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diff --git a/18582.txt b/18582.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6437015 --- /dev/null +++ b/18582.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5130 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Gypsy Breynton, by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps + +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: Gypsy Breynton + +Author: Elizabeth Stuart Phelps + +Release Date: June 14, 2006 [EBook #18582] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GYPSY BREYNTON *** + + + + +Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + +GYPSY BREYNTON + +By +ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS + +New York +Dodd, Mead and Company + + + + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by +GRAVES & YOUNG, +in the Clerk's Office for the District Court of Massachusetts + +Copyright, 1894, by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward. + + + + +PREFACE. + + +Having been asked to write a preface to the new edition of the Gypsy +books, I am not a little perplexed. I was hardly more than a girl myself, +when I recorded the history of this young person; and I find it hard, at +this distance, to photograph her as she looks, or ought to look to-day. +She does not sit still long enough to be "taken." I see a lively girl in +pretty short dresses and very long stockings,--quite a Tom-boy, if I +remember rightly. She paddles a raft, she climbs a tree, she skates and +tramps and coasts, she is usually very muddy, and a little torn. There is +apt to be a pin in her gathers; but there is sure to be a laugh in her +eyes. Wherever there is mischief, there is Gypsy. Yet, wherever there is +fun, and health, and hope, and happiness,--and I think, wherever there is +truthfulness and generosity,--there is Gypsy, too. + +And now, the publishers tell me that Gypsy is thirty years old, and that +girls who were not so much as born when I knew the little lady, are her +readers and her friends to-day. + +Thirty years old? Indeed, it is more than that! For is it not thirty years +since the publication of her memoirs? And was she, at that time, possibly +sixteen? Forty-six years? Incredible! How in the world did Gypsy "grow +up?" For that was before toboggans and telephones, before bicycles and +electric cars, before bangs and puffed sleeves, before girls studied +Greek, and golf-capes came in. Did she go to college? For the Annex, and +Smith, and Wellesley were not. Did she have a career? Or take a husband? +Did she edit a Quarterly Review, or sing a baby to sleep? Did she write +poetry, or make pies? Did she practice medicine, or matrimony? Who knows? +Not even the author of her being. + +Only one thing I do know: Gypsy never grew up to be "timid," or silly, or +mean, or lazy; but a sensible woman, true and strong; asking little help +of other people, but giving much; an honor to her brave and loving sex, +and a safe comrade to the girls who kept step with her into middle life; +and I trust that I may bespeak from their daughters and their scholars a +kindly welcome to an old story, told again. + +Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. + +Newton Centre, Mass., +_April, 1895._ + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER I WHICH INTRODUCES HER 7 +CHAPTER II A SPASM OF ORDER 21 +CHAPTER III MISS MELVILLE'S VISITOR 42 +CHAPTER IV GYPSY HAS A DREAM 69 +CHAPTER V WHAT SHE SAW 89 +CHAPTER VI UP IN THE APPLE TREE 105 +CHAPTER VII JUST LIKE GYPSY 126 +CHAPTER VIII PEACE MAYTHORNE 146 +CHAPTER IX CAMPING OUT 167 +CHAPTER X THE END OF THE WEEK 202 +CHAPTER XI GYPSY'S OPINION OF BOSTON 213 +CHAPTER XII NO PLACE LIKE HOME 242 + + + + +GYPSY BREYNTON + +CHAPTER I + +WHICH INTRODUCES HER + + +"Gypsy Breynton. Hon. Gypsy Breynton, Esq., M. A., D. D., LL. D., &c., &c. +Gypsy Breynton, R. R." + +Tom was very proud of his handwriting. It was black and business-like, +round and rolling and readable, and drowned in a deluge of hair-line +flourishes, with little black curves in the middle of them. It had been +acquired in the book-keeping class of Yorkbury high school, and had taken +a prize at the end of the summer term. And therefore did Tom lean back in +his chair, and survey, with intense satisfaction, the great sheet of +sermon-paper which was covered with his scrawlings. + +Tom was a handsome fellow, if he did look very well pleased with himself +at that particular moment. His curly hair was black and bright, and +brushed off from a full forehead, and what with that faint, dark line of +moustache just visible above his lips, and that irresistible twinkle to +his great merry eyes, it was no wonder Gypsy was proud of him, as indeed +she certainly was, nor did she hesitate to tell him so twenty times a day. +This was a treatment of which Tom decidedly approved. Exactly how +beneficial it was to the growth within him of modesty, self-forgetfulness, +and the passive virtues generally, is another question. + +The room in which Tom was sitting might have been exhibited with profit by +Mr. Barnum, as a legitimate relic of that chaos and Old Night, which the +poets tell us was dispelled by the light of this order-loving creation. + +It had a bed in it, as well as several chairs and a carpet, but it +required considerable search to discover them, for the billows of feminine +drapery that were piled upon them. Three dresses,--Tom counted, to make +sure,--one on the bedpost, one rolled up in a heap on the floor where it +had fallen, and one spread out on the counterpane, with benzine on it. +What with kerosene oil, candle drippings, and mugs of milk, Gypsy managed +to keep one dress under the benzine treatment all the time; it was an +established institution, and had long ago ceased to arouse remark, even +from Tom. There was also a cloak upon one chair, and a crocheted cape tied +by the tassels on another. There was a white tippet hanging on the +stovepipe. There was a bandbox up in one corner with a pretty hat lying on +the outside, its long, light feather catching the dust; it was three days +now since Sunday. There were also two pairs of shoes, one pair of rubbers, +and one slipper under the bed; the other slipper lay directly in the +middle of the room. Then the wardrobe door was wide open,--it was too full +to stay shut,--upon a sight which, I think, even Gypsy would hardly want +put into print. White skirts and dressing-sacks; winter hoods that ought +to have been put up in camphor long ago; aprons hung up by the trimming; a +calico dress that yawned mournfully out of a twelve-inch tear in the +skirt; a pile of stockings that had waited long, and were likely to wait +longer, for darning; some rubber-boots and a hatchet. + +The bureau drawers, Tom observed, were tightly shut,--probably for very +good reasons. The table, at which he sat, was a curiosity to the +speculative mind. The cloth was two-thirds off, and slipping, by a very +gradual process, to the floor. On the remaining third stood an inkstand +and a bottle of mucilage, as well as a huge pile of books, a glass +tumbler, a Parian vase, a jack-knife, a pair of scissors, a thimble, two +spools of thread, a small kite, and a riding-whip. The rest of the table +had been left free to draw a map on, and was covered with pencils and +rubber, compasses, paper, and torn geography leaves. + +There were several pretty pictures on the walls, but they were all hung +crookedly; the curtain at the window was unlooped, and you could write +your name anywhere in the dust that covered mantel, stove, and furniture. + +And this was Gypsy's room. + +Tom had spent a longer time in looking at it than I have taken to tell +about it, and when he was through looking he did one of those things that +big brothers of sixteen long years' experience in this life, who are +always teasing you and making fun of you and "preaching" at you, are +afflicted with a chronic and incurable tendency to do. It is very +fortunate that Gypsy deserved it, for it was really a horrible thing, +girls, and if I were you I wouldn't let my brothers read about it, as you +value your peace of mind, lace collars, clean clothes, good tempers, and +private property generally. I'd put a pin through these leaves, or fasten +them together with sealing-wax, or cut them out, before I'd run the risk. + +And what did he do? Why, he put a chair in the middle of the room, tied a +broom to it (he found it in the corner with a little heap of dust behind +it, as Gypsy had left it when her mother sent her up to sweep the room +that morning), and dressed it up in the three dresses, the cloaks and the +cape, one above another, the chair serving as crinoline. Upon the top of +the broom-handle he tied the torn apron, stuffed out with the +rubber-boots, and pinned on slips of the geography leaves for features; +Massachusetts and Vermont giving the graceful effect of one pink eye and +one yellow eye, Australia making a very blue nose, and Japan a small green +mouth. The hatchet and the riding-whip served as arms, and the whole +figure was surmounted by the Sunday hat that had the dust on its feather. +From under the hem of the lowest dress, peeped the toes of all the pairs +of shoes and rubbers, and the entire contents of the sliding table-cloth, +down to every solitary pencil, needle, and crumb of cake, were ranged in a +line on the carpet. To crown the whole, he pinned upon the image that +paper placard upon which he had been scribbling. + +When his laudable work was completed, this ingenious and remorseless boy +had to stand and laugh at it for five minutes. If Gypsy had only seen him +then! And Gypsy was nearer than he thought--in the front door, and coming +up the stairs with a great banging and singing and laughing, as nobody but +Gypsy could come up stairs. Tom just put his hand on the window-sill, and +gave one leap out on the kitchen roof, and Gypsy burst in, and stopped +short. + +Tom crouched down against the side of the house, and held his breath. For +about half a minute it was perfectly still. Then a soft, merry laugh broke +out all at once on the air, something as a little brook would splash down +in a sudden cascade on the rocks. + +"O--oh! Did you ever? I never _saw_ anything so funny! Oh, dear _me!_" + +Then it was still again, and then the merry laugh began to spell out the +placard. + +"Gypsy Breynton. Hon.--Hon. Gypsy Breynton,--what? Oh, Esq., M. A., D. D., +LL. D.--what a creature he is! Gypsy Breynton, R. R. _R. R.?_ I'm sure I +don't know what that means--Tom! Thom--as!" + +Just then she caught sight of him out on the ridge-pole, whittling away as +coolly as if he had sat there all his life. + +"Good afternoon," said Gypsy, politely. + +"Good afternoon," said Tom. + +"Been whittling out there ever since dinner, I suppose?" + +"Certainly." + +"I thought so. Come here a minute." + +"Come out here," said Tom. Gypsy climbed out of the window without the +slightest hesitation, and walked along the ridge-pole with the ease and +fearlessness of a boy. She had on a pretty blue delaine dress, which was +wet and torn, and all stuck together with burs; her boots were covered +with mud to the ankle; her white stockings spattered and brown; her turban +was hanging round her neck by its elastic; her net had come off, and the +wind was blowing her hair all over her eyes; she had her sack thrown over +one arm, and a basket filled to overflowing, with flowers and green moss, +upon the other. + +"Well, you're a pretty sight!" said Tom, leisurely regarding her. Indeed, +he was not far from right. In spite of the mud and the burs and the tears, +and the general dropping-to-pieces look about her, Gypsy managed, somehow +or other, to look as pretty as a picture, with her cheeks as red as a +coral, and the soft brown hair that was tossing about her eyes. Gypsy's +eyes were the best part of her. They were very large and brown, and had +that same irresistible twinkle that was in Tom's eyes, only a great deal +more of it; and then it was always there. They twinkled when she was happy +and when she was cross; they twinkled over her school-books; they +twinkled, in spite of themselves, at church and Sabbath school; and, when +she was at play, they shone like a whole galaxy of stars. If ever Gypsy's +eyes ceased twinkling, people knew she was going to be sick. Her hair, I +am sorry to say, was _not_ curly. + +This was Gypsy's one unalleviated affliction in life. That a girl could +possibly be pretty with straight hair, had never once entered her mind. +All the little girls in story-books had curls. Who ever heard of the +straight-haired maiden that made wreaths of the rosebuds, or saw the +fairies, or married the Prince? And Gypsy's hair was not only straight, it +was absolutely uncurlable. A week's penance "done up in paper" made no +more impression than if you were to pinch it. + +However, that did not interfere with her making a bit of a picture, +perched up there on the roof beside Tom, among her burs and her flowers +and her moss, her face all dimples from forehead to chin. + +"Where have you been?" said Tom, trying to look severe, and making a most +remarkable failure. + +"Oh, only over to the three-mile swamp after white violets. Sarah Rowe, +she got her two hands full, and then she just fell splash into the water, +full length, and lost 'em--Oh, dear me, how I laughed! She did look so +funny." + +"Your boots are all mud," said Tom. + +"Who cares?" said Gypsy, with a merry laugh, tipping all the wet, earthy +moss out on her lap, as she spoke. "See! isn't there a quantity? I like +moss 'cause it fills up. Violets are pretty enough, only you _do_ have to +pick 'em one at a time. Innocence comes up by the handful,--only mine's +most all roots." + +"I don't know what's going to become of you," said Tom, drawing down the +corner of his mouth. + +"Neither do I," said Gypsy, demurely; "I wish I did." + +"You won't learn to apply yourself to anything," persisted Tom. "Work or +play, there's no system to you. You're like a----" Tom paused for a +simile--"Well, like a toad that's always on the jump." + +"Ow!" said Gypsy, with a little scream, "there's a horrid old snail +crawled out my moss!" and over went moss, flowers, basket, and all, down +the roof and upon the stone steps below. "There! Good enough for it!" + +Tom coughed and whittled. Gypsy pulled her net out of her basket, and put +up her hair. There was a little silence. Nothing had yet been said about +the image in Gypsy's room, and both were determined not to be the first to +speak of it. Gypsy could have patience enough where a joke was in +question, and as is very apt to be the case, the boy found himself +outwitted. For not a word said Gypsy of the matter, and half an hour +passed and the supper-bell rang. + +"There!" said Gypsy, jumping up, "I do declare if it isn't supper, and +I've got these burs to get off and my dress to mend and my shoes and +stockings to change, and--Oh, dear! I wish people didn't ever have to do +things, anyway!" + +With this very wise remark, she walked back across the ridge-pole and +climbed in the window. There was nothing for Tom to do but follow; which +he did slowly and reluctantly. Something would