"'How dothe the little busy beeImprove each shining hour;And gather honey all the dayFrom every fragrant flower'—Amen."
"'How dothe the little busy beeImprove each shining hour;And gather honey all the dayFrom every fragrant flower'—Amen."
Poor old Billy! this scrap of a rhyme, learned in his far-away boyhood, was the one bit that had stuck in his clouded mind all these years, and had served this pious soul for a prayer ever since. Every night, kneeling reverently by his bedside, he had said it, and every morning when he arose; only then he added the petition, "God bless Mrs. Maxwell, and make Billy good."
Cricket and Hilda, too much amazed to speak, but too much impressed with Billy's earnestness to laugh, stood stock-still as they were; Hilda in the act of stretching out her hands to draw Zaidee back from the well-curb,—where she hung, in imminent danger of following George W.,—and Cricket, still grasping the pole, and looking back over her shoulder, and Helen staring with her great eyes.
As Billy ceased, there was an oppressive moment of silence. He remained on his knees, swaying his gaunt frame slightly, with his eyes still closed. Suddenly Cricket felt the bucket lurch as it lay on the surface of the water below. She looked quickly over the well-curb.
"Oh, Hilda! Billy, hurrah! he's climbed upon the bucket at last! He's way up on it. Now, we'll have him!" and with Hilda to help, she began cautiously to raise the bucket.
Billy slowly got up from the ground, and dusted off his trouser knees.
"It's allers wuth while a-prayin' for things," he remarked.
In a few minutes the bucket was on a level with the well-curb, and while Hilda held the pole, Cricket drew out her dripping, shivering pet.
Such a rubbing as he got in Marm Plunkett's little kitchen! He was very much exhausted with his cold bath, and I'm afraid that a very few minutes longer in the icy water would have ended one of George Washington's nine lives.
"All the curl has gone out of Martha, even," remarked Cricket, mournfully, surveying his straight tail.
"His tail will curl over again, when he begins to chirk up a bit," said Marm Plunkett, comfortingly. "He'd orter hev a dish of milk het up for him right away," she added. "Wisht I hed some to offer you."
"I'll go right home with him, then, Marm Plunkett, and I'll run all the way. I'll borrow this little shawl of yours, if you'll let me, to keep him warm. Now, I'm going to run, but the rest of you needn't come so fast. Good-by, Marm Plunkett. I'll come and see you again, some other day;" and off darted Cricket, followed more leisurely by the rest, leaving Marm Plunkett still murmuring,—
"Have—I—seen—Miss—Cricket!"
"Oh, dear me!" sighed Eunice, dolefully, the next morning at breakfast. "What dreadful changes there are going to be! Hilda goes to-day, the boys leave on Monday for their camp, and Edna goes on Tuesday to her grandmother's. Cricket and I will be left all forlorn."
"Yes," added Cricket, pulling a long face, "and on Tuesday morning Eunice and I will be wearing the garbage of woe."
"Whatever you rig yourself up in, Miss Scricket," said Archie, amid the general laughter, "don't deck yourself out ingarbage. You'd be a public nuisance. Flowing 'robes of porcelain,' like the heroine of one of your stories, would be better."
"You needn't tease me about that, for you know as well as anything that I meantpercaline."
But Auntie Jean and grandma had to enjoy this alone, for the boys were not equal to the fine distinctions of girl's apparel.
As Eunice said, there was a decided scattering of their little party. Hilda left Saturday afternoon, the boys departed on Monday, for their camp in the Maine woods, with a party of friends, and on Tuesday Edna had to go for her usual fortnight's visit to her grandmother Somers, who always spent July and August at Lake Clear. She was averyold lady, much older than Grandma Maxwell, and a good deal of an invalid. Edna much preferred staying with her cousins, but Grandmother Somers was very devoted to her only little granddaughter, and this was the particular time when she wanted her. Edna had never been there without her mother before, and really dreaded it. She had urged taking her cousins with her, butAuntie Jean knewthis would be altogether too much responsibility for so old a lady to have, since she herself could not leave Marbury.
"I hate to go like poison," sighed Edna to Eunice, as they strolled up and down the station platform, while waiting for the train. "I wish I could stay here. I wish grandma wasn't so fond of me. I wish you could come, too. I wish the two weeks were over. I wish—"
"Toot-to-toot!" whistled the approaching train.
"Horrid old thing! I wish it would run off the track! Wish Mrs. Abbott would forget to start this morning. She isn't here yet.Doyou suppose she's forgotten?" with sudden hopefulness.
Mrs. Abbott was a lady under whose care she was going.
"No such good luck!" murmured Eunice. "There she is now. Write to me every day, Edna."
"And you'll have time to write some lovely stories for the 'Echo,'" chirped Cricket, encouragingly.
"Yes, I will, and be glad too. It will be something to do. Think of my saying I'd be glad to write stories! Yes, mamma—good-by, everybody," and with hugs and kisses all around, Edna was put on the train and was off.
The children were both very quiet on their return ride from the station, and Auntie Jean began to fear that they might be homesick, with all their playmates gone. But when they reached home again Cricket drew Eunice into a quiet corner, and surprised her by flinging her arms around her neck, with a gigantic hug.
"I do love Hilda and Edna," she said, "but there's nobody like my old Eunice, and I'msoglad to have you all to myself for a little while again. Idon'twant to be selfish, and poor Edna hasn't any sister, but—"
"Why, you poor little thing!" said Eunice, hugging her small sister, heartily. "I expectI'vebeen very selfish. I've never thought that, perhaps, you were being lonely when I was so much with Edna. You always seemed so happy."
