TIC-TAC-TOO.
Tic-tac-too was a little boy; he was exactly three years old, and the youngest in the family; so, of course, he was the king. His real name was Alec; but he was always known in the household, and among his wide circle of friends generally, as Tic-tac-too. There was a little story to account for this, and it is that story which I am now going to tell.
There are very few children who do not know the funny old nursery rhyme of “Tic-tac-too;” it is an old-fashioned rhyme, and in great vogue amongst nurses. Of course Alec enjoyed it, and liked to have his toes pulled, and the queer words said to him. But that is not the story; for it is one thing to like a nursery rhyme very much, and another to be called by the name of that rhyme, and nothing else.
Now, please, listen to the story.
There was no nicer house to live in than Daisy Farm: it was old-fashioned and roomy; there were heaps of small bedrooms with low ceilings, and heaps of long passages, and unexpected turnings, and dear little cosey corners; and there was a large nursery made out of two or three of the small rooms thrown together, and this nursery had casement windows, and from the windows the daisies, which gave their name to the farm, could be seen. They came up in thousands upon thousands, and no power of man and scythe combined could keep them down. The mowing-machine only suppressed them for a day or two; up they started anew in their snowy dresses, with their modest pink frills and bright yellow edges.
Mr. Rogers, who owned Daisy Farm, objected to the flowers; but his children delighted in them, and picked them in baskets-full, and made daisy-chains to their hearts’ content. There were several children who lived in this pleasant farmhouse, for Tic-tac-too had many brothers and sisters. The old-fashioned nursery was all that a modern nursery should be; it had deep cupboards for toys, and each child had his or her wide shelf to keep special treasures on; and the window-ledges were cosey places to curl up in on wet days, when the rain beat outside, and the wind sighed, and even the daisies looked as if they did not like to be washed so much.
Some of the children at Daisy Farm were old enough to have governesses and masters, to have a schoolroom for themselves, and, in short, to have very little to say to the nursery; but still there were four nursery little ones; and one day mother electrified the children by telling them that another little boy was coming to pay them a visit.
“He is coming to-morrow,” said mother; “he is a year younger than Alec here, but his mother has asked us to take care of him. You must all be kind to the little baby stranger, children, and try your very best to make him feel at home. Poor little man, I trust he will be happy with us.”
Mother sighed as she spoke; and when she did this, Rosie, the eldest nursery child, looked up at her quickly. Rosie had dark gray eyes, and a very sympathetic face; she was the kind of child who felt everybody’s troubles, and nurse said she did this far more than was good for her.
The moment her mother left the room, Rosie ran up to her nurse, and spoke eagerly—
“Why did mother sigh when she said a new little boy was coming here, nursie?”
“Oh, my love, how can I tell? People sigh most likely from habit, and from no reason whatever. There’s nothing to fret anybody in a sigh, Miss Rosie.”
“But mother doesn’t sigh from habit,” answered Rosie; “I expect there’s going to be something sad about the new little boy, and I wonder what it is. Harry, shall we collect some of our very nicest toys to have ready for the poor little new boy?”
Harry was six; he had a determined face, and was not so generous as Rosie.
“I’ll not give away my skin-horse,” he said, “so you needn’t think it, nor my white dog with the joints; there are some broken things down in that corner that he can have. But I don’t see why a new baby should have my best toys. Gee-up, Alec! you’re a horse, you know, and I’m going to race you from one end of the nursery to the other—now trot!”
Fat little curly-headed Alec started off good-humoredly, and Rosie surveyed her own shelf to see which toys would most distract the attention of the little stranger.
She was standing on a hassock, and counting her treasures over carefully, when she was startled by a loud exclamation from nurse.
“Mercy me! If that ain’t the telegraph boy coming up the drive!”
Nurse was old-fashioned enough still to regard telegrams with apprehension. She often said she could never look at one of those awful yellow envelopes, without her heart jumping into her mouth; and these fears she had, to a certain extent, infected the children with.
Harry dropped Alec’s reins, and rushed to the window; Rosie forgot her toys, and did likewise; Jack and Alec both pressed for a view from behind.
“Me, me, me, me want to see!” screamed baby Alec from the back.
Nurse lifted him into her arms; as she did so, she murmured under her breath,—
“God preserve us! I hope that awful boy isn’t bringing us anything bad.”
Rosie heard the words, and felt a sudden sense of chill and anxiety; she pressed her little hand into nurse’s, and longed more than ever to give all the nicest toys to the new little boy.
