CHAPTER ITHE BACK YARD
It was a queer jumbled up place, that back yard of the house where Cassy and Jerry Law lived; old barrels tumbled to pieces in one corner, empty tomato cans rolled against cast-off shoes in another; here bits of broken crockery wedged themselves in between a lot of shingles, and there a pile of iron scraps crowded against a bottomless chair; on a clothes-line flapped several pairs of overalls and a stunted little tree bore upon its branches sundry stockings of various sizes and conditions.
It was a discouraging looking place, but Cassy, intently bending over a pile of dirt near the bottomless chair, did not heed anything but the fact that two tiny green shoots were poking themselves up from the unpromising soil. She was a thin-faced, bright-eyed child, not pretty,but with an eager, wistful expression, and as her face lit up with a sudden smile she looked unusually intelligent.
“Jerry, come here,” she cried; “I’ve got a garden.”
“Sho!” returned Jerry, “I don’t believe it.”
“I have so; just you come and look at it.” Cassy tossed back the locks of brown hair that hung over her eyes and softly patted with her two small hands the dry earth around the springing blades of green. Jerry came nearer. “It’s truly growing,” Cassy went on. “I didn’t stick it in the ground myself to make believe; just see.”
Jerry bent his sandy-colored head nearer to the object of his sister’s admiration.
“’Tain’t nothin’ but a old weed,” he decided at last.
“How do you know?”
“I just believe it.”
“Well, you don’t know, and I think it is just as good to believe it will grow to be a beautiful flower.”
“I wouldn’t count on that,” Jerry said.
“Why not?”
“’Cause.”
“But just maybe,” Cassy insisted pleadingly. “Why couldn’t it? I don’t see why not.”
“’Cause,” repeated Jerry, “I never saw no flowers growing in this back yard.”
“But Mrs. Boyle has some right next door, and oh, Jerry, Mrs. Schaff across the street has some great big lovely red ones. Please let’s hope this will be a flower.”
“Well,” replied Jerry, doubtfully, “I’ll pretend, but if it isn’t, you mustn’t say: Now, Jerry, what made you let me believe in it?”
“I won’t; I truly won’t.”
“All the same,” said Jerry, “I don’t see how you can keep it from being trampled on.”
Cassy looked alarmed.
“You see it’s right out here where anybody can pull it up or do anything. Billy Miles would rather tear it to pieces than not if he thought you wanted to keep it.”
Cassy’s distress increased. “Couldn’t we hide it or something?”
“We might for a little while, but if it should grow and grow why then anybody could find it out.”
“Oh, dear,” sighed Cassy, “it’s like Moses when they had to put him in the bulrushes. Maybe it will be a little wee bit of a flower and after a while we could come and dig it up and set it in the window. I know what I’ll do; I’ll set that old chair over it and then maybe nobody will notice it.”
“There’s a piece of chicken wire off over there,” said Jerry, good-naturedly. “I’ll get that and sort of twist it around the chair, then it will make a fence for it. Sh! There’s Billy, and if he sees us he will play the mischief with any fun of ours.”
Cassy arose hastily to her feet and faced the back door from which Billy’s form was just issuing. There was no love lost between Billy and the Law children.
“What yer doin’?” questioned Billy, looking suspiciously at Cassy’s defiant attitude.
“Nothin’.”
“Humph! I don’t believe ye.”
Cassy spread out her hands.
“Well, see, am I doing anything? Did you think I was eating strawberries or swinging in a hammock?”
“You’re too smart,” returned Billy. He came over and peered around. “You’ve got somethin’ in among those cans.”
Cassy tossed up her chin.
“You’re welcome to all you find in them.”
Billy turned one over with his foot, looked among the scraps of iron and then said:
“You’re just bluffin’, but I’ll find out.” And he climbed the fence into the next yard.
As soon as his stout legs had disappeared Cassy whirled the old chair around till it stood over her treasured plant. Jerry disengaged the strip of chicken wire from its surroundings and contrived a sort of coop-like structure which did not attract the eye, yet kept the small green shoots safely hidden without excluding the light and air.
“Now let’s go tell mother,” said Cassy, and took to her heels, Jerry following.
Up the shabby dark stairway they ran, Cassy stepping lightly, Jerry, boy-like, with clattering tread. Mrs. Law glanced up from her sewing as they entered. “We’ve got a garden,” said Cassy in a loud whisper.
“What do you mean?” inquired her mother, breaking off her thread with a snap.
“We have truly,” Cassy insisted. “It’s under an old chair in the back yard.”
“That’s a queer place for a garden,” responded her mother, rethreading her needle and taking swift stitches.
“Yes, but it happened itself, you know, and so we have to have it there. We’re so afraid Billy Miles will pull it up. Jerry thinks maybe it’s a weed, but we’re going to hope it’s a flower, a real flower. What would you like it to be, mother, a rose?”
“I’m afraid that would be setting my hopes too high. Let me see, perhaps it might be a morning-glory.”
“Are they pretty, morning-glories?”
“Yes, very.”
