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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Jimmy, Lucy, and All, by Sophie May
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Jimmy, Lucy, and All
+
+Author: Sophie May
+
+Release Date: January 5, 2005 [EBook #14608]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JIMMY, LUCY, AND ALL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Melissa Er-Raqabi and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "Edith was busy taking their photographs". Page 41.]
+
+
+
+LITTLE PRUDY'S CHILDREN
+
+
+
+JIMMY, LUCY, AND ALL
+
+BY
+
+SOPHIE MAY
+
+AUTHOR OF "LITTLE PRUDY STORIES" "DOTTY DIMPLE STORIES"
+"LITTLE PRUDY'S FLYAWAY SERIES" "FLAXIE FRIZZLE
+SERIES" "THE QUINNEBASSET SERIES" ETC.
+
+BOSTON
+LEE AND SHEPARD PUBLISHERS
+1900
+
+
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY LEE AND SHEPARD.
+
+_All Rights Reserved._
+
+JIMMY, LUCY, AND ALL.
+
+Norwood Press
+J.S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith
+Norwood Mass. U.S.A.
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAPTER
+
+   I. THE TALLYHO
+  II. THE FIRST DINNER
+ III. LUCY'S GOLD MINE
+  IV. "THE KNITTING-WOMAN"
+   V. THE AIR-CASTLE
+  VI. "GRANDMA GRAYMOUSE"
+ VII. THE ZEBRA KITTEN
+VIII. STEALING A CHIMNEY
+  IX. "CHICKEN LITTLE" AND JOE
+   X. THE THIEF FOUND
+  XI. BEGGING PARDON
+ XII. "THE LITTLE SCHOOLMA'AM'S EARTHQUAKE"
+XIII. NATE'S CAVE
+ XIV. JIMMY'S GOOD LUCK
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+"Edith was busy taking their photographs"
+"'It is perfectly awful!' said Aunt Lucy"
+Edith painting the Cherub for Mrs. McQuilken
+"'James S. Dunlee, will--you--forgive me?'"
+
+
+
+
+JIMMY, LUCY, AND ALL
+
+I
+
+THE TALLYHO
+
+
+"I never saw a gold mine in my life; and now I'm going to see one,"
+cried Lucy, skipping along in advance of the others. It was quite a
+large party; the whole Dunlee family, with the two Sanfords,--Uncle
+James and Aunt Vi,--making ten in all, counting Maggie, the maid. They
+had alighted from the cars at a way-station, and were walking along the
+platform toward the tallyho coach which was waiting for them. Lucy was
+firmly impressed with the idea that they were starting for the gold
+mines. The truth was, they were on their way to an old mining-town high
+up in the Cuyamaca Mountains, called Castle Cliff; but there had been no
+gold there for a great many years.
+
+Mr. Dunlee was in rather poor health, and had been "ordered" to the
+mountains. The others were perfectly well and had not been "ordered"
+anywhere: they were going merely because they wanted to have a good
+time.
+
+"Papa would be so lonesome without us children," said Edith, "he needs
+us all for company."
+
+He was to have still more company. Mr. and Mrs. Hale were coming
+to-morrow to join the party, bringing their little daughter Barbara,
+Lucy's dearest friend. They could not come to-day; there would have been
+hardly room for them in the tallyho. With all "the bonnie Dunlees,"--as
+Uncle James called the children,--and all the boxes, baskets, and
+bundles, the carriage was about as full as it could hold.
+
+It was seldom that the driver used this tallyho. He was quite choice of
+it, and generally drove an old stage, unless, as happened just now, he
+was taking a large party. It was a very gay tallyho, as yellow as the
+famous pumpkin coach of Cinderella, only that the spokes of the wheels
+were striped off with scarlet. There were four white horses, and every
+horse sported two tiny American flags, one in each ear.
+
+"All aboard!" called out the driver, a brown-faced, broad-shouldered
+man, with a twinkle in his eye.
+
+"All aboard!" responded Mr. Sanford, echoed by Jimmy-boy.
+
+Whereupon crack went the driver's long whip, round went the red and
+yellow wheels, and off sped the white horses as freely as if they were
+thinking of Lucy's gold mine and longing to show it to her, and didn't
+care how many miles they had to travel to reach it. But this was all
+Lucy's fancy. They were thinking of oats, not gold mines. These bright
+horses knew they were not going very far up the mountain. They would
+soon stop to rest in a good stable, and other horses not so handsome
+would take their places. It was a very hard road, and grew harder and
+harder, and the driver always changed horses twice before he got to the
+end of the journey.
+
+As the tallyho rattled along, the older people in it fell to talking;
+and the children looked at the country they were passing, sang snatches
+of songs, and gave little exclamations of delight. Edith threw one arm
+around her older sister Katharine, saying:--
+
+"O Kyzie, aren't you glad you live in California? How sweet the air is,
+and how high the mountains look all around! When we were East last
+summer didn't you pity the people? Only think, they never saw any lemons
+and oranges growing! They don't know much about roses either; they only
+have roses once a year."
+
+"That's true," replied Kyzie. "Let me button your gloves, Edy, you'll be
+dropping them off."
+
+"See those butterflies! I'd be happy if Bab was only in here," murmured
+a little voice from under Lucy's hat. "Bab didn't want to come with her
+papa and mamma; she wanted to come with _me_!"
+
+"Now, Lucy, don't be foolish," said Edith. "Where could we have put Bab?
+There's not room enough in this coach, unless one of the rest of us had
+got out. You'll see Bab to-morrow, and she'll be in Castle Cliff all
+summer; so you needn't complain."
+
+"_I_ wasn't complaining, no indeed! Only I don't want to go down in the
+gold mine till Bab comes. I s'pose they'll put us down in a bucket,
+won't they? I want Uncle James to go with us."
+
+Jimmy-boy laughed and threw himself about in quite a gale. He often
+found his little sister very amusing.
+
+"Excuse me, Lucy," said he; "but I do think you're very ignorant! That
+mine up there is all played out, and Uncle James has told us so ever so
+many times. Didn't you hear him? The shaft is more than half full of
+muddy water. I'd like to see you going down in a bucket!"
+
+"Well, then, Jimmy Dunlee, what _shall_ we do at Castle Cliff?"
+
+"We've brought a tent with us, and for one thing I'm going to camp out,"
+replied Jimmy. "That's a grand thing, they say."
+
+"Don't! There'll be something come and eat you up, sure as you live,"
+said Lucy, who had a vague notion that camping out was connected in some
+way with wild animals, such as coyotes and mountain lions.
+
+"Poh! you don't know the least thing about Castle Cliff, Lucy! And Uncle
+James has talked and talked! Tell me what he said, now do."
+
+Uncle James was seated nearly opposite, for the two long seats of the
+tallyho faced each other. Lucy spoke in a low tone, not wishing him to
+overhear.
+
+"He said we were going to board at a big house pretty near the old
+mine."
+
+"Yes, Mr. Templeton's."
+
+"And he said somebody had a white Spanish rabbit with reddish brown eyes
+and its mouth all a-quiver."
+
+"Yes, I heard him say that about the rabbit. And what are those things
+that come and walk on top of the house in the morning?"
+
+"I know. They are woodpeckers. They tap on the roof, and the noise
+sounds like 'Jacob, Jacob, wake up, Jacob!' Uncle James says when
+strangers hear it they think somebody is calling, and they say, 'Oh,
+yes, we're coming!' I shan't say that; I shall know it's woodpeckers.
+Tell some more, Jimmy."
+
+"Yes" said Eddo, leaving Maggie and wedging himself between Lucy and
+Jimmy. "Tell some more, Jimmum!"
+
+"Well, there's a post-office in town and there's a telephone, and Mr.
+Templeton has lots of things brought up to Castle Cliff from the city;
+so we shall have plenty to eat; chicken and ice-cream and things. That
+makes me think, I'm hungry. Wouldn't they let us open a luncheon
+basket?"
+
+Kyzie thought not; so Jimmy went on telling Lucy what he knew of Castle
+Cliff. "It's named for an air-castle there is up there; it's a thing
+they _call_ an air-castle anyway. A man built it in the hollow of some
+trees, away up, up, up. I'm going to climb up there to see it."
+
+"So'm I," said Lucy.
+
+"Ho, you can't climb worth a cent; you're only a girl!"
+
+"But she has an older brother; and sometimes older brothers are kind
+enough to help their little sisters," remarked Kyzie, with a meaning
+smile toward Jimmy; but Jimmy was looking another way.
+
+"Uncle James told a funny story about that air-castle," went on Kyzie.
+"Did you hear him tell of sitting up there one day and seeing a little
+toad help another toad--a lame one--up the trunk of the tree?"
+
+"No, I didn't hear," said Lucy. "How did the toad do it?"
+
+"I'll let you all guess."
+
+"Pushed him?" said Edith.
+
+"No."
+
+"Took him up pickaback," suggested Lucy.
+
+"Nothing of the sort. He just took his friend's lame foot in his mouth,
+and the two toads hopped along together! Uncle James said it probably
+wasn't the first time, for they kept step as if they were used to it."
+
+"Wasn't that cunning?" said Edith. And Jimmy remarked after a pause, "If
+Lucy wants to go up to that castle, maybe I could steady her along; only
+there's Bab. She'd have to go too. And I don't believe it's any place
+for girls!"
+
+The ride was a long one, forty miles at least. The passengers had dinner
+at a little inn, the elegant horses were placed in a stable; and the
+tallyho started again at one o'clock with a black horse, a sorrel
+horse, and two gray ones.
+
+The afternoon wore on. The horses climbed upward at every step; and
+though the journey was delightful, the passengers were growing rather
+tired.
+
+"Wish I could sit on the seat with the king-ductor," besought little
+Eddo, moving about uneasily.
+
+"That isn't a conductor, it's a driver. Conductors are the men that go
+on the steam-cars,--the 'choo choo cars,'" explained Jimmum. Then in a
+lower tone, "They don't have any cars up at Castle Cliff, and I'm glad
+of it."
+
+Lucy did not understand why he should be glad, and Jimmy added in a
+lower tone:--
+
+"Because--don't you remember how some little folks used to act about
+steam-engines? They might do it again, you know."
+
+"Yes, I 'member now. But that was a long time ago, Jimmy. He wouldn't
+run after engines now."
+
+"Who wouldn't?" inquired young Master Eddo, forgetting the "king-ductor"
+and turning about to face his elder brother. "Who wouldn't run after the
+engine, Jimmum?"
+
+"Nobody--I mean _you_ wouldn't."
+
+"No, no, not me," assented Eddo, shaking his flaxen head.
+
+And there the matter would have ended, if Lucy had not added most
+unluckily: "'Twas when you were only a baby that you did it, Eddo. You
+said to the engine, 'Come here, little choo choo, Eddo won't hurt oo.'
+_You_ didn't know any better."
+
+"_'Course_ I knew better," said Eddo, shaking his head again, but this
+time with an air of bewilderment. "_I_ didn't say, 'Come here, little
+choo choo.' No, no, not me!"
+
+"Oh, but you did, darling," persisted Lucy. "You were just a tiny bit
+of a boy. You stood right on the track, and the engine was coming,
+'puff, puff,' and you said, 'Come here, little choo choo, Eddo won't
+hurt oo!'"
+
+"I didn't! Oh! Oh! Oh! _When'd_ I say that? _Did_ the engine hurt me?
+_Where_ did it hurt me? Say, Jimmum, where did the engine hurt me?"
+putting his hand to his throat, to his ears, to his side.
+
+The more he thought of it, the worse he felt; till appalled by the idea
+of what he must have suffered he finally fell to sobbing in his mother's
+arms, and she soothed his imaginary woes with kisses and cookies. For
+the remainder of the journey he was in pretty good spirits and found
+much diversion in watching the gambols of the two dogs following the
+tallyho. One was a Castle Cliff dog, black and shaggy, named Slam; the
+other, yellow and smooth, belonged to the "king-ductor" or driver, and
+was called Bang. Slam and Bang often darted off for a race and Eddo
+nearly gave them up for lost; but they always came back wagging their
+tails and capering about as if to say:--
+
+"Hello, Eddo, we ran away just to scare you, and we'll do it again if we
+please!"
+
+It was a great day for dogs. Ever so many dogs ran out to meet Slam and
+Bang. They always bit their ears for a "How d'ye do?" and then trotted
+along beside them just for company. Eddo found it quite exciting. One
+was a Mexican dog, without a particle of hair, but he did not seem to be
+in the least ashamed of his singular appearance.
+
+Edith said it was an "empty country," and indeed there were few houses;
+but there must have been more dogs than houses, for the whole journey
+had a running accompaniment of "bow-wow-wows."
+
+The farther up hill the road wound the steeper it grew; and Jimmy
+exclaimed more than once:--
+
+"This coach is standing up straight on its hind feet, papa! Just look!
+'Twill spill us all out backward!"
+
+But it did nothing of the sort. It took them straight to Castle Cliff,
+"nearly six thousand feet above the level of the sea," and there it
+stopped, before the front door of the hotel. It was about half-past five
+o'clock in the afternoon, and Mr. Templeton, who had been looking out
+for the tallyho, came down the steps to meet his guests.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+THE FIRST DINNER
+
+
+Mr. Templeton's wife was just behind him. They both greeted the party as
+if they had all been old friends. The house, a large white one, stood as
+if in the act of climbing the hill. In front was a sloping lawn full of
+brilliant flowers, bordered with house-leek, or "old hen and chickens,"
+a plant running over with pink blossoms. Kyzie had not expected to see a
+garden like this on the mountain.
+
+At one side of the house, between two black oak trees, was a hammock,
+and near it a large stone trough, into which water dripped from a
+faucet. Two birds, called red-hammers, were sipping the water with
+their bills, not at all disturbed by the arrival of strangers.
+
+It was a small settlement. The hotel, by far the largest house in Castle
+Cliff, looked down with a grand air upon the few cottages in sight.
+These tiny cottages were not at all pretty, and had no grass or lawns in
+front, but people from the city were keeping house in them for the
+summer; and besides there were tents scattered all about, full of
+"campers."
+
+As the "bonnie Dunlees" and their elders entered the hotel, a merry
+voice called out:--
+
+"A hearty welcome to you, my friends, and three cheers for Castle
+Cliff!"
+
+Mr. and Mrs. Dunlee and the Sanfords walked on smiling, and the children
+lingered awhile outside; but it was a full minute before any of them
+discovered that the cheery voice belonged to a parrot, whose cage swung
+from a tall sycamore overhead.
+
+"Polly's pretty sociable," laughed Mr. Templeton. "Do you like animals,
+young ladies? If so, please stand up here in a group, and you shall have
+another welcome."
+
+Then he clapped his hands and called out "Thistleblow!" and immediately
+a pretty red pony came frisking along and began to caper around the
+young people with regular dancing steps, making at the same time the
+most graceful salaams, pausing now and then to sway himself as if he
+were courtesying. It was a charming performance. The little creature had
+once belonged to a band of gypsies, who had given him a regular course
+of training.
+
+"He is trying to tell you how glad he is to see you," said Mr.
+Templeton, as the children shouted and clapped their hands.
+
+"Oh, won't Bab like it, though!" cried Lucy. "Seems as if I couldn't
+wait till to-morrow for Bab to get here, for then the good times will
+begin."
+
+But for Kyzie and Edith and Jimmy the good times had begun already. The
+five Dunlees entered the house, little Eddo clinging fast to Jimmum's
+forefinger. They passed an old lady who sat on the veranda knitting. She
+gazed after them through her spectacles, and said to Mr. Templeton in a
+tone of inquiry:--
+
+"Boarders?"
+
+"Yes," he replied, rubbing his chin, "and they have lots of jingle in
+'em too; they're just the kind I like."
+
+"Well, I hope they won't get into any mischief up here, that's all I've
+got to say. Nobody wants to take children to board anyway, but you can't
+always seem to help it."
+
+And then the old lady turned to her knitting again; indeed her fingers
+had been flying all the while she talked. Mr. Templeton looked at her
+curiously, and wondered if she disliked children.
+
+"I'd as lief have 'em 'round the house as her birds and kittens anyway,"
+he reflected; for she kept a magpie, three cats and a canary; and these
+pets had not been always agreeable guests at the hotel.
+
+It was now nearly six o'clock, and savory odors from the kitchen mingled
+with the balmy breath of the flowers stealing in from the lawn. The
+Dunlee party had barely time for hasty toilets when the gong sounded for
+dinner. The Templeton dining-room was large and held several tables. The
+Dunlees had the longest of these, the one near the west window. There
+were twelve plates set, though only nine were needed to-night. The three
+extra plates had been placed there for the Hale family, who were
+expected to-morrow. Mrs. Dunlee had told the landlord that she would
+like the Hales at her table.
+
+"And Bab will sit side o' me," said Lucy. "Oh, won't we be happy?"
+
+As the Dunlees took their seats to-night and looked around the room they
+saw a droll sight. The old lady, who had been knitting on the veranda,
+was seated at a small table in one corner; and on each side of her in a
+chair sat a cat! One cat was a gray "coon," the other an Angora; and
+both of them sat up as grave as judges, nibbling bits of cheese. Mrs.
+McQuilken herself, dressed in a very odd style, was knitting again. She
+was a remarkably industrious woman, and as it would be perhaps three or
+four minutes before the soup came in, she could not bear to waste the
+time in idleness. Her head-dress was odd enough. It was just a strip of
+white muslin wound around the head like an East Indian puggaree. Mrs.