Just then the nursery door was opened, and Kate, the housemaid, appeared, carrying the yellow envelope daintily between her finger and thumb.
“There, nurse,” she said, “it’s for you; and I hope, I’m sure, it’s no ill-luck I’m bringing you.”
“Oh, sake’s alive!” said nurse. “Children, dears, let me sit down. That awful boy to bring it to me! Well, the will of the Lord must be done; whatever’s inside this ugly thing? Miss Rosie, my dear, could you hunt round somewhere for my spectacles?”
It always took a long time to find nurse’s spectacles; and Rosie, after a frantic search, in which she was joined by all the other nursery children, discovered them at last at the bottom of Alec’s cot. She rushed with them to the old woman, who put them on her nose, and began deliberately to read the contents of her telegram.
The children stood round her as she did so. They were all breathless and excited; and Rosie looked absolutely white from anxiety.
“Well, my dears,” said nurse at last, when she had spelt through the words, “it ain’t exactly a trouble; far from me to say that; but all the same, it’s mighty contrary, and a new child coming here, and all.”
“What is it, nurse?” said Harry. “Dotell us what it’s all about.”
“It’s my daughter, dears,” said nurse; “she’ll be in London to-morrow, on her way back to America.”
“Oh, nurse!” said Rosie, “not your daughter Ann?”
“The same, my love; she that has eight children, and four of them with carrotty hair. She wants me to go up to London, to see her to-morrow; that’s the news the telegraph boy has brought, Miss Rosie. My daughter Ann says, ‘Mother, meet me to-morrow at aunt’s, at two o’clock.’ Well, well, it’s mighty contrary; and that new child coming, and all!”
“But you’ll have to go, nurse. It would be dreadful for your daughter Ann not to see you again.”
“Yes, dear, that’s all very fine; but what’s to become of all you children? How is this blessed baby to get on without his old Nan?”
“Oh, nurse, youmustgo! It would be so cruel if you didn’t,” exclaimed Rosie.
Nurse sat thinking hard for a minute or two; then saying she would go and consult her mistress, she left the room.
The upshot of all this was, that at an early hour the following morning nurse started for London, and a girl, of the name of Patience, from the village, came up to take her place in the nursery.
Mrs. Rogers was particularly busy during these days. She had some friends staying with her, and in addition to this her eldest daughter, Ethel, was ill, and took up a good deal of her mother’s time; in consequence of these things the nursery children were left entirely to the tender mercies of Patience.
Not that that mattered much, for they were independent children, and always found their own amusements. The first day of nurse’s absence, too, was fine, and they spent the greater part of it in the open air; but the second day was wet—a hopelessly wet day—a dull day with a drizzling fog, and no prospect whatever of clearing up.
The morning’s post brought a letter from nurse to ask for further leave of absence; and this, in itself, would have depressed the spirits of the nursery children, for they were looking forward to a gay supper with her, and a long talk about her daughter Ann, and all her London adventures.
But this was not the real trouble which pressed so heavily on Rosie’s motherly heart; the real anxiety which made her little face look so careworn was caused by the new baby, the little boy of two years old, who had arrived late the night before, and now sat with a shadow on his face, absolutely refusing to make friends with any one.
He must have been a petted little boy at home, for he was beautifully dressed, and his curly hair was nicely cared for, and his fair face had a delicate peach bloom about it; but if he was petted, he was also, perhaps, spoilt, for he certainly would not make advances to any of his new comrades, nor exert himself to be agreeable, nor to overcome the strangeness which was filling his baby mind. Had nurse been at home, she would have known how to manage; she would have coaxed smiles from little Fred, and taken him up in her arms, and “mothered” him a good bit. Babies of two require a great lot of “mothering,” and it is surprising what desolation fills their little souls when it is denied them.
Fred cried while Patience was dressing him; he got almost into a passion when she washed his face, and he sulked over his breakfast. Patience was not at all the sort of girl to manage a child like Fred; she was rough in every sense of the word; and when rough petting failed, she tried the effect of rough scolding.
“Come, baby, come, youmusteat your bread and milk. No nonsense now, open your mouth and gobble it down. Come, come, I’ll slap you if you don’t.”
But baby Fred, though sorrowful, was not a coward; he pushed the bowl of bread and milk away, upset its contents over the clean tablecloth, and raised two sorrowful big eyes to the new nurse’s face.