have to be said now, at any +rate. But not a syllable said Gypsy. She went to the looking-glass, and +began to brush her hair as unconcernedly as if everything were just as she +left it and precisely as she wanted it. + +Tom passed through the room and out of the door; then he stopped. Gypsy's +eyes began to twinkle as if somebody had dropped two little diamonds in +them. + +"I say," said Tom. + +"What do you say?" replied Gypsy. + +"What do you suppose mother would have to say to you about this _looking_ +room?" + +"I don't know what she'd say to you, I'm sure," said Gypsy, gravely. + +"And you, a great girl, twelve years old!" + +"I should like to know why I'm a railroad, anyway," said Gypsy. + +"Who said you were a railroad?" + +"Whoever wrote Gypsy Breynton, R. R., with my red ink." + +"That doesn't stand for railroad." + +"Doesn't? Well, what?" + +"Regular Romp." + +"Oh!" + + + + +CHAPTER II + +A SPASM OF ORDER + + +"I can't help it," said Gypsy, after supper; "I can't possibly help it, +and it's no use for me to try." + +"If you cannot help it," replied Mrs. Breynton, quietly, "then it is no +fault of yours, but in every way a suitable and praiseworthy condition of +things that you should keep your room looking as I would be ashamed to +have a servant's room look, in my house. People are never to blame for +what they can't help." + +"Oh, there it is again!" said Gypsy, with the least bit of a blush, "you +always stop me right off with that, on every subject, from saying my +prayers down to threading a needle." + +"Your mother was trained in the new-school theology, and she applies her +principles to things terrestrial as well as things celestial," observed +her father, with an amused smile. + +"Yes, sir," said Gypsy, without the least idea what he was talking about. + +"Besides," added Mrs. Breynton, finishing, as she spoke, the long darn in +Gypsy's dress, "I think people who give right up at little difficulties, +on the theory that they can't help it, are----" + +"Oh, I know that too!" + +"What?" + +"Cowards." + +"Exactly." + +"I hate cowards," said Gypsy, in a little flash, and then stood with her +back half turned, her eyes fixed on the carpet, as if she were puzzling +out a proposition in Euclid, somewhere hidden in its brown oak-leaves. + +"Take a chair, and sit by the window and think of it," remarked Tom, in +his most aggravating tone. + +"That's precisely what I intend to do, sir," said Gypsy; and was as good +as her word. She went up-stairs and shut her door, and, what was +remarkable, nobody saw anything more of her. What was still more +remarkable, nobody heard anything of her. For a little while it was +perfectly still overhead. + +"I hope she isn't crying," said Mr. Breynton, who was always afraid Gypsy +was doing something she ought not to do, and who was in about such a state +of continual astonishment over the little nut-brown romp that had been +making such commotion in his quiet home for twelve years, as a respectable +middle-aged and kind-hearted oyster might be, if a lively young toad were +shut up in his shell. + +"Catch her!" said the more appreciative Tom; "I don't believe she cries +four times a year. That's the best part of Gyp.; with all her faults, +there's none of your girl's nonsense about her." + +Another person in the room, who had listened to the conversation, went off +at this period into a sudden fit of curiosity concerning Gypsy, and +started up-stairs to find her. This was Master Winthrop Breynton, +familiarly and disrespectfully known as Winnie. A word must be said as to +this young person; for, whatever he may be in the eyes of other people, he +was of considerable importance in his own. He had several distinguishing +characteristics, as is apt to be the case with gentlemen of his age and +experience. One was that he was five lengthy and important years of age; +of which impressive fact his friends, relatives, and chance acquaintances, +were informed at every possible and impossible opportunity. Another was, +that there were always, _at least_, half a dozen buttons off from his +jacket, at all times and places, though his long-suffering mother lived in +her work-basket. A third, lay in the fact that he never walked. He +trotted, he cantered, he galloped; he progressed in jerks, in jumps, in +somersets; he crawled up-stairs like a little Scotch plaid spider, on "all +fours;" he came down stairs on the banisters, the balance of power lying +between his steel buttons and the smooth varnish of the mahogany. On +several memorable occasions, he has narrowly escaped pitching head first +into the hall lamp. His favorite method of locomotion, however, consisted +in a series of _thumps_, beginning with a gentle tread, and increasing in +impetus by mathematical progression till it ended in a thunder-clap. A +long hall to him was bliss unalloyed; the bare garret floor a dream of +delight, and the plank walk in the woodshed an ecstasy. Still a fourth +peculiarity was a pleasing habit when matters went contrary to his +expressed wishes, of throwing himself full length upon the floor without +any warning whatsoever, squirming around in his clothes, and crying at the +top of his lungs. Added to this is the fact that, for some unaccountable +reason, Winnie's eyes were so blue, and Winnie's laugh so funny, and +Winnie's hands were so pink and little, that somehow or other Winnie +didn't get half the scoldings he deserved. But who is there of us that +does, for that matter? + +Well, Winnie it was who stamped across the hall, and crawled up-stairs +hand over hand, and stamped across the upper entry, and pounded on Gypsy's +door, and burst it open, and slammed in with one of Winnie's inimitable +shouts. + +"Oh _Win_nie!" + +"I say, father wants to know if----" + +"Just _see_ what you've done!" + +Winnie stopped short, in considerable astonishment. Gypsy was sitting on +the floor beside one of her bureau drawers which she had pulled out of its +place. That drawer was a sight well worth seeing, by the way; but of that +presently. Gypsy had taken out of it a little box (without a cover, like +all Gypsy's boxes) filled with beadwork,--collars, cuffs, nets, and +bracelets, all tumbled in together, and as much as a handful of loose +beads of every size, color, and description, thrown down on the bottom. +Gypsy was sorting these beads, and this was what had kept her so still. +Now Winnie, in slamming into the room after his usual style, had stepped +directly into the box, crushed its pasteboard flat, and scattered the +unlucky beads to all four points of the compass. + +Gypsy sat for about half a minute watching the stream of crimson and blue +and black and silver and gold, that was rolling away under the bed and the +chair and the table, her face a perfect little thunder-cloud. Then she +took hold of Winnie's shoulder, without any remarks, and--shook him. + +It was a little shake, and, if it had been given in good temper, would not +have struck Winnie as anything but a pleasant joke. But he knew, from +Gypsy's face, it was no joke; and, feeling his dignity insulted, down he +went flat upon the floor with a scream and a jerk that sent two fresh +buttons flying off from his jacket. + +Mrs. Breynton ran up-stairs in a great hurry. + +"What's the matter, Gypsy?" + +"She sh--sh--shooked me--the old thing!" sobbed Winnie. + +"He broke my box and lost all my beads, and I've got them all to pick up +just as I was trying to put my room in order, and so I was mad," said +Gypsy, frankly. + +"Winnie, you may go down stairs," said Mrs. Breynton, "you must learn to +be more careful with Gypsy's things." + +Winnie slid down on the banisters, and Mrs. Breynton shut the door. + +"What are you trying to do, Gypsy?" + +"Pick up my room," said Gypsy. + +"But what had that to do with stringing the beads?" + +"Why, I--don't know exactly. I took out my drawer to fix it up, and my +beads were all in a muss, and so I thought I'd sort them, and then I +forgot." + +"I see several things in the room that want putting in order before a +little box of beads," said Mrs. Breynton, with a smile that was half +amused, half sorrowful. Gypsy cast a deprecating glance around the room, +and into her mother's face. + +"Oh, I _did_ mean to shut the wardrobe door, and I thought I'd taken the +broom down stairs as much as could be, but that everlasting Tom had to go +and---- Oh dear! did you ever see anything so funny in all your life?" And +Gypsy looked at the image, and broke into one of her rippling laughs. + +"It is really a serious matter, Gypsy," said Mrs. Breynton, looking +somewhat troubled at the laugh. + +"I know it," said Gypsy, sobering down, "and I came up-stairs on purpose +to put everything to rights, and then I was going to live like other +people, and keep my stockings darned, and--then I had to go head first +into a box of beads, and that was the end of me. It's always so." + +"You know, Gypsy, it is one of the signs of a lady to keep one's room in +order; I've told you so many times." + +"I know it," said Gypsy, forlornly; "don't you remember when I was a +little bit of a thing, my telling you that I guessed God made a mistake +when he made me, and put in some ginger-beer somehow, that was always +going off? It's pretty much so; the cork's always coming out at the wrong +time." + +"Well," said Mrs. Breynton, with a smile, "I'm glad you're trying afresh +to hammer it in. Pick up the beads, and tear down the image, and go to +work with a little system. You'll be surprised to find how fast the room +will come to order." + +"I think," she added, as she shut the door, "that it was hardly worth +while to----" + +"To shake Winnie?" interrupted Gypsy, demurely. "No, not at all; I ought +to have known better." + +Mrs. Breynton did not offer to help Gypsy in the task which bade fair to +be no easy one, of putting her room in order; but, with a few encouraging +words, she went down stairs and left her. It would have been far easier +for her to have gone to work and done the thing herself, than to see +Gypsy's face so clouded and discouraged. But she knew it would be the ruin +of Gypsy. Her only chance of overcoming her natural thoughtlessness, and +acquiring the habits of a lady, lay in the persistent doing over and over +again, by her own unaided patience, these very things that came so hard to +her. Gypsy understood this perfectly, and had the good sense to think her +mother was just right about it. It was not want of training, that gave +Gypsy her careless fashion of looking after things. Mrs. Breynton was a +wise, as well as a loving mother, and had done everything in the way of +punishment, reproof, warning, persuasion, and argument, that mothers can +do for the faults of children. Nor was it for want of a good example, Mrs. +Breynton was the very pink of neatness. It was a natural _kink_ in Gypsy, +that was as hard to get out as a knot in an apple-tree, and which depended +entirely on the child's own will for its eradication. This disorder in her +room and about her toilet was only one development of it, and by no means +a fixed or continued one. Gypsy could be, and half the time she was, as +orderly and lady-like as anybody. She did everything by fits and starts. +As Tom said, she was "always on the jump." If her dress didn't happen to +be torn and her room dusty, why, she had a turn of forgetting everything. +If she didn't forget, she was always getting hurt. If it wasn't that, she +lost her temper every five minutes. Or else she was making terrible +blunders, and hurting people's feelings; something was always the matter; +and some one was always on the _qui vive_, wondering what Gypsy was going +to do next. + +Yet, in spite of it all, the person who did not love Gypsy Breynton +(provided he knew her) was not to be found in Yorkbury. Whether there was +any reason for this, you can judge for yourself as the story goes on. + +After her mother had gone down, Gypsy went to work in earnest. She picked +up the beads, and put them back into the drawer which she left upon the +floor. Then she attacked Tom's image. It took her fully fifteen minutes +merely to get the thing to pieces, for the true boy-fashion in which it +was tied, pinned, sewed, and nailed together, would have been a puzzle to +any feminine mind. She would have called Tom up to help her, but she was +just a little bit too proud. + +The broom she put out in the entry the first thing; then, remembering that +that was not systematic, she carried it down stairs and hung it on its +nail. The shoes and the dresses, the cape and the cloak, the tippet and +the hat, she put in their places; the torn apron and the unmended +stockings she tumbled into her basket, then went back and folded them up +neatly; she also made a journey into the woodshed expressly to put the +hatchet where it belonged, on the chopping-block. By this time it was +quite dark, but she lighted a lamp, and went at it afresh. Winnie came up +to the entry door, and, at a respectful distance, told her they were +"popping" corn down stairs; but she shook her head, and proceeded with her +dusting like a hero. Tom whistled for her up the chimney-flue; but she +only gave a little thump on the floor, and said she was busy. + +It was like walking into a labyrinth to dispose of the contents of that +table-cloth. How to put away the pencils and the rubber, when the +drawing-box was lost; how to collect all the cookey-crumbs and wandering +needles, that slipped out of your finger as fast as you took hold of them; +where on earth to put those torn geography leaves, that wouldn't stay in +the book, and couldn't be thrown away; where _was_ the cork to the +inkstand? and how should she hang up the riding-whip, with the string +gone? These were questions that might well puzzle a more systematic mind +than Gypsy's. However, in due time, the room was restored to an order that +was delightful to see,--for, if Gypsy made up her mind to a thing, she +could do it thoroughly and skilfully,--and she returned to the bureau +drawer. This drawer was a fair specimen of the rest of Gypsy's drawers, +shelves, and cupboards, and their name was Legion. Moreover, it was an +"upper drawer," and where is the girl that does not know what a delicate +science is involved in the rearranging of these upper drawers? So many +laces, and half-worn collars that don't belong there, are always getting +in; loose coppers have such a way of accumulating in the crevices; all +your wandering pins and hair-pins make it a rendezvous by a species of +free-masonry utterly inexplicable; then your little boxes fit in so +tightly, and never have room to open, and are always getting their covers +caught when you shut the drawer, and, when you try to keep them down, you +pinch your fingers so. + +Please to imagine, O orderly readers! who keep every pin in its proper +place, the worst looking upper drawer that your horrified eyes ever +beheld, and you will have some idea of this drawer of Gypsy's. + +There were boxes large, and boxes small, boxes round, square, and oblong; +boxes with covers (only two), and boxes without; handkerchiefs, +under-sleeves, collars,--both clean and soiled,--laces and ribbons, and +bows and nets; purses and old gloves, a piece of soap, a pile of letters, +scratched and scattering jewelry, a piece of dried cake, several fans all +covered with dust, and nobody knew what not, in the lower strata, out of +sight. + +Gypsy sat and looked at it for about two minutes in utter despair. Then +she just turned the whole thing bottom upwards in a great heap on the +floor, and began to investigate matters, with her cheeks very red. + +Presently, the family down stairs heard a little scream. Winnie stamped up +to see what was the matter. + +"Why, I've found my grammar!" said Gypsy. "It's the one in marble covers I +lost ever--ever so long ago, and had to get a new one. It was right down +at the bottom of the drawer!" + +Pretty soon there was another little scream, and Gypsy called down the +chimney: + +"Tom Breynton! What do you think? I've found that dollar bill of yours you +thought I'd burnt up." + +After awhile there came still another scream, a pretty loud one this time. +Mrs. Breynton came up to see what had happened. + +"I've cut my hand," said Gypsy, faintly; "there was a great heap of broken +glass in my drawer!" + +"_Broken glass!