Chicken Little watched Ernest tie his red muffler around his neck and sling his skates across his shoulder, enviously.
“I wish I could go skating,” she sighed.
“You shall some day, dear,” said her mother, who was sitting sewing by the open fire. “But the pond is too far away for you to go without some older person to look after you.”
“I don’t see why Ernest and Carol couldn’t look after me.”
“They would forget you in ten minutes. No, you must be patient, little daughter, and wait till you are bigger.”
Chicken Little flattened her nose against the cold pane ruefully.
“You may go and play with Katy and Gertie for an hour if you wish.”
But Jane didn’t wish. She was a child of one idea and her head was filled with visions of Cedar Pond and its crowd of gay skaters. She could fairly see the boys gliding away across the glistening surface or cutting fancy figures they loved to boast of. She knew some of the girls at school skated. She had listened to glowing tales of the sport at recess the day before.
She peered out the window, an ugly little pucker creasing her forehead. Marian, coming in a few minutes later, found her glooming there still.
“What a long face, little sister, what’s the matter? Have you broken your Xmas dolly or lost that new bracelet or what?”
“Oh, Marian, did you ever skate?”
“Skate?—I should say so. Frank and I are going out this afternoon after the bank closes.”
“Oh, Marian, couldn’t I go, too? Mother said I might learn if I only had some grown up person to go with.”
“But you haven’t any skates, Jane.”
This was a poser, but Jane moved a way out. “Maybe Grace Dart would let me have hers. May I ask mother?”
Marian hesitated a moment, but the child’s face was very pleading and she replied heartily:
“Come along if your mother will let you. We’ll look after you—you may as well ask Katie andGertie, too. Katy knows how to skate a little, I think.”
Mrs. Morton’s consent was soon obtained as well as Mrs. Halford’s. Grace Dart intended to use her own skates, but Mrs. Morton said Jane might as well buy a pair, if she were really going to learn. Marian volunteered to get them for her on the way down.
Chicken Little was gay as a robin redbreast when she ran to meet Marian at the side gate. She was in red from top to toe, red coat, red leggings and red hood. And she was so excited she acted like a much distracted robin, as Marian told her a little later.
“She does enter into things so heart and soul,” Marian confided to Frank, “she fairly quivers with excitement sometimes. Katy and Gertie are so different. They enjoy themselves just as much but they don’t tire themselves out as Chicken Little does.”
“Sis is too high strung, I guess—gets it from Father’s people. Funny, too, she’s a sober little puss a good deal of the time.”
The new skates were soon purchased and slung over her shoulder in exact imitation of the way she had seen the boys carry theirs. They looked delightfully sharp and glittering. Chicken Little felt immensely superior to Katy whose skates were two years old and not nearly so shiny.
It was a radiant afternoon, frosty and clear. The pond was covered with skaters of all ages. Someof the men were pulling women and children on sleds.
Frank strapped the little girls’ skates on firmly. Katy struck off boldly for herself, while Marian helped Gertie. Frank undertook to keep Chicken Little from measuring her length on the ice—no small task for the child was ambitious and daring. Great was her joy when she finally succeeded in taking a few short strokes without having her feet shoot out from under her. Presently Frank left her to her own devices while he went to skate with Marian.
“My feet don’t seem to want to go the same way I do,” she complained to Gertie after two hard bumps.
Gertie was proceeding more cautiously and had fewer falls in consequence.
“I guess you’ll learn pretty soon—my—just see Katy!”
Katy was circling around as gracefully and easily as if there were no such thing as falls to dread. Chicken Little began to lose faith in the superiority of her new skates.
“Katy skates most as well as the boys—I don’t see how she does it,” she said enviously.
“Cousin Sim taught her last winter. Oh, see, those boys are making an eight on the ice and,—Carol’s writing his name I do believe.”
“Yes, and there’s Pat and Mike—dear me, it seems as if everybody can skate just as easy ’cept me.”
The little girls stood watching the boys wistfully as they glided along cutting marvellous figures on the ice. The boys were bent on showing off for Marian’s benefit.
“Tired, little girls?” called the latter, skating gaily past, her cheeks rosy with exercise and the frosty air.
“No—o,” said Jane slowly, “I’m not tired but my ankles hurt and the ice seems to get slipprier and slipprier.”
“I’ll help you if you want me to,” said a voice at her elbow, and Chicken Little looked around to find Pat Casey standing shyly beside her, cap in hand.
“I think I could be after showing you how to do it.”
She hesitated a moment wondering what her mother would say to her skating with Pat, then deciding to take the chance, put out her hand with a little smile. Things went better after that for the Irish lad had a good deal of chivalry in his make-up and was very patient and careful.
“Hello, Pat,” said Frank, skating up. “That’s good of you—I believe you’re a better teacher than I was. You’ll skate like a bird in no time, Sis, you’re so light. Ice is tricky at first—throws you like abalky horse till you get the hang of it. Come on, I’ll take you for another turn.”
Frank took her spinning with him clear to the end of the pond. When they started back he made her strike out for herself, steadying her with his hand. Before they got back to the big bon-fire at the starting point, Chicken Little had discovered the all-important secret of keeping her balance.
Ernest and Carol came up in great excitement to tell them there were going to be races and the spectators must line up along the sides of the pond.
