The room was very quiet, for the girls were not allowed to talk without permission. Once in a while, there was a subdued whisper from one corner or Miss Mullins's low tones were heard as she bent over the work of some pupil. There was an odor of geraniums from the plants in the window. Sometimes, when a desk lid was raised there was a sudden spicy whiff from a hidden apple. Outside the sparrows were twittering in the vines and the rumble of wagons sounded indistinctly. It was a very quiet, orderly class indeed, thought Miss Mullins.
Suddenly from one corner came a crash, a distressed cry followed by wild sobbing. Miss Mullins looked up quickly. There was a disturbance in the direction of Ruth's seat. Miss Mullins went quickly to the scene of trouble. Crouching on the floor and holding fragments of a broken doll in her lap was Ruth wailing "She's dead! She's dead! She can never come to life again."
"You shall have mine, my Annabel Lee," Lucia was saying as she placed her own doll in Ruth's lap.
"No, no," wept Ruth, "I don't want any one but Henrietta. There was only one like her in the whole world, and she's dead, she's dead forever."
"Let me see, Ruth;" Miss Mullins bent over the weeping child. "Perhaps she can be mended."
"She can't, she can't," sobbed Ruth. "She's all broken to bits."
And indeed poor Henrietta was in a very sorry state for, though the body, legs and arms were not injured, most of the head was a total wreck.
"How did it happen? Did you let her fall?" asked Miss Mullins sympathetically.
"No, I didn't do it. Nora pushed her off my desk on purpose."
Miss Mullins straightened herself from her bending position. "Nora," she said gravely, "is that true?"
Nora, looking honestly ashamed, hung her head. "I did knock her off, but I—I didn't do it on purpose."
"But how came you to be meddling with Ruth's doll?"
Nora was silent.
"I had just taken her up for a minute," Ruth began to explain. "I wanted to measure the band around the waist, and I laid her down just for a second while I cut the band, and Nora leaned over and jogged her elbow just so and Henrietta went sliding off before I could catch her."
Miss Mullins looked again at Nora. "If that is true, it was a wicked thing to do, Nora, and I am greatly grieved that one of my class could purposely destroy another's doll."
Nora began to sniffle and look aggrieved. "I didn't think she would break. I just wanted to scare Ruth."
"You should have known that a doll was liable to break, if it fell from any distance upon a hard floor, and, in any event, you intended to do wrong. Even in trying to scare Ruth, you were to blame." Miss Mullins stood looking from the culprit to the mourning Ruth.
"The only thing I can think of that you can do to make reparation, is that you give Ruth your doll," she continued.
Ruth scrambled to her feet. "Do you suppose I would take anything she had played with? Do you suppose her horrid Violetta could take the place of my dear lovely Henrietta? And I wouldn't touch that ugly greasy old silk dress with that common cotton lace on it. I would be ashamed to be seen with such an untidy looking thing."
"Ruth, Ruth," Miss Mullins's hand was laid on her shoulder, "this will not do. I realize that you are much grieved and excited, but you must not talk so. The only way Nora can make any sort of reparation is to give you her doll, and I want her to do it."
"She can send it to the heathen or the missionaries; I don't want it, and I won't have it. Miss Mullins, do you think your mother would want to change you for some one that looked like Nora's Violetta?"
Miss Mullins tried to hide a smile.
Ruth was so fierce and contemptuous and, though she felt very sorry for her, she could not but be amused at the same time that she tried to be stern.
"You must try to curb that violent tongue of yours, Ruth," she said. "I see nothing else to be done. I am sure we are all very sorry for you, and regret what has happened. I will excuse you from sewing any more to-day and, if you and Lucia will speak in whispers, you two may take that empty seat by the door, and I will give you permission to speak to one another, if you do not disturb the rest of the class. Nora, you may come to the platform and sit by me. I want to speak to you after school is dismissed."
Bearing the fragments of her broken doll, Ruth made her way to the seat her teacher had pointed out, Lucia following with her own and Ruth's sewing materials.
At sight of the unfinished petticoat, the tears welled up into Ruth's eyes again.
"Henrietta will never need it," she sobbed, burying her face in her hands.
Lucia put her arms around her. "Don't cry," she whispered. "You can have any of my other dolls if you don't care for Annabel Lee."
Ruth gave her friend's hand a little squeeze. "You are awfully good, Lucia," she whispered. "I don't mean that your dolls aren't lovely when I say I don't want any of them, but you know there isn't any other one like Henrietta in the whole wide world. She isn't near so big as your Annabel Lee nor so 'spensive, maybe, but she isn't like anybody else and now I shall never, never see her again." And the tears flowed more plentifully.
Lucia tried to whisper comforting words though there seemed little consolation to offer.
"You can have the petticoat for your Marie; it will just fit her," said Ruth after a pause. "I shall never need it."
"Oh, no, I couldn't take it," returned Lucia, though she secretly admired the neat work.
"Please do; it will always remind me of this dreadful day and I couldn't stand it. It is nearly done, you see, and I can easily finish it."
So, realizing that Ruth really desired to give her the small garment, Lucia accepted it, determining that some day when time had softened Ruth's grief, she would again offer her one of her dolls.
It was not long before school was dismissed; then the girls gathered around Ruth with many expressions of sympathy for her and sharp censure for Nora.
"I'd never speak to her," said one.
"I wish I didn't ever have to see her face again," returned Ruth.
"I don't see how you can bear to sit by her; she was always hateful to you;" this from Annie Waite.
"I'm going to ask Miss Mullins if Lucia and I can't change our seats," returned Ruth.
But this she did not have to do, for on Monday, to her relief, she found Nora established on the other side of the schoolroom in a seat by herself, this being Miss Mullins's punishment for what she realized was a spiteful and cruel act.
Ruth, escorted by a band of sympathizing comrades, bore her doll solemnly home that fateful afternoon and poured forth her pitiful tale in the ears of Miss Hester and Billy.
Billy and The Doll
MISS HESTER did her best to comfort the grieving Ruth, and, if the truth were told, felt nearly as badly as the child herself at the destruction of the doll which had belonged to her twin sister. She took the broken doll in her hands and looked at it tenderly.
"We had them exactly alike," she told Ruth, "only mine was dressed in blue and Henrietta's in pink; we always dressed them so to tell them apart. My father brought them to us once when he had been to New York, and we thought there never were dolls like them."
"What became of yours?" asked Ruth interested. "Did you break it?"
Miss Hester smiled a little wistfully. "No, I didn't break it. I gave it to some one. Some one who used to play with me when I was a little girl."
"Did you give it away after your little sister died?"
"Yes, many years after; when I was a woman grown."
"And has the somebody you gave it to—has that somebody the doll now?"
"I think so. Don't you think, Ruth, we would best take this poor broken Henrietta and put her back in the chest from which we took her?"
"Yes," Ruth answered soberly, "I should like to know that she was laid away with Henrietta's things, the broken cup and saucer and the mittens with the thumbs worn out and all the rest of the things she used to have."
