CHAPTER XVI
Onceevery year Round Robin gave an entertainment for the children of Old Harbor. The Camp was rather far from the village, so they always had the “show” in the Casino, a little wooden building which the summer residents had put up close by the steamer landing. On Sunday the Casino was used for services by different groups all day long; early in the morning Norma, Gilda, and Victor went to hear Mass; a little later the Batchelders and Cicely had their Communion; then there was Morning Prayer which many other summer people besides Beverly and Dick attended. And Sunday evening the Casino was filled by a large congregation in which Anne joined with Nelly and Captain Sackett. Dick called it a “Round Robin Church.” Maybe some day allthe Churches will have one getting-together service.
During the week the Casino was used for all sorts of good times. So here it was that Round Robin was going to give a show for the school children. The program was practically decided; Norma would sing, Hugh would black-up and do a negro song and dance; Nancy would tell a fairy story. But they needed one more “act.” Then Nelly had her great inspiration. “Anne! You dress up in that sweet Columbine costume and do your dance. You said you danced Columbine at a party?”
“Oh, I can’t!” protested Anne in horror. “I don’t know the children here. They don’t like me. I heard the Maguire children say so one morning when they brought the eggs.”
“They will like you when they know you; when they see you in that lovely dress!” cried Nelly eagerly. And Nancy added her persuasion, saying it would be just the thing to illustrate the fairy-story she was getting ready to tell—about a beautiful fairy who danced at the King’s ball. At first Anne was sure shecould not do it. But finally she consented. “I suppose it is time I did do something for my neighbors,” she said, with poor grace.
And Columbine was the hit of the show!
The hall was full of mothers with their little children; about fifty of them, all “natives” of Old Harbor, or at any rate permanent residents there. The “summer people” had been invited, too. But they seemed too busy to come. Anne remembered that she had been asked to the Round Robin party last year, but had not had time even to answer the invitation.
Most of the little faces that gazed eagerly at the doings on the platform were of old Yankee types. But there were several with the broad, good natured features of the Irish, like the four little Maguires. And there were several handsome dark French Canadians; several Poles and Finns, whose fathers worked in the stone quarries.
They loved Norma’s singing, and applauded her rapturously. They burst into squeals of mirth over Hugh and his funny dancing, blacked up as he was and wearing his Unc’ Remus costume. They sat very quiet duringNancy’s fairy-tale, breathless with interest to see what was going to happen to the plain little beggar-girl who was invited to the King’s ball, because she had been kind to a Pussy Cat, who was really the King’s Fairy Godmother.
Anne sat on a little stool at the back of the stage while Nancy told the story. Over her Columbine dress she wore Tante’s long black cape that covered her from top to toe, with the hood drawn over her hair.
“This is Goldie the little beggar girl herself,” Nancy finished her story, stepping aside and pointing a wand at Anne. “Now, I am the Fairy-Godmother—Pussy Cat, who met the beggar girl in the wood. Rise, Goldie, and show me how you will dance at the King’s ball to-night. You will dance so beautifully that he will invite you to be the Queen!”
Nancy waved the wand, and Anne rose slowly, throwing off the cape as she did so. There she stood in the beautiful sparkling dress, a crown of roses on her hair; in dainty stockings and slippers.One, two, three!Beverly at the piano, who had playedthe accompaniment for Norma’s songs, now began a spirited waltz, and Anne danced her fairy dance on the tips of her toes, circling and pirouetting like a real fairy.
“Oh!” cried the children rapturously. “Oh!” They had never seen anything like it. No professional “shows” ever came to their remote little village. “Do it again!” They begged, so fervently that Anne had to yield. With cheeks flushed at their pleasure, she repeated her steps, better even than at first. So that Norma cried out as she danced off the stage into the dressing-room, “Brava, Anne! I didn’t know you had it in you!”
“Aren’t they dear children?” said Anne. “I didn’t know there were so many of them, and such pretty little things!”