“See they are starting now—you must be careful to keep off the track, girls. Here, let’s go over by that rock.”
Frank made haste to post his small charges midway of the course, where they could have a clear view of both ends of the pond.
Six young men lined up at the starting point while the starter stood off to one side to give the signal and another man was posted at the farther end of the course.
“One, two, three—go!”
The starter snapped the words out and the men swung off in long steady strides. Faster and faster they came till it seemed to Chicken Little they fairly flew. She watched them closely as they came nearer—there seemed something familiar about one of the racers. Suddenly she gave a little shriek of surprise.
“Why, it’s Mr. Harding—see, see! It is Mr. Harding. Oh, I just hope he’ll beat! Don’t you think he’ll beat, Frank?”
“He is a good skater, all right, Sis, but that dark chap is going it strong, too. They have to make the circuit of the pond three times. We can tell better the next lap.”
Dick Harding heard Jane’s exclamation and waved his hand at her as they swung by. He was about six feet behind the dark man, skating easily with long swinging strokes. Chicken Little waved her red mittened hand enthusiastically in return.
Carol and Ernest, who had been trying to follow the racers along the edge of the pond, pulled up along side for a breathing spell.
“Say, Frank,” exclaimed Ernest, “they say that dark fellow is a professional skater—his name is Sanders.”
“Yes, and Sherm says he’s tricky—he has just come here from some place up on the lakes,” added Carol.
“I’m afraid he has Harding outclassed,” replied Frank watching the racers circle gracefully around the end of the pond and start toward them again. The dark stranger was in the lead and Harding a couple of lengths behind, with the other four spilling out at irregular distances in the rear.
“He keeps crowding Harding out—do you see?He cuts across his path every now and then, but part of the time he only makes a feint so Harding loses a stroke and he doesn’t. I don’t think that’s fair!” Ernest raised his voice indignantly.
Frank watched them a moment keenly before he replied.
“You’re right—that is what he is doing—and it isn’t clean sport. He’s tricky—I’d like to see Harding beat him; but I’m afraid he can’t. He’s soft yet for we haven’t had more than two week’s skating here, and this chap has probably been at it for two months or more up north.”
“Oh, Frank, isn’t he skating fair? Do you think he’s going to beat Mr. Harding?” Chicken Little was genuinely distressed.
“Can’t tell, Chicken, watch and see!”
The racers turned the end of the pond for the second time and came swiftly past—Harding about the same distance behind the other as before. Again they turned and shot past for the third round, the stranger still pursuing his tactics of interfering with his rival.
“Jove, that makes me hot!” Frank exclaimed wrathfully. “I believe Harding could beat him on a fair and square race.”
“Gee, I wish we could make him give way once himself, the scoundrel!” Ernest shook his fist viciously at Sanders’ back.
“If he had to turn out just once would it help Mr. Harding?” demanded Jane.
Her own party were so intent upon the race that no one replied, but Pat, who had just skated up, answered her question himself when he found the others were ignoring it.
“It’d help—but sure Mr. Harding’s too grand a gentleman to do that kind of dirty work!”
“Oh, I just wish we could make him turn out!”
No one heeded her but Pat and he replied only with a grin.
Chicken Little clasped and unclasped her hands nervously. The men had made their last turn and were heading swiftly toward them on the home stretch. Harding had gained a little on his antagonist and was scarcely three feet behind.
“He is gaining—if Sanders will only play fair!” said Frank tensely, his eyes glued on the two dark forms.
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when Sanders made a feint to cross directly in front of his competitor and Harding lost a length in consequence.
“Confound him!” growled Frank, “the judges oughtn’t to stand for that!”
Chicken Little stood fascinated, gazing at the advancing figures.
Her small fists clenched as she saw Harding dropthe few paces behind. Suddenly an idea popped into her head. Forgetful of her own uncertain feet, and both ignorant and reckless of any danger, she darted forward, a small red danger signal directly in front of Mr. Sanders as he came opposite. The annoyed racer swerved quickly to the right, but poor Jane once started could not stop, and would have fallen a scarlet heap in Dick Harding’s path had not Pat, divining her intention, followed swiftly and grabbing her by the shoulder steered her in a sharp curve out of the way. She got a good scolding from both Frank and Marian when Pat brought her back to them.
“You might have been hurt—you almost spoiled the race—don’t you ever do anything so foolhardy again, Jane.” This from Marian.
Frank was still more severe. “I’m ashamed of you, Sis. Did you suppose Dick Harding would be willing to win the race by a trick—besides you nearly tripped him. If Pat hadn’t been so quick there would have been a bad mix-up.”
Chicken Little scarcely heeded at first because from the far end of the pond a shout went up, and looking with wide eyes, she saw the dark stranger and Mr. Harding slip over the line together—it was a tie!
Then Frank’s words began to sink in. The idea that she might have hurt or disgraced her belovedMr. Harding frightened her much more than the possible danger to herself. Her eyes filled with tears and though she tried valiantly to wink them away, they soon overflowed.
Katy and Gertie eyed her curiously, and Frank and Marian though they felt sorry for the child, felt that she needed a lesson. Ernest returning from the finish, felt called upon to rub it in still further.