“Naughty dirl, do away,” he said; “Fred don’t ’ove ’oo. Fred won’t eat bekfus’.”
“Oh, Miss Rosie, what a handful he is!” said Patience.
“Let me try him!” said Rosie; “I’ll make him eat something. Come Freddy darling, you love Rosie, don’t you?”
“No, I don’t,” said Fred.
“Well, you’ll eat some breakfast; come now.”
“I won’t eat none bekfus’—do away.”
Rosie turned round and looked in a despairing way at her own three brothers.
“If only nurse were at home!” she said.
“Master Fred,” said Patience, “if you won’t eat, you must get down from the breakfast-table. I have got to clear up, you know.”
She popped the little boy on the floor. He looked round in a bewildered fashion.
“Let’s have a very exciting kind of play, and perhaps he’ll join in,” said Rosie, in a whisper. “Let’s play at kittens—that’s the loveliest of all our games.”
“Kittens” was by no means a quiet pastime. It consisted, indeed, in wild romps on all-fours, each child assuming for the time the character of a kitten, and jumping after balls of paper, which they caught in their mouths.
“It’s the happiest of all our games, and perhaps he’ll like it,” said Rosie.
“Patie,” said Alec, going up to the new nurse, “does ’oo knowTic-tac-too?”
“Of course I do, master Baby—a silly game that.”
“I ’ike it,” said little Alec.
He tripped across the nursery to the younger baby, and sat down by his side.
“Take off ’oo shoe,” he said.
Fred was very tired of being cross and miserable. He could not say he was too little to Alec, for Alec was scarcely bigger than himself. Besides he understood about taking off his shoe. It was a performance he particularly liked. He looked at Baby Alec, and obeyed him.
“Take off ’oo other shoe,” said Alec.
Fred did so.
“Pull off ’oo ’tocks,” ordered the eldest baby.
Fred absolutely chuckled as he tugged away at his white socks, and revealed his pink toes.
“Now, come to Patie.”
Fred scrambled to his feet, and holding Alec’s hand, trotted down the long nursery.
“Patie,” said Alec, “take F’ed on ’our lap, and playTic-tac-toofor him?”
Patience was busy sewing; she raised her eyes. Two smiling little baby-boys were standing by her knee. Could this child, whose blue eyes were full of sunshine, be the miserable little Fred?
“Well, master Alec,” she said, kissing the older baby, “you’re a perfect little darling. Well, I never! to think of you finding out a way to please that poor child.”
“Tic-tac-too!” said Fred, in a loud and vigorous voice. He was fast getting over his shyness, and Alec’s game suited him to perfection.
But the little stranger didnotlike the game of kittens. He marched in a fat, solid sort of way across the nursery, and sat down in a corner, with his back to the company. Here he really looked a most dismal little figure. The view of his back was heart-rending; his curly head drooped slightly, forlornness was written all over his little person.
“What a little muff he is!” said Harry; “I’m glad I didn’t give my skin horse to him.”
“Oh, don’t,” said Rosie, “can’t you see he’s unhappy? I must go and speak to him. Fred,” she said, going up to the child, “come and play with Alec and me.”
“No,” said Fred, “I’se too little to p’ay.”
“But we’ll have such an easy play, Fred.Docome; I wish you would.”
“I’se too little,” answered Fred, shaking his head again.
At that moment Rosie and her two elder brothers were called out of the room to their morning lessons. Rosie’s heart ached as she went away.
“Something must be done,” she said to herself. “That new little boy-baby will get quite ill if we can’t think of something to please him soon.”
She did not know that a very unexpected little deliverer was at hand. The two babies were now alone in the nursery, and Patience, having finished her tidying up, sat down to her sewing.
Patience lifted him on her lap, popped him down with a bounce, kissed him, and began,—
“Tic, tac, too,The little horse has lost his shoe,Here a nail, and there a nail,Here a nail, and there a nail,Tic, tac, too!”
“Tic, tac, too,The little horse has lost his shoe,Here a nail, and there a nail,Here a nail, and there a nail,Tic, tac, too!”
“Tic, tac, too,The little horse has lost his shoe,Here a nail, and there a nail,Here a nail, and there a nail,Tic, tac, too!”
“Tic, tac, too,
The little horse has lost his shoe,
Here a nail, and there a nail,
Here a nail, and there a nail,
Tic, tac, too!”
When the other children returned to the nursery, they heard peals of merry baby laughter; and this was the fashion in which a little boy won his name.