+McQuilken had many outlandish fashions. She was the widow of a
+sea-captain and had been abroad most of her life. The children could
+hardly help staring at her. Even after they had learned to know her
+pretty well they still wanted to stare; and not being able to remember
+her name they spoke of her as "the knitting-woman."
+
+"Look, Lucy," whispered Jimmy; "there's a boy I know over there at that
+little table. It's Nate Pollard."
+
+He waved his hand toward him and Nate waved in reply. At home Jimmy had
+not known Nate very well, for he was older than himself and in higher
+classes; but here among strangers Jimmy-boy was glad to see a familiar
+face. Mr. and Mrs. Pollard were with their son. Perhaps they had all
+come for the summer. Jimmy hoped so.
+
+There were two colored servants gliding about the room, and a pretty
+waiting-maid.
+
+"O dear, no cook from Cathay," whispered Kyzie to Edith.
+
+"I don't know what you mean."
+
+"I mean I wanted a cook from Cathay or Cipango," went on Kyzie, laughing
+behind her napkin.
+
+"I'm going to shake you," said Edith, who suddenly bethought herself
+that Cathay and Cipango were the old names for China and Japan. This had
+been part of her history lesson a few days ago. How Kyzie did remember
+everything!
+
+At that moment the colored man from Georgia stood at her elbow with a
+steaming plate of soup. Lucy looked at him askance. Why couldn't he have
+been a Chinaman with a pigtail? She had told Bab she was almost sure
+there would be a "China cook" at the mountains, and when he passed the
+soup he would say, "Have soup-ee?" Bab had been in Europe and in Maine
+and in California, but knew very little of Chinamen and had often said
+she "wanted to eat China cooking."
+
+The dinner was excellent. Eddo enjoyed it very much for a while; then
+his head began to nod over his plate, his spoon waved uncertainly in the
+air, and Maggie had to be sent for to take him away from the table.
+
+The ride up the mountain had been so fatiguing that by eight o'clock all
+the Dunlees, little and big, were glad to find themselves snugly in bed.
+They slept late, every one of them, and even the woodpeckers, tapping on
+the roof next morning, failed to arouse them with their "Jacob, Jacob,
+wake up, wake up, Jacob!"
+
+After breakfast Edith happened to leave the dining-room just behind Mrs.
+McQuilken, who held her two cats cuddled up in her arms like babies,
+and was kissing their foreheads and calling them "mamma's precious
+darlings." As Edith heard this she could not help smiling, and Mrs.
+McQuilken paused in the entry a moment to say:--
+
+"I guess you like cats."
+
+"I do, ma'am. Oh, yes, very much."
+
+"That's right. I like to see children fond of animals. Now, I've got a
+new kitty upstairs, a zebra kitty, that you'd be pleased with. It's a
+beauty, and _such_ a tail! Come up to my room and see it if you want to.
+My room's Number Five. But don't you come now; I shall be busy an hour
+and a half. Remember, an hour and a half."
+
+Edith thanked her and ran to tell Kyzie what the "knitting-woman" had
+been saying.
+
+"Go get your kodak," said Kyzie. "Nate Pollard is going to take us all
+out on an exploring expedition. You know he has been in Castle Cliff a
+whole week, and knows the places."
+
+"First thing I want to see is that mine," said Lucy, as they all met
+outside the hotel.
+
+"The mine?" repeated Kyzie, and looked at Eddo. "I'm afraid it isn't
+quite safe to take little bits of people to such a place as that. Do you
+think it is, Nate?"
+
+"Rather risky," replied Nate.
+
+Eddo had caught the words, "little bits of people," and his eyes opened
+wide.
+
+"What does _mine_ mean, Jimmum?"
+
+"A great big hole, I guess. See here, Eddo, let's go in the house and
+find Maggie."
+
+"Yes," chimed in Edith, "let's go find Maggie. There's a _beau_-tiful
+picture book in mamma's drawer. You just ask Maggie and she'll show you
+the picture of those nice little guinea-pigs."
+
+Though very young, Eddo was acute enough to see through this little
+manoeuvre. It was not the first time the other children had tried to get
+him out of the way. They wanted to go to see a charming "great big hole"
+somewhere, and they thought he would fall into it and get hurt. They
+were always thinking such things--so stupid of them! They thought he
+used to run after "choo choos" and talk to them, when of course he never
+did it; 'twas some other little boy.
+
+"I want to go with Jimmum," said he, stoutly. "You ought to not go
+'thout me! _I_ shan't talk to that mine. _I_ shan't say, 'Come, little
+mine, Eddo won't hurt oo.' No, no, not me! I shan't say nuffin', and I
+shan't fall in the hole needer. So there! H'm! 'm! 'm!"
+
+It was not easy to resist his pleading. Perhaps Aunt Vi saw how matters
+were, for she appeared just then, bearing the news that she and Uncle
+James were going to drive, and would like to take one of the children.
+
+"And Eddo is the one we want. He is so small that he can sit on the seat
+between us. Aren't the rest of you willing to give him up just for this
+morning? He can go to walk with you another time."
+
+So they all said they would try to give him up, and he bounded away with
+Aunt Vi, his dear little face beaming with proud satisfaction.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+LUCY'S GOLD MINE
+
+
+The other children strolled leisurely along toward a place that looked
+like a long strip of sand.
+
+"A sand beach," said Kyzie.
+
+"No," said Nate; "it isn't a beach and it isn't sand."
+
+"What _can_ you mean? What else is it, pray?"
+
+She stooped and took up a handful of something that certainly looked
+like sand. The others did the same.
+
+"What do you call that?" they all asked, as they sifted it through their
+fingers.
+
+Nate smiled in a superior way.
+
+"Well, I don't call it sand, because it isn't sand. I thought it was
+when I first saw it; I got cheated, same as you. But there's no sand to
+it; it's just _tailings_."
+
+"What in the world is tailings?" asked Kyzie, taking up another handful
+and looking it over very carefully. Strange if she, a girl in her teens,
+couldn't tell sand when she saw it! But she politely refrained from
+making any more remarks, and waited for Nate to answer her question. He
+was an intelligent boy, between eleven and twelve.
+
+"Well, tailings are just powdered rocks," said Nate.
+
+"Powdered rocks? Who powdered them? What for?" asked Edith.
+
+"Why, the miners did it years ago. They ground up the rocks in the mine
+into powder just as fine as they could, and then washed the powder to
+get the gold out."
+
+"Oh, I see," said Edith. "So these tailings are what's left after the
+gold's washed out."
+
+"Yes, they brought 'em and spread 'em 'round here to get rid of 'em I
+suppose."
+
+"Is the gold all washed out, every bit?" asked Jimmy. "Seems as if I
+could see a little shine to it now."
+
+"Well, they got out all they could. There may be a little dust of it
+left though. Mr. Templeton says the folks in 'Frisco that own the mine
+think there's _some_ left, and the tailings ought to be sent to San
+Diego and worked over."
+
+Jimmy took up another handful. Yes, there was a faint shine to it; it
+began to look precious.
+
+"Well, there's a heap of it anyway. It goes ever so far down," said he,
+thrusting in a stick.
+
+"It's from ten to twelve feet deep," replied Nate, proud of his
+knowledge; "and see how long and wide!"
+
+"_I_ don't see how they ever ground up rocks so fine," said Kyzie.
+"Exactly like sand. And it stretches out so far that you'd think 'twas a
+sand beach by the sea,--only there isn't any sea."
+
+"Well, it's just as good as a beach anyway," said Nate. "Just as good
+for picnics and the like of that. When there's anything going on, they
+get out the brass band and have fireworks and bring chairs and benches
+and sit round here. I tell you it's great!"
+
+"There are lots of benches here now," remarked Edith. "And what's that
+long wooden thing?"
+
+"That's a staging. That's where they have the brass band sit; that's
+where they send up the fireworks."
+
+"Oh, I hope they'll have fireworks while we're here, and picnics."
+
+"Of course they will. They're always having 'em. And I heard somebody
+say they're talking of a barbecue."
+
+Edith clapped her hands. She did not know what a barbecue might be, but
+it sounded wild and jolly.
+
+"What a long stretch of mud-puddle right here by the tailings," said
+Kyzie.
+
+Nate laughed. "It _is_ a damp spot, that's a fact!"
+
+They all wondered what he was laughing at. "I guess there used to be
+water here once," said Jimmy at a venture. "There's water here now
+standing round in spots. And,--why, it's _fishes_!"
+
+Lucy stooped all of a sudden and picked up a dead fish.
+
+"Ugh! I never caught a fish before!" But next moment she threw it away
+in disgust.
+
+"How did dead fishes ever get into this mud-puddle?" queried Edith.
+
+"Well, they used to live in it before it dried up," replied Nate. "Fact
+is, this is a _lake_!"
+
+Everybody exclaimed in surprise; and Kyzie said:--
+
+"It doesn't seem possible; but then things are so queer up here that you
+can believe almost anything."
+
+"Really it is a lake. It's all right in the winter, and swells
+tremendously then; but this is a dry year, you know, and it's all dried
+up." Kyzie forgave the lake for drying up, but pitied the fishes. Edith
+thought Castle Cliff was "a funny place anyway."
+
+"What little bits of houses! Did they dry up too?"
+
+"Oh, those are just the cabins and bunk-houses that were built for the
+miners, ever so long ago when the mine was going. Fixed up into cottages
+now for summer boarders. Do you want to see the mine?"
+
+They went around behind the shaft-house and beyond the old saw-mill.
+
+"O my senses!" cried Edith, "is that the old gold mine, that monstrous
+great thing? Isn't it horrid?"
+
+They all agreed that it was "perfectly awful and dreadful," and that it
+made you shudder to look into it; and that they were glad baby Eddo was
+safely out of the way. The mine was a deep, irregular chasm, full of
+dirty water and rocks. It had a hungry, cruel look; you could almost
+fancy it was waiting in wicked glee to swallow up thoughtless little
+children.
+
+"It doesn't seem as if anybody could ever have dug for gold in that
+horrid ditch," exclaimed Kyzie.
+
+"You'd better believe they did, though," said the young guide. "They
+used to get it out in nuggets, cart-loads of it."
+
+He was not quite sure of the nuggets, but liked the sound of the word.
+
+"Yes, cart-loads of it. I tell you 'twas the richest mine in the whole
+Cuyamaca Mountains."
+
+"Too bad the gold gave out," said Kyzie, gazing regretfully into the
+watery depths.
+
+"But it didn't give out! Why, there's gold enough left down there to buy
+up the whole United States! They lost the vein, that's all"
+
+"The vein? What's a vein?" asked Edith.
+
+"Well, you see," replied the guide, "gold goes along underground in
+streaks; they call it veins. The miners had to stop digging here because
+they lost track of the streak. But they'll find it again."
+
+"How do _you_ know?" asked Jimmy-boy, who thought Nate was putting on
+too many airs.
+
+"Because Mr. Templeton said so. They've sent for Colonel Somebody from
+I--forget where. He's a splendid mining engineer, great for finding lost
+veins. He'll be here next week and bring a lot of men."
+
+"Whoop-ee!" cried Jimmy, "he'll find the vein and things, and we'll be
+having gold as plenty as blackberries!"
+
+"Just what I was talking about yesterday when you laughed," broke in
+Lucy. "I said I'd go down in a bucket; don't you know I did?"
+
+Edith was gazing spellbound at the yawning chasm.
+
+"Look at those rickety steps! The men will get killed! 'Twill all cave
+in!"
+
+"No danger," said Nate, "there are walls down there, stone walls, papa
+says, that keep it all safe."
+
+He meant "galleries," but had forgotten the word.
+
+"Well, I don't care if there are five hundred stone walls, I guess the
+men could drown all the same!" said Edith. "That water ought to be let
+out, Nate Pollard! If the colonel is coming next week why don't they let
+out the water this very day and give the place a chance to dry off."
+
+She spoke in a tone of the gravest anxiety, as if she understood the
+matter perfectly, and felt the whole care of the mine. Indeed, the mine
+had become suddenly very interesting to all the children. It certainly
+looked like a rough, wild, frightful hole; nothing more than a hole; but
+if there were gold down there in "nuggets," why, that was quite another
+matter; it became at once an enchanted hole; it was as delightful as a
+fairy story.
+
+"I hope it's true that they've sent for that colonel," said Kyzie.
+
+"Of course it's true," replied Nate, who did not like to have his word
+doubted.
+
+"I s'pose there are buckets 'round here. Oh, aren't you glad we came to
+Castle Cliff?" said Lucy, pirouetting around Jimmy.
+
+"Bab will be glad, too," she thought. For Lucy never could look forward
+to any pleasure without wishing her darling "niece" to share it with
+her.
+
+"Well, I guess we've seen everything there is to see," remarked Nate,
+who had now told all he knew and was ready to go.
+
+While they still wandered about, talking of "tailings" and "nuggets,"
+they were startled by the peal of a bell.
+
+"Twelve o'clock! Two minutes ahead of time though," said Nate, taking
+from his pocket a handsome gold watch which Jimmy had always admired.
+
+"What bell is that? Where is it?" they all asked. "And what is it
+ringing for?"
+
+"It's on top of the schoolhouse and it's ringing for noon. 'Twill ring
+again in the evening at nine o'clock. But I can tell 'em they ought to
+set it back two minutes."
+
+"A nine o'clock bell? Why, that's a _curfew_ bell! How romantic!" cried
+Kyzie. She had read of "the mellow lin-lan-lone of evening bells," but
+had never heard it. "Let's go to the schoolhouse."
+
+As luncheon at the Templeton House would not be served for an hour yet,
+they kept on to the hollow where the schoolhouse stood. It was a small,
+unpainted building in the shade of three pine trees.
+
+"Just wait a minute right here," said Edith, the young artist,
+unstrapping her kodak. "I want a snap-shot at it. Stand there by that
+tree, Jimmum. Put your foot out just so. I wish you were barefooted!"
+
+Just then, as if they had overheard the wish, two little boys came
+running down the hill, and one of them was barefooted. Moreover, when
+Kyzie asked if they would stand for a picture, they consented at once.
+
+"My name's Joseph Rolfe," said the elder, twitching off his hat, "and
+his name,"--pointing to his companion with a chuckle,--"his name is
+Chicken Little."
+
+"No such a thing! Now you quit!" retorted the younger lad in a choked
+voice, digging his toes into the dirt, "quit a-plaguing me! My name's
+Henry Small and you know it!"
+
+While Edith was busy taking their photographs, Kyzie thanked the urchins
+very pleasantly. They both gazed at her with admiration.
+
+"See here," said Joe Rolfe, twitching off his hat again very
+respectfully, "Are you going to keep school in the schoolhouse? I wish
+you would!"
+
+At this remarkable speech Jimmy and Edith fell to laughing; but Kyzie
+only blushed a little, and smiled. How very grown-up she must seem to
+Joe if he could think of her as a teacher! She was now a tall girl of
+fourteen, with a fine strong face and an earnest manner. She was
+beginning to tire of being classed among little girls, and it was
+delightful to find herself looked upon for the first time in her life as
+a young lady. But she only said:--
+
+"Oh, no, Joe, people don't teach school in summer! Summer is vacation."
+
+"Well, but they do sometimes," persisted Joe; "there was a girl kep'
+this school last summer. She called it 'vacation school.' But we didn't
+like her; she licked like fury."
+
+"So she did," echoed Chicken Little, "licked and pulled ears. Kep' a
+stick on the desk."
+
+And with these last words both the little boys took their leave, running
+up hill with great speed, as if they thought that standing for a picture
+had been a great waste of time.
+
+"That Chicken boy is the biggest cry-baby," said Nate. "The boys like to
+plague him to see him cry. Joe Rolfe has some sense."
+
+As the little party walked on, Miss Katharine turned her head more than
+once for another look at the schoolhouse.
+
+"Wouldn't it be fun, Edy, to teach school in there and ring that
+'lin-lan-lone bell' to call in the scholars? I'd make you study botany
+harder'n you ever did before."
+
+"No, thank you, Miss Dunlee," replied Edith, courtesying. "You'll not
+get me to worrying over botany. I studied it a month once, but when I go
+up in the mountains I go to have a good time."
+
+She pursed her pretty mouth as she spoke. Her sister Katharine was by
+far the best botanist in her class, and was always tearing up flowers in
+the most wasteful manner. Worse than that, she expected Edith to do the
+same thing and learn the hard names of the poor little withered pieces.
+
+"You don't love flowers as well as I do, Kyzie, or you couldn't abuse
+them so!"
+
+This is what she often said to her learned sister after Kyzie had made
+"a little preach" about the beauties of botany.
+
+As they entered the hotel for luncheon, Kyzie was still thinking of the
+schoolhouse and the sweet-toned bell and the singular speech of Joe
+Rolfe, about wanting her for a teacher. What came of these thoughts you
+shall hear later on.
+
+"Well, I declare, I forgot all about that zebra kitty," said Edith.
+"What will the knitting-woman think of such actions?"
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+THE "KNITTING-WOMAN"
+
+
+The "knitting-woman" met Edith at the dining-room door after luncheon,
+and said to her rather sharply:--
+
+"Well, little girl, I thought you liked kittens?"
+
+"I do, Mrs.--madam, I certainly do," replied Edith feeling guilty and
+ashamed. "But Nate Pollard took us to see the gold mine and the
+schoolhouse and we've just got back."
+
+"Oh, that's it! I thought 'twas very still around here--I missed the
+noise of the _boyoes_.--You don't know what I mean by boyoes," she
+added, smiling. "I picked up the word in Ireland. I'm always picking up
+words. It means _boys_."
+
+"I understand; oh, yes."
