Honorthought over the subject during the day and decided that they must hold a council of war. Some means must be decided upon for paying the bills. It was precisely one month since they had undertaken to support themselves, and already they were in difficulty. It would be humiliating to be forced to appeal so soon to Mr. Abbott for help, and yet they would far rather ask him than their Aunt Sophia. But perhaps there was some other way.
The school bills had been sent out,—they were issued in advance,—but as yet there had been no response, and even when there was, the amount would help very little. Six children at twenty dollars each for the term, one hundred and twenty dollars. The household bills for the month of November amounted to what seemed a large sum in these straitened times,—and they did notinclude the one for the school furniture,—and the money which they should receive from the pupils would be for the next four months.
There were the music scholars, to be sure, but they were but five, and Katherine received only fifty cents an hour. Mushrooms and violets, though a paying industry in theory, had not yet begun to show practical results. Six hundred dollars a year came to them, as they supposed, from their father’s estate, and there were five persons to be clothed and fed. Had they been foolish, after all, not to accept their aunt’s offer? Honor, sitting in the western window of the parlor that afternoon in December, while she waited for her sisters to join her there, wondered if they had made a mistake.
There had been a light fall of snow that day, just enough to whiten the ground and to rest lightly upon the branches of the cedar trees. The sun was shining now, shortly before setting, and the world looked very beautiful. But Honor was in no mood to enjoy the prospect. She felt an overburdening sense of responsibility. She was the eldest, the family were practically left in her care, and she missed her father more than wordscould express. Was she doing right to refuse the help which her father’s sister had offered?
Presently the front door opened, and Victoria walked in. She was singing, to a tune of her own invention, her favorite quotation from Shakespeare:
“Jog on, jog on the footpath way,And merrily hent the stile—a.A merry heart goes all the way,Your sad tires in a mile—a.”
“Jog on, jog on the footpath way,And merrily hent the stile—a.A merry heart goes all the way,Your sad tires in a mile—a.”
She was about to begin it for the second time, when she saw Honor sitting on the sofa in the bay-window. Her very attitude appeared depressed, for she was leaning her head on her hand, as her elbow rested on the back of the sofa, and she idly swung one foot to and fro.
“It is just perfect out,” said Victoria, coming into the room. A bright color glowed in her cheeks, and her voice was gay and exhilarated from her walk in the fresh air. “It is growing colder, and there is a snap about everything. Have you been out, Honor?”
“No.”
“Not all day? Oh, put on your things and come out for a walk! It is just the afternoon for it.”
“No,” said Honor, “I am waiting for you and Katherine. I don’t know where she can be.”
“What do you want us for?” asked Victoria, feeling a pang of something like depression, her sister’s tone was so dreary.
“I want to talk things over, and here comes Katherine at last. I thought you were never coming. Where have you been, Katherine? Indeed, somebody must suggest some way of getting money at once. Those bills are weighing upon me.”
“There is a way,” said Victoria, taking the other corner of the sofa, while Katherine threw herself into an arm-chair. “There is a way, but I suppose you will both be perfectly horrified if I even suggest it.”
“What is it?” asked her sisters.
“Will you promise not to exclaim?”
“It couldn’t possibly surprise us after your other suggestions,” remarked Katherine, gloomily. “I shall be quite resigned, even if you tell us we are to live on bread and water and wear ready-made clothes at five dollars a suit.”
“We might do worse,” said Victoria, “but this is quite different. We have so many things” (shelooked about the room as she spoke), “why—indeed, girls, I scarcely dare say it—why can’t we sell something?”
There was a moment of silence. Honor was the first to find her voice.
“Sell something!” she exclaimed. “Sell what?”
“Oh, a picture or two, or some books, or a piece of silver. Or isn’t there any jewelry?”
“Why, Victoria, you can’t really mean it?” cried Katherine, in an incredulous voice. “I can’t think that you really mean it.”
“Sell our family heirlooms?” exclaimed Honor, starting to her feet and gazing at her younger sister with the air of a tragedy queen. “Sell the books and the pictures that father collected with so much pride? Sell the silver which belonged to our great-great-grandmother? Victoria, are you perfectly crazy?”
“No,” said Victoria, stoutly, “not at all so, but I knew you would take it in that way. Of course, I don’t mean the family things, but I mean some of the books, or those etchings that are in the portfolio. I know well enough how dearly father loved them, but he certainly loved us more, and if he were here now and knew howpoor we are, he would be the first to say that we must do something to get money, and that we had better sell such useless things as those etchings are. They don’t do us any good, for we never look at them, and he would far rather have us sell them than owe money. You know father had a perfect horror of unpaid bills.”