"Oh, I amhappy!" answered Cricket, surprised. "I always am, I guess. But I do love to be with you, all by your lonesome, and now let's have some real old Kayuna times. Come down on the beach, and let's talk about it," with another squeeze. And then, with their arms about each other's waists, they ran down the yard.
On the small sloping beach behind the big rocks, Zaidee and Helen and Kenneth were playing by themselves. Helen and Kenneth were sitting up very straight and stiff, with their little legs out straight in front of them, and their small hands folded in their laps. They were listening with intent faces, and round, wide-open eyes, to Zaidee, who, with small forefinger uplifted, was telling them something, with a very serious face. The girls crept softly near to see what they were doing.
"And thesenaughtychil'en," went on Zaidee, "came out of the city, and they made lots of fun of Lishers, and they ran after him, an' kept calling him names, an' saying, 'Go up, ole bullhead! go up, ole bullhead!' An' Lishers got very angry—as angry as Luke did the other day, when I asked him if he liked to have such mixed-up eyes," (poor Luke was very cross-eyed, and very sensitive about it), "and he said, 'There's some gre-at big bears in these woods, 'n' I'll call 'em to come and eat you chil'en up, if you doesn't stop calling names. Only bad little chil'en, 'thout any one to tell 'em any better, calls names.' But they didn't one of 'em stop, an' Lishers just whistled, an' forty-two bears came trotting right out of the woods, an' eated—up—every—one—of—those—bad—chil'en, quicker'n scat. 'Liza said so, herself. So, Helen and Kenneth, you mustn't ever call any one any names, an'speciallyyou mustn't call 'em 'bullheads,' cause bears will come out of the woods an' eat you all up, and it's very unpolite, too."
Helen looked awed, and Kenneth unbelieving.
"Ain't any bears," he said, stoutly.
"You mustn't inkerrupt the Sunday school," said Zaidee, severely. "Any way, there are crocky-dolls, if there ain't any bears. I saw a funny, long thing come out of the water the other day, and 'Liza said she guessed it was a crocky-doll."
"Tould it eat me up?" demanded Kenneth, hastily.
"I don't think it could eat you all up at once," said Zaidee, cautiously; "but it might take bites out of you."
"What are you doing, children?" said Eunice, coming forward, and throwing herself on the sand beside them, and pulling Helen, her special pet, down into her arms.
"Playing Sunday school, Eunice," said Zaidee, sitting down, herself. "We're going to have a Sunday school every Tuesday afternoon, just the same as you have the Echo Club, you know. Helen's going to make up the texts. She makes upbeautifultexts, just like the Bible."
"Why, Zaidee!" remonstrated Eunice, looking shocked. "You mustn't say that anything is as nice as the Bible. What was it, pettikins?"
But Helen was shy, and needed much coaxing before she could be persuaded to give her "text," which was a very practical one.
"She who doth not what she is told, gets worse."
"Bravo!" cried Eunice, laughing. "Thatisa fine text."
"She made it up all her own self," said Zaidee, quite as proud of her twin's performance as if it had been her own.
"I don't want to play Sunday school any more, Zaidee," said Kenneth, getting up. "I'd ravver play turch. I'm ze talking man, wiv white skirts on," he added, standing on a stone, and waving his short arms about, for the young man had made his first appearance at church the Sunday before, and had wanted to play "turch" ever since.
"You were a naughty boy," said Zaidee, reproachfully, "you talked out loud right in meetin'-church, and I was so 'shamed."
"And you falled off the stool when all the people were kneeling down and saying, 'The seats they do hear us, O Lord;' and you made a greatbignoise," added Helen, severely, for her.
"'The seats they do hear us,'" repeated Cricket. "Whatdoesshe mean, Eunice, do you suppose?"
"Why, don't you know, Cricket," explained Helen, for herself. "When all the people are kneeling down, and the minister keeps saying things, and the people keep saying, 'The seats they do hear us,' 'course they hear them, 'cause they say it right at the back of the seats."
Eunice and Cricket shouted with laughter.
"She means, 'We beseech Thee to hear us,'" cried Cricket, choking, quite as if she never made any mistakes on her own account. But other people's mistakes aresodifferent from our own. Helen, her sensitive feelings dreadfully hurt, instantly retired under her apron, and refused to be comforted. They always had to be careful about laughing at Helen, whereas Zaidee never seemed to mind.
"Never mind, pet," said Eunice, kissing and petting her. "It wasn't a very bad mistake."
"What's this?" said Cricket, to change the subject She had been plunging her arm down deep in the sand, and had struck something big and bony. She cleared away the loose sand.
"That's our cemi-terror," explained Zaidee; "we'd been having a frinyal before we had Sunday school, and we buried that thing. We finded it in the field the other day. Let's pull it up now, Helen. We've had lots of frinyals, Cricket, and we've buried ever so many things in our cemi-terror. Turkles and things like that, you know."
Cricket, with some difficulty, extricated the object. It was a great skull of a cow, bleached as white as snow.
"'Liza says it was a cow, once," observed Zaidee, poking her fingers in the big holes where the eyes once were. "It was a pretty funny cow,Ithink. She says it has undressed all its flesh off, and we're all like that inside. But I'm not, see?" and Zaidee opened her mouth wide and offered it for inspection. "Mine's all red inside."
