CHAPTER XIX.WHAT ZAIDEE AND HELEN FOUND.
Mamma had gone away for a two weeks’ visit to grandmamma, and had taken little Kenneth with her. Zaidee and Helen felt very lonely without their small playfellow, for it was the first time they had ever been separated. The first week seemed very long. Then when nurse began to comfort them by saying that next week mamma and Kenneth would be at home again, there came a letter from mamma saying that grandmamma was not very well, and she would stay another week besides.
The twins were quite ready to cry. “Next week” seemed like saying “next year.” But auntie was staying with them still, and as she was mamma’s own sister herself, and she looked very much like her, this was a great comfort to the children, for they would try and “play” it was mamma who spoke to them. But there was no one to take little Kenneth’s place.
The twins had a favourite playground downby the brook. It was just below the pool where they had tried to drown the poor little kittens.
A great oak tree grew there, and the grass underneath was smooth and green. The brook was very shallow there, and there were plenty of smooth, round stones which they could easily get out of the water, without getting themselves at all wet. On the green grass they played house, marking off the rooms by these round stones. The acorns from the oak served the purpose of cups for their dolls, and bits of broken china made fine dishes. They had, at home, a beautiful, real doll’s house, with the cunningest furniture, and plenty of “really, truly” doll’s dishes, but they got much more pleasure out of this make-believe house, marked off with stones.
Since Kenneth was not at home to be looked after, Eliza often let the twins go down to the brook to play all by themselves. One morning, after breakfast, they ran down there as usual. To their great surprise they found that some one was there before them.
It was a little boy, about Kenneth’s age. He had on a linen dress and a broad-brimmed hat. He sat on the edge of the bank, poking astick into the water. Where could he have come from? The children were sure they had never seen him before.
As the twins approached, he looked up at them with a pair of sober, wide brown eyes.
“Oh, Helen! what’s that!” cried Zaidee, in great amazement, stopping short.
“It’s a little boy!” exclaimed Helen, as much excited as if she had found a crocodile. “We’ve finded a little boy!”
Zaidee ran up to Brown-Eyes.
“What is your name?” she demanded, eagerly.
Brown-Eyes answered nothing. He looked at the little girls, gravely, and the little girls looked at him.
“Haven’t you any name?” persisted Zaidee.
“No,” answered Brown-Eyes, briefly.
“Where do you live?” asked Helen, running round on the other side of him.
Brown-Eyes looked all around him, into the sky, into the water, and into the woods on the other side of the brook. Then he said, “I’m here.”
“Oh, Helen!” shrieked Zaidee, in great excitement. “He hasn’t any name, and hedoesn’t live anywhere but here, so he’s ours, cause we finded him, just like the kitty we finded, and auntie let us keep it.”
Zaidee was very much mixed up in her speech, but Helen understood. She clapped her hands with joy.
“Now we’ve got a little boy to play with, ’stead of Kenneth. Let’s keep him to play with till Kenneth comes home, and then there’ll be two of him, just the same as there’s two of us.”
“Can it talk, do you s’pose?” asked Zaidee, walking around Brown-Eyes, with much interest. For, excepting his two short answers, he had not spoken at all.
“I ’xpect he can talk,” returned Helen, “cause he’s got teeth, hasn’t he?” In her mind the only reason that a baby can’t talk is because it hasn’t any teeth. Brown-Eyes immediately showed a full set.
“Yes, he has,” said Helen, triumphantly. “He’s got some up teeth and some down teeth. Talk, boy.”
Brown-Eyes only looked at them as silently as before.
“Poke him,” said Zaidee. “Let’s see if he squeals.”
She did not mean to hurt him, but she poked him in the stomach rather harder than she meant. Straightway Brown-Eyes’s little feet flew out like a wind-mill, and kicked Zaidee so vigorously that she lost her balance, and nearly rolled into the brook.
Brown-Eyes still said nothing.
Zaidee picked herself up with added respect for her little guest.
“I did not mean to hurt you,” she said, standing at a little distance. “Do you want to play house with us? Let’s build him a new house, Helen. Come, boy, you get some stones.”
The excitement of building the new house soon made the children friends, and they played together happily, though Brown-Eyes did not grow talkative.
At last the little ones grew hungry, and they started for the house, taking their new playmate with them.
“Where shall we keep him?” asked Helen, as they trudged up the lane and across the green lawn.
“We’d better shut him up for awhile, till he gets used to us,” was Zaidee’s advice. “That’s the way we did with kitty.”
“We can put him in the laundry,” suggested Helen. “We put kitty there.”
As the house stood on the hillside which sloped gently back to the brook, the kitchen and laundry were down stairs. No one noticed the children as they went in at the lower door. Cricket and Eunice were off for a long scamper on their ponies, and Donald and his cousins were away fishing, while Marjorie had gone into town for the day.
The laundry, a large, light room, which was on one side of the lower hall, chanced to be deserted when they went in.
“Stay here, boy,” said Helen, “and we’ll bring you something to eat, if you’re good.”
Brown-Eyes nodded gravely. He immediately sat himself down on the floor, with his sturdy little feet straight out in front of him, and with his hands folded in his lap. “I be good,” he said, briefly. He never wasted his words.
The twins locked the laundry door and ran across to the kitchen. They intended to ask if Eliza had their luncheon ready for them upstairs, and to tell her to get something for the Boy; but cook had just taken from the oven the most distracting cookies, all in shapes of little pigs.
“Oh-h!” squealed the children in concert.