Victoria spoke rapidly, for she had become excited. The opposition manifested by her sisters only served to strengthen her belief in the common sense of her suggestion, and she felt confident that her plan was a good one.
“I was wondering if Aunt Sophia wouldn’t buy something of us.”
“Victoria!!”
“Well, you needn’t be so shocked. Aunt Sophia with all her aggravatingness is very kind-hearted, and she is fond of us in a way. She might buy something of us, and when we grow rich we could buy it back again.”
“When we do!” said Katherine, with fine sarcasm. “All I can say is that if Aunt Sophia is to be applied to, I shall have nothing to do with it. Victoria can run the affair herself.”
“Very well,” returned Victoria, “if Honor iswilling, I will. I will go to town to-morrow, and see Aunt Sophia. I only wish Mr. Abbott were at home, but he said his business would keep him away two weeks. Shall I go, Honor?”
“I suppose so,” said Honor, drearily. “I have nothing more to say.”
“To-night we can talk over what we had better offer for sale,” continued Victoria. “I think it will be quite good fun, girls.”
“It is not my idea of fun,” said Honor, “but I am willing to do almost anything for a little money. How little we supposed this time last year that we should ever be in such need! It just shows that we can’t be sure of anything.”
“By the way,” said Victoria, abruptly changing the subject, “did you know that the house on the hill has been taken?”
“One of my scholars said something about it to-day,” said Katherine. “She said their name was Madison, and there are a girl and a boy, I believe. I wonder if they are nice.”
“I hope so, as they are to be such near neighbors.”
“That won’t make any difference,” remarked Honor, “for we shall see nothing of them. Wehave no time to make new acquaintances and we are too poor. If they have taken the house on the hill, they must be very well off, and that is all the more reason for us to avoid them. We are nothing but paupers, working for our living.”
“Honor, how morbid you are getting on that subject!” cried Victoria, while Katherine laughed somewhat bitterly. “If they are nice, I shall be glad to know them, and so will you. Do cheer up a bit,” she added, rising as she spoke. “I am going to find Peter now and see how they are progressing with the mushroom bed. Don’t worry, Honor. It will all come right some day.
“Jog on, jog on the footpath way,And merrily hent the stile—a.’”
“Jog on, jog on the footpath way,And merrily hent the stile—a.’”
The sisters heard the fresh young voice as Victoria, having put on her jacket again, departed in search of Peter. Katherine seated herself at the piano, as she was apt to do when under any stress of emotion, and Honor went to her own room. She was determined that no one should see her cry if she could help it, but life was at present very disheartening, let Victoria suggest and sing as she would.
Vic on her way to the barn met Sophy, and together they sought their brother. They found him sitting with Dave Carney in the harness-room.
“Oh, come along in,” said he with unexpected cordiality, while Carney rose from the box upon which he was seated, and Sirius rapped a welcome on the floor with his long tail. The oddest part of Sirius’s somewhat grotesque appearance was the great length of his tail.
“We were just talking about the mushroom bed, and we can’t decide whether to have it in the cellar, or in the shed, or in the barn, or out of doors. Of course you don’t really know any more about it, Vic, than I do, but what do you think?”
“Did you send for the books?” asked his sister, as she seated herself.
“Yes, and they came by the noon mail. A lot about edible mushrooms, and here it tells how to raise them,” said Peter, giving her two or three pamphlets which he had been studying.
He had, upon the suggestion of the florist at Fordham, sent to Washington for these pamphlets, which were printed and published by the Department of Agriculture.
“I really believe it is going to be a good thing,Vic. They seem easy to raise, and I shouldn’t wonder if there was money in them. We might live on them ourselves, and save butcher’s bills. You know the Chinese eat them a lot.”
“Yes, I know,” responded Victoria, although somewhat doubtfully; “but then it always seems as if the Chinese ate such queer things—mice, for instance. I don’t think I should like to copy the Chinese.”
“Pooh! You don’t really believe that they eat mice, do you?” said Peter, with lofty scorn. “A lot is made up about the Chinese, because we don’t really know much about them. But they do a large business in mushrooms, or ‘edible fungi,’ as they are called. They import them from Japan and Tahiti, and even from Australia and New Zealand. They make soup out of fungus in China; and do you know in New Zealand they eat a fungus that grows out of the body of a big caterpillar.”
“Oh, horrible!” cried Victoria. “Sophy’s eyes look as big as saucers. Don’t tell any more such dreadful tales, Peter. We won’t raise that kind, at any rate. Have you decided where to have the beds?”
“That’s just what we were talking about before you came out. I was thinking of the shed at the back of the barn, and Carney thinks that would be a good place. I don’t believe out of doors will do in our climate; and Smith, the man at Fordham, said the shed was the best. I wish we could make a regular mushroom house, like the ones they show pictures of in these pamphlets, but I suppose it would cost a good deal.”