"And some day when I can afford it, I will get you a new doll."
"Lucia offered to give me any one of hers that I would choose if I ever wanted another one, but I don't feel now that I ever shall."
Ruth drew a long sigh. "I loved Henrietta so." Her chin quivered and then the tears flowed again as they did at intervals all the evening.
And at bedtime, when there was no Henrietta sitting in her little wooden chair smiling into the dimness, came the most piteous weeping of all, till Ruth's pillow was wet with tears, and when Miss Hester peeped in at midnight—so many buttonholes had there been that day—she found the child wide awake, the drops still burdening her long lashes.
"Poor baby," she said bending over to give her one of her gentle kisses, "would you like to come in and sleep with me?"
"It wouldn't seem so lonely," said Ruth, sitting up, "but you don't like any one to sleep with you, Aunt Hester."
"I'd like it to-night." So Ruth found her comfort in the clasp of Miss Hester's arm and went to sleep cuddled close.
Billy had listened with kindling eyes and with angry exclamations, to Ruth's account of the disaster, and the next day, on their way to the store, he confided to Ruth that he meant to "do up" that Nora Petty. Just what the process of doing up might mean, Ruth didn't know, but she believed in Billy's prowess and was sure it was something too dreadful for any girl to endure. If it had been a boy, now, who had done this thing, she would willingly have allowed Billy to punish him as he might see fit, but a girl battered and banged by Billy's tough little fists was something altogether too awful to be thought of, so she tried to make him promise that he would let Nora alone, saying, rather grandly, that boys ought not to fight girls.
"Ah, look a-here, I didn't mean to knock her down and pommel her," said Billy, "but I'll tell all the fellows how mean she is and if Frank Crane gives her any more apples, I'm mistaken. They won't, any of the other fellows, you can bet your boots. I guess we can find a way to give her a dose without our fists."
"Well, it won't do any good now," returned Ruth, resignedly. "Billy, I wonder who has that other doll that was Aunt Hester's."
"You can search me," replied Billy.
"Just think of it, she's the only one in the world like my Henrietta, and I do wish I could have her. Do you suppose the person loves her very much, as much as I would?"
"Ask me somethin' easy. Maybe there are some others somewhere like that one." Billy was thoughtful.
"Where? You know Aunt Hester said they didn't make that kind nowadays."
"Oh, I don't know just where. There might be some left over."
"I never saw one."
"That's not sayin' there ain't any. Some old person might know where one could be had."
"Oh, do you really think so?"
"Might. Can't say for sure, but somebody might happen to know."
"But Aunt Hester didn't know. Do you mean some one as old as she is?"
"Yes, or older."
"How old do you suppose she is?"
"About forty-four, I guess. Ye know on the headstone over the twin sister's grave it says: 'Born February 10, 1860, died March 21, 1868.' Now ye know they were twins, and if she was born in 1860, that's forty-four years ago."
"Oh, how smart you are about figures, Billy. I never could have thought of that. Forty-four is quite old, of course."
The two trudged along without saying anything for some minutes. Each one was busily thinking. Billy had a scheme he was pondering over, and Ruth was supposing. She did a great deal of supposing, "what if-ing" she and Lucia called it. What if some one knew where a doll like Henrietta could be bought, and what if some day as she was going to the store she should look down and find a silver dollar, a doll couldn't cost more than a dollar.
She stopped short and looked at the ground searchingly; it might be there at that very moment, and this might be the day when she would find it.
"What ye lookin' for?" asked Billy.
"Oh, nothing. I was just thinking what if I should find a silver dollar in the road."
"Pshaw!" exclaimed Billy. "That's foolishness."
"But people do find money sometimes."
"They don't so often when they're lookin' for it. I've often looked and I never found but a nickel in my life. No, sir, the only way you're sure of gettin' money is to work for it."
"I can't do that very well, and besides it would be much nicer to find it."
Billy did not answer; he seemed preoccupied. "There ain't much to carry home," he said. "I'll take it as far as the gate and then you can take it in. I want to see somebody before dark."
"One of the boys?" asked Ruth.
But there was no reply for by that time the store was reached.
This place was about a quarter of a mile from Miss Hester's small house which stood on the edge of the town upon a street which became a road just beyond. The town was not a large one. The houses stood far apart and many of them were surrounded by pretty gardens. In the centre of the town, just opposite the store and the post-office, stood Dr. Peaslee's house, a square brick building with as square a porch before the front door. The doctor was not married, and his mother, an invalid, was so rarely seen that most persons had forgotten her existence, and thought that a housekeeper held sway.
After leaving Ruth at the gate of their home, Billy retraced his steps, and, crossing the street when he came to the store, he went directly to Dr. Peaslee's door. The good doctor's mud-spattered buggy stood before the gate, so Billy knew that he should find the doctor at home, and he was not mistaken for he was in his office.
"Well, Billy boy," he exclaimed, looking up over his glasses, "what brings you here? Any one ill up your way? Not Miss Hester, I hope."
There was a little anxious ring in his tone.
"Nobody's sick," returned Billy. "I came over to consult you."
"About yourself? What's your particular indisposition, Mr. Beatty?"
The doctor and Billy had been good friends ever since that day when Billy had been picked up in the streets of the city and had wakened to consciousness to see the doctor's kind face bending over him.
"'Tain't nothin' the matter with me," returned Billy, grinning. "I'm all right."
"Don't want to be fashionable and part with your appendix?" asked the doctor fingering some sharp instruments which lay on the table before him.
Billy gave a little squirm but faced the doctor's glance sturdily. "I ain't achin' to be no subjick at a 'orspital," he returned. "I reckon the doctors kin learn their trade without foolin' with my in'ards."
The doctor laughed. "Well then, proceed to business. What's troubling you, governor?"
Billy looked down at the stubby toes of his shoes. He was thinking just how he would best conduct his system of inquiries. Presently he looked up and said: "You've known Aunt Hester a long time, haven't you, doctor?"
"Ever since we were smaller kids than you and Ruth."
Billy nodded. "Did you ever see them dolls her and her sister used to have, waxy ones, dressed in pink and blue?"
The doctor looked at him sharply and answered in a more reserved manner, "Yes, I remember them."
"Well, have you any idea who Miss Hester gave hers to? She said she didn't give it away till she was grown-up, and I thought maybe you might know."
The doctor drummed thoughtfully upon the arm of the desk chair which he had swung partly around toward Billy. "Why do you want to know?" he asked presently. "And why do you ask me?"
"Well, I knew you were an old friend; you've got the major's cane, you know, and I didn't know but you could tell something about the doll. This is why I want to know." And he launched forth into a tale of Ruth's trouble.
The doctor did not interrupt him, but at the close of the story, he muttered under his breath:
"Humph! That's just like a Petty." He looked Billy over with a smile. "See here, youngster," he said, "you were a wise little owl to come to me with that tale, for the fact is that I do know to whom Miss Hester gave that doll and I also happen to know that it is still in existence."