"Mamma says we're made of dust," said Helen, thoughtfully. "If we're made out of dust, I don't see why we don't get all muddy inside when we drink."
"I guess that's why my hands get so dirty," said Zaidee, suddenly, looking at her small, grimy palms with close attention. "I guess it sifts right through my skin. Course I can't keep clean when it keeps sifting through all the time, and 'Liza says shedon'tseehowI get myselfsodirty," with a funny imitation of Eliza's tones. "I'm going to tell her I can't help it. If she keeps scrubbing me as fast as it comes out, it may get all used up inside of me sometime," went on Zaidee, who was nothing if not logical.
Helen thoughtfully squeezed Eunice's arm, trying to squeeze some dust out, she said.
"Yours is all used up, I guess," she concluded, as she met with no success.
Cricket set the skull upon the high stone which Kenneth had been using for a pulpit.
"Look, Eunice! It looks just like an idol, sitting up there and grinning. Oh, let's play we're idollers ourselves and worship it! We'll build a shrine for it, and we'll offer it sacrifices. Come on!" and Cricket, with her usual energy, fell to work instantly, building stones up for an altar.
"Let me help build up the shrime, too," said Zaidee, bringing up stones also. "I want to offer sacrumfices."
"You and Helen bring a lot of dried seaweed to decorate it," said Cricket, working busily. "That's right, Kenneth. Bring all the pretty shells you can, and we'll put them all around the sides. Look, Eunice! doesn't it look fine already!"
They had built up the "shrime" to a large square pile, about two feet high, on the top of which the grinning skull reposed. The dry seaweed draped the rough stones, and Kenneth's shells were arranged about it.
"Now we must begin to offer sacrifices," said Cricket. "Wemusthave dishevelled hair, Eunice, as the women always do in stories. I can't muss mine up much more than it always is," regretfully, "but you can take your braid out, and throw your hair all around. Oh, that'slovely!" as Eunice loosened her heavy, dark braid, and threw the long, straight masses all about. "How beautifully dishevelled you are!"
"I'm glad I don't have to offer sacrifices every day," laughed Eunice, "for dishevelled hair isnotcomfortable, at least as dishevelled as this. Perhaps I wouldn't mind a little bit of it."
"Come here, Zaidee, if you wish to join the procession," and Eunice caught her small sister, and rubbed her hands vigorously over her short, soft, straight hair, till it fairly stood on end. Helen's hair curled like Cricket's, in a golden, fluffy mass.
"Now, we're all ready. We must march up before the shrine, and lay our sacrifices at the feet of the idol, and bow down before it."
"It hasn't any foots," observed Zaidee.
"Well, before its mouth, then. It's just as 'propriate, I guess. Come over here, and get into line, Eunice. You go first and I'll follow, and the children will come on behind. We must go up with weeping and wailing and gnashing our teeth," said Cricket, getting Biblical.
"How do you gnash your tooths?" inquired Helen.
"I'll show you," said Cricket, immediately rolling her eyes, and opening and shutting her mouth with such fearful snaps of her teeth, that Helen instantly retreated behind Zaidee for protection. "Clutch your hair with both hands, this way, and get into procession."
"Yes, but where's the sacrifice?" asked Eunice, suddenly recollecting this important part of the ceremony.
"I declare! I forgot all about it! Whatshallwe sacrifice?"
"We finded a little dead mouse in the woodshed after breakfast," said Zaidee. "We were going to give him to George Washington for dessert to-day. We buried it in the cemi-terror to keep till it was dinner-time."
"That will do. Dig it up. George Washington can sacrifice his mouse."
While Zaidee was unearthing George W.'s intended dessert, Cricket had found a shingle for a bier. They made a bed of seaweed on it, and stretched the little dead mouse thereon.
"I've an idea!" exclaimed Eunice. "Let's call the idol the Jabberwock, and sing the Jabberwock song as we go up."
"Splendid!" cried Cricket, clapping her hands. "How does it go?
"'Beware the Jabberwock, my son,With jaws that bite and claws that catch.'
"'Beware the Jabberwock, my son,With jaws that bite and claws that catch.'
"Isn't that it?"
"That's the second verse," said Eunice "Don't you remember,
"''Twas brillig, and the slimy sea—?'"
"''Twas brillig, and the slimy sea—?'"
"Yes, now I do. All ready."
So the procession formed itself anew. Zaidee and Helen bore the shingle-bier in front, Eunice and Cricket came behind, tearing their hair, and chanting in doleful tones how
"The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,me whiffling through the tulgey wood,And burbled as it came!"
"The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,me whiffling through the tulgey wood,And burbled as it came!"
Then, with appropriate ceremonies, they offered up the mouse to the Jabberwock, and then, joining hands, they danced around it, howling and shrieking.
"More! more!" growled Cricket, in awful tones, that were supposed to come from the yawning throat of the Jabberwock. The smaller children, by this time, were wildly excited, and ready to offer up all their possessions.
"You may have my Crumples," screamed Zaidee, making a dive for a little white china cat that lay near by with a pile of other playthings that the children had been playing with.
"We must stone it to pieces first," said Cricket, "and offer up the ashes," and soon the china cat lay in fragments, and its "ashes" were offered up.
"Let's take this old rubber-baby of Kenneth's," proposed Cricket. "You don't care for it, do you, baby? It has a hole in its head."