“We had better wait until next year for that,” said the practical Victoria. “Then we can tell whether they are going to pay or not.”
They discussed the matter for some time, until the gathering darkness warned Victoria that it was time for her and Sophy to go back to the house; and they left the boys still absorbed in the subject.
The next day was Saturday, and it was decided to make use of the holiday by arranging the mushroom bed. The boys followed closely the directions for doing this, which were given in their pamphlets; but after making the bed, they were forced to wait for a few days before introducing the seed, or spawn, until the temperature of the bed should have reached the proper degree. Thisthey were to discover by means of the ground thermometer which Peter had purchased.
The day being Saturday, Victoria was free to go to Boston to call upon her aunt. The girls had further discussed the matter the evening before, and had decided that Victoria’s plan must be followed, if they wished to avert the ruin which seemed to be staring them in the face. If Aunt Sophia declined to buy the pictures which they had determined to sell, they must be disposed of in some other way. Victoria had a private plan of her own for raising some ready money, but of this she had said nothing to her sisters.
She went to Boston in one of the early trains with a large flat package under her arm, and a small but heavy one in her pocket. The day was a fine one, and the streets were filled with Christmas shoppers, the stores being already crowded, early in the morning though it was.
Victoria walked quickly from the station to her aunt’s house. The world seemed very bright this morning, even though bills were unpaid and prospects dreary. As the young girl hurried along, one might easily have imagined from her happy face and her well-dressed figure that she was inthe most comfortable circumstances possible, and that her package was a Christmas present which she had purchased, instead of being four of her father’s precious etchings with which the sisters, after much hesitation and disinclination, had decided to part.
“I wonder what kind of a person I am,” thought Victoria as she walked. “I wonder what sort of a character I really have. I don’t seem to get as gloomy as Honor or as furious as Katherine over being poor. Does it mean that I don’t realize as they do how very bad things are? It always seems as if there must be some way out, no matter how gloomy and awful things may look. Perhaps I’m rather shallow and can’t grasp the situation. Some day when I have time I am going to sit down and study my own nature, but there are ever so many things that must be done first. And after all, it doesn’t seem worth while to waste time over that. I might find out that I was absolutely worthless, and that would be so discouraging. I suppose a great many people would say that I ought to examine myself more, and correct my faults, and all that, and I suppose I ought; but if I did I know I should getdepressed, and it really seems as if one of us should try to keep bright and cheerful, and I seem to be the one that it comes easiest to. I wish I had some one to ask about such things—a mother, for instance. Holloa, here I am at Aunt Sophia’s already. I hope she is at home.”
But inquiry proved that already Mrs. Wentworth Ward had gone out. She would not return until five o’clock that afternoon, the maid said. She had gone to Providence to attend a meeting. Would not Miss Victoria come in and rest a bit?
But Victoria declined the invitation. She had quickly determined to put her other plans into action, and no time should be lost.
It did not take long to reach a certain silversmith’s of whom she had heard, and whom she knew to be honest, although his shop was neither large nor fashionable. Fortunately no customers were in the store, and the proprietor could attend to her himself. She produced the small heavy package from her pocket, and proceeded to untie it. In it were a pair of old-fashioned gold earrings, a watch and chain, and one or two chased rings. These articles had been left to Victoriaby the will of her grandmother. The watch, which was very old, and had long since ceased to go, was of no great value as a timepiece, she supposed.
“I want to sell these things,” said she, bravely. “Will you buy them?”
The old man, who had kind eyes, Victoria thought, looked at them critically. Then he glanced benignly at the owner of the trinkets.
“Do you really want to sell them?” said he.
“Yes, I really do,” returned Victoria. “I need the money. How much will you give me for them?”
“I can’t tell that until I’ve taken them apart and weighed the gold. Come back next week, and I’ll tell you.”
“Next week!” cried Victoria. “Oh, can’t you do it now? I do want to take the money home to-day.”
“And ain’t you going to buy Christmas presents with it?” asked the old man.
“No indeed, I’m not. We really need the money. Couldn’t you tell me if I were to come back this afternoon? At three o’clock, for instance?”
“Very well. Come in at three, and I’ll try to have them weighed before that. These earrings are hollow, I guess, and there ain’t so very much gold in this open-faced watch. Here’s a receipt.”
He scrawled something on a bit of paper which he gave to Victoria, and she thanked him and left the shop. She then took her way to a picture store. It was a large one that was much frequented, and it required some determination on her part to go in and display her wares. The clerks were such fashionably dressed young men that she felt somewhat in awe of them, and they all appeared to be so busy that it was long before she was noticed at all.