_" + +"Yes, I'm sure I don't know how it came there; I guess I was going to +frame a picture." + +Mrs. Breynton bound up her finger, and went down again. She was no more +than fairly seated before there came from up-stairs, not a scream, but one +of the merriest laughs that ever was heard. + +"What is to pay, now?" called Tom, from the entry. + +"Oh, dear!" gasped Gypsy; "it's too funny for anything! If here isn't the +_carving-knife_ we scolded Patty for losing last winter, and--Oh, Tom, +just look here!--my stick of peanut candy, that I thought I'd eaten up, +all stuck on to my lace under-sleeves!" + +It was past Gypsy's bed-time when the upper drawer was fairly in order and +put back in its place. Three others remained to go through the same +process, as well as wardrobe shelves innumerable. Gypsy, with her +characteristic impulsiveness, would have sat up till twelve o'clock to +complete the work, but her mother said "No" very decidedly, and so it must +wait till to-morrow. + +Tom came in just as everything was done, and Gypsy had drawn a long breath +and stood up to look, with great satisfaction, all around her pleasant, +orderly room. + +"Well done! I say, Gypsy, what a jewel you are when you're a mind to be." + +"Of course, I am. Have you just found it out?" + +"Well, you know you're a diamond, decidedly in the rough, as a general +thing. You need cutting down and polishing." + +"And you to polish me? Well, I like the looks of this room, anyhow. It +_is_ nice to have things somewhere where you won't trip over them when you +walk across the room--only if somebody else would pick 'em up for me." + +"How long do you suppose it will last?" asked Tom, with an air of great +superiority. + +"Tom," said Gypsy, solemnly; "that's a serious question." + +"It might last forever if you have a mind to have it,--come now, Gyp., why +not?" + +"That's a long time," said Gypsy, shaking her head; "I wouldn't trust +myself two inches. To-morrow I shall be in a hurry to go to school; then I +shall be in a hurry to go to dinner; then I shall be in a _ter_rible hurry +to get off with Sarah Rowe, and so it goes. However, I'll see. I feel, +to-night, precisely as if I should never want to take a single pin out of +those little black squares I've put them into on the cushion." + +Gypsy found herself in a hurry the next day and the next, and is likely +to, to the end of her life, I am afraid. But she seemed to have taken a +little gasp of order, and for a long time no one had any complaint to make +of Gypsy's room or Gypsy's toilet. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +MISS MELVILLE'S VISITOR + + +As will be readily supposed, Gypsy's name was not her original one; though +it might have been, for there have been actual Billys and Sallys, who +began and ended Billys and Sallys only. + +Gypsy's real name was an uncouth one--Jemima. It was partly for this +reason, partly for its singular appropriateness, that her nickname had +entirely transplanted the lawful and ugly one. + +This subject of nicknames is a curiosity. All rules of euphony, fitness, +and common sense, that apply to other things, are utterly at fault here. A +baby who cannot talk plainly, dubs himself "Tuty," or "Dess," or "Pet," or +"Honey," and forthwith becomes Tuty, Dess, Pet, or Honey, the rest of his +mortal life. All the particularly cross and disagreeable girls are Birdies +and Sunbeams. All the brunettes with loud voices and red hands, who are +growing up into the "strong-minded women," are Lilies and Effies and +Angelinas, and other etherial creatures; while the little shallow, +pink-and-white young ladies who cry very often and "get nervous," are +quite as likely to be royal Constance, or Elizabeth, without any nickname +at all. + +But Gypsy's name had undoubtedly been foreordained, so perfectly was it +suited to Gypsy. For never a wild rover led a more untamed and happy life. +Summer and winter, seed-time and harvest, found Gypsy out in the open air, +as many hours out of the twenty-four as were not absolutely bolted and +barred down into the school-room and dreamland. A fear of the weather +never entered into Gypsy's creed; drenchings and freezings were so many +soap-bubbles,--great fun while they lasted, and blown right away by dry +stockings and mother's warm fire; so where was the harm? A good brisk +thunderstorm out in the woods, with the lightning quivering all about her +and the thunder crashing over her, was simple delight. A day of snow and +sleet, with drifts knee-deep, and winds like so many little knives, was a +festival. If you don't know the supreme bliss of a two-mile walk on such a +day, when you have to shut your eyes, and wade your way, then Gypsy would +pity you. Not a patch of woods, a pond, a brook, a river, a mountain, in +the region (and there, in Vermont, there were plenty of them), but Gypsy +knew it by heart. + +There was not a trout-brook for miles where she had not fished. There was +hardly a tree she had not climbed, or a fence or stone-wall--provided, of +course, that it was away from the main road and people's eyes--that she +had not walked. Gypsy could row and skate and swim, and play ball and make +kites, and coast and race, and drive, and chop wood. Altogether Gypsy +seemed like a very pretty, piquant mistake; as if a mischievous boy had +somehow stolen the plaid dresses, red cheeks, quick wit, and little +indescribable graces of a girl, and was playing off a continual joke on +the world. Old Mrs. Surly, who lived opposite, and wore green spectacles, +used to roll up her eyes, and say What _would_ become of that child? A +whit cared Gypsy for Mrs. Surly! As long as her mother thought the sport +and exercise in the open air a fine thing for her, and did not complain of +the torn dresses oftener than twice a week, she would roll her hoop and +toss her ball under Mrs. Surly's very windows, and laugh merrily to see +the green glasses pushed up and taken off in horror at what Mrs. Surly +termed an "impropriety." + +Therefore it created no surprise in the family one morning, when +school-time came and passed, and Gypsy did not make her appearance, that +she was reported to be "making a raft" down in the orchard swamp. + +"Run and call her, Winnie," said Mrs. Breynton. "Tell her it is very late, +and I want her to come right up,--remember." + +"Yes mum," said Winnie, with unusual alacrity, and started off down the +lane as fast as his copper-toed feet could carry him. It was quite a long +lane, and a very pleasant one in summer. There was a row of hazel-nut +bushes, always green and sweet, on one side, and a stone-wall on the +other, with the broad leaves and tiny blossoms of a grape-vine trailing +over it. The lane opened into a wide field which had an apple-orchard at +one end of it, and sloped down over quite a little hill into a piece of +marshy ground, where ferns and white violets, anemones, and sweet-flag +grew in abundance. In the summer, the water was apt to dry up. In the +spring, it was sometimes four feet deep. It was a pleasant spot, for the +mountains lay all around it, and shut it in with their great forest-arms, +and the sharp peaks that were purple and crimson and gold, under passing +shadows and fading sunsets. And, then, is there any better fun than to +paddle in the water? + +Gypsy looked as if she thought not, when Winnie suddenly turned the +corner, and ran down the slope. + +She had finished her raft, and launched it off from the root of an old +oak-tree that grew half in the water, and, with a long pole, had pushed +herself a third of the way across the swamp. Her dress was tucked up over +her bright balmoral, and the ribbons of her hat were streaming in the +wind. She had no mittens or gloves on her hands, which were very pink and +plump, and her feet were incased in high rubber boots. + +"Hullo!" said Winnie, walking out on the root of the oak. + +"Hilloa!" said Gypsy. + +"I say--that's a bully raft." + +"To be sure it is." + +"I haven't had a ride on a raft since--why since 'leven or six years ago +when I was a little boy. I shouldn't wonder if it was twenty-three years, +either." + +"Oh, I can't bear people that hint. Why don't you say right out, if you +want a ride?" + +"I want a ride," said Winnie, without any hesitation. + +"Wait till I turn her round. I'll bring her up on the larboard side," +replied Gypsy, in the tone of an old salt of fifty years' experience. + +So she paddled up to the oak-tree, and Winnie jumped on board. + +"I guess we'll have time to row across and back before school," said +Gypsy, pushing off. + +Winnie maintained a discreet silence. + +"I don't suppose it's very late," said Gypsy. + +"Oh, just look at that toad with a green head, down in the water!" +observed Winnie. + +They paddled on a little ways in silence. + +"What makes your cheeks so red?" asked Gypsy. + +"I guess it's scarlet fever, or maybe it's appleplexy, you know." + +"Oh!" + +Just then Winnie gave a little scream. + +"Look here--Gyp.! The boat's goin'clock down. I don't want to go very +much. I saw another toad down there." + +"I declare!" said Gypsy, "we're going to be swamped, as true as you live! +It isn't strong enough to bear two,--sit still, Winnie. Perhaps we'll get +ashore." + +But no sooner had she spoken the words than the water washed up about her +ankles, and Winnie's end of the raft went under. The next she knew, they +were both floundering in the water. + +It chanced to be about three feet and a half deep, very cold, and somewhat +slimy. Gypsy had a strong impression that a frog jumped into her neck when +she plunged, head first, into the deep mud at the bottom. After a little +splashing and gasping, she regained her feet, and stood up to her elbows +in the water. But what she could do, Winnie could not. He had sunk in the +soft mud, and even if he had had the courage to stand up straight, the +water would have been above his head. But it had never occurred to him to +do otherwise than lie gasping and flat on the bottom, where he was +drowning as fast as he possibly could. + +Gypsy pulled him out and carried him ashore. She wrung him out a little, +and set him down on the grass, and then, by way of doing something, she +took her dripping handkerchief out of her dripping pocket and wiped her +hands on it. + +"O--o--oh!" gasped Winnie; "I never did--you'd ought to know--you've just +gone'n drownded me!" + +"What a story!" said Gypsy; "you're no more drowned than I am. To be sure +you _are_ rather wet," she added, with a disconsolate attempt at a laugh. + +"You oughtn't to have tooken me out on that old raft," glared Winnie, +through the shower of water-drops that rained down from his forehead, "you +know you hadn't! I'll just tell mother. I'll get sick and be died after +it, you see if I don't." + +"Very well," said Gypsy, giving herself a little shake, very much as a +pretty brown spaniel would do, who had been in swimming. + +"You may do as you like. Who teased to go on the raft, I'd like to know?" + +"_Besides_," resumed Winnie, with an impressive cough; "you're late to +school, 'cause mother, she said you was to come right up when she sent me +down, only I--well I guess, I b'lieve I forgot to tell you,--I rather +think I did. Anyways, you're late,--_so_!" + +Gypsy looked at Winnie, and Winnie looked at Gypsy. There was an awful +silence. + +"Winnie Breynton," said Gypsy, solemnly, "if you don't get one whipping!" + +"I don't care to hear folks talk," interrupted Winnie, with dignity, "I am +five years old." + +Gypsy's reply is not recorded. + +I have heard it said that when Tom espied the two children coming up the +lane, he went to his mother with the information that the fishman was +somewhere around, only he had sent his fishes on ahead of him. They +appeared to have been freshly caught, and would, he thought, make several +dinners; but I cannot take the responsibility of the statement. + +It was very late, much nearer ten o'clock than nine, when Gypsy was fairly +metamorphosed into a clean, dry, very penitent-looking child. + +She hurried off to school, leaving Winnie and his mother in close +conference. Exactly what happened on the occasion of that interview, has +never been made known to an inquiring public. + +On the way to school Gypsy had as many as six sober thoughts; a larger +number than she was usually capable of in forty-eight hours. One was, that +it was too bad she had got so wet. Another was, that she really supposed +it was her business to know when school-time came, no matter where she was +or what she was doing. Another, that she had made her mother a great deal +of trouble. A fourth was, that she was sorry to be so late at school--it +always made Miss Melville look so; and then a bad mark was not, on the +whole, a desirable thing. Still a fifth was, that she would never do such +a thing again as long as she lived--_never_. The sixth lay in a valiant +determination to behave herself the rest of this particular day. She would +study hard. She would get to the head of the class. She wouldn't put a +single pin in the girls' chairs, nor tickle anybody, nor make up funny +faces, nor whisper, nor make one of the girls laugh, not one, not even +that silly Delia Guest, who laughed at nothing,--why, you couldn't so much +as make a doll out of your handkerchief and gloves, and hang it on your +pen-handle, but what she had to go into a spasm over it. + +No, she wouldn't do a single funny thing all day. She would just sit still +and look sober and sorry, and not trouble Miss Melville in the least. Her +mind was quite made up. + +Just as she had arrived at this conclusion she came to the school-house +door. Gypsy and a number of other girls, both her own age and younger, who +either were not prepared to enter the high school, or whose parents +preferred the select school system, composed Miss Melville's charge. They +were most of them pleasant girls, and Miss Melville was an unusually +successful teacher, and as dearly loved as a judicious teacher can be. The +school-house was a bit of a brown building tucked away under some +apple-trees on a quiet by-road. It had been built for a district school, +but had fallen into disuse years ago, and Miss Melville had taken +possession of it. + +Gypsy slackened her pace as she passed under the apple-boughs, where the +tiny, budding leaves filled all the air with faint fragrance. It was +nearly recess time; she knew, because she could hear, through the windows, +the third geography class reciting. It was really too bad to be so late. +She went up the steps slowly, the corners of her mouth drawn down as +penitently as Gypsy's mouth could well be. + +Just inside the door she stopped. A quick color ran all over her face, her +eyes began to twinkle like sparks from a great fire of hickory, and, in an +instant, every one of those six sober thoughts was gone away +somewhere--nobody could have told where; and the funniest little laugh +broke the silence of the entry. + +The most interested observer could not have told what Gypsy saw that was +so very amusing. The entry was quite deserted. Nothing was to be seen but +a long row of girls' "things," hanging up on the nails--hats and bonnets, +tippets, sacks, rubbers, and baskets; apparently as demure and respectable +as hats, bonnets, tippets, sacks, rubbers, and baskets could be. Yet there +Gypsy stood for as much as a minute laughing away quietly to herself, as +if she had come across some remarkable joke. + +About ten minutes after, some one knocked at the school-room door. Miss +Melville laid down her geography. + +"Cape Ann, Cape Hatteras, Cape--may I go to the door?" piped little Cely +Hunt, holding up her hand. Miss Melville nodded and Cely went. She opened +the door--and jumped. + +"What's the matter, Cely?