Kenneth looked doubtfully at his beloved Jacob for a moment, and then, quite carried away by the excitement of the occasion, he cried out, valiantly:
"You may have Dacob for ze Dabberwock."
One by one all the children's small possessions lay before the jaws of the Jabberwock.
"Oh, Eunice! children! let's have a fire, and burn up all these sacrifices to the Jabberwock. Think what a lovely thing he'd think that is! Idols always love to have scenes of devastination and ruin all about."
"I'm afraid that wouldn't be safe," said Eunice, hesitating. "Would auntie like it?"
"Oh, she wouldn't care. What harm? Nothing could get on fire out here on the sands, could there? Of course, we wouldn't if it was near the house anywhere. I'll go and get the matches," and off she darted like a flash.
"Oh, are we going to have a fire, and burn up the shrime?" cried Zaidee. "Goody! goody! what fun! they're going to burn up the shrime!"
Cricket flew back with a match-box in her hand.
"Now, get lots of dry seaweed, children," she ordered, "and we'll heap it around the pile, and tuck it under the pile of sacrifices, so they'll burn better. Oh, won't that make a blaze!" and Cricket danced about in anticipation. "There, Jabberwock! I hope you'll be 'tentified,' as Zaidee says. Stand back, children. Come, Eunice, and we'll march up singing, and lay our offering of a lighted match down before him," and Cricket, chanting another verse of the "Jabberwock," pranced up and struck a match.
The dry seaweed was instantly aflame, curling and leaping like a live thing, around the pile of stone. The children, dancing around and clapping their hands, screamed in ecstasy at the sight.
"Bring more seaweed," called Cricket, piling on all she had, to keep up the darting flames. The fire went springing up, licking the white bones of the Jabberwock. In their excitement the younger children scarcely noticed that their treasures were actually burning up, also, till Kenneth suddenly caught sight of his "Dacob," writhing, and curling, and jumping about in the most uncanny way, as if in mortal agony. The poor baby darted forward to rescue it.
"It's hurted Dacob! He's all wiggly!" he cried, and he tried to snatch his best beloved doll from the flames. Eunice caught him back.
"Don't touch, baby. It will burn you. Jacob can't feel it, and I'll buy you another."
"Hedoesfeel it. It's hurted him," cried Kenneth, struggling to get away. With the sudden spring he made, Eunice lost hold of him, and he made a snatch at the burning sacrifice. A long tongue of flame leaped up, caught like a live thing the baby's linen dress, and in an instant he was enveloped in flames.
For one horrible moment the other children stood paralyzed with fright. Not to the longest day she lives will Cricket forget the awful terror of that moment, as the thought surged up that, whatever happened, it was all her fault. Then, with a wild scream, to which all her previous ones had been as whispers, she darted forward. Kenneth, blind with terror and pain, beat at the flames with his tiny hands, and ran shrieking down the beach, fanning the fire to a brighter blaze.
Cricket was upon him in a moment. She flung both her arms closely around him, stopping his struggles, but the eager flames caught her own light dress as she did so. Then away she dashed, down over the few steps of beach between herself and the incoming tide, and, with him in her arms, threw herself forward in the water. As she rolled over and over, the sullen flames hissed and died.
Eunice was close behind her, shrieking for help. It was nearly high tide, and the beach sloped a little more abruptly there than in most places. Cricket rose to her knees with Kenneth in her arms, stumbled and fell forward again, face downward, limp with the excitement and the strain. Eunice, knee-deep in water, dragged them both up, and, between pulling and half carrying, got them to the water's edge, just as Auntie Jean, and Eliza, and Luke, came running from different directions. The flames, still fitfully shooting up from the smouldering seaweed, told the story.
"Run for the doctor, Luke," cried Auntie Jean, wasting no time in questions, as she lifted little drenched, burned Kenneth tenderly in her arms, and flew with him towards the house, leaving Eliza to help Cricket. Kenneth's clothes were so badly burned that they fell off from him when she laid him down. He was a dreadful sight, with his golden curls all gone, his face blackened with smoke and soot, which the water had only washed off in streaks. It was impossible for her to tell, at first, how much he was injured. Fortunately, the doctor came almost immediately.
It was an anxious hour that followed. Kenneth's most serious burns were on his arms and body, for, while the golden curls were nearly gone, his poor little face was, by some fortunate chance, only slightly burned, since, as he ran forward, his curls had blown back. Cricket was burned quite severely on her arms and hands, where she had clasped and held him.
After their wounds were dressed and bandaged, and Kenneth, a little mummy-like bundle of old white linen, lay asleep, worn out with pain and excitement, Auntie Jean found Cricket sobbing quietly under the sheet.
"What is the matter, dear?" asked auntie, tenderly. "Are you in such pain?" for she knew that Cricket was a little Spartan in respect to suffering.
"Yes, no-o," sobbed Cricket. "The pain is bad, but I don't care for that. My—conscience—aches—so—here. I—can't—stand—it, auntie. I ought to have been all burned up myself. I oughtn't to have had a fire. I knew better, only I just thought what fun it would be. To think the baby is burned, and all through my horrid badness!"
"My poor little girl!" said Auntie Jean, pitifully. "That is the hardest of all for you to bear, I well know. But after all, dear, you can comfort yourself by thinking that, but for your quickness, the little fellow must have burned to death. You saved his life, after all. You did what should have been done, so quickly."
"That isn't much comfort," sobbed Cricket. "He oughtn't to be burned at all.Anybody would have thought to throw him in the water."