At last, however, one of them stepped up to her and asked her what she wished. For a moment Victoria could not find her voice, and when she finally spoke it was so low and trembling that the clerk could not understand her.
“You wish to look at etchings?” said he. “Right over here, please. Summers, show this young lady some etchings. I have another customer.” And he turned to a gentleman who was looking at some pictures with the air of intending to buy one if not more.
“Oh, no,” said Victoria. “You have made a mistake. I don’t want to look at etchings. I want to sell those I have here. I thought that—that perhaps—you would buy them.”
Her voice was now perfectly audible. In her effort to make herself understood it reached farther than she intended. The two clerks and the gentleman who stood there all turned and looked at Victoria, and she with her package under her arm felt as though she should like to sink through the floor and disappear forever from their sight.
Butthis was no time in which to give way to embarrassment. Having undertaken the expedition in search of funds, Victoria felt that she must carry it bravely through, come what would. With fingers that trembled conspicuously she untied the cord and removed the wrappings, and presently disclosed to the view of the three men four etchings of such rare merit that they exclaimed with admiration.
“Ah, artist’s proofs!” said the gentleman who had been looking at pictures. “And a signature worth having,” he added, as he glanced at the name written beneath the etching he held in his hand. “May I ask what the price of this one is?”
“I—I don’t exactly know,” faltered Victoria. “I thought they could tell me here what they are worth. You see my father bought them and—”
She stopped abruptly. She did not wish to take these strangers into her confidence, but the threemen saw her black dress and imagined the rest. And yet she did not look as if she were in need of money.
“I should think they were worth twenty-five dollars apiece, should not you?” said the gentleman, turning to the clerks.
They were unwilling to mention any price, and one of them went in search of the owner of the store. Victoria could scarcely repress a little gasp of surprise. She had no idea that the pictures were worth so much, for they were small ones. If she succeeded in selling all of them in addition to the gold which she had left with the jeweller, she would go home with a large fortune in her pocket, and the unpaid bills could be settled at once.
She glanced at the young man, who appeared to be absorbed in examination of the etchings while he waited to hear their value. He was very tall and slight, with straight features, and neither beard nor moustache, which made him look younger than perhaps he really was. Victoria decided that he was nice looking, and was probably about twenty-five. He seemed to be well known at the shop, for the clerks treated him with marked attention andcalled him by name, but Victoria could not hear it distinctly enough to know what it was.
Again she told herself that he was very nice looking, and that he had the most charming manners she had ever seen, though perhaps she was influenced by his interest in her pictures and his evident desire to buy one. Presently the picture-dealer himself came forward and examined critically the four etchings.
“They are genuine artist’s proofs,” said he, “and I shall try to sell them myself at twenty dollars each. Probably they cost more than that, but in the present state of business they will not bring as much as they did. I will give you fifteen apiece for them and take the four.”
“And I will give you twenty-five for this one,” said the young man, holding up the one that he had first looked at. “It is a gem, and I will get you to frame it for me,” he added, turning to the dealer. “Do it for me as soon as you can, for I want to give it away for a Christmas present.”
He took out a roll of bills from his pocket, and counting out twenty-five dollars he handed the money to Victoria, taking off his hat as he did so.
“‘It is a gem’”
“Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity of securing such a prize,” he said.
Victoria hesitated and blushed scarlet.
“I don’t exactly like to take it,” she said simply, as she looked up at him. “You are giving me too much. You could buy it of the shop for twenty dollars. Please don’t give me more than that.”
“I prefer to pay five dollars more for the privilege of—of having first choice,” he said, abruptly changing the termination of his sentence.
Victoria said no more, but took the money, and at the same time one of the clerks brought her forty-five dollars for the remaining three. She thanked them all and hurried from the shop.
“Rather an odd case,” said the picture-dealer to the young man. “The man who bought those etchings in the first place knew what he was about. I daresay I shan’t sell them, but I didn’t want to let such good things go; and besides, she seemed like a nice little girl. I have a daughter just about her age and—well, no matter. Now, sir, what kind of a frame do you wish, and how about those other pictures you were looking at?”
The young man turned to look at samples offrames, but his mind was more occupied with the incident which had just taken place than with his purchases. He, too, felt sorry for the girl. She was unmistakably a lady, and it must have been a trying position for her. He would not care to have his sister in such a predicament, he said to himself.
He was a man of somewhat old-fashioned notions, one who believed that the men of the family should take care of the women. He wondered if there was no one to look out for this young girl, who seemed to be not more than fifteen,—no older person who could have come with her. Then dismissing the subject from his thoughts for the time being, he devoted his whole attention to the choice of a frame.
