom he got this clematis for us,” explained Marty, who always had to be spokesman.
“And it is beautiful!” exclaimed the young lady. “What wouldn't I give for some like it! Did Hiram leave any or did he gather all for you?”
“Oh, there's plenty left!”
“Then I must have some,” said the young lady, jumping up. “Come, girls, follow yourleader to this bottom, wherever it is, and let us gather clematis while we may.”
“Fanny, Fanny, you crazy thing! Sit down and behave yourself,” cried one of her friends, laughing. “You have no idea where the place is, and we have been walking for three or four hours already.”
“Oh, you can't go,” said Marty earnestly to Miss Fanny. “It's miles and miles away; down steep hills and across the ford. Besides, Hiram says there may be snakes among the bushes.”
“Well, that settles it,” said Miss Fanny, reseating herself on the log, while the others laughed heartily.
Then Marty said with pretty hesitation, “Wont you have some of my flowers? I'd like to give you some.”
“Some of mine, too,” said Evaline, her generosity overcoming her shyness.
“Oh, no, indeed!” protested Miss Fanny. “Thank you very much, but I would not for the world deprive you of them. Very likely you have got it all arranged exactly how you are going to dispose of them at home.”
So they had, but neither of them was a bit selfish. Marty had already placed her hat on the end of the log and was busily engaged in separating a large bunch of flowers from therest, and Evaline, approaching the young ladies, held out her apronful towards them.
“Perhaps,” suggested the tall, fair girl, whom her companions called “Dora,” “perhaps you would be willing to play you are real flower girls and would sell us some.”
“Yes, yes,” exclaimed Miss Fanny, “let us make a play of it. Little girls, how much are your flowers?” and she drew forth a long blue purse.
“'T would be mean to sell what didn't cost us anything, and what we didn't have to move a finger to get,” said Marty. “I'd a great deal rather you would let me give you as many as you want.”
“No, it would not be mean at all when you are giving up what you have so much pleasure in. It would only be fair to take something in exchange,” said Miss Fanny. “Just think!” she added persuasively, “isn't there something you'd each like to have a quarter for?”
Marty still held out against taking money for the flowers, but all at once Evaline exclaimed brightly, “Oh, the mission-band!”
“Mission-band!” cried Miss Fanny. “Familiar sound! Are you mission girls?”
“Yes,” they said.
“Why, so are we all. We must shake hands all around.”
They did so, laughing, and feeling like old friends. Then in ten minutes' chatter the young ladies told what cities they were from and what bands they belonged to, found out about Marty's home band, and the newly-formed mountain band she took such an interest in, and which Evaline persisted in saying Marty started. They were particularly delighted in hearing about this last; they thought it highly romantic that the meetings were held in that lovely grove, and were amused by the idea of meeting in the barn in case of rain, and also of Hiram's consenting to join as an honorary member.
“Now,” said Miss Fanny, “you will agree to sell some of your flowers, wont you? See how nicely it all fits in—we want some flowers very much, and you want some money for your mission work. So it's a fair exchange. Girls,” she said, turning to her friends, “you know this is Mrs. Thurston's birthday. Wouldn't it be lovely if we could have about half this clematis to decorate her room with?”
Marty declared if she was going to give them a quarter apiece, she must take all, or most of the flowers, instead of half. After much talk it was finally arranged that the little girls were each to keep what Miss Fanny called “a good double-handful,” and the rest was handed over to the young ladies.
“This is my first missionary money,” said Evaline, caressing her bright silver quarter in delight.
Marty, also, appeared very well pleased with the unexpected increase to her store.
Before separating Miss Fanny proposed another plan. She had already stated that she and her friends were staying at the hotel in Riseborough, and had caused Evaline to point out where she lived.
“Day after to-morrow,” said Miss Fanny, “a party of five or six of us are going to take a drive to see some falls, and coming back we pass right by your house. We shall probably be along towards the close of the afternoon. Now couldn't you be on the lookout for us, and have some more missionary clematis for sale?”
“It doesn't grow very near here,” said Evaline, “and I don't believe Hiram would have time to take us to the bottom again after any. He's busy harvesting.”
“Of course I don't wish you to go to so much trouble about it; but cannot you get us flowers of some kind near here—in some of these woods?”
Evaline, who was anxious for more missionary money, said she thought there were still some cardinal flowers down in the glen, and Miss Fanny said they would be the very thing.
“And then it would be more like earning the missionary money if we had to work ourselves to get the flowers,” said Marty.
“You have been brought up in the orthodox school, I see,” said Miss Fanny, and all the young ladies laughed.
After many last words and kindly adieus, they parted, and the children ran home to relate their adventures.