"I'm not sure of that. In excitement people do not always use their wits—especially children. Even Eunice, thoughtful as she usually is, was behind you."
"And I sprained grandma's ankle, too. I ought to be put in prison," went on Cricket, in a fresh deluge of remorse.
"Nobody blamed you for that, dearie, though youarerather a thoughtless little body. But the ankle was purely an accident. When it comes to the playing with fire, however, you really should have known better than to do such a dangerous thing. But you have learned your lesson, and now we must be thankful the consequences are no worse."
Cricket raised a tear-stained face.
"Yes, only—my dear baby! If only I could take all his burns! I'd set fire to myself and burn myself up, if he could be well. I did the mischief, and he gets the worst of it."
"Indeed, little Cricket," said Auntie Jean, softly, almost to herself, as she bent and kissed her little niece, "you will learn, as you grow older, that that's not the least hard part of all the harm we do—we do the mischief, and the one we love best often gets the burns."
The next few days were not very happy ones. Auntie Jean had her hands full. Grandma's ankle was much better, to be sure, but still it did not allow her to walk or stand on it but very little, so that she could not be of much assistance in the nursing that followed. Poor little Kenneth suffered greatly from his burns, and his fever ran high, and the very hot weather made it harder for him to bear. He cried continually for his mother. He had not fretted for her, especially, while he was well, but now that he was sick he wailed constantly for "Mamma."
Cricket was up and about, after a day or two. Her arms and hands were still bandaged, and she was very helpless about dressing and undressing herself, but she felt better to be up. She longed to do something for Kenneth, but this was impossible, with both arms in slings. These were rather dark days for the poor little girl, for, on account of the anxiety about Kenneth, she received less attention than she otherwise would have had. She was very grateful, however, that nobody reminded her that it was chiefly her fault.
Unfortunately, her right hand, with which she had first clasped Kenneth, was much more seriously burned than the other. The left hand came out of its sling at the end of three or four days, and while the arm remained bandaged, she could use her fingers.
"If it was only the other way," she mourned, "I could write a lot of stories and things for the 'Echo,' and my time would not beallwasted."
"Learn to write with your left hand," suggested grandma.
"Could I?" said Cricket, brightening. "Why, why not? It won't be like learning to write over again. I've often tried it, only my left-hand fingers don't seem to have anypushin them."
"If you practise half an hour a day, you will soon do wonders," said grandma, encouragingly. "I had a brother, once, who was left-handed, and he learned to use his right hand equally well. He drew beautifully, and would often work with a pencil in each hand. Not only that, but I have often seen him write with one hand and draw with the other."
"Isn't that wonderful?" exclaimed Cricket. "I'll begin to practise this minute, Eunice, if you'll get me paper and pencil," she added, eagerly.
She worked busily for a few minutes, in silence, after the materials were brought her.
"It looks exactly like Zaidee's writing," she said, at length, in disgust, after her first few attempts. She wrote a firm, pretty hand for a girl of her age, and these shaky, disjointed letters, sprawling across the page, were very discouraging.
"It looks like the tracks of a crazy ant," she said, half laughing.
"If you practise faithfully for a few days you will find they will look like the tracks of a very sane ant," said grandma. "And, besides, think how much easier it is to learn to write with your left hand than with your toes."
"With yourtoes, grandma," came in a united chorus.
"Yes, with your toes. I knew of a man, once, who was born without any arms, and—"
"No arms at all? Not one?"
"Not one," answered grandma, smiling on her eager questioner. "He was the son of a very poor woman here in the village. They lived in that little red cottage on the Bainbridge road, where you turn by the four oaks."
"Without any arms! Did he have shoulders?" asked Cricket.
"Oh, yes, indeed. I saw them often when he was a baby—bare, I mean. The shoulder ended smoothly where the arms should be. He grew up a very bright little fellow. Running barefoot all the time, as he did, I suppose he learned to pick up things with his toes very naturally. At any rate, when he was eight years old he could even handle his knife and fork with his toes."
"Ugh!" shuddered Eunice, "Did he sit on the table?"
"No, not quite so bad as that. He sat on a little low stool, and his plate was put on the floor in front of him. He would pick up his knife and fork, cut up his meat, and feed himself as deftly as possible. It was very funny."
"Think of washing his feet before dinner, instead of his hands!" giggled Cricket.
"Could he get his feet right up to his mouth?" asked Eunice.
"Yes, easily. He was very limber."
Zaidee instantly sat down on the piazza floor and attempted the performance.
"It most cracks my back," she said, getting up and trying to reach around behind herself to rub it.
"Icould do it," said supple Cricket, who could sit on the floor and put her legs around her neck.
"He went to the district school," went on grandma, "and learned to read very quickly, and his mental arithmetic was really wonderful. Long examples that the others did on their slates, he did almost as quickly in his head. One year, they had a very good, patient teacher, who, noticing how deftly he picked up all sorts of things with his toes, had the bright idea of teaching him to write by holding his pen between his toes. Now his toes, by constant using, had grown longer and slenderer than most people's, and in a very short time he could guide a pencil sufficiently to make very legible letters. Quite as much so as your first attempts with your left hand, just now, Jean."
"Think of it!" exclaimed Cricket. "I'm going to try it to-night when we go to bed, Eunice."