Victoria, when she left the shop, felt that all their difficulties were at an end. She had a roll of bills in her pocket,—she put her hand in more than once as she walked, to make sure that the money was safe,—and if all went as smoothly as she hoped, she would have more before the day was over. She had left home that morning with her railroad ticket and twenty-five cents for emergencies; she expected to return in affluence,and it had all been done without the intervention of Aunt Sophia. How fortunate it was that Aunt Sophia had elected to go to Providence on this day of all others! What would she say to such a proceeding if she ever happened to hear of it?
Victoria smiled to herself at the idea. Very probably Aunt Sophia dealt at that picture store herself. How little the dealer suspected that she was the niece of Mrs. Wentworth Ward of Beacon Street,—or the young man who had given her twenty-five dollars. Then in a flash the other side of the occurrence presented itself. Should she have taken so much from him? Was the etching worth that much? Why should she have calmly allowed herself to accept twenty-five dollars from him and only fifteen from the dealer? Had she made herself an object of charity?
She had walked across the Common, and was about to cross Tremont Street when she reached this point in her reflections, and so absorbed was she in the subject that she barely escaped being run over by one of the innumerable electric cars which were passing in long succession, interspersed with dashing herdics and hurrying cabs.All the world seemed to be in haste this sharp winter morning, and a motorman shouted angrily to her as she attempted to cross in front of his car.
She reached the other side of the street in safety, and then she wondered what she should do next. She had no Christmas shopping to consume her time, for their gifts to one another were to be very simple this year and were to be made at home. The stores on Temple Place were packed with people, and as she walked she was jostled and almost bruised by the inevitable handbags, without which Boston shoppers are rarely seen. It was now only half-past ten, and she must stay in town until after three, the hour of her appointment with the jeweller. She determined to go back to her aunt’s, and remain there until the afternoon, and there she could think quietly of the events of the morning.
She did this, and was shown by the maid into the library and told to make herself at home. Although Mrs. Wentworth Ward was their own aunt, the Starrs had never felt for her the affection which is so common in that relationship. It had always been more or less of an effort for them togo to her house, and their calls there were unmistakably “duty visits.” Mrs. Ward was without doubt very trying at times, and the girls were in her opinion absurdly independent.
There were faults on both sides, perhaps, as there usually are in such cases. Victoria, sitting in the luxurious library, thought it all over.
“If Aunt Sophia were only like some aunts,” she said to herself, “how nice it would have been to come and live with her! Think of this big house and no one in it but herself; but oh, I hope we shall never have to do it! I do wonder what the girls will say about my sales this morning. I felt exactly like a book agent or a pedler. Dear me, I only hope I shall never see that young man again! He was just as nice as he could be, but I don’t want ever to meet him! He really made me a present of ten dollars, you might say. What will Honor think of it all?”
Three o’clock came at last, and as the hands of the clock on the steeple of the Old South Church pointed to the hour, Victoria entered the shop where she had left her gold that morning. She knew little of the value of watches, but she fancied that when new they cost not less thanone hundred dollars, and often very much more; therefore she hoped for at least fifty for hers. Her disappointment was consequently very great when she learned that it was worth exactly thirteen dollars and seventy-five cents, while the other trinkets would bring but seven and a half.
“The chain and the earrings are hollow,” said the man, “and the works of the watch are good for nothing. You may be glad to get this much.”
She thanked him and left the store feeling somewhat crestfallen, although twenty-one dollars and a quarter made a sum not to be despised.
The girls were eagerly awaiting her return, and when she displayed her roll of bills and informed them that she had brought them ninety-one dollars and twenty-five cents, they could scarcely believe her. Honor looked grave over the account of the young man’s generosity, as Victoria had supposed that she would, and she also expressed the hope that they might never see him again.
“It would be simply unendurable to feel that we were under obligations to him,” said she; “but it isn’t at all likely that we shall ever meet him. We don’t see many people but those who live in Fordham, and if he lived anywhere in thisneighborhood, you would have known him by sight. You are sure you never saw him before, Vic?”
“Perfectly sure. He was probably some Boston swell, but he was an awfully nice one, and if it were not for that ten dollars, I should really like to know him.”
“You may as well say if it were not for that whole ninety-one dollars and twenty-five cents,” said Honor. “I am glad enough to get the money, but I can’t bear to think of your having to go to those shops by yourself and sell things. I ought to have gone with you, Vic. Indeed, I ought! It was very cowardly and selfish for me to let you go alone—a young thing like you. Some one might have been impertinent to you, and then I should never have forgiven myself.”