+
+"Well, 'twas a little trouble to me, your not coming when I expected
+you; but you may come this afternoon. I'll be ready in ten minutes."
+
+"Yes, madam, thank you."
+
+Edith ran to her mother laughing. "Oh, mamma, she is the queerest woman!
+Calls boys _boyoes_! I must go to see her kitten whether I want to or
+not--in just ten minutes! I wish I could take Kyzie with me; would you
+dare?"
+
+"Certainly not. Katharine has not been invited. And don't make a long
+call, Edith."
+
+"No, mamma, I'll not even sit down. I'll just look at the zebra kitty
+and come right away."
+
+Mrs. Dunlee smiled. If there were many pets at Number Five it was not
+likely that Edith would hasten away. "Remember, daughter, fifteen
+minutes is long enough for a call on an entire stranger. You don't wish
+to annoy Mrs. McQuilken; but if you should happen to forget, you'll hear
+this little bell tinkle, and that will remind you to leave."
+
+Number Five was a very interesting room, about as full as it could hold
+of oddities from various countries, together with four cats, a canary,
+and a mocking-bird.
+
+"If you had come this morning you would have seen Mag, that's the
+magpie," said Mrs. McQuilken. "She's off now, pretty creature. She likes
+to be picking a fuss with the chickens."
+
+The good lady had been knitting, but she dropped her work into the large
+pocket of her black apron, and moved up an easy-chair for her guest.
+Edith forgot to take it. Her eyes were roving about the room, attracted
+by the curiosities, though she dared not ask a single question.
+
+"That nest on the wall looks odd to you, I dare say," said Mrs.
+McQuilken. "The twigs are woven together so closely that it looks nice
+enough for a lady's work-bag, now doesn't it?"
+
+Edith said she thought it did.
+
+"Well, that's the magpie's nest. She laid seven eggs in it once. I keep
+it now for her to sleep in; it's Mag's cot-bed."
+
+Edith's eyes, still roving, espied a handsome kitty asleep on the
+lounge. It must be the zebra kitty because of its black and dove-colored
+stripes. Most remarkable stripes, so regular and distinct, yet so softly
+shaded. The face was black, with whiskers snow-white. How odd! Edith had
+never seen white whiskers on a kitten. And then the long, sweeping
+black tail!
+
+Mrs. McQuilken watched the little girl's face and no longer doubted her
+fondness for kittens.
+
+"I call her Zee for short. Look at that now!" And Mrs. McQuilken
+straightened out the tail which was coiled around Zee's back.
+
+"Oh, how beautifully long!" cried Edith.
+
+"Long? I should say so! There was a cat-show at Los Angeles last fall,
+and one cat took a prize for a tail not so long as this by
+three-quarters of an inch! And Zee only six months old!"
+
+The kitty, wide awake by this time, was holding high revel with a ball
+of yarn which the tortoise-shell cat had purloined from her mistress's
+basket.
+
+"Dear thing! Oh, isn't she sweet?" said Edith, dropping on her knees
+before the graceful creature.
+
+Mrs. McQuilken enjoyed seeing the child go off into small raptures;
+Edith was fast winning her heart.
+
+"Does your mother like cats?" she suddenly inquired.
+
+"Not particularly," replied Edith, clapping her hands, as Zee with a
+quick dash bore away the ball out of the very paws of the coon cat.
+"Mamma thinks cats are cold-hearted," said she, hugging Zee to her
+bosom. "She says they don't love anybody."
+
+"I deny it!" exclaimed Mrs. McQuilken, indignantly. "Tell your mother to
+make a study of cats and she'll know better."
+
+Edith looked rather frightened. "Yes'm, I'll tell her."
+
+"They have very deep feelings and folks ought to know it. Now, listen,
+little girl. I had two maltese kittens once. They were sisters and
+loved each other better than any girl sisters _you_ ever saw. One of the
+kittens got caught in a trap and we had to kill her. And the other one
+went round mewing and couldn't be comforted. She pined away, that kitty
+did, and in three days she died. Now I know that for a fact."
+
+"Poor child!" said Edith, much touched. "_She_ wasn't cold-hearted, I'll
+tell mamma about that."
+
+"Well, if she doesn't like 'em perhaps it wouldn't do any good; but
+while you're about it you might tell her of two tortoise-shell cats I
+had. They were sisters too. Whiff had four kittens and Puff had one and
+lost it. And the way Whiff comforted Puff! She took her right home into
+her own basket and they brought up the four kittens together. Wasn't
+that lovely?"
+
+"Oh, wasn't it, though?" said Edith. "Cats have hearts, I always knew
+they did."
+
+"That shows you're a sensible little girl," returned the old lady
+approvingly. "But you haven't told me yet what your name is?"
+
+"Edith Dunlee."
+
+"I knew 'twas Dunlee--that's a Scotch name; but I didn't know about the
+Edith. Well, Edith, so you've been to see the gold mine? Pokerish place,
+isn't it? I hear they're going to bring down the engine from the big
+plant and try to start it up again."
+
+Edith had no idea what she meant by the "big plant," so made no reply.
+Mrs. McQuilken went back to the subject of cats.
+
+"Did you know the Egyptians used to worship cats? Well, sometimes they
+did. And when their cats died they went into mourning for them."
+
+"How queer!"
+
+"It does seem so, but it's just as you look at it, Edith. Cats are a
+sight of company. I didn't care so much about them or about birds
+either when my husband was alive and my little children, but now--"
+
+Again she paused, and this time she did not go on again. Some one out of
+doors laughed; it was Jimmy Dunlee, and the mocking-bird took up the
+merry sound and echoed it to perfection.
+
+"Doesn't that seem human?" cried Mrs. McQuilken. And really it did. It
+was exactly the laugh of a human boy, though it came from the throat of
+a tiny bird.
+
+"My little boys, Pitt and Roscoe, liked to hear him do that," said Mrs.
+McQuilken.
+
+Edith observed that she did not say "my boyoes." "Pitt, the one that
+died in Japan, doted on the mocking-bird. The other boy, Roscoe, was all
+bound up in the canary."
+
+"Does the canary sing?"
+
+"Yes, he's a grand singer. Just you wait till he pipes up. You'll be
+surprised. But you remember what I was saying a little while ago about
+your mother? That zebra kitty--"
+
+Before she could finish the sentence Edith heard the warning tinkle of
+the tea-bell, and sprang up suddenly, exclaiming: "Good-by,
+Mrs.--good-by, _madam_, I must go now. You've been very kind, thank you.
+Good-by."
+
+And out of the door and away she skipped, leaving her hostess, who had
+not heard the bell, to wonder at her haste. "She went like a shot off a
+shovel," said the good lady, taking up her knitting-work. "She seemed to
+be such a well-mannered little girl, too! What got into her all at once?
+She acted as if she was 'possessed of the fox.'"
+
+This is a common expression in Japan, and naturally Mrs. McQuilken had
+caught it up, as she had caught up other odd things in her travels. She
+was something of a mocking-bird in her way, was the captain's widow.
+
+"I've taken quite a fancy to Edith," she added, "a minute more and I
+should have offered to give her the zebra kitty. But there, I shouldn't
+want to make a fuss in the family. That woman, her mother, to think of
+her talking so hard about cats! She doesn't _look_ like that kind of a
+woman. I'm surprised."
+
+Edith ran back to her mother breathless.
+
+"Oh, mamma, I was having such a good time! And she didn't appear to be
+'annoyed,' she talked just as fast all the time! But the bell rang while
+she was saying something and I had to run."
+
+"Had to run? I hope you were not abrupt, my child?"
+
+"Oh, no, mamma, not at all. I said 'good-by' twice, and thanked her and
+told her she had been very kind. That wasn't abrupt, was it? But oh,
+that kitty's tail! I forget how many inches and a quarter longer than
+any other kitty's tail in this state! And they are not cold-hearted,--I
+mean cats,--I promised to tell you."
+
+Here followed an account of the two cat-sisters, who loved each other
+better than girl-sisters.
+
+"And think of one of them dying of grief, the sweet thing! Human people
+don't die of grief, do they, mamma?"
+
+"Not often, Edith. Such instances have been known, but they are very
+rare."
+
+"Well," struck in wee Lucy, who had been listening to the touching
+story, "well, I guess some folks would! Bab would die for grief of me,
+and I would die for grief of Bab; we _said_ we would!"
+
+She made this absurd little speech with tears in her eyes; but Kyzie
+and Edith dared not laugh, for mamma's forefinger was raised. Mamma
+never allowed them to ridicule the friendship of the two little girls,
+who had made believe for more than a year that they were "aunt" and
+"niece." The play might be rather foolish, but the love was very sweet
+and true.
+
+Lucy had been thinking all day of Barbara and longing for her arrival. A
+full hour before it was time for the stage she went a little way up the
+mountain with Jimmy, and they took turns gazing down the winding, dusty
+road through a spy-glass. "I shan't wait here any longer. What's the
+use?" declared Jimmy.
+
+"She's coming! she's coming! I saw her first!" was Lucy's glad cry. And
+she ran down the mountain in haste, though the stage, a grayish green
+one, was just turning a curve at least a mile away.
+
+"Well, you _have_ been parted a good while," said Uncle James, as the
+two dear friends met and embraced on the coach steps; "a day and a
+half!"
+
+"I'd have 'most died if I'd waited any longer," said Aunt Lucy, putting
+her arm around her niece and leading her up the gravel path with the
+pink "old hen and chickens" on either side.
+
+The little girls were entirely unlike, and the contrast was pleasant to
+see. Lucy was very fair, with light curling hair:--
+
+    "Blue were her eyes as the fairy flax,
+      Her cheeks like the dawn of day,
+    And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds
+      That ope in the month of May."
+
+Bab was quite as pretty, but in another way. She had brilliant dark eyes
+and straight dark hair with a satin gloss. She was half a head shorter
+than her "auntie," though their ages were about the same. People liked
+to see them together, for they were always sociable and happy, and loved
+each other "dearilee."
+
+"Oh, Bab," said wee Lucy, "I had such a _loneness_ without you!"
+
+"I had a loneness too, Auntie Lucy. Seemed as if the time never would
+go."
+
+And then the dark head and the fair head met again for more kisses,
+while both the mammas looked on and said, in low tones and with smiles,
+as they always did:--
+
+"How sweet! Now we shall hear them singing about the place like two
+little birds."
+
+This was Tuesday. The days went on happily until Thursday afternoon,
+when "the Dunlee party," which always included the Hales and Sanfords,
+set forth up the mountain for a sight of the famous "air-castle." Of
+course Nate was with them, but this time not as a guide; the guide was
+Uncle James.
+
+The road, though rather steep, was not a hard one. Mr. Dunlee had his
+alpenstock, and Uncle James walked beside him, holding little Eddo by
+the hand. Bab and Lucy, or "the little two," as Aunt Vi called them,
+were side by side as usual, and Lucy had asked Bab to repeat the story
+of "Little Bo-Peep" in French, for Nate wanted to hear it. Bab could
+speak French remarkably well.
+
+    "Petit beau bouton
+    A perde ses moutons,
+      Il ne sais pas que les a pris.
+    O laissez les tranquille!
+    Ils se retournerons,
+      Chacun sa queue apres lui."
+
+Mrs. Dunlee and Kyzie were just behind the children, and while Bab was
+repeating the verse Kyzie said in a low tone:--
+
+"Oh, mamma, let me walk with you all the way, please. There's something
+I want to talk about."
+
+She looked so earnest that Mrs. Dunlee wondered not a little what it was
+her eldest daughter had to say.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+THE AIR-CASTLE
+
+
+"A vacation school, Katharine? And pray what may that be?"
+
+Kyzie's cheeks were flushed, her eyes shining. She held her mother's
+hand and talked fast, though plainly she did not feel quite at her ease.
+
+"Why, mamma, you've certainly heard of vacation schools--summer schools?
+They're very common nowadays. In the summer, you know; so that college
+people can go to them, and business people."
+
+"Ah! Like the one at Coronado Beach? Now I understand. But it didn't
+occur to me that my little daughter would know enough to teach college
+people!"
+
+"Now, mamma, don't laugh at me! Of course I mean children, the little
+ignorant children right around here," making a sweeping gesture toward
+the cottages and "bunk houses" that dotted the country lower down the
+mountain, "I know enough to teach little children, I should hope,
+mamma."
+
+"Possibly!"
+
+Mrs. Dunlee's tone was so doubtful that her daughter felt crushed.
+
+"Possibly you may know enough about books; but book-knowledge is not all
+that is required in a teacher. Could you keep the children in order?
+Would they obey you?"
+
+The little girl's head drooped a little.
+
+"Let me see, you are only fourteen?"
+
+"Fourteen last April, mamma. But everybody says, don't you know, that
+I'm very large for my age."
+
+She tried to speak bravely, but the look of quiet amusement on her
+listener's face made it rather hard for her to go on.
+
+"I suppose," said she, dropping her eyes again, "I suppose they don't
+know much here, mamma,--the families that live here all the time. Some
+of the boys actually go barefooted."
+
+"So I have observed. A great saving of shoes."
+
+"And they had a school last summer," went on Kyzie, resolutely. "A young
+girl taught it who boarded where we do. Mr. Templeton said she did it
+for fun."
+
+"Indeed!"
+
+"But they didn't like her a bit. I could teach as well as she did
+anyway, mamma, for she just went around the room boxing their ears."
+
+"Is it possible, Katharine?" Mrs. Dunlee was serious enough now. "To
+box a child's ears is simply brutal!"
+
+"I knew you'd say so, mamma; but that was just what Miss Severance did.
+Of course I wouldn't touch their ears any more than I would fly!"
+
+Mrs. Dunlee turned now and regarded her daughter attentively.
+
+"But how did you ever happen to take up this sudden fancy for teaching,
+dear? It's all new to me. What first made you think of it--at your age?
+Can you tell?"
+
+"Oh, mamma, I've been thinking about it, off and on, for a year. Ever
+since I was at Willowbrook last summer and heard Grandma Parlin talk
+about _her_ first school. Why, don't you remember, she was just
+fourteen, she said, nearly three months younger than I am."
+
+Mrs. Dunlee understood it all now, and said to herself:--
+
+"Dear old Grandma Parlin! Little did she imagine she was filling her
+great grand-daughter's head with mischievous notions!"
+
+They walked on a short way in silence. "But you must remember,
+Katharine, that was seventy years ago. Grandma Parlin wouldn't advise a
+girl of fourteen to do in these days as she did then. Schools are very
+different now."
+
+"Yes, indeed, mamma, very, very different. Isn't it too bad? I'd like to
+'board 'round' the way grandma did, and rap on the window with a ferule,
+and 'choose sides' and all that! But there's one thing I could do!"
+exclaimed the little girl, brightening. "I could make the children 'toe
+the mark'; wouldn't that be fun? I mean stand in a line on a crack in
+the floor. How grandma would laugh! I'll write her all about it, and
+send her a photograph, bare feet and all."
+
+In her eagerness Kyzie spoke as if the matter were all arranged and she
+could almost see the children "toeing the mark."
+
+"Not so fast, my daughter. Remember there are three points to be settled
+before we can discuss the matter seriously. First, would your papa
+consent? Second, would your mamma consent? Third, do the people of
+Castle Cliff want a summer school anyway?"
+
+"Three points? I see, oh, yes," said Kyzie, meekly.
+
+"But now, Katharine, let us walk a little faster and join the others.
+And not a word more of this to-day."
+
+"What did keep you two so long?" asked Edith, coming to meet them with a
+bright face. If her happy thoughts had not been dwelling on the zebra
+cat just presented her by the "knitting-woman," she would have observed
+at once that mamma and Kyzie had been "talking secrets"; though she
+might not have suspected that this had anything to do with the vacation
+school.
+
+"Do hurry along," she added. "I want to show you the funniest sight! I
+don't believe you've seen Barbara Hale, have you?"
+
+Edith could hardly speak for laughing; and her mother and Kyzie did not
+wonder when they beheld the figure that little Bab had made of herself,
+by a new style of dressing her hair. The two little girls were, as I
+have told you, as different as possible, but had an intense desire to
+look "just alike"; and when they tried their best the result was very
+funny.
+
+I will mention here that Lucy "despised" her own hair for not being
+straight like Bab's, and had often tried to braid it down her back; but
+as the braid always came out and the ribbon came off, the attempt had
+been forbidden.
+
+Now, however, as the children had left their city home and come to a
+place where everybody was "on holiday," the mammas decided that they
+might have a little more liberty.
+
+Their dresses were off the same piece,--good, strong brown ones; their
+hats were alike; and, as for their hair, they were allowed to wear it as
+they pleased "just for this summer."
+
+"We'll look exactly alike up there in the mountains," the little souls
+had said to each other; and this was perhaps one reason why they had
+been so overjoyed at the prospect of going.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+But to-day, ah! who would have dreamed that sweet little Bab could
+become such a fright? She had done up her hair the night before on as
+many as twenty curl-papers. Before starting for the air-castle she had
+taken out some of the papers and found--not ringlets, but wisps of
+very unruly hair. It would not curl any more than water will run up
+hill.
+
+She went to Aunt Lucy in her trouble to seek advice. Aunt Lucy looked
+her over with great care and then announced:--
+
+"It is perfectly awful! Don't take out any more papers, Bab. Let 'em be,
+so you can have something to stick the curls on to."
+
+And so it was done. The "curls," as Lucy was pleased to call them, were
+drawn up and looped and twisted and fastened by hair-pins to the other
+curls left in the papers. The effect was most surprising. It made Bab's
+head so much higher than usual that she was as tall now as auntie, and
+that in itself was a great gain. Besides, this style, as Lucy said, was
+the "pompy-doo," and very fashionable!