"It was a funny sight to see him get ready for his school work. When he arrived at school his brother washed and dried his feet carefully, and put on him an old pair of loose slippers to keep them clean. His slate or paper would be put on the floor before him, and he would slip his foot out of his slipper, grasp his pencil, and begin. By the end of a year, he really wrote wonderfully well."
"Oh-h!" sighed Zaidee. "Helen and I practised lots, last winter, with mamma, and we can't write much now. We writed every day, too."
"Where is the man now?" asked Eunice. "What became of him?"
"When he was a boy of fourteen or so, a travelling circus manager heard of him, and offered him a large salary to go with him to be exhibited," answered grandma. "He got a large salary, and after that helped support his family. He learned to do many other things with his toes, later, people said. For instance, he drew beautifully, and could even hold a knife and whittle a stick. The family soon left here, and I never knew anything more about him. So, my little Jean, aren't you encouraged to practise writing with your left hand, with good hope of success?"
"Yes, indeed, grandma," answered Cricket, taking her pencil, and going to work again, awkwardly but energetically. And I may just say, in passing, that she worked to such good effect, that in ten days' time her left-handed writing, though it slanted backward, was firm and legible.
"There!" exclaimed Cricket, with a long sigh, after her first half-hour was over, as she rose to stretch her arm above her head, "I've written so long that I'm so tired that I can hardly put one foot before the other."
"That would be a more appropriate sentiment if you were my no-armed man," said grandma, smiling.
"I'm justwildwith keeping still, grandma! Resting makes mesotired. I want to go rowing or riding or walking. I'd like to jump over the moon, as far as my feelings go, but it makes my arm ache if I move round much."
"Read aloud to us," suggested grandma, "and perhaps Eunice will hold the wool for me while you do."
Cricket liked to read aloud, and she got a book very willingly.
"Here's a lovely story," she said, "all about battles and fighting, and exciting things. 'How Captain Jack Won His Epauplets.'"
"Won his—what?" asked grandma, holding her ball suspended.
"His epauplets. He was just a plain, every-day soldier, you know, to start with."
"Oh! won his epaulets, you mean," said grandma, gravely.
"Won his—oh, of course! how stupid of me!" looking more closely at the word. "Now I've always thought that word was epauplets, grandma, truly I did."
"Go on and begin," said Eunice; "how did he win them?"
The reading proceeded quietly for a time. Eunice held the wool, grandma wound it off, and Zaidee and Helen played tonka on the piazza steps. Tonka was a little Japanese game on the order of jackstones, only, instead of hard, nobby stones, that spoil the dimpled knuckles, tiny bags of soft, gay silk, half full of rice, are used. Six little bags are made with the ends gathered, and one more, the tonka, is made flat and square of some different coloured silk, to distinguish it, as the gay little bags fly up and down. It was a very favourite amusement with all the children. Eliza was with Kenneth, and auntie was lying down, for the poor baby had been wakeful and in much pain the night before, and auntie had had little sleep.
Nearly an hour slipped by, when suddenly grandma stopped Cricket.
"How quiet the children are. Are they there still?" turning to see. Eunice looked up also.
"Dear me, I haven't thought of them for a long time. They've slipped off. I suppose I ought to go and see what Zaidee's doing, and tell her she mustn't," and Eunice lay down her work. She had had to have much care of the younger ones these last few days.
"I'll go, too," said Cricket, getting up gladly. "'Scuse us, please, grandma, for leaving you all alone."
Cricket had scarcely ever been ill a day in her life, not even with children's diseases, which she had always escaped, and, in all her adventures, she was very rarely hurt. Therefore, pain was a very dreadful thing to her. She bore it bravely, but it was strange to see her looking so pale and heavy-eyed. But these few days of suffering were teaching her many things.
Eunice and Cricket heard the sound of the children's voices as they turned the corner of the house.
"Oh, they're all right," said Eunice, relieved.
Just back of the house, in a tiny little shed, built especially for it, stood a big barrel of kerosene. It was kept outside, because grandma was very much afraid of the possibility of fire. Once, in an unlucky moment, the waitress, Delia, in drawing the oil into a small can to be carried into the house, had yielded to Zaidee's entreaty, and had let her turn that fascinating little spigot. After that the twins made several private expeditions to the barrel, but as the spigot was kept locked, of course they could not turn it. It chanced that this morning Delia had drawn the oil in a hurry, and had forgotten to turn the catch in the spigot that locked it.
Zaidee and Helen, prowling around for something to do, chanced to come past the barrel, and Zaidee tried the faucet. To their rapture a spurting stream of oil instantly poured out. An old dipper, lying near by, was immediately seized upon, as something to fill, and all the flower beds that were near by were well watered with kerosene. Next, they spied a small churn, which Bridget, the cook, had just put out in the sun to dry. This was an opportunity not to be neglected, and the next dipperful of kerosene went splash into Bridget's clean, white churn. Up and down went the dasher, worked by these eager hands, while, behind them, the kerosene still poured from the barrel.
"Yes, they're all right," repeated Eunice. "They're only working the churn-dasher up and down. Probably Bridget left some water in it to soak."
"Come over here," called Zaidee, hospitably.
"We're making butter, Eunice."
Eunice drew a little nearer, then, suddenly, she stopped, sniffed, and darted forward.
"Children, whathaveyou there?"
"Caroseme," responded Zaidee, promptly. "We drawed it from the pretty little fountain in the barrel."
Eunice turned hastily towards the "caroseme" barrel, then flew towards it. As the barrel had been lately filled there was plenty in it, still, and it was flowing merrily, while a pool of kerosene lay over the board floor.