“What in the dickens were you trying to do, Jane Morton, were you crazy?”
Chicken Little answered never a word, but the tears dripped faster and an observing person would have noticed that the child was digging her finger nails into her palms to keep back the sobs. But her family was too disgusted with her to be either sympathetic or observing. They scarcely noticed that she was loitering behind.
She had no definite purpose till she saw they were about to pass Dick Harding who was the center of an admiring group. This was more than she could stand, and dropping a little farther behind, she slipped into the crowd and started off in the opposite direction. No one missed her for a time as they all stopped to congratulate Dick. It was not until he inquired what the child had been trying to do in her reckless dash, that her absence was discovered.
“Oh, Frank, I am afraid we were too hard on her!” exclaimed Marian.
Frank himself looked anxious for it was fast growing dusk. He scanned the thinning crowd on the pond sharply—no little red figure was to be seen.
“She can’t have gone far!” he said now genuinely alarmed.
“Marian, you go on home with the children and I’ll find her.”
“Let me go with you—poor little girlie she was trying her small best to help me.” Harding was scanning the pond narrowly as he spoke.
“I believe she must be behind that big tree across there. She could hardly have got completely out of sight any place else.”
Dick Harding fastened on his skates and hurried across the pond to a big oak, which stood flanked by a clump of bushes close to the edge of the bank.
Sure enough, Chicken Little had flung herself down in the snow behind the tree, and was sobbing her heart out. He lifted her tenderly.
“Dear me, little friend, this won’t do—where’s my little champion who tried to help me win the race just now?”
Chicken Little hushed her sobs in astonishment.
“Frank said—he said—he——” the tears were coming again, “he said I’d disgraced you and I didn’t think—you’d ever speak to me again!”
“Nonsense, Jane, listen to me. I am proud andhappy that you wanted to help me—it wasn’t the best way to do it, but you didn’t know. Now come, dry your tears and let’s hurry back to the others—they thought they’d lost you.”
“And you aren’t ashamed of me?”
“Ashamed of you? Bless your heart, I am proud to have such a staunch friend.”
February was birthday month in the Morton family. Jane’s came first on the thirteenth, Ernest’s on the twenty-second, and Mrs. Morton came near having a birthday only once in four years, for hers was on the twenty-eighth.
“My, I’d hate to be born on the thirteenth. Cousin May says thirteen is awfully unlucky,” said Katy impressively, when Chicken Little told her the fateful date.
“Yes, but you see I was born on Sunday, too, and Sunday’s the very luckiest day there is to be born on.”
“Yes, Jane, ‘Blithe and bonny and good and gay, is the child who is born on the Sabbath day,’” chanted Marian, who was sitting by the windowsewing. “You have something to live up to, little sister, if you are all that.”
“I’m glad my birthday isn’t coming on Sunday this year,” said Jane thoughtfully. “It did one year and I couldn’t have a party or nothing. I do think Sunday is the inconvenientest day—I wish God hadn’t ever thought to make it!”
“But we need one day of rest,” said Marian, struggling with a laugh.
“Ye—es, but I think we get enough rest sleeping nights; I think Sundays are awful tiring,—you have to work so hard remembering what you can’t do.”
“I like Sundays,” said Gertie, “’cause Father’s home and he reads to us Sunday afternoons.”
“Father takes a nap, you can hear him all over the house—and Mother tells us to be quiet so we won’t wake him. ’Sides your mother lets you do more things.”
“I guess your folks are religiouser than ours,” said Katy complacently.
“You think it is more religious to sleep Sunday afternoons, Katy?” interposed Marian smiling.
“Well, you can’t do anything bad when you are asleep,” replied Katy a little confused, but bound to stick to her point.
“Not a bad idea—whenever I am tempted to be bad after this, I’ll take a nap and throw the devil off the track that way.”
“My mother says it isn’t nice to talk about the devil.” Katy looked so gravely disapproving that Marian had hard work to keep her face straight.
“Oh, excuse me—I’ll be careful not to mention his Satanic majesty again. Well, Chicken Little, are you going to have a birthday party this year?”
“Not a really party, but Mother said I could have Katy and Gertie and Grace Dart come to tea. There’s going to be a sure enough birthday cake with candles and my name and age in pink frosting—and we’re going to have chocolate creams—and all the dolls.”
“I shall bring Violet—she’s got a new dress and she’s just had her hair glued on—I curled it on the curling iron,” said Gertie.
“I’m going to bring my nigger Dinah and you can play she helps wait on the table,” put in Katy.
“Dear me, is that the latest thing in dolldom, to have the guests wait on the table?” quizzed Marian.
“I guess it would be all right to play she did,” Jane responded with a grin.
“Your mother’s birthday comes soon. What are you going to give her, Jane?”
“Yes, and Ernest’s too, his is the twenty-second.”
“And Valentine’s day comes the fourteenth—just the day after your birthday.”
“Yes, Father says I was intended for a valentine only I was mailed too soon. I was just wondering what I could give Mother, Marian,—and Ernest. I’ve only got sixteen cents. I don’t think birthdays ought to come so near Christmas.”
“Sixteen cents isn’t much for two presents, is it? We’ll have to put our thinking caps on. Let me see. How would you like to make Mother a little tidy for her rocking chair? I think I have a piece of honey-comb canvas left that would be just about the right size—you might do a Greek border with rose-colored worsted. It’s fast work. You could do it easily.”