“An’ here’s a plateful fur yer auntie,” said cook. “Be off wid yerself, an’ don’t come nigh me agin till me floor’s mopped entirely.”
Off scampered Zaidee and Helen with the cookies, in great delight, and quite forgot their little prisoner in the laundry. They found auntie on the cool, vine-covered piazza.
“What hot little girlies!” she exclaimed, putting back the curly hair from the warm, shiny little faces. “Eliza,” she called to the nurse, who passed through the hall at that moment, “take the children upstairs and wash their hands and faces. Then come back here, little ones, and auntie will read you a story while you cool off.”
The twins went very willingly, and soon came back, fresh and sweet. They perched themselves on the broad arms of auntie’s chair, munching cookies and rocking comfortably, while auntie read to them.
Suddenly a nursemaid came running up the avenue.
“I beg your pardon, ma’am,” she said, breathlessly. “I’m Mrs. Bennett’s nurse, and she’s lost Phelps. We can’t find him anywhere, and Mrs. Bennett’s most distracted.”
The Bennetts were new people, who had lately come for the summer, having taken a house near by.
“Is the little boy lost?” asked Mrs. Somers, rising. “No, he has not been here. When did you miss him?”
“It’s over two hours since anyone’s seen him, ma’am. I was busy and thought he was with his ma, and she thought I had him. We didn’t miss him till about half an hour ago, and we’ve looked everywhere about the house and grounds. I just thought he might have run in here, ma’am,” said the frightened maid.
“He certainly has not been here!” said auntie, “Have you seen Phelps, children?”
“No,” they both said, positively.
They hadn’t seen Phelps. They hadn’teverseen him.
“I’m so sorry,” said auntie. “Still he can’t have gone very far. Eliza, ask Mike or Thomas if they’ve seen the child anywhere around this morning. Have you been to the village?”
“Mrs. Bennett’s just gone up there, herself, ma’am,” returned the nurse. “And the gardener has gone the other way to look for him.”
Eliza came back and said that Mike had seensuch a little fellow further down the road, near the farm-house, earlier in the morning.
“P’raps our man has found him, then,” said the nurse, hurrying off, while auntie sent Eliza again to tell Mike and Thomas to join in the search.
“Auntie,” broke out Zaidee, a little while later, “I forgot to tell you that we’ve got a little boy of our own, down stairs.”
“A little boy, Zaidee?” said auntie, laying down her book. “What do you mean?”
“We finded him, auntie, he’sours,” said Zaidee, earnestly. “Come and see him.”
“We finded him down by the brook, in our play-house,” chimed in Helen. “He’s ours, auntie. He’s awful cunning. We’re going to keep him and feed him as we did the kitty that we finded once, and when Kenneth comes home they can be twins, just like us.”
“But, children,” exclaimed auntie, “it must be Phelps. Where is he? Why didn’t you speak before? You said you hadn’t seen him.”
“It isn’t Phelps,” insisted Zaidee. “He’s ours. Wefindedhim. He hasn’t any name, only just Boy. He doesn’t live anywhere. He said so.Pleaselet us keep him,” she pleaded. “Mamma let us keep the kitty.”
“You ridiculous children,” said auntie. “A little boy isn’t like a cat. Tell me where he is, now.”
“He’s in the laundry, where we put the kitty. He’s getting used to us. He’s real good, and he doesn’t cry at all; he won’t be a bit of trouble!” begged Helen.
Auntie flew down stairs, the children following, and protesting all the way against his being sent off. Auntie unlocked the laundry door hastily and looked in. There sat Master Brown-Eyes, exactly as they had left him an hour before.
“Phelps are hungry,” he announced at once, looking reproachfully at the twins.
Auntie picked up the patient baby in her arms.
“You poor little soul!” she exclaimed. But Brown-Eyes resisted strongly.
“Put me down,” he said, for his dignity was much hurt.
“Oh, are you going to send him away?” asked Helen, ready to cry. “Please let us keep him just till Kenneth comes home, then. He’s lots better than the kitty was.”
“He certainly is,” said auntie, laughing, “for kitty would not have stayed there quietly for so long.”
She was carrying struggling Phelps upstairs, while the twins tagged on behind.
“There’s Eliza and the men, now,” auntie said, when, breathless, she reached the piazza. “Run, Zaidee, and tell them that Phelps is found. Tell Mike to go to Mrs. Bennett’s and tell her.—There, my little man, eat some of these cookies and stop kicking.”
Phelps wriggled out of auntie’s lap, and preferred to eat his cookies, standing on his own two stout legs, while the twins eyed him, in deep disappointment.
Their visitor ate all the cookies there were left, and then he suddenly said, “I are doin’ home now,” and began to back down the steps in his own solemn fashion.
“Oh, Boy!” cried Helen, reproachfully; “you said you didn’t have any home.”
Brown-Eyes would not make any reply. He trudged down the avenue soberly.
“Come, twinnies,” laughed auntie, “we’ll go and look after him and see that he doesn’t lose himself again.”
“Boy,” called Zaidee, “will you come and let us find you again?”
Brown-Eyes nodded, but kept on his way. Atthe gate they saw a lady running towards them, from the direction of the village.
“I are dust comin’ home, mamma,” called Phelps, his fat legs quickening their rate to a run.
His mamma caught him in her arms, and this time he was quite content to nestle in her neck.
Auntie told her how it had all happened, and, now that the fright was over, Mrs. Bennett could laugh at the story, and she promised that her little boy should come and see the twins, even if they could not keep him as their own.