"Goodness gracious me! How shall I ever get in there to turn it off?" cried Eunice. "Ican'tstep in it?"
"Let Zaidee do it. She's soaking already with it. Zaidee, come here, directly, and turn this kerosene off."
Zaidee came up cheerfully, and waded in, regardless of her shoes.
"It's too bad to turn it off, when it looks so pretty," she said, regretfully.
"You are naughty children," said Eunice, severely, arraying the guilty twins before her, when this was done. "Whatever shall I do with you? I can't take you, all dripping like that, into the house to Eliza, because she's with Kenneth, and auntie's lying down, and I don't suppose Delia would know what to do with you."
"Hang them both up over the clothes-line to dry," suggested Cricket, darkly eying the chief culprit. "Dear me! how you do smell!"
"I don't like it pretty well," admitted Zaidee, sniffing at her hands. "I want to go in and get us washed off now."
"No, stop," commanded Eunice, as Zaidee was starting off. "You would ruin everything you touched, I suppose. You're reeking wet. You can't go into the nursery, for you mustn't disturb Kenneth. Auntie said particularly that we mustn't even make any noise around, so he can sleep. WhatshallI do with you?"
"I'll tell you," suggested Cricket, the ever-ready. "Take them down to the Cove and put them in the water just as they are, and wash off the worst of it. Then you can take off their clothes and leave them down there in the bathing-house, for 'Liza to look after when she can."
"Perhaps that might do. I could put on my own bathing-suit and take them in, and wash off the outside, anyway."
"Yes, let's," cried Zaidee, scampering off in high feather at the delightful possibility of going into the water all dressed, "just like a dog."
"Grandma wouldn't care, would she?"
"There's nothing else to do. You go on and I'll tell her. My arm aches so that I can't walk over there," said Cricket, turning away, very dolefully. She didn't like to miss the fun of ducking those naughty children. She watched them out of sight.
"But it isn't really a bit worse of Zaidee to turn that spigot, and play with the oil, than it was for me to play with the fire," she said, honestly, to herself, as she walked slowly back to grandma. "I can't say much. But itisfunny how much badder things seem in other people, when they're really just as worse in ourselves."
And with this not very lucid statement of an undeniable fact, Cricket walked up the piazza steps and informed grandma of the state of affairs.
Half an hour later Eunice appeared, driving a pair of depressed looking children before her, clad only in their little blue bathing-suits.
She was hot and flushed, Zaidee cross and rebellious, and Helen tearful and subdued. Eunice had found that the plan of washing oily children, with all their clothes on, was much easier in theory than in practice. And such a task as it had been to get their dripping clothes off! Wet buttonholes refused to open, shoestrings knotted hopelessly, and everything stuck flabbily together.
Auntie Jean was with little Kenneth again, so Eliza was at liberty to take the children in hand, but before they went off, grandma said, very gravely, to them, that they were to go directly to bed for two whole hours, so that they might have a quiet time to think over the mischief they had done.
Two weeks later everything was running again as usual. Kenneth, quite recovered, was as lively as possible, though he was a funny looking little object, with his lovely golden curls, to everybody's great grief, cropped as close to his head as a prize-fighter's.
"If it only will grow out alittle, before mamma gets home," mourned Cricket. "He looks so ridiculous. He looks just like the sheep, after 'Gustus John has sheared them. Even the little lambs don't know their own mothers, sometimes, auntie, after they're clipped. Oh!" clasping her hands in horror at a new thought. "Do you suppose mamma won't evenknowKenneth?"
"He doesn't look much like himself, certainly, but I don't fancy that there's the least danger that his mother won't know him instantly," said auntie, comfortingly.
"I'm so glad," said Cricket, with a sigh of relief, "if you really think so. But, anyway, he's thesheepiest-looking child."
But, fortunately, his burns had healed beautifully, and the doctor assured them that he would even outgrow every scar. Cricket was entirely herself again, with only one deep scar across her right wrist to remind her of that unlucky sacrifice to the Jabberwock.
Edna was at home, also, delighted to be back with her beloved Eunice. She proudly flourished, actually, two stories for the "Echo," as the result of her "banishment," as she insisted on calling her visit. She was so proud of them that she wanted to carry them about with her all the time, and was all impatience for the next number of the paper to be ready. Eunice had been working at it, during Edna's absence, and it was all ready, excepting to print Edna's story, for which space had been left.
It was getting well into September now, and the children were looking eagerly forward to the return of the travellers, who were to sail early in October. Letters said that mamma was improving so delightfully that she was quite as strong as ever, and that she was looking forward with quite as much impatience to seeing the children again as they could have to see her. The children didn't quite believe this, though.
"Shecouldn'tbe glad as I am," said Cricket, positively. "If she were she would just simply burst. Ofcoursewe're gladder to see her than she could be to see us, because she'smamma, and we're only just the children! I'm chock full of gladness!" and Cricket gave an ecstatic caper as she waved the letter that definitely set the date of the travellers' return.
"Lookout, Cricket," said Eunice, hastily, "that's the second time you've nearly knocked my ink over," rescuing, as she spoke, the fresh, fair copy of the "Echo," to which she was giving the finishing touches, for the afternoon's reading.
"Please excuse me, but I'm so happy! Oh, auntie, it's worth while to have mamma and papa go to Europe and miss them so, when you are so gladder than glad when they come back."