+
+If Bab could have kept her hat on! But she couldn't, and the moment it
+came off they all cried out:--
+
+"Why-ee, Barbara!" and turned away to laugh.
+
+If Mrs. McQuilken had been there she would have said the child looked
+"as if she was possessed of the fox."
+
+"The little goosies! Let them enjoy it!" whispered Mrs. Hale to Mrs.
+Dunlee. "But those topknots will have to come down before the child can
+go to the dinner-table."
+
+And then both the ladies laughed privately behind a large tree. The
+mountain air was doing them good, and they often had as merry times
+together as the young people.
+
+"Hear the boyoes," cried Edith, meaning Jimmy and Nate, who had now
+reached the air-castle and were shouting with all their might. The
+children ran, and so indeed did the older ones, for there was an
+excellent path all the way.
+
+"So that is the air-castle," exclaimed Kyzie, when they were all within
+sight of it. "It's a real house, built right in the mountain."
+
+She was right. There happened to be a great crack right here in the
+rocky side of the mountain, and a cunning little house had been tucked
+into the crack. It was built of small stones. It had two real windows
+with glass panes, and a real door with a brass knocker, which the
+children declared was "too cute for anything."
+
+"The house is as strong as a fort," said Uncle James. "Do you observe it
+is walled all around with stones?"
+
+"Do you know who built it?" asked Aunt Vi; "and why he built it?"
+
+"A rich Mexican named Bandini. He admired the view from the mountain,
+and I don't blame him, do you? He wanted a nice, quiet place where he
+could read and write; that was why he came here. He has been here every
+summer for years."
+
+"Well," said Mr. Dunlee, "if you call this an air-castle I must say it
+is the most solid one I ever heard of! It doesn't look dreamy at all.
+Why, an earthquake could hardly shake it."
+
+"The steps that lead up to it are not dreamy either," said Mrs. Dunlee.
+"Real granite; and there's a large flag up there floating from the
+evergreen tree."
+
+The "boyoes" had already climbed the steps, and Nate called down to Mrs.
+Dunlee, "It's the Mexican flag!" But she had known that at a glance. The
+colors were red, white, and green, and the device was an eagle on a
+prickly pear with a snake in his mouth.
+
+"I wonder if there's anybody at home," said Nate, and would have lifted
+the knocker if Jimmy had not said, "Wait for Uncle James."
+
+Jimmy thought as Uncle James was the leader of the expedition he should
+be the one to do the knocking, or at any rate to tell them when to
+knock. Nate himself had not thought of this. He was not so refined as
+Jimmy, either by nature or by training.
+
+Everybody had climbed the steps now. The older people were enjoying the
+magnificent view; but Bab and Lucy were looking for the two toads who
+had been seen going up to the castle together, the well toad taking the
+lame toad's foot in his mouth.
+
+"I wish they were both here," said Uncle James, "for you would like to
+see them take that little journey."
+
+"And the Mexican who built this air-castle," said Aunt Vi, "is he here
+this summer?"
+
+"No, he died last spring."
+
+"Died?" echoed little Eddo, who had heard that dying means "going up in
+the sky." "What made him die, mamma? Didn't he like it down here?"
+
+Then without waiting for a reply he added most tenderly and
+unexpectedly, "Isn't it nice that _you're_ not dead, mamma?"
+
+"Why do you think that, my son?" she asked, wondering what he would say.
+
+"Oh, _be_-cause I _am_ so glad about it." And at this sweet little
+speech his mother caught him up in her arms and kissed him. How could
+she help it?
+
+"Now," said Uncle James, "let us see if we can enter the castle. 'Open
+locks whoever knocks.' Try it, boys."
+
+Nate lifted the knocker and pounded with a will. There was no answer or
+sign of life.
+
+"Let's see if this will help us," said Uncle James, taking a key from
+his vest pocket:--
+
+    "For I'm the keeper of the keys,
+    And I do whatever I please."
+
+The key actually fitted the lock, the door opened at once, and they all
+entered the castle.
+
+"Mr. Templeton lent me the key," explained Mr. Sanford. "He said the
+castle was as empty as a last year's bird's nest, but I thought we might
+like to take a look at it."
+
+"We do, oh, we do," said Lucy. "Isn't it queer? Just two rooms and
+nothing in 'em at all! Oh, Bab, let's you and I bring some dishes up
+here and keep house! Here's a cupboard right in the wall."
+
+"I guess it's Mother Hubbard's cupboard, it looks bare enough. Just a
+table in the room and one old chair," exclaimed Edith.
+
+"I'm glad we came in, though," said Kyzie. "Isn't it beautiful to stand
+in the door and look down, down, and see Castle Cliff right at your
+feet? And off there a city--Why, what's that noise?"
+
+No one answered. The older people knew the sound: it was that of an
+angry rattlesnake out of doors shaking his rattle.
+
+Mr. Dunlee said:--
+
+"Stay in the house, please, you ladies, and keep the children here.
+James and I will go out and attend to this."
+
+He had an alpenstock, Uncle James a cane. The ladies and Mr, Hale and
+the children watched the two gentlemen from the window,--all but little
+Eddo, whose mother was playing bo-peep with him to prevent him from
+looking out. A handsome rattlesnake was winding his way up the mountain
+in pursuit of a tiny baby rabbit. The little "cotton-tail" was running
+for the castle as fast as he could, intending to hide in a hole under
+the door-stone. But he never would have reached the door-stone alive,
+poor little trembling creature, if Mr. Dunlee and Uncle James had not
+come up just in time to finish the cruel snake with cane and alpenstock.
+Bunny got away safe, without even stopping to say, "Thank you." The
+snake wore seven rattles, of which he was very proud; but Eddo had them
+next day for a plaything, and made as much noise with them as ever the
+snake had done; though Eddo never knew where they came from.
+
+It had been a delightful day, and when the friends all met again at
+table they kept saying, "Didn't we have a good time?"
+
+It was to be noticed that Barbara's "topknots" had disappeared; and I
+am glad to say that she never wore her lovely hair "pompy-doo" again.
+
+Kyzie's face was alight. In passing the door of her mother's room she
+had heard her father say, laughing:--
+
+"What, our Katharine? Why, how that would amuse Mr. Templeton!"
+
+Kyzie had hurried away for fear of listening; but now she kept
+thinking:--
+
+"Papa laughed. He always laughs when he is going to say 'yes.' He'll
+talk to Mr. Templeton, and I just know I shall have the school Isn't it
+splendid?"
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+"GRANDMA GRAYMOUSE"
+
+
+"Hoopty-Doo!" shouted Jimmy, alighting on the piazza on all fours. "A
+little girl like that keep school!"
+
+"Well, she is going to," returned Edith, looking up from the picture she
+was drawing of a cherub in the clouds, "she's going to; and Mr.
+Templeton says the Castle Cliff people are as pleased as they can be."
+
+"I heard what he said," struck in Nate. "He said they jumped at it like
+a dolphin at a silver spoon."
+
+"He's always talking about that dolphin and that silver spoon," laughed
+Edith. "If I knew how a dolphin looks, I'd draw one and give it to him
+just for fun. But mamma, you don't expect me to go to school to that
+little girl; now do you?"
+
+"Certainly not, Edith; oh, no."
+
+"Must _I_ go to Grandmother Graymouse?" whined Jimmy, "She's only my
+sister. And I came up here to play."
+
+"Play all you like, my son. No one will ask you to go school."
+
+"But _I_ really want to go," said Nate. "I wouldn't miss it for
+anything. A girl's school like that will be larks. Only four hours
+anyway, two in the forenoon and two in the afternoon. Time enough left
+for play."
+
+"H'm, if that's all, let's go," cried Jimmy. "We can leave off any time
+we get tired of it."
+
+Kyzie heard this as she was crossing the hall.
+
+"Why, boys," she said, "you don't live in Castle Cliff! It's the Castle
+Cliff children I'm going to teach--the little ones, you know."
+
+"But papa said if you'd show me about my arithmetic--" began Nate.
+
+"Perhaps I don't know so much as you do, Nate. But if you go you'll be
+good, won't you--you and Jimmy both?"
+
+She spoke with some concern. "For if you're naughty, the other boys will
+think they can be naughty too; and I shan't know what in the world to do
+with them."
+
+"Oh, we'll sit up as straight as ninepins; we'll show 'em how city boys
+behave," said Nate, making a bow to Kyzie.
+
+He could be a perfect little gentleman when he chose. He liked to tease
+Jimmy, younger than himself, but had always been polite to Kyzie. Still
+Kyzie did not altogether like the thought of having a boy of twelve for
+a pupil. What if he should laugh at her behind his slate?
+
+Here Barbara and Lucy appeared upon the veranda, holding Edith's new
+kitty between them.
+
+"We're going. We'll sit together and cut out paper dolls and eat figs
+under the seat," declared Lucy, never doubting that this would be
+pleasing news to the young teacher.
+
+Before Kyzie had time to say, "Why, Lucy!" little Eddo ran up the steps
+to ask in haste:--
+
+"Where's Lucy going? I fink I'll go too."
+
+Kyzie could bear no more. She ran and hid in the hammock and cried. They
+all thought she was to have a sort of play-school; did they? They were
+going just for fun. She must talk to mamma. Mamma thought the school was
+foolish business; but mamma always knew what ought to be done, and how
+to help do it. Or if mamma ever felt puzzled, there was papa to go
+to,--papa, who could not possibly make a mistake. Between them they
+would see that their eldest daughter was treated fairly.
+
+Monday morning came. Kyzie's courage had revived. Eddo would be kept at
+home; Lucy and Bab had been informed that they were not to cut paper
+dolls, though they might write on their slates. All that they thought of
+just now, the dear "little two," was of dressing to "look exactly
+alike." As Bab had learned once for all that her hair would not curl,
+she spent half an hour that morning braiding her auntie's ringlets down
+her back, and tying the cue with a pink ribbon like her own. But for all
+the little barber could do the flaxen cue would not lie flat. It was an
+old story, but very provoking.
+
+"Oh dear," wailed Lucy, "'most school-time and my hair is all _over_ my
+head!"
+
+It did look wild. You could almost fancy it was angry because it had
+not been allowed to curl after its own graceful fashion.
+
+The "little two" started off in good season, hoping not to be seen by
+Eddo; but he espied them from the window, and they heard him calling
+till his baby voice was lost in the distance:--
+
+"You ought to not leave me! You ought to not leave m-e-e!"
+
+"He wants to go everywhere big people go."
+
+"Yes," responded Bab. "Such babies think they are as old as anybody. Oh,
+see that Mexican dog, how straight his tail stands up!"
+
+"Like your hair," sighed Lucy. "If my hair would only be straight like
+that!"
+
+And neither of them smiled at this droll remark.
+
+"But there's one thing we must remember, Bab. I'm glad I thought of it.
+We must say, 'Miss' to Kyzie."
+
+"Miss what?"
+
+"Miss Dunlee. If we forget it, she'll feel dreadfully." And then they
+began to hum a tune and keep step to the music. They often did this as
+they walked.
+
+Kyzie had gone on before them. Her father was with her, but she had the
+key in her hand and opened the schoolhouse door. They walked in
+together, and Kyzie locked the door behind them, for several children
+were waiting about who must not enter till the bell rang.
+
+The schoolhouse floor was very clean; the new teacher herself had swept
+it. On the walls were large wreaths of holly, which had been left over
+from last Christmas, when the Sunday-school had had a celebration here.
+At one end of the room was a raised platform with a large desk on it.
+On the wall over the desk was a motto made of red pepper berries, only
+the words were so close together that you could not make them out unless
+you knew beforehand what they were.
+
+"That means, 'Christ is risen,'" explained Kyzie. "It looks dreadfully,
+but they didn't want it taken down, I'll make another by and by."
+
+There were blackboards on three sides of the room; quite clean they
+looked now. The desks and benches were rude ones of black oak, and had
+been hacked by jack-knives. Kyzie regretted this, but supposed the boys
+had not been taught any better. There was only one chair in the room, a
+large armed chair for the little teacher, and it stood solemnly on the
+platform before the desk.
+
+"You see, papa, I've brought a big blank-book to write the names in. The
+pen and inkstand belong here. Ahem, I begin to tremble," said she, and
+looked at her mother's watch which she wore in her belt. "It's five
+minutes of nine."
+
+"Oh, you'll do famously," said Mr. Dunlee. "And now, daughter, I'll wish
+you good-by and the very best luck in the world."
+
+"Good-by, papa," said Kyzie, and locked the door after him. "I wish I'd
+asked him to stay till I called them in and took their names. Papa is so
+dignified that it would have been a great help. My, I feel as if I
+weren't more than six years old!"
+
+She walked the floor, watch in hand. "Fifty seconds of nine."
+
+She went to the bell-rope and pulled with both hands. It was quite
+needless to use so much force. The bell was directly over her head; and
+instead of the "mellow lin-lan-lone" she expected, it made a din so
+tremendous that it almost seemed as if the roof were about to fall upon
+her. At the same time there was a scrambling and pounding at the door.
+The children were trying to get in.
+
+"Oh, miserable me, I've locked them out!" thought the little teacher in
+dismay.
+
+She hastened to the door and opened it, and they rushed in with a shout.
+This was an odd beginning; but Kyzie said not a word. She remembered
+that she was now Miss Dunlee, so she threw back her shoulders and looked
+her straightest and tallest, and as much as possible like Miss Prince,
+her favorite teacher. She had intended all along to imitate Miss
+Prince--whenever she could think of it.
+
+Only fourteen years old! Well, what of that? Grandma Parlin had been
+only fourteen when she taught _her_ first school. Keep a brave heart,
+Katharine Dunlee!
+
+Joe Rolfe walked in as stiffly as a wooden soldier. Behind him came a
+few boys and girls, some of them with their fingers in their mouths.
+There were twelve in all. The last ones to enter were Nate and Jimmy,
+followed by Aunt Lucy and her niece arm in arm.
+
+"I wonder if Nate is laughing at me for locking the door?" thought
+Kyzie, not daring to look at him, as she waved her hands and said in a
+loud voice to be heard above the noise:--
+
+"All please be seated."
+
+Being seated was a work of time; and what a din it made! The children
+wandered about, trying one bench after another to see which they liked
+best.
+
+"You would think they were getting settled for life," whispered Nate to
+Jimmy.
+
+The "little two" chose a place near the west window and began at once
+to write on their slates.
+
+"I'm scared of Miss Dunlee," wrote Aunt Lucy.
+
+"Stop making me laugh," replied the niece.
+
+When at last everybody was "settled for life," Kyzie did not know what
+to do next. "What would Miss Prince do? Why she would read in the Bible.
+I forgot that."
+
+The new teacher took her stand on the platform behind the desk, opened
+her Bible, and read aloud the twenty-third Psalm. Her voice shook,
+partly from fright, partly from trying so hard not to laugh. But she did
+not even smile--far from it. Nate and Jimmy who were watching her could
+have told you that. If she had been at a funeral she could hardly have
+looked more solemn.
+
+Jimmy touched Nate's foot under the bench; Nate gave Jimmy a shove; Bab
+gazed hard at Lucy's flaxen cue; Lucy gazed straight at her thumb.
+
+After the reading "Miss Dunlee" walked about with her blank-book in one
+hand and her pen in the other to take down the children's names.
+
+"I'm Joseph Rolfe; don't you remember me?" said the boy with red hair.
+"And this boy next seat is Chicken Little."
+
+"No, I ain't either, I'm Henry Small," corrected the little fellow,
+ready to cry.
+
+Kyzie shook her finger at both the boys and resolved that "Joe should
+stop calling names, and Henry should stop being such a cry-baby."
+
+Annie Farrell was a dear little girl in a blue and white gingham gown,
+and the new teacher loved her at once. Dorothy Pratt was little more
+than a baby, and when spoken to she put her apron to her eyes and wanted
+to go home.
+
+"She can't go home," said her older sister Janey, "mamma's cookin' for
+company!"
+
+Kyzie patted the baby's tangled hair and sent Janey to get her some
+water.
+
+"I'll go," spoke up Jack Whiting, aged seven. "Janey isn't big enough.
+Besides the pail leaks."
+
+"I'm so glad Edith isn't here," thought Kyzie, "or we should both get to
+giggling. There, it's time now to call them out to read. Let me see,
+where is the best crack in the floor for them to stand on? Why didn't I
+bring a quarter of a dollar with a hole in it for a medal? Oh, the medal
+will be for the spelling-class; that was what Grandma Parlin said."
+
+It seemed a "ling-long" forenoon, and the little teacher rejoiced when
+eleven o'clock came. The family at home looked at her curiously, and
+Uncle James asked outright, "Tell us, Grandmother Graymouse, how do the
+scholars behave?"
+
+"Well, I suppose they behaved as well as they knew how; but oh, it makes
+me so hungry!"
+
+She could not say whether she liked teaching or not.
+
+"Wait till Friday night, Uncle James, and then I'll tell you."
+
+"Well said, Grandmother Graymouse! You couldn't have made a wiser
+remark. We'll ask no further questions till Friday night."
+
+But when Friday night came they were all thinking of something else,
+something quite out of the common; and "Grandmother Graymouse" and her
+school were forgotten.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+THE ZEBRA KITTEN
+
+
+It began with Zee. By this time her young mistress had become very much
+attached to her; and so indeed had all the "Dunlee party." Even Mrs.