“Oh, nonsense, Honor!” laughed her young sister. “You are not so very much older yourself, and I went to such respectable places that of course no one would be impertinent. And, besides, I wanted to surprise you about the gold. I wanted to go alone.”
But Honor shook her head. She knew that she had been remiss, and that her father would not have approved of Victoria’s solitary expedition.If the young man whom she had met was truly a gentleman, as Vic declared that he was, what could he have thought of such a proceeding? He certainly must suppose that her relatives were very careless and very peculiar people, to say the least, and Honor hoped with all her heart that he would never cross her path again.
But it was a great source of comfort to feel that their bills could now be paid; and the girls went to bed that night feeling comparatively happy, for the consciousness of their debts had weighed upon them all. Katherine—though she would not acknowledge it—had felt particularly uncomfortable, for the unused typewriter continued to stare her in the face. Now she felt quite relieved about it, and she had serious thoughts of running into Boston Monday afternoon to buy Christmas presents for the family. It would be such a surprise to them, and she should of course use her own money.
Within half an hour she had fully made up her mind to do this, and was already planning what she should bestow upon each one, when a remark of Honor’s warned her that it would be wiser not to carry out her intentions.
“I hope,” said the eldest sister, “that we shall not lose our heads over our unexpected good fortune. We mustn’t spend a bit more than we can possibly help. Remember, we don’t want any more bills!”
The winter days passed quickly, filled as they were with things of importance to do. The first planting of mushrooms was successful; and Peter, upon his return from the Boston market, to which he took them, proudly added his earnings to the family purse. He pretended that he felt it but a small thing to do, and that the future would prove that he was considering deeds of far greater moment than the cultivation of mushrooms; but in reality he was becoming immensely interested in the pursuit.
Victoria’s violets bloomed in February, and they also were taken to Boston, and disposed of to a florist. Dave Carney attended to this part of the business for her, and was indeed most useful in every way. The Starrs had never been able to discover anything about the antecedents of this member of the household, and in fact they had not made any great effort to do so. They liked the boy, and they found him both obliging and dependable. Peter knew that he had a brother,for he saw one day in Fordham a young man who so closely resembled Dave that he was on the point of speaking to him; and when he questioned Dave upon the subject, the boy told him briefly that it was his brother, and that he was a few years older than himself. He said nothing more, and Peter did not ask for further information, as was characteristic of him.
It was a mild winter, and although there were frequent falls of snow, they were always succeeded by days of such springlike warmth that there was neither sleighing nor coasting, and scarcely any skating.
His sisters suspected that Peter was not particularly happy in his school life, but he did not tell them so. He was a boy who did not make friends easily, and the mere knowledge that he was looked upon as an interloper by the boys at the school which he attended, drove him still farther into his shell, as it were. He had little to do with them, and usually came home as soon as the day’s session was over.
Sophy and Sirius together always watched eagerly for his return, both consumed with the same hope and desire that Peter would invitethem to join him in whatever he intended to do—a hope which was more apt to be fulfilled in the case of Sirius than of Sophy. An eight-year-old sister is by no means so interesting a companion, Peter thought, as an active and particularly intelligent dog.
There were occasions, however, when Sophy was bidden to bear him company; and, on a certain afternoon, the little girl was made happy by the announcement that Peter was going for a walk, and if she wanted to go, and would promise not to get tired, and not to make a fuss if they came across any muskrats or field mice, and, in fact, to show no signs of fear about anything which they might meet, she should be allowed to accompany her brother and his dog.
Sophy, transported with delight, and ready to promise anything in the way of courage, ran for her hat and jacket and quickly followed Peter to the barn, whither he gone to inspect the mushroom bed. It was a mild day in early spring. The young leaves had just burst forth upon the trees, and the smell of earth, and the gentle murmurings of the little brooks in pasture and woods, and the soft freshness of the breeze, showed thatanother winter had passed. Many of the birds had returned to their summer homes and were busily engaged in nest-building, and little chipmunks darted about in a ceaseless game of tag, pausing for a moment to peer inquisitively at Sophy with their bright eyes, and then vanishing from sight. Peter, having attended to his affairs at the barn, took his way across the pasture. Sirius scampered on in advance, nosing here and there along the path, stopping to investigate every hole and barking noisily at a gray squirrel, which climbed the trunk of a tree at his approach, and then sat on a branch in safety, but extreme indignation. “Do squirrels go to sleep in winter, Peter?” asked Sophy, as she trudged along close to his side.