--Oh!" For there stood the funniest old woman +that Cely or Miss Melville had ever seen. She had on a black dress, very +long and very scant, that looked as if it were made out of an old +waterproof cloak. Over that, she wore a curious drab-silk sack, somewhat +faded and patched, with all the edges of the seams outside. Over that, was +a plaid red-and-green shawl, tied about her waist. There was a little +black shawl over that, and a green tippet wound twice around her throat +with the ends tucked in under the shawl. She had a pair of black mitts on +her hands, and she carried a basket. Her face no one could see, for it was +covered with a thick green veil, tied closely about her bonnet. + +Cely gave a little scream, and ran behind the door. Miss Melville stepped +down from the platform, and went to meet the visitor. + +"Good arternoon," said the old woman, in a very shrill voice. + +"Good afternoon," said Miss Melville, politely. + +"I come to see the young uns," piped the old woman. "I ben deown teown fur +some eggs, an'clock I heerd the little creaturs a sayin'clock of their +lessons as I come by, an'clock thinks says I to myself, says I, bless +their dear hearts, I'll go in an'clock see 'em, says I, an'clock I'll +thank ye kindly for a seat, for I'm pretty nigh beat out." + +The scholars all began to laugh. Miss Melville, somewhat reluctantly, +handed her visitor a chair by the door, but did not ask her upon the +platform, as the visitor seemed to expect. + +"There's a drefful draught here on my neck," she muttered, discontentedly; +"an'clock I'm terribly afflicted with rheumatiz mostly. Can't see much of +the young uns here, nuther." + +"I doubt if there is much here that will interest you," observed Miss +Melville, looking at her keenly. "You may rest yourself, and then I think +you had better go. Visitors always disturb the children." + +"Bless their dear hearts!" cried the old woman, shrilly. "They needn't be +afraid of me--_I_ wouldn't hurt 'em. Had a little angel boy once myself; +he's gone to Californy now, an'clock I'm a lone, lorn widdy. I say--little +gal!" and the stranger pointed her finger (it trembled a little) at Sarah +Rowe, who had grown quite red in the face with her polite efforts not to +laugh. "Little gal, whar's yer manners?--laughin'clock at a poor ole +creetur like me! Come out here, and le's hear ye say that beautiful psalm +of Dr. Watts--now!" + +"How doth the little busy bee!" + +But just then something happened for which the old woman and the scholars +were equally unprepared. Miss Melville looked through the green veil +straight into the old woman's eyes, and said just one word. She said it +very quietly, and she said it without a smile. It was + +"Gypsy!" + +There was a great hush. Sarah Rowe was the first to break it. + +"Why, that's my sack turned wrong side out!" + +"And those are my mitts!" said Agnes Gaylord. + +"If you please, Miss Melville, that's my black shawl,--I know it by the +border," piped a very little girl in mourning. + +"I do believe that's my waterproof, and Lucy's plaid shawl," giggled Delia +Guest. "Did you _ever_?" + +"And my green veil," put in somebody else, faintly. + +Miss Melville quietly removed the veil, and Gypsy looked up with her +mischief bright all over her face. Her eyes fell, however, and her cheeks +flushed crimson, when she saw the look about Miss Melville's mouth. + +"You may go and put away the things, Gypsy," said Miss Melville, still +without a smile. Gypsy obeyed in silence. The girls stopped laughing, and +began to whisper together behind the desk-covers. + +"The school will come to order," said Miss Melville. "Cely, what is the +largest river in New England?--Next." + +Gypsy hung up the things, and came slowly back into the room. Miss +Melville motioned her to her seat, but took no further notice of her. +Gypsy, silent and ashamed, took out her spelling-book, and began to study. +The girls looked at her out of the corners of their eyes, and every now +and then Delia Guest broke out afresh into a smothered laugh, but no one +spoke to her, and she spoke to nobody. + +The spelling-class was called out, but Miss Melville signified, by a look, +that Gypsy was to keep her seat. Recess came, but Miss Melville was busy +writing at her desk, and took no notice of her, further than to tell the +group of girls, who had instantly clustered buzzing and laughing about +her, that they were all to go out doors and play. They went, and Gypsy sat +still with her head behind the desk-cover. Something in Miss Melville's +manner said, louder than words, that she was displeased. It was a manner +which made Gypsy feel, for once in her life, that she had not one word to +say. + +She busied herself with her books, and tried to look unconcerned when the +scholars came back. The arithmetic class recited, but her teacher did not +call for her; the history class, but no one spoke to Gypsy. The disgrace +of this punishment was what Gypsy minded the most, though it was no slight +thing to see so many "absent" marks going down on her report, when she was +right in the room and had learned her lessons. + +After what seemed to her an interminable time, the morning passed and the +school broke up. The children, controlled by that something in Miss +Melville's manner, and by Gypsy's averted head and burning cheeks, left +the room quickly, and Gypsy and her teacher were alone. + +"Gypsy," said Miss Melville. + +There was no answer. + +"Gypsy." + +There came a faint "Yes'm" from behind the desk-cover. Miss Melville laid +down her pencil, closed her own desk, and came and sat down on the bench +beside Gypsy. + +"I wonder if you are as sorry as I am," she said, simply. + +Something very bright glittered on Gypsy's lashes, and two great drops +stood on her hot cheeks. + +"I don't see what possessed me!" she said, vehemently. "Why don't you turn +me out of school?" + +"I did not think you could willingly try to make me trouble," continued +Miss Melville, without noticing the last remark. + +The two great drops rolled slowly down Gypsy's cheeks, and into her mouth. +She swallowed them with a gulp, and brushed her hand, angrily, across her +eyes. Gypsy very seldom cried, but I fancy she came pretty near it on that +occasion. + +"Miss Melville," she said, with an earnestness that was comical, in spite +of itself; "I wish you'd please to scold me. I should feel a great deal +better." + +"Scoldings won't do you much good," said Miss Melville, with a sad smile; +"you must cure your own faults, Gypsy. Nobody else can do it for you." + +Gypsy turned around in a little passion of despair. + +"Miss Melville, _I can't_! It isn't in me--you don't know! Here this +very morning I got late to school, tipping Winnie over in a raft--drenched +through both of us, and mother, so patient and sweet with the dry +stockings she'd just mended, and wasn't I sorry? Didn't I think about it +all the way to school--the whole way, Miss Melville? And didn't I make up +my mind I'd be as good as a kitten all day, and sit still like Agnes +Gaylord, and not tickle the girls, nor make you any trouble, nor anything? +Then what should I do but come into the entry and see those things, and it +all came like a flash how funny it would be'n I'd talk up high like Mrs. +Surly 'n you wouldn't know me, and--that was the last I thought, till you +took off the veil, and I wished I hadn't done it. It's just like me--I +never can help anything anyhow." + +"I think you can," said her teacher, kindly. "You certainly had the power, +when you stood out there in the entry, to stop and think before you +touched the things." + +"I don't know," said Gypsy, shaking her head, thoughtfully; "I don't +believe I had." + +"But you wouldn't do it again?" + +"I guess I wouldn't!" said Gypsy, with an emphasis. + +"What you can do one time, you can another," said Miss Melville. + +Gypsy was silent. + +"There's one other thing about it," continued her teacher, "besides the +impropriety of playing such a trick in school hours--that is, that it was +very unkind to me." + +"Unkind!" exclaimed Gypsy. + +"Yes," said Miss Melville, quietly, "unkind." + +"Why, Miss Melville, I wouldn't be unkind to you for anything!--I love you +dearly." + +"Nevertheless, Gypsy, it was very unkind to deliberately set to work to +annoy me and make me trouble, by getting the school into a frolic. +Anything done to break the order of study-hours, or to withstand any rule +of the school, is always an unkindness to a teacher. There is scarcely a +girl in school that might help me more than you, Gypsy, if you chose." + +"I don't see how," said Gypsy, astonished. + +"I do," said Miss Melville, smiling, "and I always think a little vote of +thanks to you, when you are quiet and well-behaved. An orderly scholar has +a great deal of influence. The girls all love you, and are apt to do as +they see you do, Gypsy." + +There was a little silence, in which Gypsy's eyes were wandering away +under the apple-boughs, their twinkling dimmed and soft. + +At last she turned quickly, and threw her arms about her teacher's neck. + +"Miss Melville, if you'll give me one kiss, I'll never be an old woman +again, if I live as long as Methuselah!" + +Miss Melville kissed her, and whispered one or two little loving words of +encouragement, such as nobody but Miss Melville knew how to say. But Gypsy +never told what they were. + +"I believe there's a bolt left out of me somewhere," she said, as they +left the school-house together; "what do you suppose it is?" + +"It is the strong, iron bolt, '_stop and think_,' Gypsy." + +"Um--yes--perhaps it is," said Gypsy, and walked slowly home. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +GYPSY HAS A DREAM + + +"Come, Tom--do." + +"Do what?" + +"You know as well as I do." + +"What did you observe?" + +_"Tom Breynton!"_ + +"That's my name." + +"Will you, or will you not, come down to the pond and have a row?" + +"Let's hear you tease a little." + +"Catch me! If you won't come for a civil request, I won't tease for it." + +"Very good," said Tom, laying aside his Euclid; "I like your spunk. Rather +think I'll go." + +Tom tossed on his cap and was ready. Gypsy hurried away to array herself +in the complication of garments necessary to the feminine adventurer, if +she so much as crosses the yard; a continual mystery of Providence, was +this little necessity to Gypsy, and one against which she lived in a state +of incessant rebellion. It was provoking enough to stand there in her +room, tugging and hurrying till she was red in the face, over a pair of +utterly heartless and unimpressible rubbers, that absolutely refused to +slip over the heel of her boot, and to see Tom through the window, with +his hands in his pocket, ready, waiting, and impatient, alternately +whistling and calling for her. + +"I never _did_!" said Gypsy, in no very gentle tone. + +"Hur--ry up!" called Tom, coolly. + +"These old rubbers!" said Gypsy. + +"What's the matter?" asked her mother, stopping at the door. + +"It's enough to try the patience of a saint!" said Gypsy, emphatically, +holding out her foot. + +"Perhaps I can help you," said Mrs. Breynton, stooping down. "Why, Gypsy! +your boots are wet through; of course the rubbers won't go on." + +"I didn't suppose that would make any difference," said Gypsy, looking +rather foolish. "I got them wet this morning, down at the swamp. I thought +they were dry, though: I sat with my feet in the oven until Patty drove me +off. She said I was in the bread." + +"You will have to put on your best boots," said her mother. + +"Oh, Tom!" called Gypsy, in despair, as the shrillest of all shrill +whistles came up through the window. "Everything's in a jumble! I'll be +there as soon as I can." + +She changed her boots, tossed on her turban, whisked on her sack, and +began to fasten it with a jerk, when off came the button at the throat, +and rolled maliciously quite out of sight under the bed. + +"There!" said Gypsy. + +"Can't wait!" shouted Tom. + +"I mended that sack," said Gypsy, "only yesterday afternoon. I call it too +bad, when a body's trying to keep their things in order, and do up all +their mending, that things have to act so!" + +"I think you have been trying to be orderly," said her mother, helping her +to pin the offending sack about the throat, for there was no time now to +restore the wandering button. "I have noticed a great improvement in you; +but there's one thing wanting yet, that would have kept the button in its +place, and had the boots properly taken off and dried at the right time." + +"What's that?" asked Gypsy, in a great hurry to go. + +"A little more _thoroughness_, Gypsy." + +This bit of a lesson, like most of Mrs. Breynton's moral teachings, was +enforced with a little soft kiss on Gypsy's forehead, and a smile that was +as unlike a sermon as smile could be. + +Gypsy gave two thoughts to it, while she jumped down stairs three steps at +a time; then, it must be confessed, she forgot it entirely, in the sight +of Tom coolly walking off down the lane without her. But words that Mrs. +Breynton said with a kiss did not slip away from Gypsy's memory "for good +an a'," as easily as that. She had her own little places and times of +private meditation, when such things came up to her like faithful angels, +that are always ready to speak, if you give them the chance. + +Tom was still in sight, among the hazel-nut bushes and budding grape-vines +of the lane, and Gypsy ran swiftly after him. She was fleet of foot as a +young gazelle, and soon overtook him. She had just stopped, panting, by +his side, and was proceeding to make some remarks which she thought his +conduct richly deserved, when the sound of some little trotting feet +behind them attracted their attention. + +"Why, Winnie Breynton!" said Gypsy. + +"Where are you going?" asked Tom, turning round. + +"Oh, nowheres in particular," said Winnie, with an absent air. + +"Well, you may just turn round and go there, then," said Tom. "We don't +want any little boys with us this afternoon." + +"_Little boys!