+Dunlee petted the kitten and said she was the most graceful creature she
+had ever seen, except, perhaps, the dancing horse, Thistleblow. Eddo
+loved her because "she hadn't any pins in her feet" and did not resent
+his rough handling. The "little two" loved her because she allowed them
+to play all sorts of games with her. They could make believe she was
+very ill and tuck her up in bed, and she would swallow meekly such
+medicine as alum with salt and water without even a mew.
+
+"She is so amiable," said Edith. "And then that wonderful tail of hers,
+mamma! 'Twould bring, I don't know how much money, at a cat fair. It's a
+regular _prize_ tail, you see!"
+
+An animal like this merited extra care. She was not to be put off like
+an everyday cat with saucers of milk and scraps of meat; she must have
+the choicest bits from the table.
+
+"Mrs. McQuilken says the best-fed cats make the best mousers," said
+Edith.
+
+"Is that so, Miss Edith? Then the mice here at Castle Cliff haven't long
+to live!" laughed good-natured Mr. Templeton, as he handed Zee's little
+mistress a pitcher of excellent cream.
+
+Edith was very grateful to Mrs. McQuilken for this remarkable kitten.
+She had taken much pains with her pencil drawing of a cherub in the
+clouds, intending it as a present for the eccentric old lady.
+
+"Do you suppose she'll like it, mamma? You know she's so odd that one
+never can tell."
+
+Mrs. Dunlee was sure the picture would be appreciated. The cherub's
+sweet face looked like Eddo's, and the clouds lay about him very softly,
+leaving bare his pretty dimpled feet, and hands, and arms, and neck. On
+Friday afternoon Edith took the picture in her hand and knocked with a
+beating heart at the door of Number Five.
+
+"Mrs. Me--McQuilken," said she, in a timid voice, on entering the room,
+"you're so fond of pictures that I thought I'd bring you one I drew
+myself. I'm afraid it's not so very, very good; but I hope you'll like
+it just a little."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Mrs. McQuilken was much surprised as well as gratified; and actually
+there were tears in her eyes as she took the offering from Edith's hand.
+She was a lonely old body, and never expected much attention from any
+one, especially from children.
+
+"Why, how kind of you, my dear! It's a beauty!" she exclaimed, gazing at
+the cherub through her spectacles. She was a good judge of pictures.
+"That face is well drawn, and the clouds are fleecy. Did you really do
+it your own self--and for me? Thank you, dear child!"
+
+Edith blushed with pleasure. She had by no means counted on such praise.
+
+"I'll always be kind to old people after this," she thought. "I believe
+they care more about it than you think they do."
+
+But here they were interrupted by the very loud mewing of a cat out of
+doors. They both ran downstairs to see what it meant.
+
+"I do hope and trust it isn't my Zee," cried Edith in alarm.
+
+But it was. They did not see her at first; she was in the back yard
+behind the hotel. It seems a pan of clams had been left standing on the
+back door-step; and Zee must have been frolicking about the pan, never
+dreaming any live creature was in it, when one of the clams, attracted
+by her black waving tail, had caught the tip of the tail in his mouth
+and was holding it fast!
+
+This was pretty severe. Being only an ignorant bivalve, the clam did not
+know that what he had in his mouth was a very precious article, the
+"prize tail" of a beautiful cat. But having once taken hold of it, the
+clam was too obstinate to let go.
+
+Poor Zee jumped up and down, and ran around in circles, mewing with all
+her might. What had happened she did not know; she only knew some heavy
+thing was dragging at her tail and pinching it fearfully. Every one in
+the back of the house was busy; no one but Eddo heard Zee's cries. He
+ran to the maid to ask "what made the kitty sing so sorry?" Whenever she
+mewed he called it singing.
+
+The maid looked out then and threw down her mixing-spoon for laughing.
+It was an odd sight to see a cat prancing about, waving her plume-like
+tail with a clam at the end of it! Nancy was sorry for the kitten, but
+did not know how in the world to get off the clam.
+
+"Take an axe! Take a hatchet!" cried Mrs. McQuilken.
+
+And without waiting for Nancy she seized a hatchet herself, split the
+shell of the clam, and let poor kitty free.
+
+When Kyzie got home from school, Mrs. McQuilken had just mended Zee's
+bleeding member with a piece of court-plaster. All the boarders were
+grouped about on the lawn and veranda talking it over. Mrs. Dunlee held
+in her lap a very forlorn and crumpled little bundle of kitty; and Edith
+and Eddo were crying as if their hearts would break.
+
+"That beautiful, beautiful tail!" sobbed Edith.
+
+"Don't be unhappy about it, darling," said Aunt Vi, "it will heal in
+time."
+
+"I know 't will heal, auntie; but what I'm thinking of is, won't it be
+stiff? Aren't you afraid 'twill lose the--the--_expression of the
+wiggle?_"
+
+No one even smiled at the question; everybody tried to comfort Edith.
+And right in the midst of this trying scene another event occurred of a
+different sort, but far more serious. It was little wonder that nobody
+once thought of saying to Kyzie:--
+
+"Well, Grandma Graymouse, you promised to tell us to-night how you like
+your school."
+
+The school was quite forgotten, and so was the injured kitten. It
+happened in this way: As soon as the kitten had been placed in a basket
+of cotton and seemed tolerably comfortable, Jimmy and "the little two"
+went along the road as they often did to watch for the stage. "The
+colonel" might be coming now at almost any time, to find the lost vein
+of the gold mine, and they wanted to see him first of any one. Lucy had
+her papa's watch fastened to the waist of her dress, and took great
+pleasure in seeing the hands move. This was not the first time she had
+been allowed to carry the watch, and she was very proud because papa had
+just said, "See how I trust my little girl."
+
+Jimmy had Uncle James's spy-glass.
+
+"Nate thinks the colonel won't come till to-morrow; but I expect him
+to-night. Let's go farther up," said Jimmy-boy.
+
+They all climbed a little way and stood on a rock gazing down toward the
+dusty road. They could see the roofs of several houses, and Lucy asked
+why there was so much wire on them.
+
+"Oh, that's to hold the chimneys on," was Jimmy's reply.
+
+"How queer!"
+
+"Not queer at all. I've seen lots of chimneys tied on that way."
+
+Bab doubted this, but Lucy was proud to think how much Jimmy knew.
+
+"Six minutes past five," said she, looking at the watch again. "It takes
+these little hands just as long to go round this little face as it takes
+a clock's hands to go round a clock's face. How funny!"
+
+"Not funny at all," said Jimmy. "They're made that way. But be careful,
+Lucy Dunlee, or you'll drop that watch. I shouldn't have thought papa
+would have let you bring it up here. Did you tell him where we were
+going?"
+
+"No, I never," replied Lucy with a sudden prick of conscience. "I didn't
+know we'd go so far. 'Twas you that spoke and said we'd go higher up."
+
+"Well, you'd better let me take it, Lucy. I'm older than you are, and
+I've got a little pocket, too, just the right size to hold it."
+
+Lucy hesitated, not wishing to part with the watch, and not at all sure
+that it would be safer with Jimmy than with herself. He was not a famous
+care-taker.
+
+"I don't see why you want to get it away when papa lent it to me and
+it's fastened on so tight. How do I know papa would be willing?"
+
+As she spoke, however, Jimmy was fingering the little chain to see if
+he could undo the clasp which held it to her dress.
+
+"There, I don't believe you could have got it off, Lucy, you didn't know
+how."
+
+"Why, I never tried--papa fastened it on himself--oh, Jimmy-boy, you
+will be so careful of it, now won't you?"
+
+For the watch lay in his hand, and she did not know how to get it back
+again. When he had set his heart on anything Lucy usually gave up.
+Barbara looked on in disapproval as the big brother put the watch in his
+pocket.
+
+It had long been Jimmy's unspoken wish to have a watch of his very own
+like Nate Pollard and various other boys. How rich and handsome the
+short gold chain looked! What a bright spot it made as it dangled down
+his new jacket. He gazed at it admiringly, while Bab and Lucy took
+turns in looking through the spy-glass.
+
+"The stage is coming," they cried. Then they all started and ran down
+the mountain; but as the stage drove up to the hotel no colonel
+alighted, or at least, no one who looked like a colonel. Jimmy was
+playing with the short gold chain which made a bright spot on his
+jacket. He meant to restore the watch to its owner at dinner-time; but
+it was early, he was not going in yet. And there was Nate Pollard
+throwing up his cap and looking ready for a frolic.
+
+"I stump you to catch me!" said Nate.
+
+"Poh, I can catch you and not half try."
+
+Jimmy-boy was agile, Nate rather heavily built and clumsy. But if Jimmy
+had suspected what a foolhardy project was in Nate's mind he would have
+held back from the race.
+
+As it was, they both planted themselves against a tree, shouted, "One,
+two, three!" and off they started. No one was watching, no one
+remembered afterward which way they were going.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+STEALING A CHIMNEY
+
+
+The "knitting-woman" sat knitting in her chamber that looked up the
+mountain side, and thinking how the zebra kitten had suffered from her
+enemy, the clam. Mrs. McQuilken's own cats were most of them asleep; the
+blind canary was eating her supper of hemp-seed; and the noisy magpie
+had run off to chat with the dog and hens. The room seemed remarkably
+quiet. Mrs. McQuilken narrowed two stitches and glanced out of the
+window.
+
+"Mercy upon us!" she exclaimed, though there was not a soul to hear her.
+"Mercy upon us, what are those boyoes doing atop of that house?"
+
+In her astonishment she actually dropped her knitting-work on the floor
+and rushed out of the room crying, "Fire!" though there was not a spark
+of fire to be seen.
+
+The "boyoes" were Nate and Jimmy. Nate had said to Jimmy just as they
+started on the race:--
+
+"You won't dare follow where I lead;" and Jimmy, stung by the defiant
+tone, had answered:--
+
+"Poh, yes, I will! Who's afraid?" never once suspecting that Nate was
+going to climb the ridge-pole of a house!
+
+The house was a small cabin painted green, but there were people living
+in it, and nothing could be ruder than to storm it in this way, as both
+boys knew.
+
+"Why, Nate why, _Nate_, what are you doing?"
+
+"Ho, needn't come if you're scared," retorted Nate.
+
+"Who said I was scared? But I'm not your 'caddy,' I won't go another
+step," gasped Jimmy.
+
+Still he did not stop climbing. Hadn't Nate "stumped" him; and hadn't he
+"taken the stump," agreeing to follow his lead? Besides, Nate was
+already on the roof, and it was necessary to catch him at once.
+
+Jimmy reached the roof easily enough and darted toward Nate with both
+arms out-stretched. But by that time Nate had turned around and begun to
+slide down another ridge-pole, shouting:--
+
+"Here, my caddy, here I am; catch me, caddy!"
+
+It was most exasperating. Jimmy saw that he had been outwitted. On the
+solid earth, running a fair race, the chances were that he could have
+beaten Nate. But was this a fair race?
+
+"No, I'll leave it out to anybody if it's fair! Nate Pollard is the
+meanest boy in California," thought angry Jimmy, as he started to follow
+his leader down the ridge-pole.
+
+At this moment something hit him just below the knee and held him fast.
+In his haste he had not stopped to notice that the chimney was of the
+very sort he had just described to Lucy--built of tiles and held on to
+the roof by wires. He was caught in these wires; and whenever he tried
+to move he found he was actually pulling the chimney after him! Nate,
+safely landed on the ground, called back to him in triumph:--
+
+"Hello, Jimmy-cum-jim! Hello, my caddy! Where are you? Why don't you
+come along?"
+
+Jimmy was coming as fast as he could. He lay face downward, sliding
+along toward the edge of the roof, and carrying with him that most
+undesirable chimney! What would become of him if he should fall
+head-first with the chimney on his back?
+
+It was a rough scramble; but he managed to turn over before he reached
+the ground--so that he landed on his feet. The chimney landed near him,
+a wreck. Jimmy was unhurt except for a few scratches. But oh, it was
+dreadful to hear himself laughed at, not only by that mischievous Nate,
+but by half a dozen other boys and a few grown people, who had collected
+on the spot; among them the landlord and Mrs. McQuilken.
+
+Not that any one could be blamed for laughing. Jimmy was a comical
+object. In carrying away a chimney which did not belong to him, he had
+of course torn his clothes frightfully and left big pieces sticking on
+the broken wires of the roof. A more "raggety" boy never was seen.
+
+"Wouldn't he make a good scarecrow?" said the landlord, shaking his
+sides. "Jimmum, chimney, and all!"
+
+It was necessary to tear his clothes still more in order to get them
+free from the tangle of wires. As the poor young culprit crept
+unwillingly back to the hotel all the cats, dogs, donkeys, and chickens
+in Castle Cliff seemed to combine in a chorus of mewing, barking,
+braying, and cackling to inform the whole world that here was a boy who
+had stolen a chimney!
+
+What wretched little beggar was this coming to the house? No one thought
+of its being Jimmy Dunlee.
+
+"We caught this young rogue stealing a chimney," said Mr. Templeton.
+
+It seemed funny at first, and the Dunlees and Sanfords and Hales all
+laughed heartily, till it occurred to them that the dear child had been
+in actual danger; and then they drew long breaths and shuddered,
+thinking how he might have pitched headlong to the ground and been
+crushed by the weight of the chimney.
+
+"But my little son," asked Mrs. Dunlee presently, when the child was
+once more respectably clad, and was walking down to dinner between
+herself and Aunt Vi, "but my little son, what could have possessed you
+to climb a roof? Was that a nice thing to do?"
+
+"No, mamma, of course not. But 'twas all Nate Pollard's fault. Nate
+stumped me to it and I took the stump."
+
+"What _do_ you mean?"
+
+"Why, he said, 'You won't dare follow me,' and I said, 'Yes, I would.'
+And I never mistrusted where he was going. Who'd have thought of his
+climbing top of a house?"
+
+"Why, Jamie Dunlee, you did not follow Nate without knowing where he
+was going?"
+
+"Yes, mamma; if I _had_ known I wouldn't have followed. But you see he
+had stumped me and I'd taken the stump, so I was _obliged_ to go!"
+
+"Obliged to go!" repeated Aunt Vi, laughing, "Isn't that characteristic
+of Jimmy?"
+
+The little fellow felt guiltier than ever. When Aunt Vi used that word
+of five syllables it always meant that people had done very wrong, so he
+thought.
+
+"Jamie," said his mother very seriously, "I am surprised that you should
+have promised to follow Nate without knowing where he was going! And you
+never even asked him where he was going! Is that the way you play, you
+boys?"
+
+"No, mamma, it isn't. Nate makes you play his way because he's the
+oldest. He's just as mean! But I couldn't back out after I was
+stumped."
+
+"Oh, fie! Backing out is exactly the thing to do when a boy is trying to
+lead you into mischief! But we'll talk more of this by and by."
+
+As they entered the dining-room, Jimmy squared his shoulders and would
+not look toward Nate's table; and Nate, who had been severely reproved
+by his parents, never once raised his eyes from his plate. No one felt
+very happy. Jimmy's new suit was ruined; and Mr. Dunlee had already
+learned that it would cost ten dollars to restore the tile chimney. Nor
+was this all. While Jimmy was trying to console himself with ice-cream
+he suddenly thought of his father's watch! It must have dropped out of
+his pocket when he slid down the roof; but where, oh, where was it now?
+Was it still on the ground, or had some one picked it up? Joe Rolfe had
+been there, so had Chicken Little and a dozen others. He must go and
+look for that watch, he must go this minute.
+
+"Mamma," he murmured, pushing aside his saucer of ice-cream, "may I--may
+I be excused?"
+
+There was no answer; his mother had not heard him.
+
+"Mamma," in a louder tone, "oh, mamma!"
+
+"What is it, my son?"
+
+Seeing by his unhappy face that something was wrong, she nodded
+permission for him to leave the table; and at the same time arose and
+followed him into the hall.
+
+"Dear child, what is the matter?"
+
+"Papa's watch," he moaned. "I'm afraid somebody will steal it."
+
+As Mrs. Dunlee knew nothing whatever about the watch this sounded very
+strange. She wondered if Jimmy had really been hurt by his fall and was
+out of his head.
+
+"Why, my precious little boy," said she, taking his hot hand in hers.
+"Papa's watch is safe in his vest pocket. Nobody is going to steal it."
+
+Jimmy looked immensely relieved.
+
+"Oh, has he got it back again? I'm so glad! Where did he find it?"
+
+"Darling," said Mrs. Dunlee, now really alarmed. "Come upstairs with
+mamma. Does your head ache? I think it will be best for you to go right
+to bed."
+
+But Jimmy persisted in talking about the watch.
+
+"Where did papa find it? He let Lucy have it; don't you know?"
+
+"No, I did not know."
+
+"And I took it away from Lucy. I was afraid she'd lose it. And
+then,--oh, dear, oh, dear,--then I went and lost it myself!"
+
+Mrs. Dunlee understood it all now. Jimmy's head was clear enough; he
+knew perfectly well what he was talking about. The watch was gone, a
+very valuable one. Search must be made for it at once. Without waiting
+to speak to her husband, Mrs. Dunlee put on her hat and went with Jimmy
+up the hill. He limped a little from the bruise of his fall and she
+steadied him with her arm as they walked.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+"CHICKEN LITTLE" AND JOE
+
+
+The man and woman who lived in the green cottage had gone to a
+neighbor's to stay till their chimney should be fastened on again. There
+was no one in sight.
+
+"Here's the place where I went up," said Jimmy, laying his hand on one
+of the ridge-poles. "And here's the place where I came down," pointing
+to another ridge-pole.