"Now, I really flattered myself that you had been tolerably contented here, this summer," said Auntie Jean, pretending to look aggrieved. "I'm very sorry that you've been so wretched."
"Wretched! Ihaven't," said Cricket, giving auntie a rapturous hug, and, at the same time, sending her heels kicking out behind, like a little wild pony. "I've had an awfully good time."
"Cricket!" shrieked Eunice, "you knocked over the ink at last!" She snatched up the "Echo" just in time to save it from an inky bath. "Hand me that blotter, Edna. Never mind, auntie, for it's mostly on the newspapers. Cricket, youarethe ink-spillingest girl!" scolded Eunice, scrubbing and cleaning as she talked. "Yesterday you knocked it out of the window, and only the other day you had it all over the piazza-floor."
Cricket looked much depressed, as she helped Eunice repair damages.
"I rather guess you'll be too relieved for anything to see the last of me, grandma," she said, mournfully. "I never saw anybody like me. I never mean to do things, and then I go and do them. I don't see how you've stood it all summer, anyway, with such racketting children around, I truly don't."
"You've been a pretty obedient set," said grandma, patting the hand that stole around her neck. "And when children are obedient and truthful, one can excuse a great deal else. Indeed, I shall miss my flock exceedingly, I assure you, in spite of your ink-spilling tendencies."
"Even if I did sprain your ankle?" whispered Cricket, very softly, "and burn up Kenneth's hair? and break through the plaster in your ceiling, and lots of other things?"
"Yes, in spite of it all," whispered grandma, back again, just as softly. "Because I never knew you to do anything I told you not to do, and whatever you tell me, I know is exactly true."
"You're such a beautiful grandma!" said Cricket, with a hug, and then she pranced off.
Zaidee and Helen came toiling up from the beach, with their arms full of dolls. Zaidee dropped down on the top piazza-step.
"Auntie Jean, I'm all in such a pusferation," she sighed. "It's so much work to take care of such a lot of children as I have. I wish I had a little live nurse to help me. Couldn't I?"
"Take Cricket," suggested Auntie Jean. "She wants something to do."
"No, I thank you," said that young woman, decidedly. "I'm gladIdon't have to follow Zaidee up all day."
"And I wouldn't have you," returned Zaidee, with equal decision. "You tooked up my Beatrice by the neck, and it hurted her. She told me so. I don't want you for my dollie's nurse, or for my nurse, either."
"Yournurse!" exclaimed Cricket. "I wouldn't be 'Liza for anything! I'd as soon take care of a straw in a high wind, as take care of you."
Auntie Jean laughed, and drew Cricket down into her arms.
"Did you ever think, honestly," she whispered, "that Zaidee is a little, just a little, like one of her older sisters?"
"Oh, she's not so bad," responded Cricket, instantly. "But because she's like me is no reason I like it any better. I like it all the worse. Besides, I don't set up to be a polygon."
Hereupon Auntie Jean laughed until grandma demanded to know what the joke was, and why they were talking secrets.
"No secrets," answered auntie, wiping her eyes. "Cricket was only telling me that she didn't set up to be aparagon."
Cricket flashed a quick glance at auntie, caught her eye, and nodded her thanks.
"There's George Washington," she hastily remarked, changing the subject. "Come here, sir, and play a little. You've been as sober as a judge lately. I haven't seen you run after Martha for perfect ages."
The September days slipped by, until the first of October was just at hand. It was arranged that Auntie Jean should go and get the house in town in readiness for the family's return. At first she expected to go alone, but the girls begged to go with her, and finally she concluded to take them.
Will and Archie had already gone back to Philadelphia, on account of their school, so this arrangement would only leave the younger ones and Eliza with grandma for a few days longer.
Then, oh, joy! that blessed Auntie Jean further decided that she would take them all down to New York the day before the steamer was due, so that they might have the earliest possible glimpse of the family. Was not all this enough to fill any little girl's cup of bliss to overflowing?
For once, reality surpassed anticipation. Such excitement for the last week in packing up; such walks and rows and drives between times; such a fine number of the "Echo," to wind up with; such a funny farewell call—laden with all manner of good things—to the old woman, who was still overcome by the thought that she had seen Miss Cricket; then such parting hugs and kisses for dear grandma and the children; such hand-shakings with old Billy, who distributed peppermints like a red and white snow.
Then came the jolly three days' picnic in the empty house in town. The three girls thought that they rendered perfectly indispensable aid to auntie and the maids, in opening the house, getting off holland covers, and arranging everything, till it was all in apple-pie order for the homecomers.
Then came the last and loveliest treat,—the delightful trip to New York in the night boat, and the vast importance of the thought of going to meet their European travellers. They discussed them, as if they had been gone ten years, at least. Eunice wondered if she would know Marjorie, and if Donald's mustache would be as long as papa's, while Cricket was a little afraid that they might have forgotten how to talk English.
The steamer was not due till late in the afternoon, so that they had the day before them, and a day crammed with good things it was. Although they had often been there before, the children immediately voted for Central Park and the Metropolitan Museum first. Then they visited some of the great stores, and then lunched at Delmonico's. In the afternoon they went for a long, lovely ride up Riverside Park, and then, at last, came the crowning joy of watching the steamer's arrival.
"There's mamma!" shrieked Cricket, regardless of the crowd about her, as the great steamer swung into her moorings, and in five minutes more everybody was being rapturously hugged by everybody else.
THE END.