_" said Winnie, with a terrible look; "I'm five years old, +sir. I can button my own jacket, and I've got a snowshovel!" + +Tom walked rapidly on, and Gypsy with him. A moment's reflection seemed to +convince Winnie that his company was not wanted, and he disappeared among +the hazel nut bushes. + +Gypsy and Tom were fast walkers, and they reached the pond in a +marvellously short time. This pond was about a half-mile from the house, +just at the foot of a hill which went by the name of Kleiner Berg--a +German word meaning little mountain. There were many of these elevations +all along the valley in which Yorkbury was situated. They seemed to be a +sort of stepping-stones to the great, snow-crowned mountains, that towered +sharply beyond. The pond that nestled in among the trees at the foot of +the Kleiner Berg was called the Kleiner Berg Basin. It was a beautiful +sheet of water, small and still and sheltered, and a great resort of +pleasure-seekers because of the clouds of white and golden lilies that +floated over it in the hot summer months. Mr. Breynton owned a boat there, +which was kept locked to a tiny wharf under the trees, and was very often +used by the children, although Tom declared it was no better to fish in +than a wash-tub; as a Vermont boy, used to the trout-brooks up among the +mountains, would be likely to think. + +"What's that?" asked Gypsy, as they neared the wharf. + +"Looks as much like a little green monkey as anything," said Tom, making a +tube of his hands to look through. "It's in the boat, whatever it is." + +"It's a green-and-white gingham monkey," said Gypsy, suddenly, "with a +belt, and brown pants, and a cap on wrong side before." + +"The little----, he may just walk home anyhow," observed Tom, in his +autocratic style. "He ought to be taught better than to come where older +people are, especially if they don't want him." + +"I suppose he likes to have a boat-ride as well as we do," suggested +Gypsy. + +"Winthrop!" called Tom, severely. + +Winnie's chin was on his little fat hand, and Winnie's eyes were fixed +upon the water, and Winnie was altogether too deeply absorbed in +meditation to deign a reply. + +"Winnie, where did you come from?" + +"Oh!" said Winnie, looking up, carelessly; "that you?" + +"How did you get down here, I'd like to know?" said Gypsy. + +Winnie regarded her impressively, as if to signify that his principles of +action were his own until they were made public, and when they were made +public she might have them. + +"You may just get out of that boat," said Tom, rather crossly for him. +Winnie hinted, as if it were quite an accidental remark, that he had no +intention of doing so. He furthermore observed that he would be happy to +take them to row. "Father said whoever took the boat first was to have +it." + +Tom replied by taking him up in one hand, twisting him over his shoulder, +and landing him upon the grass. At this Winnie, as characteristic in his +wrath as in his dignity, threw himself flat, and began to scream after his +usual musical fashion. + +"It's too bad!" said Gypsy. "Let him go, Tom--do." + +"He should have stayed where he was told to," argued Tom, who, like most +boys of his age, had a sufficiently just estimate of the importance of his +own authority, and who would sometimes do a very selfish thing under the +impression that it was his duty to family and state, as an order-loving +individual and citizen. + +"I know it isn't so pleasant to have him," said Gypsy, "but it does make +him so dreadfully happy." + +That was the best of Gypsy;--she was as generous a child as poor, fallen +children of Adam are apt to be; as quick to do right as she was to do +wrong, and much given to this fancy of seeing people "dreadfully happy." I +have said that people loved Gypsy. I am inclined to think that herein lay +the secret of it. + +Then Gypsy never "preached." If she happened to be right, and another +person wrong, she never put on superior airs, and tried to patronize them +into becoming as good as she was. She made her suggestions in such a +straightforward, matter-of-fact way, as if of course you thought so too, +and she was only agreeing with you; and was apt to make them so merrily +withal, that there was no resisting her. + +Therefore Tom, while pretending to carry his point, really yielded to the +influence of Gypsy's kind feeling, in saying,-- + +"On the whole, Winnie, I've come to the conclusion to take you, on +condition that you always do as I tell you in future. And if you don't +stop crying this minute, you sha'n't go." + +This rather ungracious consent was sufficient to dry Winnie's tears and +silence Winnie's lungs, and the three seated themselves in the little +boat, and started off in high spirits. It was a light, pretty boat, +painted in bright colors, and christened _The Dipper_, it being an +appropriate and respectful title for a boat on the Kleiner Berg _Basin_. +Moreover, the air was as sweet as a May-flower, and as warm as sunshine; +there was a soft, blue sky with clouds of silver like stately ships +sailing over it, and such a shimmering, bright photograph of it in the +water; then Tom was so pleasant, and rowed so fast, and let Gypsy help, +and she could keep time with him, and the spray dashed up like silver-dust +about the oars, and the bees were humming among the buds on the trees, and +the blue dragon-flies, that skipped from ripple to ripple, seemed to be +having such a holiday. Altogether, Gypsy felt like saying, with famous +little Prudy,-- + +"Oh, I'm so glad there happened to be a world, and God made me!" + +After a while Tom laid down his oars, and they floated idly back and forth +among the lily-stems and the soft, purple shadows of the maple-boughs, +from which the perfumed scarlet blossoms dropped like coral into the +water. Tom took off his cap, and leaned lazily against the side of the +boat; Winnie, interested in making a series of remarkable faces at himself +in the water, for a wonder sat still, and Gypsy lay down across two seats, +with her face turned up watching the sky. It was very pleasant, and no one +seemed inclined to talk. + +"I wish I were a cloud," said Gypsy, suddenly, after a long silence. "A +little white cloud, with a silver fringe, and not have anything to do but +float round all day in the sunshine,--no lessons nor torn dresses nor +hateful old sewing to do." + +"S'posin' it thunder-stormed," suggested Winnie. "You might get striked." + +"That would be fun," said Gypsy, laughing. "I always wanted to see where +the lightning came from." + +"Supposing there came a wind, and blew you away," suggested Tom, sleepily. + +"I never thought of that," said Gypsy. "I guess I'd rather do the sewing." + +Presently a little scarlet maple-blossom floated out on the wind, and +dropped right into Gypsy's mouth (which most unpoetically happened to be +open). + +"Just think," said Gypsy, whose thoughts seemed to have taken a +metaphysical turn, "of being a little red flower, that dies and drops into +the water, and there's never any fruit nor anything,--I wonder what it was +made for." + +"Perhaps just to make you ask that question," answered Tom; and there was +a great deal more in the answer than Tom himself supposed. This was every +solitary word that was said on that boat-ride. A little is so much better +than much, sometimes, and goes a great deal further. + +It seemed to Gypsy the pleasantest boat-ride she had ever taken; but Tom +became tired of it before she did, and went up to the house, carrying +Winnie with him. Gypsy stayed a little while to row by herself. + +"Be sure you lock the boat when you come up," called Tom, in starting. + +"Oh yes," said Gypsy, "I always do." + +"Did you bring up the oars?" asked Tom, at supper. + +"Yes, they're in the barn. I do sometimes remember things, Mr. Tom." + +"Did you----," began Tom, again. + +But Winnie just then upset the entire contents of his silver mug of milk +exactly into Tom's lap, and as this was the fourth time the young +gentleman had done that very thing, within three days, Tom's sentence was +broken off for another of a more agitated nature. + +That night Tom had a dream. + +He thought the house was a haunted castle--(he had, I am sorry to say, +been reading novels in study hours), and that the ghost of old Baron +Somebody who had defrauded the beautiful Lady Somebody-else, of Kleiner +Berg Basin and the Dipper, in which it was supposed Mrs. Surly had +secreted a blind kitten, which it was somehow or other imperatively +necessary should be drowned, for the well-being of the beautiful and +unfortunate heiress,--that the ghost of this atrocious Baron was going +down stairs, with white silk stockings on his feet and a tin pan on his +head. + +At this crisis Tom awoke, with a jump, and heard, or thought he heard, a +slight creaking noise in the entry. Winnie's cat, of course; or the wind +rattling the blinds;--nevertheless, Tom went to his door, and looked out. +He was exceedingly sleepy, and the entry was exceedingly dark, and, though +he had not a breath of faith in ghosts, not he,--was there ever a boy who +had?--and though he considered such persons, as had, as candidates for the +State Idiot Asylum, yet it must be confessed that even Tom was possessed +of an imagination, and this imagination certainly, for an instant, deluded +him into the belief that a dim figure was flitting down stairs. + +"Who's there?" said Tom, rather faintly. + +There was no reply. A curious sound, like the lifting of a distant latch +by phantom fingers, fell upon his ear,--then all was still. + +"Stuff and nonsense!" said Tom. Nevertheless, Tom went to the head of the +stairs, and looked down; went to the foot of the stairs, and looked +around. The doors were all closed as they had been left for the night. +Nothing was to be seen; nothing was to be heard. + +"Curious mental delusions one will have when one is sleepy," said Tom, and +went back to bed, where, the reader is confidentially informed, he lay for +fifteen entire minutes with his eyes wide open, speculating on the +proportion of authenticated ghost-stories;--to be sure, there had been +some; it was, perhaps, foolish to deny as much as that. + +After which, he slept the rest of the night as soundly as young people of +sixteen, who are well and happy, are apt to sleep. + +That night, also, Gypsy had a dream. + +She dreamed that Miss Melville sailed in through the window on an oar, +which she paddled through the air with a parasol, and told her that her +(Gypsy's) father had been hung upon a lamp-post by Senator Sumner, for +advocating the coercion of the seceded States, and that Tom had set Winnie +afloat on the Kleiner Berg Basin, in a milk-pitcher. Winnie had tipped +over, and was in imminent danger of drowning, if indeed he were not past +hope already, and Tom sat up in the maple-tree, laughing at him. + +Her mother appeared to have enlisted in the Union army, and, her father +being detained in that characteristic manner by Mr. Sumner, there was +evidently nothing to be done but for Gypsy to go to Winnie's relief. This +she hastened to do with all possible speed. She dressed herself under a +remarkable sense of not being able to find any buttons, and of getting all +her sleeves upon the wrong arm. She put on her rubber-boots, because it +took so long to lace up her boots. Her stockings she wore upon her arms. +The reason appeared to be, that she might not get her hands wet in pulling +Winnie out. She stopped to put on her sack, her turban, and her blue veil. +She also spent considerable time in commendable efforts to pin on a lace +collar which utterly refused to be pinned, and to fasten at her throat a +velvet bow that kept turning into a little green snake, and twisting round +her fingers. + +When at length she was fairly ready, she left the house softly, under the +impression that Tom (who appeared to have the remarkable capacity of being +in the house and down in the maple-trees at one and the same time) would +stop her if he heard her. + +She ran down the lane and over the fields and into the woods, where the +Kleiner Berg rose darkly in front of her; so, at last, to the Basin, which +rippled and washed on its shore, and tossed up at her feet--_an empty +milk-pitcher_! + +A horrible fear seized her. She had come too late. Winnie was drowned. It +was all owing to that lace collar. + +She sprang into the boat; she floated away; she peered down into the dark +water. But Tom laughed in the maple-tree; and there was no sign nor sound +of Winnie. + +She cried out with a loud cry, and awoke. She lifted up her head, and +saw---- + + + + +CHAPTER V + +WHAT SHE SAW + + +A great, solemn stretch of sky, alive with stars. + +A sheet of silent water. + +A long line of silent hills. + +_She had acted out her dream!