"Do you think the person that has it would sell it? I'd work all day Saturdays, all the time I mean from my regular chores, to pay for it. You haven't got any odd jobs to be done, have you, doctor? I'm real strong. Feel my muscle."
He spoke eagerly and stretched out an arm which in truth showed more muscle than flesh.
The doctor gravely responded to the invitation and nodded assent. "You'll do," he said. "Well, sir, I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll try to arrange the matter for you. I'll see about bargaining for the doll; I can probably make a better deal than you, and I'll have some jobs ready for you, if not here, somewhere. Now mind, I'm not sure that we can make the trade, but I'll see how the land lies, and if the doll can be given up without any hurt feelings or anything of that kind, we'll get it."
Billy's face beamed. "Thank you, sir," he said, getting up from his chair. "I just felt sure you could help a fellow out. Say," he paused after picking up his hat, "I heard the other day that it was one of them Pettys that's keepin' Miss Hester out of her house."
"See here, youngster," returned the doctor rising, "you see and hear too much. Such an old head as yours must have broader shoulders to carry it before you tackle such matters as that."
Billy stood still. "I guess maybe I have got an old head," he replied soberly. "I don't guess I ever was a baby. I don't remember any time when I didn't have to look after myself, and it's come kind of natural, so now it seems as if I ought to be lookin' after her when she's so good to me."
The doctor softly pinched the boy's ear. "That's all right, governor, but I reckon she has one or two friends that are not so old yet but that they can give an eye to Hester Brackenbury's affairs. You think about your lessons and your little chores and things, so that when the time comes for we old fellows to step out, you can step in. Oh, yes, when shall you come again? Let me see, this is Saturday. Come in Tuesday and I'll tell you if we're on the track of the doll."
Billy departed in high spirits.
The doctor looking after him said to himself, "Smart little rascal, keen as a razor, and, if I'm not mistaken, he's going to turn out to be Hester's right hand man. She'll make a good boy out of him if any one can."
And the doctor turned back to his desk.
Billy trotted home well satisfied with his call. He would not tell Ruth yet, but he chuckled as he thought of what a joyful surprise it would be to her if such a thing were to happen as that he could produce the doll in a blue frock. It must be confessed that there was a measure of feeling against Nora Petty which prompted him in being most energetic in trying to find the doll.
He had heard whispers of Miss Hester's transactions with the Pettys. It had been told him that old Mr. Petty had been the one to press his claim against Major Brackenbury's estate and that there were suspicions of there having been some sharp practice. It was known that the major, in his last years, was very forgetful, and, moreover, being an honest man himself, was too ready to trust others, so that he had not been as careful as he should have been in business matters.
The result of this was that after his death there were outlying debts which Miss Hester believed to have been paid, but for which no receipts could be found. Among these debts was a sum of money claimed by old Simon Petty. Miss Hester was sure her father had paid it, for it was a large amount, and she remembered hearing the major say one day that he would be clear of that debt before twenty-four hours were over.
Yet, when they came to look for the receipt, it could not be found, neither was any amount of money corresponding to that due, to be discovered remaining to the major's credit in bank or elsewhere. Every one felt that there was a fraud somewhere, but it could not be ferreted out, and, therefore, the old home passed into Simon Petty's hands and Miss Hester went to live in the little brown house.
It was the Sunday after Billy's call upon the doctor, that this gentleman overtook Miss Hester and the children on their way home from church.
The doctor was in his buggy. He checked his horse and called: "Jump in here, Hetty, and I'll take you home."
Miss Hester hesitated, but the doctor insisted saying, "I've something very important to talk to you about, and I don't know when I'll get another chance."
So Miss Hester left the children to go home together while she and the doctor drove off.
They must have taken a long way around, however, for the children had reached the house and were setting the table for dinner when the buggy stopped at the door. There was a little wistful smile on Miss Hester's face all during dinner, and she was evidently thinking of something besides the food upon her plate. The children thought it must be the sermon of which she thought and would have been rather surprised if they could have known that her old doll occupied her mind, and that the doll at that moment lay in a drawer in the doctor's desk.
It had been there many a year, and the doctor valued it highly, for had it not taken part in the adventures of little Hester Brackenbury and Tommy Peaslee, years before? Had it not often been taken a-nutting in the woods with the two, and once rescued from a watery grave by Tommy who could not stand Hester's tears and who got himself wet to the skin in his valiant effort to save the sinking doll? At another time had it not proved a benefactor when they had lost their way and a stream of sawdust from the doll's body served as a clue to lead them back to the right path? Hester's mother had restored the sawdust and had mended the leak so that this particular thinning out did not happen again. These and many more incidents came to Miss Hester's mind as she ate her dinner.
The last time she had seen her childhood's treasure was when Tommy went to college and had begged the doll as a mascot. "It will help to keep me straight, Hetty," he said, and she had given it to him laughing at his whim.
On his visits home, he had told her of the doll's honored place in his room, of the jokes of his fellow students concerning it, of how he had nearly fought some one because of it, and of how the scoffer had been made to offer an humble apology to Miss Doll as satisfaction.
She had never asked it back again. So many things had happened since; trouble had come to them both, and these two had never married because of them. So, on this Sunday morning, Dr. Tom Peaslee told Miss Hester of Billy's quest for her old doll and asked her if it would please her were he to give the doll to Billy for Ruth.
"It was dear of Billy to think of getting it," said Miss Hester. "Yes, Tom, if you can spare your mascot, it will give great happiness to little Ruth."
"I must confess that I still want it, old idiot that I am," he answered, "but Hester, the good luck I hoped it would bring seems never to be mine and so—"
"But you are greatly blessed, Tom," Miss Hester interrupted quickly. "You have a good practice and are so well beloved. Yes, you are greatly blessed."
"In all things but in a wife, Hester," said the doctor, sighing.
"Your mother is just the same?"
"Just the same; exacting, querulous, domineering, yet clinging to me and dependent upon me for all that makes life at all worthwhile to her. She is my mother, and we love each other."
"She needs you, Tom, just as my father needed me, and we have neither of us failed in our life-work. My two children are a great comfort to me."
"They are uncommonly nice little youngsters, considering how you happened to find them. I shall keep an eye on that boy," said the doctor. "He has a future before him, or I'm mistaken. I think it will be as well, perhaps, if I let him earn the doll."
Miss Hester agreed. "I want him to learn to be self-respecting. He has good instincts, is shrewd and ambitious; he continually astonishes me by exhibiting some new and very hopeful trait. I liked the way, at the first, that he was willing to go to school and be placed in the class with boys so much smaller, for he knew very little. He had learned to read, and is quick as lightning at figures, so he is fast pushing his way up into the higher classes."
"He's all right," commented the doctor. "I hope you will have as great satisfaction from that little mouse of a girl."