+
+Mrs. Dunlee was stooping and looking around carefully. There was not a
+tuft of grass or a clump of weeds behind which even a small article
+could be hidden, much less a large bright object like a gold watch. She
+took a wooden pencil from her pocket and scraped the earth with it; but
+only disturbed a few ants and beetles. If the watch had ever been
+dropped here, it certainly was not here now. She and Jimmy turned and
+walked home in the twilight,--or as Mrs. McQuilken called it, "the
+dimmets," and poor Jimmy drew a cloud of gloom about him like a cloak.
+
+They looked on the ground at every step of the way.
+
+"There's a piece of chaparral over there. Did you go through that?"
+asked Mrs. Dunlee.
+
+"No, I never, I'm sure I never. I walked in the road right straight
+along. Oh, mamma, if I've lost that watch 'twill break my heart. But
+I'll pay papa for it, you see if I don't! I'll save every penny I get
+and put it together and pay papa!"
+
+Mrs. Dunlee did not reply for a moment; she took time to reflect. Jimmy
+was a dear boy, but very heedless. He had done wrong in the first place
+to take the watch from Lucy without his father's permission. He must be
+taught to respect other people's property and other people's rights. He
+must learn to think, and learn to be careful. Here was a chance for a
+lesson.
+
+"Jamie," said she at last, "I am glad you wish to atone for the wrong
+you have done; it shows a proper spirit. I agree with you that if the
+watch isn't found you ought to give papa what you can toward paying for
+it. That is no more than fair."
+
+"I want to, mamma, I just want to!" burst forth Jimmy. "I wish I was
+little like Eddo, before 'twas wrong for me to be naughty."
+
+His mother took him in her arms and kissed him, for he was so tired and
+miserable that he could not keep the tears back another moment.
+
+Friday night passed and most of Saturday; and though diligent search
+was made, the watch was not found.
+
+"Poor papa!" said Kyzie. "He doesn't say much; but how sober he looks!
+Grandma Dunlee gave him that watch, Jimmy, when he was a young man; and
+he did love it so!"
+
+"I know it. Oh, dear, how can he stand it?" responded jimmy, who had
+been deeply touched from the first by his father's forbearance. "Mr,
+Pollard punished Nate dreadfully, you know; but here's Papa Dunlee, why,
+he hasn't even scolded!"
+
+Papa Dunlee was a wise man. He saw that his little son was suffering
+enough already; he was learning a hard lesson, and perhaps would learn
+it all the better for being left alone with his own conscience.
+
+On Sunday afternoon the boy was very disconsolate, and Mr. Dunlee patted
+him on the head, saying:--
+
+"Maybe we'll find the watch yet, my son. And anyway, I know Jimmum
+didn't mean to lose it."
+
+Then he sat down to read, and Jimmy gazed at him reverently. The
+sunshine about his head seemed almost like a halo, and the boy thought
+of the angels, and wondered if they could possibly be any better than
+papa!
+
+"Papa is the best man! Never was cross in his life. I should be cross as
+fury! I should shake _my_ boy all to pieces if he should carry off my
+gold watch and drop it in the sand!"
+
+Monday morning came and the missing article did not appear. Everybody
+looked troubled. Edith walked about, carrying her lame kitten in a
+basket, and saying:--
+
+"Zee is getting better all the while, but how can I be happy when papa's
+watch is lost!"
+
+"Who knows but I shall be the one to find it?" returned Katharine with
+a mysterious smile, as she was leaving the house.
+
+"You forgot to tell us, and we forgot to ask you, How do you like your
+school?" said Aunt Vi.
+
+"Oh, ever so much, auntie. I'm making it just as old-fashioned as I can.
+I'm going to write Grandma Parlin this week and ask her if what I do is
+old-fashioned enough. Good-by."
+
+Jimmy was waiting for her down the path.
+
+"What makes you think you'll find the watch, Kyzie?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know, myself, what I meant. I just said it for fun."
+
+"Well, do you think Joe Rolfe has got it, or Chicken Little? That's what
+I want to know."
+
+"Hush, Jimmy! Papa wouldn't allow you to speak names in that way.
+Somebody stole it, I suppose, but we don't know who it was."
+
+Still Kyzie's face wore a stern look that morning. It was a thing not to
+be spoken of, but she had resolved to "keep an eye" on two or three of
+the boys, and see if there was anything peculiar in their appearance.
+Should one of them blush or turn pale when spoken to, it would be a sure
+sign of guilt, and she should go home and announce with triumph to her
+father:--
+
+"Papa, I've found out the thief!"
+
+The scholars all appeared pretty much as usual; raising their hands very
+often to ask, "May I speak?" or, "May I have a drink of water?" The
+little teacher had always wished they would not do so, but how could she
+help it? It was "an old-fashioned school," perhaps that was why it was
+so noisy. Whatever went wrong, Kyzie always said to herself, "Oh, it's
+just an old-fashioned school."
+
+Nate Pollard and Jimmy sat to-day as far apart as possible, almost
+turning their backs upon each other. At the bottom of his heart Nate was
+truly ashamed of himself, though he would not have owned it. There were
+five new scholars, and Katharine wrote down their names with much pride.
+Best of all, some of the children really seemed to be trying to get
+their lessons.
+
+She had never known Joe Rolfe to study like this. "Is it because he is
+guilty?" thought the little teacher watching him from under her
+eyebrows. She walked along toward him so softly that he did not hear her
+footsteps.
+
+"Joseph!" she exclaimed, suddenly. Her voice startled him; he looked up
+in surprise.
+
+"I'm glad to see you studying, Joseph."
+
+Did he blush? His face was of a brownish red hue at any time, being
+much tanned; she could not be quite sure of the blush. But why did he
+look so sober? Children generally smile when they are praised.
+
+She had been to Bab and Lucy and said, "How still you are, darlings!"
+and they had seemed delighted.
+
+Next she tried Chicken Little. He certainly jumped when she spoke his
+name close to his ear, "Henry." Now why should he jump and seem so
+confused unless he knew he had done something wrong? She forgot that he
+was a very timid boy.
+
+"Henry, what is the matter with you?" she asked, frowning severely.
+
+She had never frowned on him before, for she liked the little fellow,
+and was trying her best to "make a man of him."
+
+"What is the matter, Henry?"
+
+By this time he was scared nearly out of his wits, and stole a side
+glance at her to see if she had a switch in her hand.
+
+"Don't whip me," he pleaded in a trembling voice. "Don't whip me,
+teacher; and I'll give you f-i-v-e thousand dollars!"
+
+As he offered this modest sum to save himself from her wrath, the little
+teacher nearly laughed aloud, Henry did not know it, however; her face
+was hidden behind a book.
+
+"What made you think, you silly boy, that I was going to punish you?"
+she asked as soon as she could find her voice. "Have you done something
+wicked?"
+
+She spoke in a low tone for his ear alone, but he writhed under it as if
+it had been a blow.
+
+"I--don'--know."
+
+"He is the thief," thought Kyzie. "Oh, Henry, if you've done something
+wrong you must know it. Tell me what it was."
+
+"I--can't!"
+
+She put her lips nearer his ear. "Was it you and Joseph Rolfe together?
+Perhaps you _both_ did something wicked?"
+
+"I--don'--know."
+
+"Was it last Friday?"
+
+"I--don'--know!"
+
+"Will you tell me after school?"
+
+Henry was unable to answer. Worn out with contending emotions he put his
+head down on the seat and cried.
+
+This did not seem like innocence. Joseph Rolfe was looking on from
+across the aisle, as if he wished very much to know what she and Henry
+were talking about.
+
+"I'll make them tell me the whole story, the wicked boys," thought
+Kyzie, indignantly. "But I can't hurry about it; I must be very
+careful. I think I'll wait till to-morrow."
+
+So she calmed herself and called out her classes. Katharine was a
+"golden girl," and had a strong sense of justice. She would say nothing
+yet to her father, for the boys might possibly be innocent; still she
+went home that afternoon feeling that she had almost made a discovery.
+
+"Good evening, Grandmother Graymouse," said Uncle James, as they were
+all seated on the veranda after dinner, "do I understand that you are
+hunting for a watch?"
+
+"I'm hunting for it, oh, yes," replied Kyzie, trying not to look too
+triumphant; "but I haven't found it yet. Just wait till to-morrow, Uncle
+James."
+
+"I don't believe we'll wait another minute!" declared Mr. Sanford,
+looking around with a roguish smile. "I see the Dunlee people are all
+here, Jimmum, Lucy, and all. Attention, my friends! The thief has been
+found!"
+
+"What thief?" asked Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Dunlee.
+
+"Why, _the_ thief! The one we're looking for! The one that stole the
+watch!"
+
+"Do you really mean it?" asked the ladies again. "Did he bring it back?"
+
+"Come and see," said Uncle James, leading the way upstairs.
+
+"Of course it's Joe Rolfe," thought Kyzie. "I suppose he was frightened
+by what I said to Henry Small."
+
+"Is the thief in your room, Uncle James?" said Jimmy. "Why didn't you
+put him in jail?"
+
+"Ah, Jimmum, do you think all thieves ought to go to jail? I once knew a
+little boy who stole a chimney right off a house; yet I never heard a
+word said about putting _him_ in jail!
+
+"But here we are at the chamber door. Stand behind me, all of you, in
+single file."
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+THE THIEF FOUND
+
+
+"I don't know so much as I thought I did," said Kyzie to herself. "Joe
+Rolfe wouldn't be in this room."
+
+For Uncle James was knocking at the door of Number Five.
+
+"Walk right in," said Mrs. McQuilken, coming to meet her guests. She had
+her knitting in one hand. "Come in, all of you. Why, Mr. Templeton, are
+you here too? You wouldn't have taken me into your house if you'd known
+I was a thief; now would you, Mr. Templeton?"
+
+And laughing, she put her right hand in her apron pocket and drew out a
+gold watch and chain.
+
+"If this belongs to anybody present, let him step up and claim his
+property."
+
+Mr. Dunlee came forward in amazement, while Jimmy gave a little squeal
+of delight.
+
+"This is mine, thank you, madam," said Mr. Dunlee, looking at the watch
+closely. It seemed very much battered.
+
+"Dreadfully smashed up, isn't it, sir? I can't tell you how sorry I am."
+
+Mr. Dunlee shook it, and held it to his ear.
+
+"Oh, it won't go," said Mrs. McQuilken. "The inside seems worse off, if
+anything, than the outside. 'Twill have to have new works."
+
+"Very likely. But it is so precious to me, madam, that even in this
+condition I'm glad to get it back again. Pray, where has it been?"
+
+"Right here in this room. Didn't you understand me to confess to
+stealing it? Why, you're shaking your head as if you doubted my word."
+
+They were all laughing now, and the old lady's eyes twinkled with fun.
+
+"Well, if I didn't steal it myself, one of my family did, so it amounts
+to the same thing. Come out here, you unprincipled girl, and beg the
+gentleman's pardon," she added, kneeling and dragging forth from under
+the bed a beautiful bird.
+
+It was her own magpie, chattering and scolding.
+
+"Now tell the gentleman who stole his watch? Speak up loud and clear!"
+
+The bird flapped her wings, and cawed out very crossly:--
+
+"Mag! Mag! Mag!"
+
+"Hear her! Hear that!" cried her mistress. "So you did steal it,
+Mag--I'm glad to hear you tell the truth for once in your life."
+
+"Did she take the watch? Did she really and truly?" cried the children
+in chorus.
+
+"To be sure she did, the bad girl. She has done such things before, and
+I have always found her out; but this time she was too sly for me. She
+went and put it in my mending-basket; and who would have thought of
+looking for it there?"
+
+Mag tipped her head to one side saucily, and kept muttering to herself.
+
+"Well, I happened to go to the basket this afternoon and take up a pair
+of stockings to mend. They felt amazingly heavy. There was a hard wad in
+them, and I wondered what it could be. I put in my hand and pulled out
+the watch. Yes, 'twas tucked right into the stockings."
+
+"I wonder we didn't any of us mistrust her at the time of it," said Mr.
+Templeton; "those magpies are dreadful thieves."
+
+"Well, I suppose you thought 'twas my business to take care of her, and
+it was. I'm ashamed of myself," said Mrs. McQuilken. "I was looking out
+of the window when the boys shied over that roof, but my mind wasn't on
+jewelry then. All I thought of was to run and call for help."
+
+Yes, and it was her screams which had aroused the whole neighborhood.
+
+"And at that very time my Mag was roaming at large. No doubt she saw the
+watch the moment it fell; and to use your expression, Mr. Templeton, she
+jumped at it like a dolphin at a silver spoon."
+
+The landlord laughed. "But the mystery is," said he, "how she got back
+to the house without being seen. She must have been pretty spry."
+
+"O Mag, Mag, to think I never once thought to look after you!"
+exclaimed Mrs. McQuilken, penitently.
+
+The bird was scolding all the while, and running about with short, jerky
+movements, trying her best to get out of the room; but the door was
+closed.
+
+"Pretty thing," said Edith. "What a shame she should be a thief!"
+
+"She is pretty, now isn't she?" returned her mistress, fondly. "My
+husband brought her from China. You don't often see a Chinese magpie,
+with blue plumage,--cobalt blue."
+
+"She's a perfect oddity," said Mrs. Hale. "See those two centre
+tail-feathers, so very long, barred with black and tipped with white."
+
+"Yes," said Mr. Dunlee, "and the red bill and red legs. She's a
+brilliant creature, Mrs. McQuilken."
+
+"Well, you'll try to forgive her, won't you, sir? I mean to bring her
+up as well as I know how; but what are you going to do with a girl that
+can't sense the ten commandments?"
+
+"What indeed!" laughed Mr. Dunlee.
+
+"You see she's naturally light-fingered. Yes, you are, Mag, you needn't
+deny it. Those red claws of yours are just pickers and stealers."
+
+Here Edith called attention to Mag's nest on the wall, and they all
+admired it; and Mrs. McQuilken said the canary liked to have Mag near
+him at night, he was apt to be lonesome.
+
+"I wish you'd come in the daytime," said she. "Come any and all of you,
+and hear him sing. He does sing so sweetly, poor blind thing; it's as
+good as a sermon to hear him."
+
+On leaving Mrs. McQuilken the children went to Aunt Vi's room and Jimmy
+kept repeating joyously:--
+
+"We've found the watch, we've found the watch!"
+
+"Yes," said Aunt Vi; "but what a wreck it is! Your papa will have to
+spend a deal of money in repairing it."
+
+"Too bad!" said Lucy, "I 'spect 'twould cost him cheaper to buy a new
+one."
+
+"'Twouldn't cost him so much; that's what you mean," corrected Jimmy.
+"But I'm going to pay for mending it anyway."
+
+"How can you?" asked Kyzie. "All you have is just your tin box with
+silver in it."
+
+"Well, but don't I keep having presents? And can't I ask folks to stop
+giving me toys and books and give me money? And they'll do it every
+time."
+
+"But that would be begging."
+
+Jimmy's face fell. Yes, on the whole it did seem like begging. He had
+not thought of that.
+
+"Why can't it ever snow in this country?" he exclaimed suddenly. "Then I
+could shovel it. That's the way boys make money 'back East'"
+
+Then after a pause he burst forth again, "Or, I might pick berries--if
+there were any berries!"
+
+"It's not so very easy for little boys to earn money; is it, dear?" said
+Aunt Vi, putting her arm around her young nephew and drawing him toward
+her. "But when they've done wrong--you still think you did wrong, don't
+you, Jimmy?"
+
+"He knows he did," broke in Lucy. "My papa lent me the watch."
+
+"She wasn't talking to you," remonstrated Jimmy. "Yes, auntie, I did
+wrong; but Lucy needn't twit me of it! I won't be _characteristic_ any
+more as long as I live."
+
+Aunt Vi smiled and patted his head lovingly.
+
+"No, dear, I think you'll be more thoughtful in future. But now let us
+try to think what can be done to pay for the watch."
+
+"I'll let him have some of the money I get for teaching. I always meant
+to," said Kyzie.
+
+"Very kind of you," returned Aunt Vi; "but we'll not take it if we can
+help it, will we, Jimmy? I've been thinking it over for some days,
+children; and a little plan has occurred to me. Would you like to know
+what it is?"
+
+They all looked interested. If Aunt Vi had a plan, it was sure to be
+worth hearing.
+
+"It is this: mightn't we get up some entertainments,--good ones that
+would be worth paying for?"
+
+"And sell the tickets? Oh, auntie, that's just the thing! That's
+capital!" cried Edith and Kyzie. "You'd do it beautifully."
+
+"I'm not so sure of that, girls. But we might join together and act a
+little play that I've been writing; that is, we might try. What have you
+to say, Jimmy? Could you help?"
+
+"I don't know. I can't speak pieces worth a cent," replied the boy,
+writhing and shuffling his feet. "Look here!" he said, brightening.
+"Don't you want some nails driven? I can do that first rate."
+
+Aunt Vi laughed and said nails might be needed in putting up a staging,
+and she was sure that he could use a hammer better than she could.
+
+Jimmy-boy, much gratified, struck an attitude, and pounding his left
+palm with his thumb, repeated the rhyme:--
+
+    "Drive the nail straight, boys,
+      Hit it on the head;
+    Work with your might, boys,
+      Ere the day has fled."
+
+"There, he can speak, I knew he could speak!" cried Lucy, in admiration.
+
+It was settled that they were all to meet Wednesday morning, and their
+mother with them, to talk over the matter.
+
+"That's great," said Jimmy.