_ When the truth came to Gypsy, she sat for a +moment like one stunned. The terrible sense of awakening in a desolate +place, at midnight, and alone, instead of in a safe and quiet bed, with +bolted doors, and friends within the slightest call, might well alarm an +older and stouter heart than Gypsy's. The consciousness of having wandered +she did not know whither, she did not know how, in the helplessness of +sleep, into a place where her voice could reach no human ear, was in +itself enough to freeze her where she sat, with hands locked, and wide, +frightened eyes, staring into the darkness. + +After a few moments she stirred, shivered a little, and looked about her. + +It was the Basin, surely. There were the maples, there was the Kleiner +Berg rolling up, soft and shadowy, among its pines. There were the +mountains, towering and sharp--terrible shadows against the sky. Here, +too, was the Dipper beneath her, swaying idly back and forth upon the +water. She remembered, with a little cry of joy, that the boat was always +locked; she could not have stirred from the shore; it would be but the +work of a moment to jump upon the wharf, then back swiftly through the +fields to the house. + +She looked back. The wharf was not in sight. A dark distance lay between +her and it. The beds of lily-leaves, and the dropping blossoms of the +maples were about her on every side. She had drifted half across the pond. + +She understood it all in a moment--_she had not locked the boat that +afternoon_. + +What was to be done? The oars were half a mile away, in the barn at home. +There was not so much as a branch floating within reach on the water. She +tried to pull up the board seats of the boat, under the impression that +she could, by degrees, paddle herself ashore with one of them. But they +were nailed tightly in their places, and she could not stir them. +Evidently, there was nothing to be done. + +Perhaps the boat would drift ashore somewhere; she could land anywhere; +even on the steep Kleiner Berg side she could easily have found footing; +she was well used to climbing its narrow ledges, and knew every crack and +crevice and projection where a step could be taken. But, no; the boat was +not going to drift ashore. It had stopped in a tangle of lily-leaves, far +out in the water, and there was not a breath of wind to stir it. If the +water had not been deep she could have waded ashore; but her practised ear +told her, from the sound of the little waves against her hand, that wading +was not to be thought of. To be sure, Gypsy could swim; but a walk of half +a mile in drenched clothes was hardly preferable to sitting still in a dry +boat, to say nothing of the inconvenience of swimming in crinoline, and on +a dark night. + +No, there was nothing to be done but to sit still till morning. + +Having come to this conclusion, Gypsy gave another little shiver, and +slipped down into the bottom of the boat, thinking she might lie with her +head under the stern-seat, and thus be somewhat shielded from the chilly +air. In turning up her sack-collar, to protect her throat, she touched +something soft, which proved to be the lace collar. This led her to +examine her dress. She now noticed for the first time that one stocking +was drawn up over her hand,--the other she had probably lost on the +way,--and that she had put her bare feet into rubber-boots. The lace +collar was fastened by a bit of green chenille she sometimes wore at her +throat, and which had doubtless been the snake of her dream. + +Lonely, frightened, and cold as she was, Gypsy's sense of the ludicrous +overcame her at that, and she broke into a little laugh. That laugh seemed +to drive away the mystery and terror of her situation, in spite of the +curious sound it had in echoing over the lonely water; and Gypsy set +herself to work with her usual good sense to see how matters stood. + +"In the first place," she reasoned, talking half aloud for the sake of the +company of her own voice, "I've had a fit of what the dictionary calls +somnambulism, I suppose. I eat too much pop-corn after supper, and that's +the whole of it,--it always makes me dream,--only I never was goose enough +to get out of bed before, and I rather think it'll be some time before I +do again. I came down stairs softly, and out of the back door. Nobody +heard me, and of course nobody will hear me till morning, and I'm in a +pretty fix. If I hadn't forgotten to lock the boat I should be back in bed +by this time. Oh dear! I wish I were. However, I'm too large to tip myself +over and get drowned, and I couldn't get hurt any other way; and there's +nothing to be afraid of if I do have to stay here till morning, except +sore throat, so there's no great harm done. The worst of it is, that old +Tom! Won't he laugh at me about the boat! I never expect to hear the end +of it. Then when they go to my room and find me gone, in the morning, +they'll be frightened. I'm rather sorry for that. I wish I knew what time +it is." + +Just then the distant church-clock struck two. Gypsy held her breath, and +listened to it. It had a singular, solemn sound. She had never heard the +clock strike two in the morning but once before in her life. That was once +when she was very small, when her father was dangerously sick, and the +coming of the doctor had wakened her. She had always somehow associated +the hour with mysterious flickering lights, and anxious whispers and +softened steps, and a dread as terrible as it was undefined. Now, out here +in this desolate place, where the birds were asleep in their nests, and +the winds quiet among the mountain-tops, and the very frogs tired of their +chanting,--herself the only waking thing,--these two far, deep-toned +syllables seemed like a human voice. Like the voice, Gypsy fancied, of +some one imprisoned for years in the belfry, and crying to get out. + +Two o'clock. Three--four--five--six. At about six they would begin to miss +her; her mother always called her, then, to get up. Four hours. + +"Hum,--well," said Gypsy, drawing her sack-collar closer, "pretty long +time to sit out in a boat and shiver. It might be worse, though." Just +then her foot struck something soft under the seat. She pulled it out, and +found it to be an old coat of Tom's, which he sometimes used for boating. +Fortunately it was not wet, for the boat was new, and did not leak. She +wrapped it closely around her shoulders, curled herself up snugly in the +stern, and presently pronounced herself "as warm as toast, and as +comfortable as an oyster." + +Then she began to look about her. All around and underneath her lay the +black, still water,--so black that the maple-branches cast no shadow on +it. About and above her rose the mountains, grim and mute, and watching, +as they had watched for ages, and would watch for ages still, all the long +night through. Overhead, the stars glittered and throbbed, and shot in and +out of ragged clouds. Far up in the great forests, that climbed the +mountain-sides, the wind was muttering like an angry voice. + +Somehow it made Gypsy sit very still. She thought, if she were a poet, she +would write some verses just then; indeed, if she had had a pencil, I am +not sure but she would have, as it was. + +Then some other thoughts came to Gypsy. She wondered why, of all places, +she chanced to come to the Basin in her dream. She might have gone to the +saw-mill, and been caught and whirred to death in the machinery. She might +have gone to the bridge over the river, and thrown herself off, not +knowing what she did. Or, what if the pond had been a river, and she were +now floating away, helpless, out of reach of any who came to save her, to +some far-off dam where the water roared and splashed on cruel rocks. Or +she might, in her dream, have tipped over the boat where the water was +deep, and been unable to swim, encumbered by her clothing. Then she might +have been such a girl as Sarah Rowe, who would have suffered agonies of +fright at waking to find herself in such a place. But she had been led to +the quiet, familiar Basin, and no harm had come to her, and she had good +strong nerves, and lost all her fear in five minutes, so that the +mischance would end only in an exciting adventure, which would give her +something to talk about as long as she lived. + +Well; she was sure she was very thankful to--whom? and Gypsy bowed her +head a little at the question, and she sat a moment very still. + +Then she had other thoughts. She looked up at the shadowed mountains, and +thought how year after year, summer and winter, day and night, those +terrible masses of rock had cleaved together, and stood still, and caught +the rains and the snows and vapors, the golden crowns of sunsets and +sunrisings, the cooling winds and mellow moonlights, and done all their +work of beauty and of use, and done it aright. _"Not one faileth."_ No +avalanche had thundered down their sides, destroying such happy homes as +hers. No volcanic fires had torn them into seething lava. No beetling +precipice, of which she ever heard, had fallen and crushed so much as the +sheep feeding in the valleys. To the power of the hills as to the power of +the seas, Someone had said, Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther. + +And the Hand that could uphold a mountain in its place, was the Hand that +had guided her--one little foolish, helpless girl, out of millions and +millions of creatures for whom He was caring--in the wanderings of an +uneasy sleep that night. + +There was a great awe and a great joy in this thought; but sharp upon it +came another, as a pleasure is followed by a sudden pain,--a thought that +came all unbidden, and talked with Gypsy, and would not go away. It was, +that she had gone to bed that night without a prayer. She was tired and +sleepy, and the lamp went out, and so,--and so,--well, she didn't know +exactly how it came about. + +Gypsy's bowed head fell into her hands, and there, crouched in the lonely +boat, under the lonely sky, she put this thought into a few whispered +words, and I know there was One to hear it. + +Other thoughts had Gypsy after this; but they were those she could not +have put into words. For three of those solemn, human syllables had +sounded from the distant clock, and far over the mountain-tops the sweet +summer dawn was coming. Gypsy had never seen the sun rise. She had seen, +to be sure, many times, the late, winter painting of crimson and gold in +the East, which unfolded itself before her window, and chased away her +dreams. But she had never watched that slow, mysterious change from +midnight to morning, which is the only spectacle that can properly be +called a sunrise. + +There was something in Gypsy that made her sit like a statue there, +wrapped in Tom's old coat, her face upturned, and her very breath held in, +as the heavy shadows softened and melted, and the stars began to dim in a +pale, gray light, that fell and folded in the earth like a mist; as the +clouds, that floated faintly over the mountains, blushed pink from the +touch of an unseen sun; as the pink deepened into crimson, and the crimson +burned to fire, and the outlines of the mountains were cut in gold; as the +gold broadened and brightened, and stole over the ragged peaks, and shot +down among the forests, and filtered through the maple-leaves, and chased +the purple shadows far down among the valleys; as the birds twittered in +unseen nests, and the crickets chirped in the meadows, and the dews fell +and sparkled from nodding grasses, and "all the world grew green again." + +Gypsy thought it was worth an ugly dream and a little fright, to see such +a sight. She wondered if those old pictures of the great masters far away +over the sea, of which she had heard so much, were anything like it. She +also had a faint, flitting notion that, in a world where there were +sunrises every day, it was very strange people should ever be cross, and +tear their dresses, and forget to lock boats. It seemed as if they ought +to know better. + +Just then Gypsy fell asleep, with her head on the bottom of the boat; and +the next she knew it was broad day, and a dear, familiar voice, from +somewhere, was calling,-- + +"Gypsy!--Why, Gypsy!" + +"How do you do?" said Gypsy, sleepily, sitting up straight. + +Tom was standing on the shore. He did not say another word. He jumped into +an old mud-scull, that lay floating among the bushes, and paddled up to +her before she was wide enough awake to speak. + +"Why, Gypsy Breynton!" + +"I've been walking in my sleep," said Gypsy, with a little laugh; "I came +out here to save Winnie from upsetting in a milk-pitcher, and then I woke +up, and I _did_ forget to lock the boat, and I couldn't get ashore." + +"How long have you been here?" Tom was very pale. + +"Since a little before two. There was a splendid sunrise, only it was +rather cold, and I didn't know where I was at first, and I--well, I'm glad +you're come." + +"Put on my coat over that. Lean up against my arm--so. Don't try to talk," +said Tom, in a quick, business-like tone. But Tom was curiously pale. + +"Why, there's no harm done, Tom, dear," said Gypsy, looking up into his +face. + +"I can't talk about it, Gypsy--I _can't_, I thought, I----" + +Tom looked the other way to see the view, and did not finish his sentence. + +"You don't suppose she's going to be a somnambulist?" asked Mr. Breynton. +This was the first time he had remembered to be worried over any of +Gypsy's peculiarities all day. He had spent so much time in looking at +her, and kissing her, and wiping his spectacles. + +"No, indeed," said her mother; "it was nothing in the world but +popped-corn. The child will never have another such turn, I'll venture." + +And she never did. + +It is needless to say that nobody scolded Gypsy for forgetting to lock the +boat. She was likely enough to remember the incident. She had, perhaps, +received a severe punishment for so slight a negligence, but the reader +may rest assured that the boat was always locked thereafter when Gypsy had +anything to do with it. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +UP IN THE APPLE TREE + + +"Gypsy! Gypsy!" + +"What's wanted?" + +"Where are you?" + +"Here." + +"I don't know where 'here' is." + +"Well, you'll find out after a while." + +Winnie trotted along down the garden-path, and across the brook. "Here" +proved to be the great golden-russet tree. High up on a gnarled old +branch, there was a little flutter of a crimson and white gingham dress, +and a merry face peeping down through the dainty pink blossoms that +blushed all over the tree. It looked so pretty, framed in by the bright +color and glistening sunlight, and it seemed to fit in so exactly with the +fragrance and the soft, dropping petals, and the chirping of the +blue-birds overhead, that I doubt if even Mrs. Surly would have had the +heart to say, as Mrs. Surly was much in the habit of saying,-- + +"A young lady, twelve years old, climbing an apple-tree! Laws a massy! I +pity your ma--what a sight of trainin'clock she must ha' wasted on you!" + +"It looks nice up there," said Winnie, admiringly, looking up with his +mouth open; "I'm acomin'clock up." + +"Very well," said Gypsy. + +Winnie assailed a low-hanging bough, and crawled half way up, where he +stopped. + +"Why don't you come?" said Gypsy. + +"Oh, I--well, I think I like it better down here. You can see the grass, +and things. There's a black grasshopper here, too." + +"What do you want, anyway?" asked Gypsy, taking a few spasmodic stitches +on a long, white seam; "I'm busy. I can't talk to little boys when I'm +sewing." + +"Oh, I guess I don't want anythin'clock, very much," said Winnie, folding +his arms composedly, as if he had seated himself for the day; "I'm five +years old." + +Down went Gypsy's work, and a whole handful of pink and white blossoms +came fluttering into Winnie's eyes. + +"How am I going to sew?" said Gypsy, despairingly; "you're so exactly in +the right place to be hit. I don't believe Mrs. Surly herself could help +snowballing you." + +"Mrs. Surly snowball! Why, I never saw her. Wouldn't it be just funny?" + +"Winnie Breynton, _will_ you please to go away?" + +"I say, Gypsy,--if you cut off a grasshopper's wings, and frow him in a +milk-pan, what would he do?" remarked Winnie, inclining to metaphysics, as +was Winnie's custom when he wasn't wanted. Gypsy took several severe +stitches, and made no answer. + +"Gypsy--if somebody builded a fire inside of me and made steam, couldn't I +draw a train of cars?" + +"Look here--Gyp., when a cat eats up a mouse----" + +Winnie forgot what he was aiming at, just there, coughed, and began again. + +"Samson could have drawed a train of cars, anyway." + +"Oh, Winnie Breynton!" + +"Well, if he had a steam-leg, he'd be jest as good as an +engine--_wouldn't_ I like to seen him!" Just then a branch struck Winnie's +head with decidedly more emphasis than the handful of blossoms, and Winnie +slid to the ground, and remarked, with dignity, that he was sorry he +couldn't stay longer. He would come again another day. About half way up +the walk, he stopped, and turned leisurely round. + +"Oh--Gypsy! Mother want's to know where's the key of the china-closet she +let you have. She's in a great hurry. That's what I come down for; I +s'posed there was something or nuther." + +"Why, Winnie Breynton! and you've been sitting there all this----" + +"Where's the key?" interrupted Winnie, severely; "mother hadn't ought to +be kept waitin'clock." + +"It's up-stairs in--in, I guess in my slippers," said Gypsy, stopping to +think. + +_"Slippers!"