"Ruth, once her love is won, is the dearest child in the world," Miss Hester hastened to say. "I think she will be like a real daughter to me. Oh, yes, Tom, I shall be very happy to see her joy over the doll, and it is good of you to be willing to give it up, though we are too old now to be sentimental over such things."
The doctor sighed. "I have other treasures and memories, Hester, and most precious of all are the memories. I wish I could save you that everlasting needlework. I remember you always did hate buttonholes."
"They are a good discipline," returned Miss Hester, smiling. "I probably need them for my development. Won't you come in?"
The doctor declined. "God bless her," he murmured, as he drove away.
Miss Hester Meets an Old Acquaintance
ON Tuesday, Billy hied him forth again to the doctor.
When he returned, he had a package carefully tucked under his arm.
It was a mild day and Ruth was sitting on the steps with Stray in her lap. She had pinned a small shawl around him, and was now holding him like a baby, in which position, he seemed most comfortable.
Ruth looked up as Billy came in. "I am pretending that Stray is my child. He is the only doll I have now to play with," she said.
Billy laughed a little gleeful laugh as he stopped to look at the patient Stray whose brown paws hung helplessly outside the shawl. "He ain't got quite such a pretty complexion as your other doll," said Billy. "He's as dark as a Dago. Maybe he is one."
"Oh, no, he's not," returned Ruth, looking down, a little out of conceit with her baby.
"I'd rather play a dog was a dog," said Billy.
"Oh, no, you wouldn't, not if you were a girl and hadn't any doll. What would you do then?"
"I'd get one, with a blue dress on," answered Billy, going into the house laughing.
Ruth felt that this was an unnecessarily cruel taunt, and did not follow him. Great would have been her surprise if she had seen him enter Miss Hester's presence, joyfully holding out his package and crying: "I've got it, I've got it, and I'm goin' to work Saturdays, an hour every Saturday for a month, to pay for it. Ain't that fine? I tell ye Dr. Peaslee is a brick."
Miss Hester held out eager hands. "Let me see, Billy," she said.
He handed her the package which she carefully unwrapped and disclosed to view a doll about ten inches long, dressed in a faded blue frock. What memories it brought back to the gentle woman whose eyes filled with tears as she sat holding the doll in her hand. She said never a word, at which Billy wondered, but at last she drew a long sigh.
"It makes me remember so many things, Billy dear," she said. "I forgot where I was for the moment, for I went back to those old days when my father brought Henrietta and me our dolls, then later on there were so many things, so many things. Never mind, it is all over now. Where is Ruth, Billy? Are you going to give her the doll right away?"
"Yes, don't ye think I'd better? I certainly want to see her when she gets it. She's sittin' out on the steps nursin' Stray. She hadn't an idea what I had under my arm. I'll tell ye what let's do: Let's wait till supper time and then set the doll in her chair. I'll put a pile of books in it, and then won't she stare to see Miss Doll sittin' in her place?"
Miss Hester smiled assent and the two plotted together while Ruth sat outside on the steps watching the sun go down.
A golden afterglow was lighting up the sky when Billy came out to her.
"Supper's ready, Ruth," he said rubbing his hands together in a pleased manner. "Come on, hurry up, we're goin' to have somethin' good."
"Are we, really?" Ruth forgot that she was slightly miffed at Billy's former remark.
Billy nodded, and Ruth, unpinning the shawl from Stray, set him down on the ground where he stretched himself, wagged his tail and started off to find some exciting thing to do, after his hour of rest in Ruth's arms.
The kitchen in which they ate their meals, except on high days and holidays, was a comfortable place. A neat rag carpet covered the floor; there were white curtains at the windows, and, now that Miss Hester had lighted the lamp, there was a cheerful brightness in the room.
"Old Mrs. Perkins sent me a nice pot of apple-butter this morning, and some fresh sausage," said Miss Hester as Ruth came in. "We are going to have some of the apple-butter to-night and some of the sausage in the morning. I don't know any one who makes better apple-butter and sausage than she does. She used to send it to my father who always praised it highly, and now she seems to be keeping up the custom by sending it to me. Come, Ruth."
"Doesn't it look good?" said Billy viewing the dish with hungry eyes, "and it will taste as good as it looks, so spicy and sweet. Hallo, who's that sittin' in your chair, Ruth?"
Ruth, who had been sniffing the apple-butter from the other side of the table, went quickly to her place and gave a little scream of surprise and delight.
"Oh, Billy! Oh, Aunt Hester! Where did it come from? It is my dear Henrietta's twin sister, I am sure. Oh, how did you get her?"
"Ask Billy," said Miss Hester.
Ruth turned a questioning face toward Billy.
"You'll never guess," he said. "Dr. Peaslee got it for me."
"For you? Did you tell him? Oh, you dear Billy. Go on, tell me all about it."
"I got it for ye," said Billy, "and I am goin' to pay for it by workin' an hour on four Saturdays for the doctor. I am to rake leaves for him and do some clearin' out in his garden." He spoke in an off-hand manner. "Isn't she the very livin' image of the other one?"
Ruth examined the doll critically. "Yes, as near as could be. She has just a little different expression, but she is just as lovely. Oh, you dear Billy, how good you are to do this for me. I am so happy. I could never in the world do anything half so nice for you. If only you didn't hate to be kissed, I'd come right over there and kiss you. I'll hug you anyhow."
"Oh, now," began Billy, "that's just like a girl," though any one could see that he was not ill-pleased when Ruth rushed to him and gave him as mighty a hug as she was capable of.
The apple-butter was a thing of small consideration by the side of this wonderful thing that had happened, and Ruth had so many questions to ask about the how and why of it all that she ate very little supper and her eyes constantly traveled to the doll which she had sitting beside her in another chair, and she chattered so constantly about it, that her appreciation was good to see.
"Weren't you 'sprised and glad to see her again, Aunt Hester?" she asked. "I should think you would love to have her back again living in the same house with you. Do you suppose the person you gave her to was very sorry to give her up?"
"Rather sorry, I think," returned Miss Hester with a faint little flush coming to her cheeks.
"Maybe she needed the money more than the doll," Ruth consoled herself by saying. "Of course, as long as she must be a grown person now, she would be likely to want a new bonnet or frock, and that's why she was willing to sell the doll."
"I've a notion it was the doctor himself," said Billy, his mouth full of bread and apple-butter.
"Why, Billy Beatty, what in the world would he want with a doll?" exclaimed Ruth, surprised at such a suggestion. "Did he have it, Aunt Hester?"
"Why, my dear—" Aunt Hester began, when she was interrupted by a knock on the door, and Billy rushed tumultuously to answer, being very anxious to get back to the bread and apple-butter.
It was Dr. Peaslee himself who entered.