+
+The watch was found and the world looked bright once more. True, he was
+deeply in debt; but with such a grand helper as Aunt Vi he was sure the
+debt would very soon be paid.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+BEGGING PARDON
+
+
+Next morning Jimmy walked to school with "the little two," whistling as
+he went. Lucy had tortured her hair into a "cue," and
+
+    "The happy wind upon her played,
+    Blowing the ringlet from the braid."
+
+"I've got the snarling-est, flying-est hair," scolded she. "I never'll
+braid it again as long as I live; so there!"
+
+"Good!" cried Jimmy. "It has looked like fury ever since we came up
+here."
+
+Here Nate overtook the children. He had not been very social since the
+accident, but seemed now to want to talk.
+
+"How do you do, Jimmy?" he said: and Jimmy responded, "How d'ye do
+yourself?"
+
+The little girls ran on in advance, and Jimmy would have joined them,
+but Nate said:---
+
+"Hold on! What's your hurry?"
+
+Jimmy turned then and saw that Nate was scowling and twisting his
+watch-chain.
+
+"I've got something to say to you--I mean papa wants me to say
+something."
+
+"Oh ho!"
+
+"I don't see any need of it, but papa says I must."
+
+Jimmy waited, curious to hear what was coming.
+
+"Papa says I jollied you the other day."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Why, fooled you."
+
+"So you did, Nate Pollard, and 'twas awful mean."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"It wasn't either. What made you climb that ridge-pole? You needn't
+have done it just because I did. But papa says I've got to--to--ask your
+pardon."
+
+"H'm! I should think you'd better! Tore my clothes to pieces. Smashed a
+gold watch."
+
+"You hadn't any business taking that watch."
+
+There was a pause.
+
+"Look here, Jimmy Dunlee, why don't you speak?"
+
+"Haven't anything to say."
+
+"Can't you say, 'I forgive you'?"
+
+"Of course I can't. You never asked me."
+
+"Well, I ask you now. James S. Dunlee, will--you--forgive me?"
+
+"H'm! I suppose I'll have to," replied Jimmy, firing a pebble at nothing
+in particular. "I forgive you all right because we've found the watch.
+If we hadn't found it, I wouldn't! But don't you 'jolly' me again, Nate
+Pollard, or you'll catch it!"
+
+This did not sound very forgiving; but neither had Nate's remark sounded
+very penitent. Nate smiled good-naturedly and seemed satisfied. The fact
+was, he and Jimmy were both of them trying, after the manner of boys, to
+hide their real feelings. Nate knew that his conduct had been very
+shabby and contemptible, and he was ashamed of it, but did not like to
+say so. Jimmy, for his part, was glad to make up, but did not wish to
+seem too glad.
+
+Then they each tried to think of something else to say. They were fully
+agreed that they had talked long enough about their foolish quarrel and
+would never allude to it again.
+
+"Glad that watch has come," said Nate.
+
+"So am I. It has come, but it won't _go_," said Jimmy. And they laughed
+as if this were a great joke.
+
+Next Jimmy inquired about "the colonel," and Nate asked: "What colonel?
+Oh, you mean the mining engineer. He'll be here next week with his men."
+
+By this time the boys were feeling so friendly that Jimmy asked Nate to
+go with him before school next morning to see the knitting-woman's pets
+and hear the blind canary sing.
+
+"Do you suppose the magpie will be there?" returned Nate. "I want to
+catch her some time and wring her old neck."
+
+"Wish you would," said Jimmy. "Hello, there's Chicken Little crying
+again. He's more of a baby than our Eddo."
+
+Henry was crying now because Dave Blake had called him a coward. So
+very, very unjust! He stood near the schoolhouse door, wiping his eyes
+on his checked apron and saying:--
+
+"I'll go tell the teacher, Dave Blake!"
+
+"Well, go along and tell her then. Fie, for shame!"
+
+Henry, a feeble, petted child, was always falling into trouble and
+always threatening to tell the teacher. Kyzie considered him very
+tiresome; but to-day when he came to her with his tale of woe, she
+listened patiently, because she had done him a wrong and wished to atone
+for it. She had "really and truly" suspected this simple child of a
+crime! He would not take so much as a pin without leave; neither would
+Joseph Rolfe. Yet in her heart she had been accusing these innocent
+children of stealing her father's watch!
+
+"Miserable me!" thought Kyzie. "I must be very good to both of them now,
+to make up for my dreadful injustice!"
+
+She went to Joe and sweetly offered to lend him her knife to whittle
+his lead pencil. He looked surprised. He did not know she had ever
+wronged him in her heart.
+
+She wiped Henry's eyes on her own pocket handkerchief.
+
+"Poor little cry-baby!" thought she. "I told my mother I would try to
+make a man of him, and now I mean to begin."
+
+She walked part of the way home with him that afternoon. He considered
+it a great honor. She looked like a little girl, but her wish to help
+the child made her feel quite grown-up and very wise.
+
+"Henry," said she, "how nice you look when you are not crying. Why, now
+you're smiling, and you look like a darling!"
+
+He laughed.
+
+"There! laugh again. I want to tell you something, Henry. You'd be a
+great deal happier if you didn't cry so much; do you know it?"
+
+"Well, Miss Dunlee,"--Kyzie liked extremely to be called Miss
+Dunlee,--"well, Miss Dunlee, you see, the boys keep a-plaguing me. And
+when they plague me I have to cry."
+
+"Oh, fie, don't you do it! If I were a little black-eyed boy about your
+age I'd laugh, and I'd say to those boys: 'You needn't try to plague me;
+you just can't do it. The more you try, the more I'll laugh.'"
+
+Henry's eyes opened wide in surprise, and he laughed before he knew it.
+
+"There! that's the way, Henry. If you do that they'll stop right off.
+There's no fun in plaguing a little boy that laughs."
+
+Henry laughed again and threw back his shoulders. Why, this was
+something new. This wasn't the way his mamma talked to him. She always
+said, "Mamma's boy is sick and mustn't be plagued."
+
+"Another thing," went on the little girl, pleased to see that her words
+had had some effect; "whatever else you may do, Henry, _don't_ 'run and
+tell,' Do you suppose George Washington ever crept along to his teacher,
+rubbing his eyes this way on his jacket sleeve, and said 'Miss
+Dunlee--ah, the boys have been a-making fun of me--ah! They called me
+names, they did!'"
+
+Henry dropped his chin into his neck.
+
+"Never mind! You're a good little boy, after all. _You_ wouldn't steal
+anything, would you, Henry?"
+
+This sudden question was naturally rather startling. He had no answer
+ready.
+
+"Oh, I know you wouldn't! But sometimes little _birds_ steal. Did you
+hear that a magpie stole a watch the other day?"
+
+"Yes, I heard."
+
+"Well, here's some candy for you, Henry."
+
+The boy held out his hand eagerly, though looking rather bewildered. Was
+the candy given because George Washington didn't "run and tell"? Or
+because magpies steal watches?
+
+"Now, good night, Henry, and don't forget what: I've been saying to
+you."
+
+Henry walked on, feeling somewhat ashamed, but enjoying the candy
+nevertheless. If his pretty teacher didn't want him to tell tales, he
+wouldn't do it any more. He would act just like George Washington; and
+then how would the big boys feel?
+
+He did not forget his resolve. Next morning when Dave Blake ran out his
+tongue at him and Joe Rolfe said, "Got any chickens to sell?" he laughed
+with all his might, just to see how it would seem. Both the boys stared;
+they didn't understand it. "Hello, Chicken Little, what's the matter
+with you?"
+
+Henry could see the eyes of his young teacher twinkling from between the
+slats of the window-blinds, and he spoke up with a courage quite
+unheard-of:--
+
+"Nothing's the matter with _me!_"
+
+"Hear that chicken," cried Joe Rolfe. "He's beginning to crow!"
+
+Henry felt the tears starting; but as Miss Katharine at that moment
+opened the blind far enough to shake her finger at him privately he
+thought better of it, and faltered out:--
+
+"See here, boys, I like to be called Chicken Little first rate! Say it
+again. Say it fi-ive thousand times if you want to!"
+
+"Oh, you're too willing," said Joe. "We'll try it some other time when
+you get over being so willing!"
+
+The bell rang; it sounded to Henry like a peal of joy. He walked in in
+triumph, and as he passed by the little teacher she patted him on the
+head. She did not need to wipe his eyes with her handkerchief, there
+were no tears to be seen. He was not a brave boy yet by any means, but
+he had made a beginning; yes, that very morning he had made a beginning.
+
+"Don't you tease Henry Small any more, I don't like it at all," said
+Katharine to Joseph Rolfe.
+
+And then she slipped a paper of choice candy into Joe's hand, charging
+him "not to eat it in school, now remember." It was a queer thing to do;
+but then this was a queer school; and besides Kyzie had her own reasons
+for thinking she ought to be very kind to Joe.
+
+"How silly I was to suspect those little boys! I'm afraid I never shall
+have much judgment. Still, on the whole, I believe I'm doing pretty
+well," thought she, looking proudly at Henry Small's bright face, and
+remembering too how Mr. Pollard had told her that very morning that his
+son Nate was learning more arithmetic at her little school than he had
+ever learned in the city schools. "Oh, I'm so glad," mused the little
+teacher.
+
+Mrs. Dunlee thought Kyzie did not get time enough for play. And just now
+the little girl was unusually busy. They were talking at home of the new
+entertainment to be given for Jimmy-boy's benefit, and she was to act a
+part in it as well as Edith. It was "Jimmy's play," but Jimmy was not to
+appear in it at all. Kyzie and Edith together were to print the tickets
+with a pen. The white pasteboard had been cut into strips for this
+purpose; but as it was not decided yet whether the play would be
+enacted on the tailings or in the schoolhouse, the young printers had
+got no farther than to print these words very neatly at the bottom of
+the tickets:
+
+"ADMIT THE BEARER."
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+"THE LITTLE SCHOOLMA'AM'S EARTHQUAKE"
+
+
+There were only ten days in which to prepare for the play called
+"Granny's Quilting." The children met Wednesday morning in Aunt Vi's
+room, all but Bab, who was off riding. So unfortunate, Lucy thought; for
+how could any plans be made without Bab?
+
+The play was very old-fashioned, requiring four people, all clad in the
+style of one hundred and fifty years ago. Uncle James would wear a gray
+wig and "small clothes" and personate "Grandsir Whalen"; Kyzie Dunlee,
+Grandsir's old wife, in white cap, "short gown," and petticoat, was to
+be "Granny Whalen" of course.
+
+A grandson and granddaughter were needed for this aged couple. Edith
+would make a lovely granddaughter and pretend to spin flax. Who would
+play the grandson and shell the corn? Jimmy thought Nate Pollard was
+just the one, he was "so good at speaking pieces." They decided to ask
+Nate at once, and have that matter settled.
+
+Aunt Vi showed a collection of articles which "the knitting-woman" had
+kindly offered for their use; a three-legged light stand, two
+fiddle-backed chairs, and a very old hour-glass.
+
+"I should call it a pair of glasses," said Edith, as they watched the
+sand drip slowly from one glass into the other.
+
+Aunt Vi said it took exactly an hour for it to drain out, and our
+forefathers used to tell the time of day by hour-glasses before clocks
+were invented.
+
+"What _are_ forefathers?" Lucy asked Edith.
+
+"Oh, Adam and Eve and all those old people," was the careless reply.
+
+"And didn't they have any clocks?"
+
+"Of course not. What do you suppose?"
+
+There was a knock at the door. Nate had come to find Jimmy and go with
+him to see the blind canary.
+
+"We were just talking about you," said Aunt Vi. "Are you willing to be
+Katharine's grandson in the play?"
+
+Nate replied laughing that he would do whatever was wanted of him, and
+he could send home and get some knee-buckles and a cocked hat.
+
+Aunt Vi said "Capital!" and gave Jimmy a look which said, "Everything
+seems to be going on famously for our new play."
+
+Jimmy led the way to Mrs. McQuilken's room, his face wreathed with
+smiles.
+
+"Ah, good morning; how do you all do?" said the lady, meeting the
+children with courteous smiles. "I see you've brought your kitten,
+Edith."
+
+"Yes, ma'am; will you please look at her wounds again?"
+
+"They are pretty well healed, dear. I've never felt much concerned about
+Zee's wounds. She makes believe half of her sufferings for the sake of
+being petted."
+
+"Does she, though? I'm so glad."
+
+"Yes; that 'prize tail' will soon be waving as proudly as ever. But I
+suppose you all came to see the canary. Mag, you naughty girl," she
+added, turning to the magpie, "hide under the bed. They didn't come to
+see you. Here, Job, you are the one that's wanted."
+
+Little Job, the canary, was standing on the rug. He came forward now to
+greet his visitors, putting out a foot to feel his way, like a blind
+man with a cane. Then he began to sing joyously.
+
+"Don't you call that good music?" asked his mistress, knitting as she
+spoke. "He came from Germany; there's where you get the best singers.
+Some canaries won't sing before company and some won't sing alone; they
+are fussy,--I call it _pernickitty_. Why, I had one with a voice like a
+flute; but I happened to buy some new wall-paper, and she didn't like
+the looks of it, and after that she never would sing a note."
+
+"Are you in earnest?" asked Kyzie.
+
+"Yes, it's a fact. But Job never was pernickitty, bless his little
+heart!"
+
+She brought a tiny bell and let him take it in his claws.
+
+"Now, I'll go out of the room, and you all keep still and see if he'll
+ring to call me back."
+
+She went, closing the door after her. No one spoke. Job moved his head
+from side to side, and, apparently making up his little mind that he was
+all alone, he shook the bell peal after peal. Presently his mistress
+appeared. "Did you think mamma had gone and left you, Job darling? Mamma
+can't stay away from her baby."
+
+The cooing tone pleased the little creature, and he sang again even more
+sweetly than before.
+
+"Let me show you another of his tricks. You see this little gun? Well,
+when he fires it off that will be the end of poor Job!"
+
+The gun was about two inches long and as large around as a lead pencil.
+Inside was a tiny spring; and when Job's claw touched the spring the gun
+went off with a loud report. Job fell over at once as if shot and lay
+perfectly still and stiff on the rug. Lucy screamed out:---
+
+"Oh, I'm so sorry he is dead!"
+
+But next moment he roused himself and sat up and shook his feathers as
+if he relished the joke.
+
+The children had a delightful half hour with the captain's widow and her
+pets; only Lucy could not be satisfied because Bab was away.
+
+"Too bad you went off riding yesterday," said she as they sat next
+morning playing with their dolls. "You never saw that blind canary that
+shoots himself, and comes to life and rings a bell."
+
+"But can't I see him sometime, Auntie Lucy?"
+
+"You can, oh, yes, and I'll go with you. But, Bab, you ought to have
+heard our talk about the play! Kyzie is going to be as much as a hundred
+years old, and I guess Uncle James will be a hundred and fifty. And
+they've got a pair of old glasses with sand inside--the same kind that
+Adam and Eve used to have."
+
+"Why-ee! Did Adam and Eve wear glasses? 'Tisn't in their pictures; _I_
+never saw 'em with glasses on!"
+
+"No, no, I don't mean glasses _wear_! I said glasses with sand inside;
+_that's_ what Uncle James has got. Runs out every hour. Sits on the
+table."
+
+"Oh, I know what you mean, auntie! You mean an _hour-glass!_ Grandpa
+Hale has one and I've seen lots of 'em in France."
+
+Lucy felt humbled. Though pretending to be Bab's aunt, she often found
+that her little niece knew more than she knew herself!
+
+"Seems queer about Adam and Eve," said she, hastening to change the
+subject; "who do you s'pose took care of 'em when they were little
+babies?"
+
+"Why, Auntie Lucy, there wasn't ever any _babiness_ about Adam and Eve!
+Don't you remember, they stayed just exactly as they were made!"
+
+"Yes, so they did. I forgot."
+
+Lucy had made another mistake. This was not like a "truly auntie"; still
+it did not matter so very much, for Bab never laughed at her and they
+loved each other "dearilee."
+
+"You know a great many things, don't you, Bab? And _I_ keep forgetting
+'em."
+
+"Oh, I know all about the world and the garden of Eden; _that's_ easy
+enough," replied the wise niece.
+
+And then they went back to their dolls.
+
+Half an hour later Kyzie Dunlee was standing in the schoolhouse door
+with a group of children about her when Nate Pollard appeared. As he
+looked at her he remembered "Jimmy's play," and the parts they were
+both to take in it; and the thought of little Kyzie as his poor old
+grandmother seemed so funny to Nate that he began to laugh and called
+out, "Good morning, grandmother!"
+
+He meant no harm; but Kyzie thought him very disrespectful to accost her
+in that way before the children, and she tossed her head without
+answering him.
+
+Nate was angry. How polite he had always been to her, never telling her
+what a queer school she kept! And now that he had consented to be her
+grandson in Jimmy's play, just to please her and the rest of the family,
+it did seem as if she needn't put on airs in this way!
+
+"Ahem!" said he; "did you hear about that dreadful earthquake in San
+Diego?"
+
+There had been a very slight one, but he was trying to tease her.
+
+"No, oh, no!" she replied, throwing up both hands. "When was it?"
+
+"Last night. I'm afraid of 'em myself, and if we get one here to-day you
+needn't be surprised to see me cut and run right out of the
+schoolhouse."
+
+The children looked at him in alarm. Kyzie could not allow this.
+
+"Oh, you wouldn't do that!" said she, with another toss of the head.
+"Before I'd run away from an earthquake! Besides, what good would it
+do?"