“They do usually, but it was so warm this winter I guess they didn’t get so sound asleep. I’ll tell you something, Soph. Carney and I both think the same thing. You know people always say that when there are a lot of nuts, it means that we are going to have a cold winter and the squirrels will have plenty to eat. Well, you know there were plenty of nuts last fall, and look at thewinter we’ve had! As warm as toast. I think, and Carney thinks so, too, that it means a warm winter to have so many nuts. The squirrels are not going to sleep so much, and so they will need more food. And look at last year; scarcely any nuts in the fall and an awfully cold winter. I’m going to write to theTranscriptabout it sometime, and see what people say. Other people will answer, and it will be lots of fun. Sophy, I’ll tell you something if you’ll promise never to tell. Will you?”
“Do you meannever?”
“Yes, never, until I’ve done it. Then I’ll tell it myself.”
“All right, Peter, I’ll promise,” said the little sister. The absence of the front teeth made her lisp slightly, and Peter was alarmingly apt to make fun of this defect when she used the letter “s”; but he was too much engrossed with his subject at present to remark upon it, greatly to Sophy’s relief. A wave of gratification filled her heart, both because of this and because her brother was apparently about to make a confidante of her.
“I’ll promise,” she repeated solemnly. “What is it?”
“When I grow up,” said Peter, “in a very few years, I’m going to write a book.”
“Peter! A real printed book?”
“Of course, child. What other kind of a book could it be?”
“And what will it be about? A story likeAlice in WonderlandorLittle Women?”
“Little Women! A girl’s story! No indeed. There won’t be a girl in the book, that is one thing certain. But it is to be about everything else. You know I really know a lot about all sorts of things, and I intend to write about everything that I know the least thing about.”
“Goody me!” exclaimed the astonished Sophy. “It will be an awful big book, Peter!”
“Of course it will. It will probably be in a great many volumes, all bound alike. It will be a regular Encyclopedia, and people will probably look into it when they want to find out about anything. I’m going to tell about squirrels and birds and mushrooms and muskrats and ants and bees and boys’ games and schools—I’m going to tell a lot about schools, how to keep them, and all that—and travels—I mean to travel as soon as I get enough money and have madeenough for you girls to live on, and I shall write about every place I visit, and oh, everything!”
“I should think you would have a little room in so many volumes to say something about girls,” murmured Sophy.
“But what for?” demanded Peter. “Why should I waste my time writing about them? You know very well, Sophy, that girls aren’t at all interesting, as ants or birds are, for instance. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Sophy, humbly; “I know that because you have often told me so, but then, Peter, you can talk to a girl, but you can’t talk to an ant or a bird. Doesn’t that make some difference?”
“Not much,” he replied. “I would rather watch a colony of ants any day than talk to a girl. Now mind, Sophy, you don’t tell any one about my book.”
“Indeed I won’t, Peter, and I think it’s going to be a splendid book, even if there are no girls in it. I wish it was all made, though.”
“So do I,” said he; “but it won’t take long when I once get started on it. Hark! What’s that?”
A strange wild cry rang through the woods. Sirius stopped short in the path, with ears erect and motionless tail, while Sophy gave a little shriek and clung to her brother’s arm.
“Whatis it?” whispered Sophy. “Oh, Peter, is it a ghost?”
“A ghost! Pooh, what nonsense! I’ll never bring you again, Sophy. You promised you wouldn’t be afraid of anything.”
“Oh, but, Peter, that was such a queer noise, and so dreadful! If you could only tell me what it was!”
“An owl, very likely. Sometimes they make queer noises like that. Let’s try to find it. Sik ’em, Sirius, sik ’em, sir!” And disengaging himself from Sophy’s detaining hand he and the dog dashed into a by-path and disappeared from sight.
Sophy tried to follow, but there were many intersecting paths or tracks in this part of the woods, and she was not in the least sure which one her brother had taken. She ran along one, only to find that it was rendered impassable by some brambles, so she turned and went back to herstarting-point to try another. She hoped that she should not again hear that terrible cry. It might be an owl, as Peter had suggested, but then again it might not. Peter did not really know for a certainty what it was. And then, as suddenly as it had come before, rang out once more this unearthly shriek. Sophy covered her face with her hands for an instant. Then, indifferent as to what might become of her if only she could get as far as possible from this terrible creature, whatever it might be, she fled in the opposite direction to that from which the sound appeared to come.
Peter and Sirius pursued their way with unerring instinct to a large tree, upon the unleaved branch of which sat an immense owl. What had at first disturbed it Peter could not guess, but at his approach the owl gave another cry and then, spreading its wings, flew aimlessly away into the deeper woods, flapping blindly among the trees as it went.
It was unusual to see an owl so active in the daytime, and Peter, his naturalist’s nature all alive, followed closely, anxious to see what would happen next. He stopped long enough, however, to try to discover what had frightened the bird, but couldfind nothing. Then he concluded that the enemy, whatever it was, must have disappeared.