"Hallo!" he cried cheerily. "I was driving by and I thought I would drop in and see if this young man got home safely with his purchase. What's this? Apple-butter? I declare that takes me back to the old days, Hester, when we used to come back hungry from our romps in the woods and would make raids on the crock of apple-butter in the pantry. Do you remember how old Polly used to scold us because we always preferred that which Mrs. Perkins had sent and which Polly always reserved especially for the major?"
"And this is some of that very Mrs. Perkins's make," Miss Hester told him. "Sit down, Tom, and have some."
Glad as the children were to see him, and honored as they felt by his presence at their supper table, they were struck with consternation at the amount of apple-butter he consumed and considered that at that rate, the crock would last but a short time.
The doctor, catching sight of Billy's eyes fixed anxiously upon him as he helped himself to a fourth slice of bread which he lavishly spread with apple-butter, threw back his head and laughed.
"You think I've a pretty good appetite, don't you, governor?" he said. "This is positively my last slice. I have had a long ride 'way out in the country to see a sick woman and this is my first bite since breakfast."
He was as good as his word, and when he had finished he turned to Ruth and said, "You haven't told me how you like this young lady."
He picked up the doll and looked at it with such interest that Ruth said, "Was it really yours, doctor? Billy says he believes it was."
The doctor laughed. "Billy is too smart. Don't you think it would be rather funny for an old bachelor to be playing with dolls? Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies. The truth is, Miss Mouse, the person to whom it belonged would rather keep the ownership a secret."
Ruth looked a little disappointed; she would like to have had a history of the doll's career since it left Miss Hester's hands. She was too polite, however, to press the question and only said: "I am sure it was very nice of whoever it was to give it up to me, and I am very much obliged to you for getting it for Billy and me. I thought maybe she belonged to a lady who needed a new winter hat and that was why she was willing to sell the doll."
"I need a new winter hat, don't you think so?" said the doctor, drawing attention to his old felt hat the worse for wear, and trying to turn the subject.
"Yes, but you can buy one whenever you want. All you have to do is to go to the bank and they will give you the money."
The doctor laughed. "That's your idea of it, is it?"
"Why, of course. All gentlemen have money in the bank," she answered confidently.
The doctor laughed again. "Then I suppose if I want to keep up my reputation for being a gentleman, I'd better not contradict you," he said.
"What would you name the doll?" asked Ruth, changing the subject to one with which she was more familiar.
"How do you like Little Mascot?"
Ruth considered this very seriously. "I don't think I quite like that," she decided.
Then lest she might be hurting his feelings, she hastened to say: "I think what you call Aunt Hester sometimes is a pretty name."
"What do I call her?"
"Hetty. I'd like to call her that, I think."
"Then suppose you do. I'm sure that will satisfy us all."
And so Hetty was the name decided upon.
"It seems to me she needs a new frock," suggested the doctor.
"A blue one," Ruth agreed.
"Yes, that should be the color. Some day I'll take you down-town and we'll buy the stuff for one, then Miss Hester can help you make it."
Ruth looked at Miss Hester wistfully. "But she has to sew so much," she said, "though now I can wear Henrietta's clothes, there is not so much to do for me, and Billy's overcoat is all done, and it looks fine."
Miss Hester colored up a little and said: "Never mind about that, Ruth."
The doctor grumbled something about its being a crying shame to cheat a woman, and after that, he and Aunt Hester went into the living-room while Ruth and Billy washed the dishes, Hetty sitting well propped up on a chair watching them.
Once in a while the children caught the words, "old Petty" and "Squire Field," and knew that the two in the other room must be talking either about the lost receipt or the government claim.
"When we get back to the old house," said Ruth, as she washed the last plate, "we can have apple-butter every night for supper and the doctor can come and have all he wants, but I wish he had had his dinner to-day," she added.
"So do I," said Billy, with feeling.
"Oh, you dear beautiful love," Ruth turned to Hetty. "You are going to have a lovely new frock some day. Oh, Billy, don't you just love Dr. Peaslee?"
"He's fine," responded Billy. "Maybe I'll be a doctor, Ruth, if I don't keep a store."
"Oh, I'd rather you'd keep the store," decided Ruth, "for then you won't ever have to go without your dinner."
The doctor stayed for an hour or more and then it was bedtime for Ruth. She would fain have taken Hetty to bed with her, but at the dreadful suggestion from Billy that she might roll over on her in the night, she concluded that Hetty would be safer elsewhere, so a bed was made for her on a chair by Ruth's bedside so that she could be near at hand.
"I thought of taking her up to see poor Henrietta," Ruth told Miss Hester, "but then I thought she might feel too badly to see how dreadful she looks after all these years, and so I am not going to let her know where she is. Please, Aunt Hester, I want to say God bless Billy over again. I didn't say it slowly enough, and maybe He'll think I didn't mean it."
So she added to her prayer: "Please God, bless Billy a great deal more than you did before and make him grow up to be like Dr. Peaslee, only let him keep a store, please."
She was not usually so expansive, and Miss Hester realized that her heart was very full, and that into it she had taken for all time, not only herself, but Billy Beatty and Dr. Peaslee.
A Surprise Party
THE news was soon noised abroad among Ruth's playmates that she had another doll "zackly like Henrietta," and, because there was some mystery about it as well as because the doll was unlike others of the period, Hetty was quite a belle for a time, though Ruth determined never to take her to school again, lest Nora's spite should work her ill.
She did take her over to Annie Waite's one day where she found Nora, who, with some other little girls, had been invited to spend the afternoon. Perceiving her enemy, Ruth ran home again after a whispered consultation with Annie. Nora looked rather shamefaced when Ruth returned without her doll, but she said nothing, and, as Annie lent Ruth one of her dolls to play with, every one was supplied.
This was really a surprise party for Ruth, for Annie had found out that it was her birthday, and, knowing that Miss Hester could not very well afford parties, had begged her mother to let her have a simple little affair with Ruth as guest of honor.
It was a great occasion for Ruth who did not remember ever having a party before, and she was quite overcome when she came back and found that both Annie and Lucia had provided gifts for her.
Lucia gave her a box of candy temptingly tied up in white paper with blue ribbons, and Annie gave her a doll prettily dressed and small enough to carry in her pocket while Charlotte Bingham brought her a big bunch of chrysanthemums.
"Let's dress up," proposed Annie, suddenly, when they were at the end of their resources, having played "Mother" and "Old Witch" and a dozen other things. "I'll get sister to let us have some of her old things and we'll be ladies."
"No, let's be queens," put in Lucia.
"We don't all want to be queens," returned Annie. "It would be funny to have so many; some ought to be maids of honor."
"Then we'll choose a queen. I vote for Ruth; it's her birthday."
"I vote for her, too," chimed in Annie.
"Humph!" exclaimed Nora, tossing her head. "I don't then. I reckon I'm not going to be maid to any cha—"
"You just hush," cried Lucia, putting her hand over Nora's mouth. "She is just as good as you are and a great deal better. Her grandfather never—" she paused, for she realized that it was very rude to quarrel with Annie's guests. So she turned and said: "I'll tell you what we'll do, Annie; we'll have two queens. You and I will be Ruth's maids of honor, and the others can choose their queen, then we can go on splendid journeys to visit each other."