“What color?”
“All colors, but the common ones are generally purple or blue.”
“I’d like them to be blue. What do they look like?”
“They grow on a vine, and the flowers are little vase-like cups that open first thing in themorning and close when the sun shines on them.”
“But they open the next day?”
“No, not the same flower, but others do. They bloom very freely, although each one lasts only a little while.”
“Do they smell sweet?”
“I never noticed that they did.”
Cassy was not entirely satisfied with this description and sat very still thinking about it. After awhile she broke out with: “You don’t think it could be any other kind of a flower?”
“Oh, I didn’t say so. Of course it might be. We can tell very soon. I know the leaves of a morning-glory, and when I get time I will go down and look at your plant. Yes, I know morning-glories well enough. There used to be a great mass of them over the back fence where we used to live; all colors, blue and pink and lovely white ones striped. I used to think they were very beautiful.” She sighed and worked faster. “Don’t go out, Jerry,” she said presently. “This work must go home this evening.”
“May I go with Jerry?” asked Cassy.
Her mother hesitated and then replied, “Yes, but don’t stay.”
Spring was well on its way as open windows and doorsteps swarming with children showed, but in this narrow street there were no perfume-laden airs; it seemed instead that all the foul odors were made more evident by the warmer weather, and as the brother and sister made their way through the slovenly groups of loungers, there was little to make them realize the beauty of a world where green trees and sweetly smelling orchards made the heart glad.
They took their way along soberly enough, Jerry lugging the big bundle and his sister trotting along by his side. From the narrow street they turned into a broader one where shops of all kinds were arrayed along the way. Into one of these the children turned, delivered their bundle and hurried out. They never tarried long at the place, for they did not feel comfortable under the old Jew’s sharp eyes, and did not enjoy being stared at by the two big boys who were always there, too.
“We did hurry,” said Cassy when they reached the corner. “And see, Jerry, there are treeswith tiny green leaves on them behind that wall. I have always wanted so much to see what was behind that wall. Do you believe you could climb it?”
“Yes, ’course I could, but the cops wouldn’t let me.”
“I do want to know so much,” repeated Cassy wistfully. “There is a gate, you know, but it’s boards, and it’s always shut tight. Can’t we walk around that way now? It won’t take us long and it’s so much nicer than the other way.”
“I don’t know why,” said Jerry. “Brick walls ain’t so awful pretty.”
“No, but the trees are getting green; little bits of baby leaves are coming out on them and we can see them above the wall. Let us go that way.”
“All right,” agreed Jerry.
They trotted along till the brick wall was reached and then Cassy exclaimed excitedly: “Oh, Jerry, I believe the gate is open; there is a man there with a wheelbarrow. Oh, do hurry.”
She ran forward as fast as her legs would carry her and sure enough the gate was open and beyond it smiled such a garden as Cassy had neverbefore seen. Tulips, red and yellow, flaunted themselves in their little round beds, daffodils nodded sunnily from the borders, primroses and pansies, flowering bush and early shrub were all in bloom. Cassy drew a long breath of delight. Was ever anything ever so beautiful? Her eager little face was bent forward and her big eyes were taking in the whole scene when the gardener came out trundling his wheelbarrow.
“Take care, sis,” he warned, “don’t stand in the way.”
“Oh!” Cassy exclaimed, scarcely noticing what he said. “Oh, isn’t it beautiful?”
The gardener smiled.
“’Tain’t so bad. You can step inside the gate out of the way, if you want to.”
“And Jerry, too?” Cassy asked as her brother came up.
The gardener looked suspiciously at Jerry. He had reasons for not thinking well of small boys.
“He’d better stay outside,” he said; but seeing Cassy’s disappointed face he yielded. “If you’ll keep right there by the gate I guess you’ll do noharm,” he told Jerry, and the two children stepped inside.
Such a waft of sweet odors as met them, and such a glory of color. The gardener glanced at Cassy’s rapt face as he trundled in his last load of sand, and he looked pleased.
“You like it pretty well, don’t you?” he said. “If I had time I’d show you about, but I’ve got to get some plants potted before night, and I’ve got to shut the gate now,” he added regretfully.
Cassy turned slowly, her eyes still lingering upon the borders.
“She’s wanted to see the inside of this place more’n anything,” Jerry confided to the gardener as Cassy’s steps lagged, “but the gate ain’t ever been open before.”
“Then I’m glad it happened to be this time when you were by,” said the gardener heartily. “Some day if you happen to see me when I’ve got time I’ll take you all over the garden.”
“Oh, thank you, sir, thank you. I’d love that. Have you any morning-glories?”
The man laughed.
“No, pesky things; they grow so fast that they’d get the best of me in no time; though,now I think of it, there were some by the kitchen door last year. The cook planted them, and I guess they’ll come up again this summer too plentiful for my use. Do you like ’em, sis?”
“I never saw any,” Cassy told him. “But I want to.”
She turned away as the gardener made ready to shut the gate, and all the way home she had scarcely a word to say. “It was like the garden of Eden,” she said under her breath once.