It was a great horned owl, he was almost sure, and he knew that one of that species was rarely seen so near civilization. He followed it as closely as possible, but during his short stop to look for the cause of its fright the owl had disappeared, and Peter did not see it again. After spending some time in a fruitless search for it, he returned to the edge of the wood, supposing that he should find Sophy where he had left her; but his thoughts were now distracted by something else.
The excited barking of Sirius proved that he had come upon prey of some sort, and sure enough, when Peter reached the dog he saw that he had discovered the entrance to a nest of field mice beneath an old log, and already he had killed one of the parents. Peter hoped to be in time to save the other, but he was not, and scarcely liked to scold Sirius for the double murder, for he knew the dog was only following the instincts of his kind. He determined to secure the young ones, however, if young ones there were.
He turned over the log, and there beneath it he found a neatly made nest of long grasses, builtbetween the detached bark and the log itself, and containing a number of tiny baby-mice. They were orphans now, alas! the father and mother having both been killed by Sirius, but Peter determined that the little ones should not suffer for this misfortune. Carefully removing the nest from its resting-place, he laid it in his cap and started for home. He would have liked to examine the log further, for it seemed to be an interesting place. A colony of large black ants, which had fashioned for themselves a most elaborate dwelling, were running about now in a distracted manner, owing to the sudden upheaval of the log, which had probably been their undisturbed home for a long time; and Peter would have been glad to watch them.
But from the way in which Sirius was barking and sniffing at a hole in the log, Peter was led to suspect that another nest of mice might be there, and rather than have that family also broken up, and because he had no way of disposing of the little creatures in his cap, he hurried away from the fascinating scene, calling to the dog to follow.
He took a short cut across the woody pasture, which lay on the outskirts of the thicker woods,his mind so absorbed with the adventure, that there was no room for thought of Sophy. He had forgotten her as completely as though she did not exist.
Then, too, to his delight and surprise, he came across some fungi. They were growing in a grassy place at the border of the field, and just above the river. It seemed very early in the season for mushrooms, but still these might be of an edible variety, and if they were, would it not be an excellent plan to take them home for supper? The family refrained always from eating the cultivated mushrooms which Peter could sell, but if they were beginning already to grow wild, they surely might be indulged in.
Peter placed his cap on the top of a rock, which was too high and too steep for Sirius to scale, and proceeded to test the fungi. Were they edible or not? Unfortunately they were not, as he soon discovered by bruising the gills. A white milk exuded, and his reading had taught Peter that such were to be avoided. Greatly disappointed, he picked up his capful of mice once more and continued on his way.
Arrived at the barn, he made the littleorphans as comfortable as possible in a place which was quite protected from an attack by Sirius. He looked for Carney, but the boy was not to be found. Victoria, however, was busy with her violets, and Peter consulted with her as to the best method of disposing of his new pets.
“Dear me!” exclaimed Victoria, when he showed them to her. “They are the cunningest things I ever saw, but you are not going to keep them, are you, Peter? Why not set them free?”
“Vic, you must be perfectly crazy,” said Peter. “Set them free, these poor little things without any father or mother? They would be eaten right up by something. I had no idea you were so cruel. I am going to keep them until they’re old enough to look out for themselves, and then I’ll take them out to the pasture and let them go, if they want to.”
“I don’t know what Katherine will say, she hates mice so.”
“Katherine needn’t know anything about them. She never comes near the barn.”
“Do you know where Sophy is?” Victoria called after him as he walked off, but Peter didnot hear her. He had placed his new pets as comfortably as possible, and now he hastened back to the fascinating log, a good mile away though it was.
Sirius accompanied him, but was ordered to remain at a safe distance, lest the other families of mice should be disturbed, and the dog was forced to content himself with digging a hole and burrowing so deep after imaginary prey, that nothing could be seen but a wagging tail above the ground.
Peter remained there until almost dark, watching the ants, which had apparently recovered from the shock of the disturbance, and were trying now to make themselves as comfortable as possible after the fright. Some were carrying the eggs to a more retired place than that in which they were, now that the log had been turned upon another side, while others were engaged in repairing the injured passage-ways of their dwelling.
At last the pangs of hunger warned Peter that it must be nearly supper time, and he again went home, Sirius following, covered with brown earth, but happy as a king, even though his searchunderground had failed to bring anything to light that was desirable.
When Peter reached home, his three elder sisters came hurrying to meet him.
“Where is Sophy?” they cried with one voice. “What have you done with her?”
Peter stopped short in his walk across the grass.
“I don’t know,” said he, a sudden dismay striking him as he spoke. “Didn’t she come home?”
“No! We haven’t seen her since she went with you. Oh, Peter, where is the child?”