"All right," agreed the rest. "That will be fine. We'll choose you, Nora," said Angeline McBride, "won't we, Charlotte?"
Charlotte consented and Annie rushed off to get the proper trappings for their play. Her sister, Isabel, always had a store of these on hand for just such occasions, so presently, Annie returned with her arms piled high with all sorts of stuff; old velveteen skirts, discarded evening wraps, scarfs, shawls and jackets. She threw these down in a heap on the lounge.
"Now help yourselves," she said. "Queens take first choice, maids next. Go ahead, Ruth, and pick out what you want."
"I'm just as much a queen as she is," grumbled Nora.
"But Ruth was the first chosen," argued Lucia.
"I don't care if she was. I won't play if I can't have first choice," pouted Nora who had her eye on a blue velvet skirt.
"Oh, let her choose first if she wants to," said Ruth, with some disdain. "She'll need the best things she can get to make her look like anybody," she said in an aside to Lucia.
Lucia giggled and Nora shot them an angry look, but began to turn over the things on the lounge selecting this, discarding that till finally Lucia broke in with, "Here, here, you can't do that way, Nora. Can she, Annie? She is picking out the very best things and isn't leaving anything for any one else. She can't wear two velvet skirts."
"No, that's not the way," said Annie, seeing how things were going. "You can only choose one thing at a time."
Nora protested but was over-ruled by the others, so she stood undecided between a blue velveteen skirt and a red fur-trimmed cloak, finally deciding upon the former and Ruth was awarded the cloak.
Nora's next choice fell upon a pink silk waist while Ruth chose a dim old brocaded skirt with golden lights through it.
At this, Nora had cast a contemptuous look, but in it Ruth saw possibilities and added to her choice a pale green waist and a floating scarf. She found, too, a gold crown which fitted her little head and some dazzling ornaments.
It took some time to select, and then the two queens with their finery, carried by their maids, took possession of different rooms. There was some squabbling as to who should be the visiting queen, but finally Nora carried the day.
When she entered Ruth's presence, however, she was sorry she had not elected to remain in her own kingdom, for Ruth, seated upon a gilt chair which was mounted upon a window-box covered with rugs, arose to meet her in such magnificence as quite crushed Nora for the moment. Upon her head glittered the crown, her rippling chestnut hair falling below it, a gold embroidered scarf floated from her shoulders while the red fur-trimmed cloak swept as a long train far behind her, opening in front to show the brocaded skirt. Around her waist was a jeweled belt and in her hand she held a sceptre which Miss Isabel had hastily prepared for her from a stick and some gold paint.
Nora's rather short blue velvet train was held up by Charlotte. Her pink waist looked somewhat dowdy and contrasted badly with the blue skirt. She wore no crown upon her head, only a chiffon hat trimmed with mussed flowers, and the cloak which she wore, being of a terra-cotta hue, gave a combination of colors which was anything but pleasant to look upon.
"Doesn't she look a sight?" whispered Lucia.
Ruth nodded and then swept to meet her guest with a haughtiness which was not all put on.
Nora tried to courtesy, but in doing so bumped against Charlotte who still held the train, and the two tumbled over together to the amusement of the rest.
"I think it is a silly, horrid play," cried Nora, picking herself up, "and I'm not going to be in it."
"I shouldn't think you would want to be," said Lucia, scornfully.
And Nora dashed from the royal presence in anything but a dignified manner.
"The idea of her trying to look like a queen," said Lucia, loftily. "She looks more like an old crazy woman. Now Ruth is just as queenly as anything. Isn't she fine, Angeline? She knew just what would look well."
"She does look nice," Angeline confessed.
Ruth extended her sceptre. "You may ask a favor of us," she said after the manner of a fairy queen she had read about. "Your wish shall be granted."
Angeline laughed. "I don't believe you could grant many wishes."
"Oh, let's just pretend," put in Annie.
"Well, I wish for a pony."
"We will conduct our guest to the royal stable and let her select for herself," said Ruth, quick to perceive a toy horse in the closet at the end of the room, for this, being the playroom, held the children's toys. She walked with great stateliness across the floor and flung open the closet door, disclosing a horse and cart, a horse on wheels and a tin affair with two horses abreast dragging a fire-engine.
The girls shrieked with laughter, but Ruth turned a grave countenance upon them. "Oh, do pretend," she said. "What's the use of playing if we don't make-believe? You mustn't laugh that way; it keeps it from being real."
But as no one possessed sufficient imagination to see anything but the funny side of it, Angeline's wish was not granted.
"I wonder what's become of Charlotte and Nora," said Annie. "They went back to my room to take off their hats and things."
"I don't believe they are going to play queen any more," said Angeline.
"We might have tableaux or charades," suggested Lucia.
"I'll go find the others and tell them," said Annie. "You be picking out a play while I'm gone."
They were talking the matter over when Annie returned with her two missing guests.
"We are going to play robbers or something and carry off a lovely lady to a cave," announced Lucia. "Ruth's the smallest and she'll be the easiest to carry."
"Oh, I think that's line," said Annie. "What will you be, Lucia?"
"I am going to be the young knight who rescues her."
"And I'll be the chief of the robber band," said Nora, "or maybe I'll be the old woman that's always ready to receive the prisoners; you know there is always one like that in the stories."
Annie, Charlotte and Angeline, therefore, resolved themselves into a band of robbers and Ruth in her queenly robes was dragged off unmercifully.
Annie's room became the robber's den and the closet therein the special corner where the princess was bestowed. It was a large light closet with a transom over the door and held, besides clothing, a trunk and several boxes.
"Now, don't you let any one come and take away our prisoner or steal our treasure," ordered the robbers, when Ruth had been safely disposed in the den.
"Shall we bind her hand and foot?" asked Charlotte.
"Oh, yes," Nora was ready to add anything she could to Ruth's discomfort. She had quite enjoyed the process of dragging Ruth to the den and treating her harshly.
"No, we won't bind her," Annie decided. "It will be too uncomfortable; it's bad enough to shut her up."
"So then, Ayesha," said Lucia, addressing Nora, "we will go and hunt wild beasts. Guard the prisoner well and you shall have part of the ransom."
With this the three stalked off leaving Nora in possession.
With Ruth safe under lock and key, and, the knight not to be expected just yet, for there was to be a fight on the borders of the forest before he could arrive, Nora found it rather stupid in Annie's room. Upon the bed lay Ruth's red coat which Nora secretly admired. She tried it on and viewed herself in the glass. She filled out the coat more than Ruth did and considered that she looked vastly better in it.