“Oh, Marian, you do think of the nicest things!” and Chicken Little got up impulsively to give her a grateful hug.
“But Ernest will be harder—he wouldn’t care for fancy work.”
“He wants a new base ball—an awfully hard one like Carol’s.”
“Frank can get him that. I’ll tell you, Chicken Little, I believe he’d like a nice strong bag for his marbles—it won’t be long till marble time now. But, perhaps, we can think up something else.”
“I wisht you’d come to my tea party, Marian.”
“I’d be charmed to, and I’ll bring my old doll, Seraphina. She is huge and hasn’t any nose left and only one eye. Will she be welcome in thiswounded state or had we better put her in a hospital?”
“Oh, Marian, will you?—I’d love to see her.”
“She’s down in the bottom of a trunk, but I am sure she would be delighted to get out in the world again. What are you looking at with those big eyes of yours, Katy?”
“I was just thinking she must be awful old.”
“She is—frightfully—almost as old as I am. My aunt brought her to me from Paris when I was just seven. She was elegant then—all pink silk ruffles with a little wreath of forget-me-nots in her hair. I crowed over all the children I knew because she was so fine, but I must be getting home. Children dear, I wonder if your mothers would mind if you ran down to the postoffice to mail this letter for me. I want it to get off on the five o’clock train.”
Chicken Little’s boasted luck seemed about to fail her entirely on her birthday morning. She got up late and was so excited over her little remembrances that she almost forgot to get ready for school. She ran as hard as she could, so hard she had a stitch in her side, but the last child in the line was disappearing inside the school-house door, when she was still half a block away.
She knew what that meant. Miss Brown had a harsh rule for tardy pupils—they stayed one-halfhour after school, rain or shine. And to stay in a half hour on one’s birthday with a party on foot was unthinkable. Why it would be most dark when she got home! And her mother—well, maybe her mother wouldn’t say very much since it was her birthday, but Jane wasn’t keen about hearing what she would say.
She dragged herself reluctantly up the stairs, taking an unnecessarily long time to hang up her wraps and it was fully five minutes past nine when she took her seat. Miss Brown looked severe.
“You understand this means thirty minutes after school. I have told you I will not tolerate tardiness.”
Chicken Little didn’t try to catch up with Katy and Gertie going home that noon. She plodded along soberly by herself with such a forlorn air that Dick Harding, just behind her on his way to his own lunch, was struck by it, and overtook her to find out what was amiss now.
“Have to stay after school on a birthday—well, that is tough. I see plainly you need the services of a lawyer. I guess I’ll have to take this under advisement and see what can be done. You know it’s my turn to help you out. Clear up that solemn face, Chicken Little,—that’s better—I see the smile coming. I’ll tell you—wait by the school gate when you come back from dinner and I’ll think up some way to mend matters.”
Chicken Little hurried through her dinner and back to school, posting herself expectantly to watch for Dick Harding. She did not have long to wait. Mr. Harding had hurried, too, on her account.
“I have been considering this, Jane. I don’t believe it would be quite fair to the other pupils to persuade Miss Brown to let you off, as I at first thought of doing. Do you think it would?”
Richard Harding regarded the child keenly, curious to see whether she would see the point.
Chicken Little looked up at him soberly.
“No, I guess it’s just as bad to be late on your birthday as any other time. And I s’pose if Miss Brown let me go she’d have to let the rest go, too. And I guess there wouldn’t be any rule if she did that.”
“Right you are, but I think I have a plan that won’t be unfair to anybody and will still keep the birthday intact. We couldn’t have the birthday hurt you know, Chicken Little. It’s such a little young birthday—it might cry!” Dick Harding smiled down at her whimsically and Jane smiled understandingly back.
“Why don’t you ask me what my plan is? You haven’t the proper amount of feminine curiosity.”
Chicken Little smiled again—a confiding little smile.
“How would it do, Chicken Little Jane, if Ishould get a cutter with two gray horses and lots of bells—real noisy bells—and call for your guests first, then come here to the school after you? We could go for a nice sleigh ride before that supper party.”
Chicken Little’s face lit up as instantaneously as if someone had just turned on an electric light before it. She gave one blissful “Oh” then stopped. “If Mother——?” she said.
“‘If Mother’ is all attended to. I met your father and he said he would make it all right with your mother. So if Miss Jane Morton will do me the honor to ride with me this afternoon, I shall consider the matter settled.” Dick Harding made an elaborate bow.
Jane still beamed but found words difficult.
“I’m waiting, Miss Morton, you’d better hurry—I think the bell is going to ring.”
The child glanced back at the school house apprehensively.
“Course I want to—awfully, and—Mr. Harding,” Chicken Little reached up to whisper something and the tall man bent down.
“I love you most as well as Brother Frank.”
“Thank you, dear—I’ve never had a little sister. Don’t you think I might adopt a little piece of you?”
“That’s what Alice said. She said little sisterswere so nice and cuddly—I think you and Alice are a lot alike, Mr. Harding.”
“I’m flattered—in what way?”
“’Cause you—she—why I guess ’cause you and she both know how little girls feel inside—and you’re so comforting.”