+
+By afternoon the news had spread about among the children that there was
+to be a terrible earthquake that day. They huddled together like
+frightened lambs. The little teacher, wishing to reassure them, planted
+herself against the wall, and made what Edith would have called a
+"little preach."
+
+She pointed out of the window to the clear sky and said she "could not
+see the least sign of an earthquake." But even if one should come they
+need not be afraid, for their heavenly Father would take care of them.
+
+"And you mustn't think for a moment of running away! No, children, be
+quiet! Look at me, _I_ am quiet. I wouldn't run away if there were fifty
+earthquakes!"
+
+Strange to say, she had hardly spoken these words when the house began
+to shake! They all knew too well what it meant, that frightful rocking
+and rumbling; the ground was opening under their feet!
+
+Kyzie, though she may have feared it vaguely all along, was taken
+entirely by surprise, and did--what do you think? As quick as a flash,
+without waiting for a second thought, she turned and jumped out of the
+window!
+
+Next moment, remembering the children, she screamed for them to follow
+her, and they poured out of the house, some by the window, some by the
+door, all shrieking like mad.
+
+It was a wild scene,--the frantic teacher, the terrified children,--and
+Kyzie will never cease to blush every time she recalls it. For there was
+no earthquake after all! It was only the new "colonel" and his men
+blasting a rock in the mine!
+
+Of course this escapade of the young teacher amused the people of Castle
+Cliff immensely. They called it "the little schoolma'am's earthquake";
+and the little schoolma'am heard of it and almost wished it had been a
+real earthquake and had swallowed her up.
+
+"Oh, Papa Dunlee! Oh, Mamma Dunlee!" she cried, her cheeks crimson, her
+eyelids swollen from weeping. "I keep finding out that I'm not half so
+much of a girl as I thought I was! What does make me do such ridiculous
+things?"
+
+"You are only very young, you dear child," replied her parents.
+
+They pitied her sincerely and did their best to console her. But they
+were wise people, and perhaps they knew that their eldest daughter
+needed to be humbled just a little. It was hard, very hard, yet
+sometimes it is the hard things which do us most good.
+
+"O mamma, don't ask me to go down to dinner. I can't, I can't!"
+
+"No indeed, darling, your dinner shall be sent up to you. What would you
+like?"
+
+"No matter what, mamma--I don't care for eating. I can't ever hold up my
+head any more. And as for going into that school again, I never, never,
+never will do it."
+
+"I think you will, my daughter," said Mr. Dunlee, quietly. "I think
+you'll go back and live this down and 'twill soon be all forgotten."
+
+"O papa, do you really, really think 'twill ever be forgotten? Do you
+think so, mamma? A silly, disgraceful, foolish, outrageous,
+abominable,--there, I can't find words bad enough!"
+
+As her parents were leaving the room she revived a little and added:--
+
+"Remember, mamma, just soup and chicken and celery. But a full saucer of
+ice-cream. I hope 'twill be vanilla."
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+NATE'S CAVE
+
+
+The little teacher went back to her school the very next day. It was a
+hard thing, but she knew her parents desired it. Her proud head was
+lowered; she could not meet the eyes of the children, who seemed to be
+trying their best not to laugh. At last she spoke:--
+
+"I got frightened yesterday. I was not very brave; now was I? Hark! The
+people in the mine are blasting rocks again, but we won't run away, will
+we?"
+
+They laughed, and she tried to laugh, too. Then she called the classes
+into the floor; and no more did she ever say to the scholars about the
+earthquake. She helped Nate in his arithmetic, and he treated her like a
+queen. He was coming to Aunt Vi's room that evening to show his
+knee-buckles and cocked hat and find out just what he was to do on the
+stage.
+
+Kyzie wanted to see the cocked hat and felt interested in her own white
+cap which Mrs. McQuilken was making. It was a good thing for Katharine
+that she had "Jimmy's play" to think of just now. It helped her through
+that long forenoon. After this the forenoons did not drag; school went
+on as usual, and Kyzie was glad she had had the courage to go back and
+"live down" her foolish behavior.
+
+When they met in Aunt Vi's room that evening it was decided not to have
+"Jimmy's play" on the tailings, for that was a place free to all. People
+would not buy tickets for an entertainment out of doors.
+
+"My tent is the thing," said Uncle James, and so they all thought It
+was a large white one, and the children agreed to decorate it with
+evergreens. It would hold all the people who were likely to come and
+many more.
+
+During the week Uncle James set up the tent not far from the hotel and
+in one corner of it built a staging. He did not mind taking trouble for
+his beloved namesake, James Sanford Dunlee. The stage was made to look
+like a room in an old-fashioned house. It had a make-believe door and
+window and a make-believe fireplace with andirons and wood and shovel
+and tongs. There was a rag rug on the floor, and on the three-legged
+stand stood the hour-glass with candles in iron candlesticks. The
+fiddle-backed chairs were there and two _hard_ "easy-chairs" and an old
+wooden "settle." Lucy and Bab said it looked "like somebody's house,"
+and they wanted to go and live in it.
+
+On the Saturday afternoon appointed the play had been well learned by
+the four actors. Everything being ready, this cosy little sitting-room
+was now shut off from view by a calico curtain which was stretched
+across the stage by long strings run through brass rings.
+
+The play would begin at half-past two. Jimmy was dressed neatly in his
+very best clothes. He had a roll of paper and a pencil in one of his
+pockets and during the play he meant to add up the number of people
+present and find out how much money had been taken.
+
+"But Jimmy-boy, it won't be very much," said Edith. "This is an empty
+town, and so queer too. Something may happen at the last minute that
+will spoil the whole thing."
+
+She was right. Something did happen which no one could have foreseen.
+For an "empty" town Castle Cliff was famous for events.
+
+As Jimmy left the hotel just after luncheon he overtook Nate Pollard
+and Joe Rolfe standing near a big sand bank, talking together earnestly.
+
+"Come on, Jimmum," said Nate; "we've got a spade for you. We're going to
+dig a cave in the side of this bank."
+
+"What's the use of a cave?"
+
+"Why, for one thing, we can run into it in time of an earthquake."
+
+"That's so," said Jimmy. "Or we could stay in and be cave-dwellers."
+
+But as he took up the spade he chanced to look down at his new clothes.
+He had spoiled one nice suit already and had promised his mother he
+would be more careful of this one.
+
+"Wait till I put on my old clothes, will you?"
+
+Nate laughed and snapped his fingers. "We're in a hurry. I've got to be
+in the tent in half an hour. Go along, you little dude! We'll dig the
+cave without you."
+
+The laugh cut Jimmy to the heart. And he had been learning to like Nate
+so well. A dude? Not he! Besides, what harm would dry sand do? It's
+"clean dirt."
+
+Then all in a minute he thought of that wild journey on the roof. It had
+made a deeper impression upon him than any other event of his life.
+
+"Poh! Am I going to dig dirt in my best clothes just because Nate
+Pollard laughs at me? I don't 'take stumps' any more; there's no sense
+in it, so there!"
+
+And off he started, afraid to linger lest he should fall into
+temptation. Jimmy might be heedless, no doubt he often was; but when he
+really stopped to think, he always respected his mother's wishes and
+always kept his word to her.
+
+This was the trait in Jimmy which marked him off as a highly bred
+little fellow. For let me tell you, boys, respect for your elders is the
+first point of high breeding all the world over.
+
+Jimmy sauntered on slowly toward the door of the tent. There were a
+great many benches inside, but it was not time yet for the audience to
+arrive. Uncle James and Katharine and Edith were on the stage, and Aunt
+Vi was adding a few touches to Edith's dress.
+
+"O dear," said Grandmamma Graymouse, "I hope I shan't forget my part.
+Tell me, Uncle James, do I look old enough?"
+
+"You look too old to be alive," he answered; "fifty years older than I
+do, certainly! Mrs. Mehitable Whalen, are you my wife or my very great
+grandmamma?"
+
+"But where's Nate Pollard?" Aunt Vi asked. "I told him to come early to
+rehearse."
+
+"He said he'd be here in half an hour," said Jimmy. "He's off playing."
+
+"I hope I shall not have to punish my young grandson," said Uncle James,
+solemnly, as he began to peel a sycamore switch.
+
+Uncle James's name was now "Ichabod Whalen," and he and "Mehitable
+Whalen," his wife, were such droll objects in their old-fashioned
+clothes that they could not look at each other without laughing.
+
+Their absent grandson, "Ezekiel Whalen" (or Nate Pollard), was a fine
+specimen of a boy of ancient times, and Aunt Vi had been much pleased
+with the way in which he acted his part. But where was he? Aunt Vi and
+the grandparents grew impatient. It was now half-past two; people were
+flocking into the tent; but the curtain could not rise, for nothing was
+yet to be seen of young Master "Ezekiel Whalen" and his small clothes
+and his cocked hat. The house was pretty well filled; really there were
+far more people than had been expected, Jimmy, with pencil and paper in
+hand, was figuring up the grown people and children, and multiplying
+these numbers by twenty-five and by fifteen. When he found that the sum
+amounted to nearly nine dollars he almost whistled for joy.
+
+But all this while the audience was waiting. People looked around in
+surprise; the Dunlee family grew more and more anxious. Aunt Lucy
+pinched Bab and Bab pinched Aunt Lucy.
+
+Suddenly there were loud voices at the entrance of the tent. The tent
+curtain was pushed aside violently, and Mr. Templeton and Mr. Rolfe
+rushed in exclaiming:--
+
+"Two boys lost! All hands to the rescue!"
+
+The people were on their feet in a moment and there was a grand rush
+for the outside. The panic, so it was said afterward, was about equal to
+"the little schoolma'am's earthquake."
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+JIMMY'S GOOD LUCK
+
+
+"It's the Pollard and Rolfe boys," explained Mr. Templeton.
+
+"Ho! I know where _they_ are!" cried Jimmy, "They're all right. They're
+only digging a cave in the side of a sand-bank."
+
+"Show us where! Run as fast as you can!" exclaimed Mr. Rolfe and Mr.
+Pollard. Mr. Pollard had been hunting for the last half-hour. He knew
+Nate was deeply interested in "Jimmy's play" and would not have kept
+away from the tent unless something unusual had happened.
+
+Jimmy ran, followed by several men who could not possibly keep up with
+him. But when they all reached the sand-bank, where were the
+"cave-dwellers"? They had burrowed in the sand till completely out of
+sight!
+
+"Hello! Where are you"? screamed Jimmy.
+
+There was no answer. In enlarging the cave they had loosened the very
+dry earth, and thus caused the roof over their heads to fall in upon
+them, actually burying them as far as their arm-pits! They tried to
+scream, but their muffled voices could not be heard. The "cave" looked
+like a great pile of sand and nothing more. Nobody would have dreamed
+that there was any one inside it if it had not been for Jimmy's story.
+
+"Courage, boys, we're after you, we'll soon have you out!" said the men
+cheerily; though how could they tell whether the boys heard or not?
+Indeed, how did they know the boys were still alive?
+
+Two men went for shovels. The other men, not waiting for them to come
+back thrust their arms into the bank and scooped out the sand with
+their hands. The sand was loose and they worked very fast. Before the
+shovels arrived a moan was heard. At any rate one of the boys was alive.
+And before long they had unearthed both the young prisoners and dragged
+them out of the cave.
+
+Not a minute too soon, Joe gasped for breath and looked wildly about;
+but Nate lay perfectly still; it could hardly be seen at first that he
+breathed. His father and mother, the doctor and plenty of other people
+were ready and eager to help; but it was some time before he showed
+signs of life. When at last he opened his eyes the joy of his parents
+was something touching to witness.
+
+Jimmy, who had been standing about with the other children, watching and
+waiting, caught his mother by the sleeve and whispered:--
+
+"I should have been in there too, mamma, if it hadn't been for you!"
+
+"What do you mean, my son? In that cave? I never knew the boys were
+trying to make a cave. I did not forbid your digging in the sand, did
+I?"
+
+"No, mamma; but I knew you wouldn't want me to do it in these
+clothes--after all my actions! And I had promised to be more careful."
+
+Mrs. Dunlee smiled, but there were tears in her eyes.
+
+"How glad I am that my little boy respected his mother's wishes," said
+she, stooping to kiss his earnest face.
+
+She dared not think what might have happened if he had disregarded her
+wishes!
+
+It was a time of rejoicing. Mr. Templeton ordered out the brass band
+and the Hindoo tam tam. The horse Thistleblow seemed to think he must be
+wanted too, and came and danced in circles before the groups of happy
+people.
+
+"I could believe I was in some foreign country," said Mrs. McQuilken,
+smiling under her East Indian puggaree, as she had not been seen to
+smile before, and dropping a kiss on the cheek of her favorite Edith.
+
+After dinner the Dunlees met in Aunt Vi's room, and Aunt Vi observed
+that Mrs. Dunlee kept Jimmy close by her side, looking at him in the way
+mothers look at good little sons, her eyes shining with happy love and
+pride.
+
+They were talking over "Jimmy's play," which had not been played. The
+money must all be given back to the people who had sat and looked so
+long at that calico curtain.
+
+"We'll try 'Granny's Quilting' again next Saturday," said Aunt Vi.
+
+They did try it again. There were no caves to dig this time, and young
+Master "Ezekiel Whalen" was on the stage promptly at half-past one,
+eager to show his grandparents that he was a boy to be relied upon after
+all. The play was a remarkable success. All the "summer boarders and
+campers" came to it, and everybody said:--
+
+"Oh, do give us some more entertainments, Mrs. Sanford! Let us have one
+every Saturday."
+
+Aunt Vi, being the kindest soul in the world, promised to do what she
+could. She gave the play of the "Pied Piper of Hamelin," with children
+for rats; and Eddo was dressed as a mouse, and squealed so perfectly
+that Edith's cat could hardly be restrained from rushing headlong upon
+the stage.
+
+Later there were tableaux. Edith wore red, white, and blue and was the
+Goddess of Liberty. Jimmy was a cowboy with cartridge-belt and pistols.
+Lucy and Barbara were Night and Morning, with stars on their heads. Mr.
+Sanford was Uncle Jonathan. Mr. Hale was an Indian chief.
+
+Jimmy's debts were more than paid, and a happier boy was not to be found
+in the state of California.
+
+After this there were plenty of free entertainments on the tailings. At
+one of these, when the audience was watching a flight of rockets,
+Katharine heard two women not far away talking together. One of them
+asked:--
+
+"Where's that little Dunlee girl, the one that keeps the play-school?"
+
+"Over there in the corner," replied the other, "She hasn't any hat on.
+She's sitting beside the girl with a cat in her lap."
+
+"Oh, is that the one? So young as that? Well, she's a good girl, yes,
+she is. I guess she _is_ a good girl," said the first speaker heartily.
+"My little Henry thinks there's nothing like her. He never learned much
+of anything till he went to that play-school. He never behaved so well
+as he does now, never gave me so little trouble at home. She's a _good_
+girl."
+
+A world of comfort fell on Kyzie. Young as she was and full of faults,
+she had really done a wee bit of good.
+
+"And they didn't say a word about my jumping out of the window," thought
+she, with deep satisfaction. "Wait till I grow up, just wait till I grow
+up, and as true as I live I'll be something and do something in this
+world!"
+
+She did not say this aloud, you may be sure; but there was a look on her
+face of high resolve.
+
+Uncle James had often said to Aunt Vi:--
+
+"Our Katharine is very much in earnest. I know you agree with me that
+"little Prudy's" eldest daughter is a golden girl!"
+
+The "play-school" closed a few days later, and it was Henry Small who
+received the medal for good spelling. He wasn't so much of a cry-baby
+nowadays and the boys had stopped calling him "Chicken Little."
+
+The Dunlee party went home the last week in August, declaring they had
+had delightful times at Castle Cliff.
+
+"Only I never went down that mine in a bucket," said Lucy. "How could I
+when the men were blowing up rocks just like an earthquake?"
+
+"And I wanted to wait till they found that vein," said Jimmy.
+
+A few days before they left, Uncle James went hunting and shot a deer. I
+wish there were space to tell of the barbecue to which all the
+neighbors were invited a little later.
+
+As it is, my young readers are not likely to hear any more of the
+adventures of the "bonnie Dunlees," either at home or abroad.
+
+But during their stay in the mountains that summer Lucy begged Aunt Vi
+to write some stories, with the little friends, Bab and Lucy, for the
+heroines.
+
+"Some 'once-upon-a-time stories,' Auntie Vi. Make believe we two girls
+go all about among the fairies, just as Alice did in Wonderland; only
+there are two of us together, and we shall have a better time!"
+
+"Oh, fie! How could I take real live little girls into the kingdom of
+the elves and gnomes and pixies? I shouldn't know how!"
+
+But she was so obliging as to try. The week before they left for home
+she had completed a book of "once-upon-a-time stories," which she read
+aloud to all the children as they clustered around her in the
+"air-castle." She called it "Lucy in Fairyland," though she meant Bab
+just as much as Lucy. If the little public would like to see this book
+it may be offered them by and by; together with the comments which were
+made upon each story by the whole Dunlee family,--Jimmy, wee Lucy, and
+all.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: LITTLE PRUDY SERIES
+Specimen illustration from "Sister Susie"]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: LITTLE PRUDY SERIES
+Specimen illustration from "Dotty Dimple"]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: LITTLE PRUDY SERIES
+Specimen illustration from "Cousin Grace"]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: LITTLE PRUDY'S CHILDREN SERIES
+Specimen illustration from "Wee Lucy's Secret"]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jimmy, Lucy, and All, by Sophie May
+
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