Tired of admiring herself, she turned to something else to amuse her. There was the daintily wrapped box which Lucia had given Ruth, and which she had begged Ruth not to open till she reached home. Nora's curiosity got the better of her. She would like to see just what was in it. Listening all the while, she stealthily untied the blue ribbons and lifted the lid. The candies looked delicious. She took out one and smelled it. Just then the robbers came clamoring up and she hastily threw Ruth's coat over box and lid.
"Is all well, Ayesha?" asked Annie in a gruff voice.
"All's well," she answered, her heart beating fast.
"There are no skulking thieves about to rob us of our gains?"
"No, sir," returned Nora, cringingly.
"She actually acts as if she were afraid of us," laughed Angeline, who with fierce burned cork eyebrows and mustache looked quite terrible.
"Guard our cave well; there are plunderers about," charged Annie. "Come, comrades, we must to the chase."
"Let no one so much as put a foot across the sill, my honest Ayesha," said Angeline. "We can trust you with our treasures but no one else. If so much as a dog approaches, drive him out." And they clattered off again.
Nora listened till they were out of hearing, then she lifted the coat and drew forth the box.
She could not resist popping one very fat chocolate into her mouth; it would never be missed. It tasted very good. She wished that it were her birthday and that some one had brought her such a box of candy. She shook the box a little and some of the pieces being disarranged the lid would not shut down tightly. Nora could not set aside the opportunity which this gave her. One tall and toothsome piece of candy seemed to be the specially annoying one which prevented the lid from fitting. She would eat that and even then the box would look full.
But just as she had slipped it into her mouth a voice from somewhere above her—it sounded in mid-air—said mockingly, "Honest Ayesha!"
Overcome with fright, Nora dropped the box on the bed and the contents rolled out.
"Let me out! Let me out, you mean piggy child," came from the top of the closet, and looking up, Nora saw Ruth's face at the transom. She had piled up some of the boxes upon the trunk, and had climbed upon them to peep through, thinking to surprise Nora, which she very effectually had done.
"Let me out this minute," she cried, "or I will tell on you."
"Oh, please don't," begged Nora overcome with shame. "I—I—was only just going to taste them; they looked so good."
"Oh, I saw you," declared Ruth. "I saw you when you opened the box and when you tried on my coat that you pretend you don't like; you seemed to think you looked very fine in it."
"Oh, Ruth, please don't tell the others," whimpered Nora.
"Let me out then so I can pick up my candies. I don't want you to touch another one. Hurry up now, or the others will be back."
Thus admonished, Nora unlocked the door, and Ruth, with a haughtiness to which the costume added effect, swept past her. She carefully replaced the candies, tied up the box and put it on a shelf in the closet.
"I don't dare trust you," she told Nora. "You are just the one to play at being a robber, only you don't have to play at it. You needn't lock me in; I'll stay, for I don't like your company."
Nora was quite crushed.
Ruth had her in her power, and, though she inwardly raged, she knew that words would only bring future mortification to her. She was very sure that Ruth would not tell, though there was no reason that she should not, she was obliged to acknowledge, and her thoughts were far from agreeable.
She did not have long to sit in silence for presently the robbers came storming back, followed by the rescuing knight who slew then; one by one, so that they fell in a limp heap just inside the door, and, with no sort of protest from the guarding Ayesha, Ruth was delivered from her imprisonment.
At this moment came word that certain good things were ready to be served in the dining-room, so there was much flurry in getting rid of superfluous garments, burned cork mustaches and such things. In the confusion and hurry, no one noticed Nora's extremely meek demeanor nor Ruth's contemptuous looks.
It was, however, an occasion which neither one ever forgot, and Ruth's former dislike to Nora was increased that day for more than one reason. After this, Nora no longer openly annoyed her, but, in fact, tried to avoid her and consequently there were more peaceful times at school for Ruth.
However, she did not refrain from expressing her scorn of Nora to Billy when she reached home after her surprise party.
"She is a piggy child," she said. "She looked all over the plate of cake and took the best piece, and she did the same way when the grapes were passed; she took the biggest, nicest bunch. All the girls noticed it. She may call me a charity child if she likes but I call her a piggy child. Aunt Hester tells us it is ill-bred to act so greedily. Lucia and Annie never do so; they always leave the best for others. Nora is a piggy child and I never want to have anything to do with her."
Truth to tell, circumstances soon arose which forbade Ruth for a long time having more to do with any of her schoolmates, for there were changes in store for her.
A Strange Visitor
IT was the next day after her surprise party that Ruth was running after Stray who had wriggled under the gate and had scampered down the street with Ruth in hot pursuit and calling:
"Stray, Stray, naughty dog, come back."
The little girl knew that he would probably come back in his own good time, but she and Billy did not like him to associate with certain evilly disposed curs around in the next street, and moreover, he was still such a little fellow, ready to make friends with any one who encouraged a friendship, that they were afraid he might be picked up and carried off. Fast though Ruth's legs hurried, Stray's four carried him faster, but his career came to a full stop when a man coming in an opposite direction caught him and held him fast till Ruth ran up panting.
"Oh, thank you for catching Stray," she said. "He is only in fun, of course, but we don't like him to get into the next street; there are so many bad dogs there."
"And you must look out for his morals," returned the man, lifting himself from where he was bending over holding the squirming Stray. "What's your name?" he asked sharply and dropping his jocose tone while he bent a keen look upon the child.
"Ruth Henrietta Brackenbury," came the reply promptly enough.
The man drew in his breath sharply. "Ruth," he said, "that was her name too, and I think she would have looked much like you."
"Your little girl, do you mean? Is she—is she dead?" Ruth asked.
"I am afraid so."
"Oh, don't you know?"
The man shook his head and walked along by Ruth's side as she dragged the unwilling Stray toward home. "Do you live near here?" he asked presently.
"Yes, just around the corner. We used to live in that big house," she nodded toward the white pillars which showed between the russet brown leaves of the oaks.
"And why did you leave there?" asked the man pleasantly.
"The major died, and Aunt Hester didn't have enough money to live there, so she and Billy and I came to the little brown house. It is a nice little house, only it isn't very big."
"Billy is your brother?"
"No, not exactly; he is almost though," returned Ruth a little doubtfully. She did not want to seem to deny Billy. "His name is Billy Beatty," she added.
"I suppose then he is a nephew of your aunt as you are her niece."
"Yes." Ruth felt that this was quite the truth.
"Your aunt's name is Brackenbury, then, or is it Beatty?" asked the man abruptly after a few minutes' silence.
"It is Brackenbury." Ruth wondered at the many questions. "This is where I live," she told him when they had reached the gate. "Goodbye. Thank you very much for helping me catch Stray."
Then, as the man stood looking at her with that same searching expression, she felt impelled to ask: "What was your little girl's name?"
"It wasn't my own little girl of whom I was thinking, but of the child of my dead brother, my little niece, Ruth Mayfield, who might well have looked like you."
Very pale and with eyes burning, Ruth backed away, then turned and fled into the house giving but one backward fearful look. The man looked after her thoughtfully for a moment and then slowly moved away.