_ + +"Yes. I was afraid I should forget to put it up, so I put it in my +slipper, because I should feel it, and remember it. Then I took off the +slippers, and that was the last I thought of it." + +"It was very careless," said Winnie, with a virtuous air. It was +noticeable that he took good care to be out of hearing of Gypsy's reply. + +Gypsy returned to her seam, and the apple-blossoms, and to her own little +meditations about the china-closet key; which, being of a private and +somewhat humiliating nature, are not given to the public. + +The apple-tree stood in one corner of a very pleasant garden. Mr. Breynton +had a great fancy for working over his trees and flowers, and, if he had +not been a publisher and bookseller, might have made a very successful +landscape-gardener. Poor health had driven him out of the professions, and +the tastes of a scholar drove him away from out-door life; he had +compromised the matter by that book-store down opposite the post-office. +The literature of a Vermont town is not of the most world-stirring nature, +and it did occur to him, occasionally, that business was rather dull, but +his wife loved the old home, the children were comfortable and happy, and +he himself, he thought, was getting rather old to start out on any new +venture elsewhere; so Yorkbury seemed likely to be the family nest for +life. + +It was the same methodical kind-heartedness that made him at once so +thoughtful and tender a father, and yet so habitually worried by the +children's little failings, that gave him his taste for beautiful flowers +and shrubbery, and his skill in cultivating them. This garden was his pet +enterprise. It was gracefully laid out with winding walks, evergreens, +fruit-trees and flower-beds; not in stiff patterns, but with a delightful +studied negligence, such as that with which an artist would group the +figures on a landscape. Rocks and vines and wild flowers were scattered +over the garden very much as they would be found in the fields; stately +roses and dahlias, delicate heliotrope and aristocratic fuchsias, would +grow, side by side, with daisies and buttercups. But, best of all, Gypsy +liked the corner where the golden russet stood. A bit of a brook ran +across it, which had been caught in a frolic one day, as it went singing +away to the meadows, and dammed up and paved down into a tiny pond. + +The short-tufted grass swept over its edge like a fringe, and in their +season slender hair-bells bent over, casting little blue shadows into the +water; the apple-boughs, too, hung over it, and flung down their showers +of pearls and rubies, when the wind was high. Moreover, there was a +statue. This statue was Gypsy's pride and delight. It was Aladdin's +Palace, the Tuilleries, Versailles, and the Alhambra, all in one. The only +fault to be found with it was that it was not marble. It was a species of +weather-proof composition, but very finely carved, and much valued by Mr. +Breynton. It was a pretty thing--a water-nymph rising from an unfolded +lily, with both hands parting her long hair from a wondering face, that, +pleased with its own beauty, was bent to watch its reflection in the +water. + +Altogether, the spot was so bewitching, that it is little wonder Gypsy's +work kept dropping into her lap, and her eyes wandering away somewhere +into dreamland. + +One of those endless seams on a white skirt that you have torn from the +placket to the hem, is not a very attractive sight, if you have it to +mend, and don't happen to like to sew any better than Gypsy did. + +She seemed fated to be interrupted in her convulsive attempts at +"run-and-back stitching." Winnie was hardly in the house, before Sarah +Rowe came out in the garden to hunt her up. + +"Oh, dear," said Gypsy, as Sarah's face appeared under the apple-boughs; +"I'm not a bit glad to see you." + +"That's polite," said Sarah, reddening; "I'll go home again." + +"Look," said Gypsy, laughing; "just _see_ what I've got to mend, and I +came out here on purpose to get it done, so I could come over to your +house. You see I oughtn't to be glad to see you at all, but I am +exceedingly." + +Sarah climbed up, and sat down beside her upon a long, swaying bough. + +"Now don't you speak a single word," said Gypsy, with an industrious air, +"till I get this done." + +"No, I won't," said Sarah. "What do you have to sew for, Saturday +afternoons?" + +"Why, it's my mending: mother wants me to do it Saturday morning, and of +course it's a great deal easier, because then you have all the afternoon +to yourself, only I never seem to get time; I'm sure I don't know why. +This morning I had my history topics to write." + +"Why, I wrote mine yesterday!" + +"I meant to, but I forgot; Miss Melville said I musn't put it off another +day. There! I wasn't going to talk." + +"Mother does my mending for me," said Sarah. + +"She does! Well, I just wish my mother would. She says it wouldn't be good +for me." + +"How did you tear such a great place, I'd like to know?" + +"Put my foot right through it," said Gypsy, disconsolately. "It was +hanging on a chair, and I just stepped in it and started to run, and down +I went,--and here's the skirt. I was running after the cat. I'd put her +under my best hat, and she was spinning down stairs. You never saw +anything so funny! I'm always doing such things,--I mean like the skirt. I +do declare! you mustn't talk." + +"I'm not," said Sarah, laughing; "it's you that are talking. You haven't +sewed a stitch for five minutes, either." + +Gypsy sighed, and her needle began to fly savagely. There was a little +silence. + +"You see," said Gypsy, breaking it, "I'm trying to reform." + +"Reform?" said Sarah, with some vague ideas of Luther and Melancthon, and +Gypsy's wearing a wig and spectacles, and reading Cruden's "Concordance." + +"Yes," nodded Gypsy, "reform. I never knew anybody need it as much as I. I +never do things anyway, and then I do them wrong, and then I forget all +about them. Mother says I'm improving. She says my room used to look like +a perfect Babel, and now I keep the wardrobe door shut, and dust it +out--sometimes. Then there's my mending. I came out here so's to be quiet +and _keep at it_. The poor dear woman is so afraid I won't learn to do +things in a lady-like way. It would be dreadful not to grow up a lady, +wouldn't it?" + +"Dreadful!" said Sarah; "only I wish you'd hurry and get through, so we +can go down to the swamp and sail. Couldn't you take a little bigger +stitches?" + +"No," said Gypsy, resolutely; "I should have to rip it all out. I'm going +to do it right, if it takes me all day." + +Gypsy began to sew with a will, and Sarah, finding it was for her own +interest in the end, stopped talking; so the fearful seam was soon neatly +finished, the work folded up, and the thimble and scissors put away +carefully in the little green reticule. + +"I lose so many thimbles,--you don't know!" observed Gypsy, by way of +comment. "I'm going to see if I can't keep this one three months." + +"Now let's go," said Sarah. + +"In a minute; I must carry my work up first. I'm going to jump off--it's +real fun. You see if I don't go as far as that dandelion." + +So Gypsy sprang from the tree, carrying a shower of blossoms with her. + +"Oh, look out for the statue!" cried Sarah. + +The warning came too late. Gypsy fell short of her mark, hit the +water-nymph heavily, and it fell with a crash into the water, where the +paved bottom was hard as rock. + +"Just see what you've done!" said Sarah, who had not a capacity for making +comforting remarks. "What do you suppose your father will say?" + +Gypsy stood aghast. The water gurgled over the fallen statue, whose +pretty, upraised hands were snapped at the wrist, and the wondering face +crushed in. There was a moment's silence. + +"Don't you tell!" said Sarah at length; "nobody saw it fall, and they'll +never think you did it. You just seem surprised, and keep still about it." + +Gypsy flushed to her forehead. + +"Why, Sarah Rowe! how can you say such a thing? I wouldn't tell a lie for +anything in this world!" + +"It wouldn't be a lie!" said Sarah, looking ashamed and provoked. "You +needn't say you didn't do it." + +"It would be a lie!" said Gypsy, decidedly. "He'd ask if anybody knew,--I +wouldn't be so mean, even if I knew he couldn't find out. I am going to +tell him this minute." + +Gypsy started off, with her cheeks still very red, up the garden paths and +down the road, and Sarah followed slowly. Gypsy's sense of honor had +received too great a shock for her to take pleasure just then in Sarah's +company, and Sarah had an uneasy sense of having lowered herself in her +friend's eyes, so the two girls separated for the afternoon. + +It was about a mile to Mr. Breynton's store. The afternoon was warm for +the season, and the road dusty; but Gypsy ran nearly all the way. She was +too much troubled about the accident to think of anything else, and in as +much haste to tell her father as some children would have been to conceal +it from him. + +Old Mr. Simms, the clerk, looked up over his spectacles in mild +astonishment, as Gypsy entered the store flushed, and panting, and pretty. +To Mr. Simms, who had no children of his own, and only a deaf wife and a +lame dog at home for company, Gypsy was always pretty, always "such a +wonderful development for a young person," and always just about right in +whatever she did. + +"Why, good afternoon, Miss Gypsy," said Mr. Simms; "I'm surprised to see +you such a warm day--very much surprised. But you always were a remarkable +young lady." + +"Yes," panted Gypsy; "where's father, Mr. Simms?" + +"He's up in the printing-room just now, talking with the foreman. Can I +carry any message for you, Miss Gypsy?" + +"Oh, Mr. Simms," said Gypsy, confidentially, "I've done the most dreadful +thing!" + +"Dear me! I don't see how that is possible," said Mr. Simms, taking his +spectacles off nervously, and putting them on again. + +"I have," said Gypsy; "I've broken the water-nymph!" + +"Is that all?" asked Mr. Simms, looking relieved; "why, how did it +happen?" + +"I jumped on it." + +_"Jumped on it!"_ + +"Yes; I'm sure I don't know what father'll say." + +"Well, I _must_ say you are a wonderful young person," said Mr. Simms, +proudly. "I'm sure I'm glad that's all. Don't you fret, my dear. Your +father won't care much about water-nymphs, when he has such a daughter." + +"But he will," said Gypsy, who regarded Mr. Simm's compliments only as a +tiresome interruption to conversation, and by no means as entitled to any +attention; "he will be very sorry, and I am going to tell him right off. +Please, Mr. Simms, will you speak to him?" + +"Remarkable development of veracity!" said Mr. Simms, as he bowed himself +away in his polite, old-fashioned way, and disappeared up the stairway +that led to the printing-rooms. It seemed to Gypsy, waiting there so +impatiently, as if her father would never come down. But come he did at +last, looking very much surprised to see her, and anxious to know if the +house were on fire, or if Winnie were drowned. + +"No," said Gypsy, "nothing has happened,--I mean nothing of that sort. +It's only about me. I have something to tell you." + +"I think I will walk home with you," said her father. "There isn't much +going on Saturday afternoons. Simms, you can lock up when you go home to +supper. I hope you haven't been giving your mother any trouble, or thrown +your ball into Mrs. Surly's windows again," he added, nervously, as they +passed out of the door and up the street together. + +"No, sir," said Gypsy, faintly; "it's worse than that." + +Mr. Breynton heaved a sigh, but said nothing. + +"I know you think I'm always up to mischief, and I don't suppose I'll ever +learn to be a lady and know how not to break things, and I'm so sorry, but +I didn't suppose there was any harm in jumping off an apple-tree, and the +water-nymph went over and perhaps if you sent me to school or something +I'd learn better where they tie you down to a great board," said Gypsy, +talking very fast, and quite forgetting her punctuation. + +"The water-nymph!" echoed Mr. Breynton. + +"Yes," said Gypsy, dolefully; "right over, head-first--into the +pond--broken to smash!" + +"Oh, Gypsy! that is too bad." + +"I know it," interrupted Gypsy; "I know it was terribly +careless--terribly. Did you ever know anything so exactly like me? The +worst of it is, being sorry doesn't help the matter. I wish I could buy +you another. Won't you please to take my five dollars, and I'll earn some +more picking berries." + +"I don't want your money, my child," said Mr. Breynton, looking troubled +and puzzled. "I'm sorry the nymph is gone; but somehow you do seem to be +different from other girls. I didn't know young ladies ever jumped." + +Gypsy was silent. Her father and mother seemed to think differently about +these things. To her view, and she felt sure, to her mother's, the fault +lay in the carelessness of not finding out whether the image was in her +way. She could not see that she was doing anything wrong in going out +alone into an apple-tree, and springing from a low bough, upon the soft +grass. Very likely, when she was a grown-up young lady, with long dresses +and hair done up behind, she shouldn't care anything about climbing trees. +But that was another question. However, she had too much respect for her +father to say this. So she hung her head, feeling very humble and sorry, +and wondering if Mr. Simms couldn't plaster the nymph together somehow, he +was always so ready to do things for her. + +"Well," said her father, after a moment's thought, in which he had been +struggling with a sense of disappointment at the destruction of his +statue, that would have made a less kind-hearted man scold. + +"Well, it can't be helped; and as to the climbing trees, I suppose your +mother knows best. I am glad you came and told me, anyway--very glad. You +are a truthful child, Gypsy, in spite of your faults." + +"I couldn't bear to tell lies," said Gypsy, brightening a little. + +It is possible this was another one of the reasons why people had such a +habit of loving Gypsy. What do you think? + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +JUST LIKE GYPSY + + +One afternoon Gypsy was coming home from the post-office. It was a rare +June day. The great soft shadows fell and faded on the mountains, and the +air was sweet with the breath of a hundred fields where crimson clovers +nodded in the sleepy wind. It seemed to Gypsy that she had never seen such +mellow sunlight, or skies so pure and blue; that no birds ever sung such +songs in the elm-trees, and never were butterflies so golden