“Much obliged, little sister, I know Miss Alice deserves that nice compliment and I hope I do. Are you lonesome without her?”
“Yes, only when I’m with you it always seems as if she were close by, too.”
“Happy thought! Perhaps, it’s because I’m partial to being in her neighborhood myself. There goes the bell—I’ll be here at 4:30 sharp.”
Chicken Little was not the only unfortunate that afternoon. Two small boys were late at noon and Miss Brown set them all to writing long lists from their spellers as soon as the other children filed out. Chicken Little watched the clock anxiously, starting up at every distant tinkle of sleigh bells. It was a glorious clear crisp afternoon and the jingle of bells sounded at frequent intervals.
Her excitement rose as half-past four approached. Finally, just as the clock chimed the half hour, an answering chime tinkled in the distance and two or three minutes later, ceased suddenly in front of the school building.
Chicken Little ran quickly down the walk andthere they all were. Dick Harding had a lovely double-seated cutter with white horses and two gay strings of sleigh bells on each horse. Packed snugly in under the bright colored robes were Katy and Gertie and Grace and sister Marian—and the entire family of dolls. Dick Harding had insisted on the dolls. He said he never approved of parents leaving their offspring at home to cry their eyes out, while they went skylarking.
Katy had secured the place next to their host and Chicken Little looked enviously as she started to climb in. But Dick Harding made room for her beside him, saying finally:
“I believe I am to have the honor of having Miss Morton and the birthday sit beside me.”
A shadow of disappointment crossed Katy’s face. Marian made a little sign to Jane and the child responded bravely.
“I guess Katy ought to have the best place ’cause she’s company.”
“The queen has spoken,” replied Dick Harding with an approving smile. “Perhaps, I might hold the birthday on my lap.”
“I wouldn’t trust him with it Jane. Young lawyers always want to be older than they are,” laughed Marian.
Jane made an elaborate pretense of handing over the birthday.
“You see Chicken Little Jane has a better opinion of me than you,” retorted Dick. “Miss Morton, which way shall we go?”
The children were riotously happy. Mr. Harding let each child choose a direction to turn, and they whirled around corners and drove by each small guest’s home in great state, so that mothers and sisters might see.
Bright hoods and caps and coats made the sleigh load look like a nosegay and Dick Harding treated them all with an exaggerated courtesy that kept them merry.
They landed at the Morton front gate at six o’clock. It was quite dark but the street lamps were lit and the cheer of gas and firelight streamed out from the old gabled house invitingly.
“This was a mighty sweet thing to do, Dick,” said Marian as he helped her out.
“The pleasure is mine,” he responded gallantly, “further I’m going to claim a toll of one kiss and a half from every passenger under twelve years of age.”
The toll was paid promptly. He was most exacting as to the half kiss, demanding full measure. Marian insisted that the dolls came under the ruling, too, but he begged off. He said he felt it would be taking unfair advantage of their extreme youth.
But Chicken Little and Katy were too much forhim. They declared that Marian’s doll was older than any of them. So Mr. Harding duly took a peck at Seraphina’s pallid cheek to the huge delight of the children.
The hot biscuit and chicken tasted doubly delicious after the long ride in the sharp air. Grace Dart took two servings of quince preserves but declined the apple butter saying she could get that at home.
At the close of the repast Dr. and Mrs. Morton and Frank and Ernest came in to share the birthday cake. Ernest was the only one who could blow out all the candles at one fell swoop. When the last morsel had vanished Chicken Little had another surprise. Dr. Morton went out into the hall and pulled a large white envelope out of his overcoat pocket addressed to “Miss Jane Morton.” It was postmarked Cincinnati.
“Oh, it’s something from Alice—I just know—open it quick!”
“Bet it’s a valentine,” guessed Ernest.
“Yes, it looks like one of those beautiful lacy ones with hearts and doves on it,” said Katy.
It not only looked, it was—the very fluffiest, laciest one Jane had ever seen, with marvellous cupids and hearts, and forget-me-nots and true lover’s knots of blue ribbon. In a little white envelope inside was a tiny gold ring.
Chicken Little gave one squeal of ecstasy:
“Isn’t it cunning—I always wanted a ring. Whatever do you s’pose made Alice think of it?”
“She didn’t,” said Mrs. Morton, “the valentine is from Alice, but her Uncle Joseph sent the ring. It seems he liked your letter and when Alice mentioned getting the valentine he wanted to send something too. You’ll have to write him another letter to thank him.”
“That reminds me that I saw Gassett on the street this morning. He looks pretty badly still,” remarked Dr. Morton.
“Well, he can’t get Alice’s papers now ’cause she’s got them way off in Cincinnati,” said Chicken Little.
“Huh, that doesn’t make any difference—they could make her send them back,” Ernest replied.
Chicken Little turned to her father.
“No need to borrow trouble, Chicken, Alice has an Uncle Joseph to look after her now, anyway. Has it been a happy birthday, pet?”
Ernest was so tired of being pitied he was in open rebellion.
“For goodness’ sake, don’t ‘poor’ me any more! My eyes will be all right as soon as they get a good rest—the doctor said so. I guess I can stand it if they don’t hurt like sin. Everybody comes in like a funeral procession asking me how I feel, and hoping it will be a lesson to me to take better care of my eyes. People needn’t rub it in because a fellow’s down—and the last thing he wants to think of is how he feels!”