“I think he might have given us some flowers,” said Jerry.
“Maybe he couldn’t,” returned Cassy. “They aren’t his. I think he was very good to let us go in. Oh, Jerry, how happy, how happy people must be who have a garden like that.”
There was excuse enough for their having tarried when they reached home at dusk to find their simple little supper of mush and molasses ready for them. Cassy could talk of nothing but the garden, and all night long she dreamed of nodding flowers and green trees.
In the morning her first thought was of the two green shoots under the old chair in the back yard. Perhaps the plant needed water; shewould go down and see before any one was up. Carefully carrying a cupful of water she went down the rickety steps which led to the back yard.
The little green shoots had stretched further up out of the dry earth, to the child’s delight. Lifting the chair with a cautious look around she poured the water upon the earth and watched it sink into the ground. She crouched there for some time as if she would discover the plant’s manner of growing.
At last she arose with a sigh. Such a poor little garden compared to the one she had seen yesterday, but what possibilities did it not hold? This tiny plant might yet show gorgeous blooms of red and yellow, or send forth big bunches of pink. Her thoughts went rioting along when they were interrupted by a hoarse laugh, and looking up startled, she saw the grinning face of Billy Miles peering over the fence.
“I caught ye,” he jeered. “I seen ye. What yer got buried there?”
“Nothing,” returned Cassy stoutly.
“Yer another,” retorted Billy, clambering over the fence. “What yer got in that cup?”
Cassy turned the cup upside down, but Billy was not satisfied. He came threateningly towards her, taking no heed of where he was stepping.
“Oh, take care,” cried Cassy, forgetting caution in her alarm lest his heavy tread should crush her precious plant.
Billy looked down.
“Ye tried to fool me,” he cried, seeing the moist circle out of which stretched the green shoots.
“I didn’t, either.”
Billy for answer gave a savage kick and snap went the little stalk. Cassy burst into tears, picked up her treasured plant and went flying up-stairs. She laid the tiny stalk before her mother, and hiding her face in her hands sobbed bitterly.
Jerry, still frowsy and unkempt, issued from his bit of a room.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, looking at Cassy in concern. For answer Mrs. Law held up the broken stalk, and Jerry looked his sympathy.
“Never mind, don’t cry so, dear,” Mrs. Lawsaid at last. “Very likely it wouldn’t have lived anyhow.”
“How did it happen?” whispered Jerry.
“Billy Miles,” Cassy whispered back, choking down her sobs. “He saw me watering it and he got mad and kicked it to death. Oh, my poor little flower that was going to be a morning-glory. It was, wasn’t it, mother?”
Mrs. Law examined the broken leaves.
“I think perhaps it was,” she replied.
“Won’t it live if I plant it in a box?” asked Cassy, this new hope causing her tears to cease.
“I’m afraid not.”
“I’ll get even with Billy Miles,” muttered Jerry; then louder he said, “Cheer up, Cass; I’ll get you a real, righty flower, see if I don’t.” He looked at his mother for encouragement.
“How will you do it?” asked Cassy, interested.
“Never you mind. I will, honest, I will. I’ll tell mother.” And drawing Mrs. Law to one side he confided to her his plan.
All day long Jerry was absent, and when Cassy asked where he was, her mother only smiled, though if the truth were known he was notvery far away, for he was keeping watch by the gate in the garden wall. If that gardener should but once appear Jerry knew well what he meant to do. He did not come home even to dinner, but munched a crust he had stuffed in his pocket, and kept his eye on the gate.
“He might just be coming out to dinner now,” the boy murmured to himself, “and I’d be sure to miss him if I left.” But no gardener appeared till late. The clock had struck six and the streets were full of workmen returning to their homes when the gate did open and out stepped the gardener, dinner bucket in hand. He had no sooner appeared than Jerry met him, outwardly as bold as a lion, but inwardly anxious.
“Mr. Gardener,” he began.
The man scowled down at him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Out with it.”
“Nothing much,” returned Jerry, “at least, you see—you know me and my sister were here looking at your garden yesterday.”
“Yes, I remember now. Well?”
“And you know—” Jerry went on to tell his story of the broken plant, concluding with: “soI thought some time, you know, you might have an extra plant, just a little bit of a one, that you wouldn’t miss, and if you’d sell it cheap, I’d work it out, the pay, I mean. I could help to wheel that sand, you know.”
The man’s face broke into a smile.
“All right, sonny; it’s a bargain. I must go home now, but you come around Monday, and sister shall get a plant.”
“Shall I come to this gate?” asked Jerry eagerly. “When?”
“No, not here; round at the other side. We don’t often open this gate, only to take in loads of dirt and such, and when I am late I go out this way. You go all the way around to the other side and you’ll see an iron railing; there’s another gate there; go in and knock at the back door and say you want to see John McClure. Come about twelve o’clock and bring sissy.” He nodded and passed on, leaving Jerry in a state of extreme satisfaction, and ready to make for home with scurrying legs and a large appetite.