Ruth ran through the kitchen to her own little room which opened out of it. She took off her hat and coat and threw them on the bed; then she crowded herself behind a chair into a corner as if she would get out of sight of and as far away as possible from every one. She felt much as she did when a certain bad dream haunted her. In it she was always fleeing from a crazy man who pursued her with a sword. She was troubled and afraid. Mayfield, that was her own name before she had been given that of Brackenbury. She crouched in her corner thinking, thinking.
Who was this man? Not her father, of course, because he had said it was his niece of whom she reminded him. Any relatives that she might have had she remembered but vaguely. She had a dim recollection of a grandmother, of a Christmas day when she was about three years old and when uncles and aunts had given her presents, but a child forgets such things very soon, and relationships are difficult to grasp at a tender age.
Of course, this man might be her own uncle or perhaps there were other little Ruth Mayfields in the world. At all events, she determined to say nothing about the man to Miss Hester or Billy, for a great fear was in her heart that he might want to take her away. If he did attempt such a thing and she were warned of it, she reflected that she would hide somewhere till he gave up the search.
She sat long in her corner pondering over these dreadful possibilities till it began to grow dusk and she heard Miss Hester stirring about the kitchen, making ready for supper. Then duty called her; she must set the table, and she crept out blinking as she faced the light in the room.
"What a little mouse you have been. Were you asleep, Ruth?" said Miss Hester as she came in.
"No, Aunt Hester," returned the child soberly, "I was only thinking."
"You were so quiet that I didn't even know you were in the house. How long have you been in? I was just thinking of sending Billy to hunt you up. No wonder Dr. Peaslee calls you Miss Mouse, you slip around just like one."
"I've been in—oh, I don't know just how long. It wasn't a bit dark when I came."
"I saw you running after Stray and that was my last glimpse of you."
"I came right back; pretty soon I mean, and then I came in the house after I had shut Stray in the wood-shed. I must go let him out, poor doggie. He was so miserable, Aunt Hester, for he knew he was being punished for running away."
Just then Billy came in, Stray at his heels. The dog nosed Ruth fawningly with much wagging of tail and twisting of body as if trying to become on good terms with her again. Presently a knock at the front door sent Billy to answer.
He came back directly. "A gentleman wants to see you, Aunt Hester," he reported.
Ruth started and looked around tremblingly. "What does he look like?" she whispered when Miss Hester had left the room.
"I couldn't see very well," Billy answered.
"Was he tall, and did he wear a gray overcoat? Oh, Billy—" She paused.
"What's the matter? You look like something was after you," said Billy.
"Maybe something is," returned Ruth.
"Oh, you silly," Billy spoke contemptuously. "Do you hear a mouse, or what is the matter?"
"No, I don't hear anything, but—oh, never mind, I'll tell you some time."
"You girls are always getting up some mystery," said the boy. "Say, I'm awful hungry, and that man is stayin' the mischief of a time. What do you suppose he wants?"
Ruth hesitated, then she fixed her solemn eyes upon Billy. "He wants me, I expect," she said impressively.
Billy gave her a look. "Say, look here, what are you up to? Is it some sort of make-believe like you and Lucia are always playing?"
"No, it isn't. Come over here by the wood-box, Billy, and I'll tell you if you promise not to breathe it to a soul."
"All right. Fire ahead."
"Cross your heart you won't tell."
Billy went through the ceremony with due solemnity, and then Ruth poured forth her surprising story ending with, "And so, I'm awfully afraid he has come to take me away."
"Maybe he's got loads of money," returned the practical Billy. "And maybe he's got a fine house and a horse and carriage and all that."
"Oh, I don't believe that, and anyhow, do you suppose if he has that I would want to leave Aunt Hester?" The same passionate love and loyalty that Ruth had given her mother she was beginning to bestow upon Miss Hester. "Besides," she went on, "I'm named Brackenbury now, and I can't have two names any more."
"Oh, well, don't let's suppose any more till we know for sure," said Billy. "Perhaps it isn't the same man at all, and, if it is, perhaps he wouldn't want you to leave here. Say, don't let's wait for her to come out to supper. I'm half-starved and we won't have time for our lessons before bedtime if we don't begin soon. You can keep the tea hot, can't you?"
"Yes, of course. We might eat our supper, I suppose, and then we can wash up the dishes we have soiled and let Aunt Hester's stand."
This they concluded to do, and it was well they did, for nearly two hours passed before the door closed behind the stranger, and the children had finished studying their lessons when Miss Hester returned to them.
Billy was nodding over his spelling-book but Ruth's eyes were big and bright. She put down her geography and ran to Miss Hester, clasped her waist and looked up into her face with pleading eyes. Miss Hester stooped to kiss her, but she gave no explanation of her visitor's errand.
"You ate your supper?" she said. "That was right. I didn't realize how late it was."
She drunk a cup of tea and ate a bit of bread as if she were not aware of what she was doing, her face very thoughtful meanwhile. After her meal, she sat still lost in thought, Ruth watching her furtively.
Presently Miss Hester roused herself. "It is time you children were in bed," she said. "Run along, Billy, you look sleepy enough to drop off on the stairs. Come, Ruth."
She arose to give Billy his good-night kiss after which he stumbled up the stairway, and then she sat down again and held out her arms to Ruth who threw herself into them and hid her face. "You knew, my little girl, didn't you?" said Miss Hester, softly. "I saw that you did as soon as I came in."
Ruth's arms went tight around her neck. "Will he take me away? Will he, Aunt Hester?" she began to sob. "Oh, don't let him. Don't."
Miss Hester drew a long sigh, and held the child closer. "It is a difficult question, my little girl," she said.
"But—but, I am your own little girl. I am named Brackenbury. You said so. You told me you were just exactly the same as my mother and my mother wouldn't let me go. Oh, no, she would never have done it."
"And I shall not, if I can help it, dear. We will not talk of it to-night. I am to see your uncle again. One thing is sure, you shall not leave me unless you are willing to go."
"Then I never will." Ruth pressed her cheek against Miss Hester's. "I am yours, yours, your little girl, and nobody else's. My name is Ruth Henrietta Brackenbury. It is. It is."
"It surely is. Come, do not think about it any more to-night. You shall stay with me always, always, if after your uncle has talked to you it seems to be the thing that you most want to do."
Ruth felt sure that no amount of talking could shake her decision, and, if it depended upon herself, she need have no fears, so she felt comforted. "He is my real uncle then," she said.
"Yes, I think there is no doubt of it. Come, come, you must go to bed. Billy is probably asleep before this."
But though to bed Ruth went, it was not to go to sleep. Her eyes seemed propped wide open. There were a hundred questions she wanted to ask, and she was sure that she could never wait till morning to ask them. She heard the rockers of Miss Hester's chair going squeaky-squeak, squeaky-squeak upon a loose board in the floor. She wondered if she were at work upon the buttonholes she disliked so much, or what she was doing.