“I think you must be feeling better, Ernest, or you wouldn’t be so cross,” retorted Marian slyly.
Ernest relaxed his gloom enough to grin.
“Well, I don’t care—Mother hangs around babying me as if I were six years old!”
Ernest’s catastrophe had come about so gradually no one had suspected it. He was reading a letter from Alice, who wrote a fine close hand, when his father noticed that he was holding the paper almost to his eyes. An examination revealed the fact that the poor eyes were sadly overstrained and would have to have a complete rest for weeks or his eyesight would be permanently injured.
This was distressing news to bookworm Ernest who was never so happy as when lost in a book. The lad was immensely proud of his school standing, too, and he chafed sadly at the thought of losing it.
“No school for three months, Son,” his father said sorrowfully after the boy’s eyes had been thoroughly tested.
“It must be a dark room and a bandage for three weeks at the very least, Dr. Allerton says.”
Ernest groaned and growled rather more than usual to keep from breaking down and playing the baby, when he heard this verdict.
“It was all that confounded scroll work!”
“I am afraid so—you remember your mother warned you against selecting all those intricate patterns.”
Ernest remembered only too distinctly, but he preferred not to be reminded of it.
“Is there anything a fellow can do?” he demandedafter three horrid days of close confinement with the blinds down.
“Not much, poor boy, I’m afraid,” Mrs. Morton replied pityingly. “I’ll read to you a couple of hours this morning and perhaps Sherm and Carol will come in for a while after school. I’ll send word to them by Chicken Little. Mrs. Dart sent you over one of her custard pies just now.”
The custard pie sounded comforting.
“How long is it till dinner time?”
“Only about three hours—we might let you have a taste now if you are impatient,” Mrs. Morton said.
“Oh, I can wait but the hours seem so plaguey long when you can’t see. Read me Alice’s letter again, will you? Gee, I wish she were here—she always knew how to help a chap out.”
“Better than mother?” Mrs. Morton couldn’t help feeling a trifle nettled.
Ernest felt the tone.
“Oh, Mumsey, you’re a brick, but Alice can always think up things—you know? Of course, she isn’t like your mother.” Ernest reached for his mother’s dress and pulling her head down gave her a kiss—an unusual mark of affection.
It wrung Mrs. Morton’s heart to see him grope to find her.
It took her a moment to compose herself beforeshe went over to the window and raised the blind enough to see to read the letter.
Alice had written jubilantly of her progress.
“I am so happy today over a compliment—doesn’t that sound vain?—that I am going to sit right down and share it with you. I should like to get up on a fence like that little bantam rooster of Darts’ and crow it to all the world. Mrs. Martin, our principal, told me this morning I had done wonders in three months! And I was so stupid at first—French and Geometry seemed absolutely impossible. I used to put myself to sleep saying those awful French verbs. If the French had invented those verbs on purpose I’d never forgive them. But I suppose your language is like the color of your hair—you’re not responsible. Funny how little of us isus, and how much is somebody else, isn’t it? Tell Ernest the first ten pages of Geometry would have floored me completely if I hadn’t remembered how patiently he used to saw round all those curves and curlicues in that scroll-work. Every time I flung the old book down and said ‘I can’t,’ I seemed to see Ernest bent over that old scroll saw cutting Geometry out of wood. I could not let a fourteen year old boy beat me. Now the figures are getting as tame as kittens which reminds me of Jane’s kitten.
“We call her Poky Pry because she is always poking her inquisitive nose into places where she has nobusiness. I was afraid they might not want her here, but she frisked her way into favor at once. Her usual place for a morning nap is in Aunt Clara’s work basket. We found her once in Uncle Joseph’s silk hat. Another time she got shut in a bureau drawer and miauwed pitifully to be let out. But her funniest adventure was going downtown. Uncle Joseph got on the horse car one morning and was talking to a friend when they heard a soft purring. ‘What on earth is that—it sounds like a cat?’ asked the other man. They both looked all around. As soon as Uncle Joseph moved, the sound ceased. When they settled down to talk again the purring began again. ‘Well, I never!’ said Uncle Joseph. He made another search even getting down to look under the car seat. The sound ceased the moment he began to hunt. ‘Pshaw,’ said his friend, ‘somebody is playing a trick on us. I’ve heard of people who can throw their voices so the sound seems to come from some other place.’ So they settled down once more, and once more the purring began and grew louder. Uncle Joseph got fidgety. His friend watched the lips of the other passengers to see who was hoaxing them. ‘It sounds,’ he remarked finally, ‘as if it came from your overcoat pocket!’—Uncle Joseph plunged his hand down into his pocket and felt soft warm fur. The whole car shouted when he drew Poky Pry out.
“I wonder if I told Chicken Little how Poky frightened the Pullman porter. She was sound asleep in her basket and I put it at the lower end of the berth, carelessly leaving the cover off. The porter was making up the next berth to mine. Suddenly I heard a wild shriek, and, parting my curtains, saw the porter dashing down the aisle with Poky Pry clanging distractedly to his kinky black head. She had crept out of her basket and made her way to the berth above the one he was making, to watch him. When he straightened up she evidently thought his wooly hair some new variety of mouse and she made a spring for it.