“You’ll have to come out and let them see you just as you are,” said Nancy, delighted with the success of her illustrated fairy-tale. “They are just crazy, Anne!” So after Norma had sung another song, and Hugh had declared the “show” ended, the performers came out in front and made friends with the children.At first the little ones were shy of Anne, but gathered about her in an admiring group.
“Are you really a Fairy?” lisped one little tot, touching a fold of the tarlatan dress. “Can you make my dress look like that?”
“I wish I could!” said Anne, stooping over the baby, and patting her yellow curls. “Where do you live, Dear?”
“We live at the lighthouse,” volunteered the baby’s elder sister. “She’s Patty and I’m Alice Hopkins. We used to see you riding on a pony,” she added shyly. “But you looked cross, then. You didn’t look like a nice Fairy. Do you wear this all the time now?”
These were the nearest neighbors to Idlewild, except the Sacketts. But Anne had never noticed them till now. Their father had care of the great light that made the Harbor safe for boats.
The other children pressed close to Anne, eager to feel her costume and see if she were real. One little black-haired Finn stepped up. “Can’t I have one o’them?” he asked, pointing to the flowers on Anne’s head.
“Of course you can!” she said, and takingoff the wreath she untied it and gave a flower to each child as far as they would go around. “They will bring you good luck,” she declared.
Little Tom Maguire, pushing forward, boasted to the other children. “I know her! I seen her washin’ dishes when I went to the Camp ’tother day. She didn’t see me, though!”
“Shenever washed dishes!” protested Alice Hopkins. “Never!”
“When the beggar girl went to be Queen,” Nancy added a postscript to her story for their benefit, “of course she took right hold of the housekeeping in the palace. And after that it was always done right. Because if you keep house in a fairy way, it is fun. That’s what the Fairy Godmother brought Goldie to the palace for—to make things jollier all around.”
(“Good for you, Nancy!” Beverly squeezed her hand on the sly.)
The mothers were talking and whispering together in the back of the hall, pleased to see their children so happy. Some of them had recognized Anne.
“It’s that Poole girl!” one exclaimed inamazement. “That proud piece! I didn’t know she could unbend so far.”
“It’s the childher done it,” observed Mrs. Maguire with her hands on her hips, nodding wisely. “If she loves the childher, she’ll be all right, believe me; rich though she may be, and spoiled, no doubt. Look at her now wid me Bridget in her arms! She’ll spoil that swate dress of hers, entirely! But I daresay she can get another one aisy-like.”
The children were loth to go away. But finally the hall was cleared, after Anne had made promises to come to see them all in turn, and Nancy had agreed to tell them some day what happened to the Beggar Girl who became Queen, and who taught the people how to put magic into chores.
The teacher of the little village school lingered for a word with the Round Robin. “Well!” she congratulated them. “You certainly did give those children a good time. I don’t believe you realize all it means to them. They haven’t much to exercise their imagination on, of course. It was a great idea to give them an illustrated fairy-story.”
Nancy said she thought they were unusually attractive children.
“I wish I could do more for them,” said Miss Merritt wistfully. “In the winter after you all go away there’s nobody but me who can spare time to do much for them. I wish I knew more! I wish I knew about medicines, for instance. We are healthy folks here, on the whole; but things do happen, of course. You know, we haven’t any doctor here in the winter. Doctor Black goes away when the summer people do.”
Anne looked at her in horror. In Mr. Poole’s house the doctor was always running in and out at the least “symptom” exhibited by one of the family. Her step-mother was continually ailing.
“What do you do when anybody is sick?” she asked Miss Merritt.
“We do the best we know how,” answered the teacher. “Most of the women know about herbs and simple remedies. Some of them are quite skilled nurses, indeed. But it’s pretty hard sometimes!”
“I should think so!” cried Anne. “Somethingought to be done. I wonder if Father knows?”
“Children in ’most any place need more than they get,” said Miss Merritt pathetically. “If only all the summer people would be interested in these little neighbors of theirs. For they are neighbors, even if it is only for a few weeks.”
The Round Robin agreed that this was another case where a “getting together” was needed. And Anne Poole said to herself—“I will ask Father if I can’t help those children some way.” But she wished she need not have to ask; Father was so queer nowadays!