“Tell Chicken Little, Kitty has kept me from being lonesome and is a great comfort. Uncle Joseph keeps asking questions about Chicken Little. His girls are all boys and grown up. He was so pleased with her note thanking him for the ring. He chuckled over her skating adventure for days. ‘Starting out pretty young to straighten up the world, isn’t she?’ he remarked.”
“Chicken Little Jane is a very rash child, I’m afraid,” Mrs. Morton said as she laid down the letter a few moments later. “I only hope she won’t get into trouble some day on account of it.”
“Don’t worry, Mother, she always comes out all right.”
Jane came up at noon to bring Ernest his dinner—adinner in which a generous quarter of the custard pie played an important part. Sherm and Carol would come right from school she told him. Chicken Little had established herself as head nurse out of school hours. She felt very important and amused Ernest with her airs.
The boys were good as their word that afternoon and she met them with a life-like imitation of her mother’s manner, admonishing them not to get Ernest excited. As a result the boys lumbered in self-conscious and awkward. Never having paid a sick-room visit before, they were rather overpowered by Ernest’s bandaged eyes and the twilight gloom the doctor prescribed. So much so in fact, that they nearly defeated the object of their visit, which was to cheer Ernest up. Indeed they were so stiff and sympathetic that Ernest gruffly requested them to drop that and tell him about school. Tongues limbered up immediately at this, for each boy had a grievance.
“You can be jolly glad you ain’t there. Old Goggle-eyes gave us two pages of Algebra—20 problems! I spent a whole hour on the first ten and I’m shaky about them now. Oh, he’s a honey, he is—the dried up old crank. I’ll bet he was old when Methuselah was born.”
“Well, I’d rather tackle Goggle-eyes and minus X than write compositions for Miss Halliday onSpring Flowers—Sper-ing Flow-ers,” Carol simpered gently, and, letting his hands fall limp from the wrists, fluttered imaginary skirts in a fantastic promenade across the room.
“‘You must cultivate the love of the be-utiful—contemplate birds—and lovely flowers and express what they mean to you,’” he quoted in a high pitched voice. “Holy smoke, I had a notion to tell her that spring flowers meant digging dandelions at five cents a thousand, when I wanted to go fishing! She might at least save ’em till the ground thaws—it’s colder than Greenland out today.”
“Yes, Father says we’re in for a blizzard tonight.”
“You might tell her the blizzard nipped all the flowers in the bud, Carol.”
“Nope, I’ll put it on the list of things I’m thankful for next Thanksgiving, that there aren’t any plaguey spring flowers in bloom to write about.”
“Say, Pat’s got your seat. But he wouldn’t let Old Goggle-eyes take your things out. He said there was plenty of room for them. He’s got them stacked up in one end of the desk all ship-shape. He’s going to be on our nine next summer.”
The boys were performing their mission nobly. Ernest began to feel actually consoled for missing school.
“I won three agates and a chiny off FattyGrover—like to froze my fingers too. We got down behind the coal house out of the wind, but it didn’t help much.”
“Thought Fatty darsent play keeps?”
“Well, I guess his dad’d lick him if he found out—s’pose he’d most have to, being the Minister—but Fatty’s game—he won’t blab. Aren’t they beauties?”
Ernest gave a little gesture of impatience and Sherm suddenly remembered the bandaged eyes.
“Oh, say, I didn’t go to——” he began penitently.
Mrs. Morton appeared opportunely at this moment with a plate of hot doughnuts, a little anxious lest the boys should fall to romping.
Poor Marian’s trouble began two weeks after Ernest’s and proved to be much more serious. She had sympathized deeply with the bookloving boy in his irksome confinement, and she had been more than faithful about coming over to read or talk to him. It was coming through a storm to keep her promise to him that proved her own undoing.
She had a hard cold already—March had been continuously raw and blustery. The last day of the month had brought with it the worst blizzard of the season. A cutting wind swept down from the north and the snow was icy hard and stinging. Marian watched the storm from her windows for some time before she could get up courage to venture out. ButMother Morton’s was only three blocks away and she knew Ernest would be doubly disappointed if she failed to come because of the dreary day. So she wrapped up warmly and braved the elements. The three blocks seemed a mile before she covered them. She had to fight every inch in the teeth of the wind and reached the gabled house thoroughly chilled and spent. A bad attack of pneumonia followed this exposure, and Ernest’s troubles were almost ignored in the anxiety about lovely Marian.
The crisis passed safely by dint of loving care and good nursing, but her convalescence was slow. Ernest’s eyes were well and he was back in school before Marian dared leave the house. It grieved them all to see her so thin and white.
Poor Ernest heard the story of her struggle with the blizzard for his sake repeated so many times, as sympathetic friends called upon his mother, that the boy began to feel a personal responsibility for her illness. He didn’t say anything but he hovered around her as soon as he was permitted to go out, spending every cent of his slender pin money in dainties and flowers which he seldom presented to her directly. He would leave them on her bed or on the dining-room table with never a word. Frank and Marian were pleased and touched by his devotion. They laughed together over his bashful ways without suspecting that the lad was worried.
It was Chicken Little who finally wormed his trouble out of him.
“Gee, I wish I had some decent marbles. Sherm’s got a stunner of an onyx and six flints and——”
“Why Ernest Morton, I thought Father gave you a quarter last night to get some.”
Ernest grinned in embarrassed silence.
Chicken Little regarded him suspiciously.
“What did you do with it?”
Ernest did not deign to reply.
“Bet you spent it for those grapes for Marian.”
Ernest drummed on the window.
“She doesn’t ’spect you to take your marble money for her, goosie. Say, Ernest, what’s the matter?”
The boy swallowed painfully.
“Tell me, Ernest, I won’t tell. Honest to goodness, I won’t.” Jane cuddled up close to him laying her face against his shoulder caressingly.
Ernest was not proof against her sympathy and he blurted out his remorse.
“’Tisn’t your fault a speck—you didn’t tease her to come.”
Chicken Little patted and argued in vain. Ernest found her comforting, but did not feel that she was old enough to understand.
Chicken Little took the matter up with Marian the very next day. She began very diplomatically because she had promised not to tell.
“Do you s’pose you’d got sick if you hadn’t come to see Ernest that day, Marian?”
“Probably not, dear.”
This was not reassuring.
“But you might have gone some place else, mightn’t you?”
“I suppose so—only I don’t think I should have been silly enough to go out in that storm without a good reason.”
“But it wasn’t Ernest’s fault it stormed,” Jane replied plaintively.
“Ernest’s fault? Why, what do you mean?” Marian looked at the child in astonishment.
Jane’s face was very sober.
“I just guess he couldn’t help if it you got all cold and——”
“Of course not, Jane, what put such an idea into your head! I should have had more sense than to venture out in such a storm. Does Ernest—is that why he brings me all those things and hangs round so?—the poor boy? Dear me, this will never do.”
“He wouldn’t like it if he knew I told you,” said Chicken Little ruefully.
“You haven’t told me, dear. I guessed it, but I’ll find a way to stop his worrying.”
April came and went and Marian was still pale and weak. Dr. Morton looked grave and finallysuggested to Frank that they should have the famous Dr. Brownleigh of Chicago down to examine Marian’s lungs. Frank went white at the suggestion, but quietly acquiesced. Two days later the great doctor arrived.
Chicken Little knew there was some excitement afoot that morning when she went to school. Both Dr. and Mrs. Morton looked sad and Mrs. Morton sighed frequently. Ernest pushed most of his breakfast away untasted.
“What time will he be here, Father?”
“On the nine-thirty.”
“Who?” Chicken Little demanded curiously.
“A man you have never seen, little daughter,” her father replied quietly.
So Chicken Little went off to school mystified but curious.
The great physician did his work carefully. It was before the days of germ cultures, and the apparatus for such tests had not reached the perfection of today. There was much room for professional judgment.
Dr. Morton and Marian’s mother were with Frank beside the bed. Frank looked miserably anxious in spite of his efforts at self control, and Marian’s big eyes were questioning and wistful.
Dr. Brownleigh smiled cheerfully down at her as he finished.
“Don’t be alarmed, Mrs. Morton, you will live to be a nice rosy-cheeked grandmother. I predict you’ll be plumper than your mother.”
The tension was broken and Marian sighed with relief.
“There, I told you it was silly to be scared about me, Frank. It always did take me a long time to recover from an illness—even a cold. I’m afraid I’m lazy—you didn’t know you had married a lazy wife did you?” Marian gave his hand a little loving pat and Frank silently stooped to kiss her, but he was not reassured.
He had watched the varying expressions of the great doctor’s face and he was decidedly uneasy. With reason, he found when he accompanied his father and Dr. Brownleigh back to the old home.
Once inside the little sitting room Dr. Brownleigh turned to him gravely.
“Mr. Morton, your face tells me that you have read mine. Please don’t make the mistake of imagining your wife is worse than she is. Her right lung is considerably affected, I am sorry to say. The left one seems to be perfectly sound there is no reason with proper care and a change of climate why she should not live for years.”
“Change of climate?—that means what—a few months or a permanent move?”
“A year at the least—I should advise a permanent change to Kansas or Colorado or Arizona. She needs a dryer and more even climate, plenty of fresh air and an outdoor life.”
Frank groaned. His father laid his hand on his shoulder sympathetically.
“It is hard, my boy, when you have such a good position here, too. Brace up—we’ll find a way out—and Marian may be completely cured—remember that.”
Many were the consultations in the Morton and Gates homes during the next few weeks. It was agreed not to tell Marian her weakness till she was able to be out again. In the meantime it was arranged that Dr. Morton should take a trip west to look up a suitable location.
Without telling her the real reason, Frank had talked Marian into the idea of ranching and the older people found her eager zest and enthusiasm for the new life, pathetic.
“I know I’ll be lots stronger on a farm,” she declared. “I shall have chickens and make butter. You can all come out and spend the summers—won’t that be grand?”
Dr. Morton had offered to buy a ranch for Frank taking over their cozy Centerville home in part payment. Ernest had been taken into the family councils and understood all this. He was a reservedserious lad who could be depended upon not to talk. But Chicken Little was not so favored. She knew only that Father was going on a long journey out west, and she did not concern herself as to his errand.