and brown and +beautiful as those which fluttered drowsily over the tiny roadside +clovers. The thought came to her like a little sudden heart-throb, that +thrilled her through and through, that this world was a very great world, +and very beautiful,--it seemed so alive and happy, from the arch of the +blazing sky down to the blossoms of the purple weeds that hid in the +grass. She wondered that she had never thought of it before. How many +millions of people were enjoying this wonderful day! What a great thing it +was to live in such a world, where everything was so beautiful and useful +and happy! The very fact that she was alive in it made her so glad. She +felt as if she would like to go off on the rocks somewhere, and shout and +jump and sing. + +As she walked slowly along past the stores and the crowded tenement-houses, +swinging her little letter-basket on her arm, and dreaming away with her +great brown eyes, as such young eyes will always dream upon a summer's +day, there suddenly struck upon that happy thought of hers a mournful +sound. + +It was a human groan. + +It grated on Gypsy's musing, as a file grates upon smooth marble; she +started, and looked up. The sound came from an open window directly over +her head. What could anybody be groaning about such a day as this? Gypsy +felt a momentary impatience with the mournful sound; then a sudden +curiosity to know what it meant. A door happened to be open near her, and +she walked right in, without a second thought, as was the fashion in which +Gypsy usually did things. A pair of steep stairs led up from the bit of an +entry, and a quantity of children, whose faces and hands were decidedly +the worse for wear, were playing on them. + +"How do you do?" said Gypsy. The children stared. + +"Who lives here?" asked Gypsy, again. The children put their fingers in +their mouths. + +"Who is that groaning so?" persisted Gypsy, repressing a strong desire to +box their ears. The children crawled a little further up-stairs, and +peered at her from between their locks of shaggy hair, as if they +considered her a species of burglar. At this moment a side door opened, +and a red-faced woman, who was wiping her hands on her apron, put her head +out into the entry, and asked, in rather a surly tone, what was wanted. + +"Who is that groaning?" repeated Gypsy. + +"Oh, that's nobody but Grandmother Littlejohn," said the woman, with a +laugh, "she's always groanin'clock." + +"But what does she groan for?" insisted Gypsy, her curiosity nowise +diminished to see a person who could be "always groanin'clock," through +not only one, but many, of such golden summer days. + +"Oh, I s'pose she's got reason enough, for the matter of that," said the +woman, carelessly; "she's broke a bone,--though she do make a terrible +fuss over it, and very onobligin'clock it is to the neighbors as has the +lookin'clock after of her." + +"Broken a bone! Poor thing, I'm going right up to see her!" said Gypsy, +whose compassion was rising fast. + +"Good luck to you!" said the woman, with a laugh Gypsy did not like very +much. It only strengthened her resolution, however, and she ran up the +narrow stairs scattering the children right and left. + +Several other untidy-looking women opened doors and peered out at her as +she went by; but no one else spoke to her. Guided by the sound of the +groans, which came at regular intervals like long breaths, she went up a +second flight of stairs, more narrow and more dark than the first, and +turned into a little low room, the door of which stood open. + +"Who's there!" called a fretful voice from inside. + +"I," said Gypsy; "may I come in?" + +"I don't know who you be," said the voice, "but you may come 'long ef you +want to." + +Gypsy accepted the somewhat dubious invitation. The room was in sad +disorder, and very dusty. An old yellow cat sat blinking at a sunbeam, and +an old, yellow, wizened woman lay upon the bed. Her forehead was all drawn +and knotted with pain, and her mouth looked just like her voice--fretful +and sharp. She turned her head slowly, as Gypsy entered, but otherwise she +did not alter her position; as if it were one which she could not change +without pain. + +"Good afternoon," said Gypsy, feeling a little embarrassed, and not +knowing exactly what to say, now she was up there. + +"Good arternoon," said Grandmother Littlejohn, with a groan. + +"I heard you groan out in the street," said Gypsy, rushing to the point at +once; "I came up to see what was the matter." + +"Matter?" said the old woman sharply, "I fell down stairs and broke my +ankle, that's the matter, an'clock I wonder the whole town hain't heerd me +holler,--I can't sleep day nor night with the pain, an'clock it's matter +enough, I think." + +"I'm real sorry," said Gypsy. + +Mrs. Littlejohn broke into a fresh spasm of groaning at this, and seemed +to be in such suffering, that it made Gypsy turn pale to hear her. + +"Haven't you had a doctor?" she asked, compassionately. + +"Laws yes," said the old woman. "Had a doctor! I guess I have, a young +fellar who said he was representative from somewhere from Medical +Profession, seems to me it war, but I never heerd on't, wharever it is, +an'clock he with his whiskers only half growed, an'clock puttin'clock of +my foot into a wooden box, an'clock murderin'clock of me--I gave him a +piece of my mind, and he hain't come nigh me since, and I won't have him +agin noways." + +"But they always splinter broken limbs," said Gypsy. + +"Splinters?" cried the old woman; "I tell ye I fell down stairs! I didn't +get no splinters in." + +Gypsy concluded to suppress her surgical information. + +"Who takes care of you?" she asked, suddenly. + +"Nobody! _I_ don't want nobody takin'clock care of me when I ain't shut up +in a box on the bed, an'clock now I am, the neighbors is shy enough of +troublin'clock themselves about me, an'clock talks of the work-house. I'll +starve fust!" + +"Who gives you your dinners and suppers?" asked Gypsy, beginning to think +Grandmother Littlejohn was a very ill-treated woman. + +"It's little enough I gets," said the old woman, groaning afresh; "they +brings me up a cup of cold tea when they feels like it, and crusts of +bread, and I with no teeth to eat 'em. I hain't had a mouthful of dinner +this day, and that's the truth, now!" + +"No dinner," cried Gypsy. "Why, how sorry I am for you! I'll go right home +and get you some, and tell my mother. She'll take care of you--she always +does take care of everybody." + +"You're a pretty little gal," said Mrs. Littlejohn, with a sigh; "an'clock +I hope you'll be rewarded for botherin'clock yourself about a poor old +woman like me. Does your ma use white sugar? I like white sugar in my +tea." + +"Oh yes," said Gypsy, rather pleased than otherwise to be called a "pretty +little gal." "Oh yes; we have a whole barrel full. You can have some just +as well as not; I'll bring you down a pound or so, and I have five dollars +at home that you might have. What would you like to have me get for you?" + +"Dear me!" said Mrs. Littlejohn; "what a angel of mercy to the poor and +afflicted you be! I should like some fresh salmon and green peas, now, if +I could get 'em." + +"Very well," said Gypsy; "I'll hurry home and see about it." + +Accordingly she left the old woman groaning out her thanks, and went down +the narrow stairs, and into the street. + +She ran all the way home, and rushed into the parlor where her mother was +sitting quietly sewing. She looked up as the door burst open, and Gypsy +swept in like a little hurricane, her turban hanging down her neck, her +hair loose and flying about an eager face that was all on fire with its +warm crimson color and twinkling eyes. + +"Why Gypsy!" + +"Oh, mother, such an old woman--such a poor old woman! groaning right out +in the street--I mean, I was out in the street, and heard her groan up two +flights of the _crook_edest stairs, and she broke her ankle, and the +neighbors won't give her anything to eat, unless she goes to the +poor-house and starves, and she hasn't had any dinner, and----" + +"Wait a minute, Gypsy; what does all this mean?" + +"Why, she fell down those horrid stairs and broke her ankle, and wants +some salmon and green peas, and I'm going to give her my five dollars, +and----Oh, white sugar, some white sugar for her tea. I never heard +anybody groan so, in all my life!" + +Mrs. Breynton laid down her work, and laughed. + +"Why, mother!" said Gypsy, reddening, "I don't see what there is to laugh +at!" + +"My dear Gypsy, you would laugh if you had heard your own story. The most +I can make out of it is, that a little girl who is so excited she hardly +knows what she is talking about, has seen an old woman who has been +begging for fresh salmon." + +"And broken her ankle, and is starving," began Gypsy. + +"Stop a minute," interrupted Mrs. Breynton, gently. "Sit down and take off +your things, and when you get rested tell me the story quietly and slowly, +and then we will see what is to be done for your old woman." + +Gypsy, very reluctantly, obeyed. It seemed to her incredible that any one +could be so quiet and composed as her mother was, when there was an old +woman in town who had had no dinner. However, she sat still and fanned +herself, and when she was rested, she managed to tell her story in as +connected and rational manner, and with as few comments and exclamations +of her own, as Gypsy was capable of getting along with, in any narration. + +"Very well," said her mother, when it was finished; "I begin to understand +things better. Let me see: in the first place, you felt so sorry for the +old woman, that you went alone into a strange house, among a sort of +people you knew nothing about, and without stopping to think whether I +should be willing to have you--wasn't that so?" + +"Yes'm," said Gypsy, hanging her head a little; "I didn't think--she did +groan so." + +"Then Mrs. Littlejohn seems to like to complain, it strikes me." + +"Complain!" said Gypsy, indignantly. + +"Yes, a little. However, she might have worse faults. The most remarkable +thing about her seems to be her modest request for salmon and white sugar. +You propose giving them to her?" + +"Why, yes'm," said Gypsy, promptly. "She's in such dreadful pain. When I +sprained my wrist, you gave me nice things to eat." + +"But it wouldn't follow that I should give Mrs. Littlejohn the same," said +Mrs. Breynton, gently. "Salmon and white sugar are expensive luxuries. I +might be able to do something to help Mrs. Littlejohn, but I might not be +able to afford to take her down the two or three pounds of sugar you +promised her, nor to spend several dollars on fresh salmon--a delicacy +which we have had on our own table but once this season. Besides, there +are thirty or forty sick people in town, probably, who are as poor and as +much in need of assistance as this one old woman. You see, don't you, that +I could not give salmon and peas and white sugar to them all, and it would +be unwise in me to spend all my money on one, when I might divide it, and +help several people." + +"But there's my five dollars," said Gypsy, only half convinced. + +"Very well, supposing I were to let you give it all away to Mrs. +Littlejohn, even if she were the most worthy and needy person that could +be found in town, what then? It is all gone. You have nothing more to +give. The next week a poor little girl who has no hat, and can't go to +Sunday-school, excites your sympathy, and you would be glad to give +something toward buying her a hat--you have not a copper. You go to +Monthly Concert, and want to drop something into the contribution box, but +Mrs. Littlejohn has eaten up what you might have given. You want to do +something for the poor freedmen, who are coming into our armies; you +cannot do it, for you have nothing to give." + +"Well," said Gypsy, with a ludicrous expression of conviction and +discomfiture, "I suppose so; I didn't think." + +"_Didn't think!_--the old enemy, Gypsy. And now that I have pointed out +the little mistakes you made this afternoon, I want to tell you, Gypsy, +how pleased I am that you were so quick to feel sorry for the old woman, +and so ready to be generous with your own money and help. I would rather +have you fail a dozen times on the unselfish side, than to have you +careless and heartless towards the people God has made poor, and in +suffering----there! I have given you a long sermon. Do you think mother is +always scolding?" + +Mrs. Breynton drew her into her arms, and gave her one of those little +soft kisses on the forehead, that Gypsy liked so much. "I will go down and +see the old woman after supper," she said, then. + +"Couldn't you go before?" suggested Gypsy. "She said she hadn't had any +dinner." + +"We can't do things in too much of a hurry; not even our charities," said +Mrs. Breynton, smiling. "I have some work which I cannot leave now, and I +have little doubt the woman had some dinner. The poor are almost always +very kind neighbors to each other. I will be there early enough to take +her some supper." + +So Gypsy was comforted for Mrs. Littlejohn. + +It was nearly dark when Mrs. Breynton came up from the village, with her +pleasant smile, and her little basket that half Yorkbury knew so well by +sight, for the biscuit and the jellies, the blanc-mange, and the dried +beef and the cookies, that it brought to so many sick-beds. Gypsy had been +watching for her impatiently, and ran down to the gate to meet her. + +"Well, did you find her?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"What do you think of her?" asked Gypsy, a little puzzled by her mother's +expression. + +"She is a good deal of a scold, and something of a sufferer," said Mrs. +Breynton. Gypsy's face fell, and they walked up to the house in silence. + +"Then you're not going to do anything for her?" asked Gypsy, at length, in +a disappointed tone. + +"Oh, yes. She needs help. She can't be moved to the poor-house now, and, +besides, is likely to get well before long, if she is properly taken care +of. I gave her her supper, and have arranged with one or two of the ladies +to send her meals for a few days, till we see how she is, and what had +better be done. I take care of her to-morrow, and Mrs. Rowe takes her the +next day." + +"Good!" said Gypsy, brightening; "and I may take her down the things, +mayn't I, mother?" + +"If you want to." + +Gypsy went to bed as happy as a queen. + +The next morning she rose early, to be sure to be in time to take Mrs. +Littlejohn's breakfast; and was disappointed enough, when her mother +thought it best she should wait till she had eaten her own. However, on +the strength of the remembrance of her mother's tried and proved wisdom, +on certain other little occasions, she submitted with a good grace. + +She carried Mrs. Littlejohn a very good breakfast of griddle-cakes and +fish-balls and sweet white bread, and was somewhat taken aback to find +that the old woman received it rather curtly, and asked after the salmon. + +It was very warm at noon. When she carried the dinner, the walk was long +and wearisome, and Mrs. Littlejohn neglected to call her an angel of +mercy, and it must be confessed Gypsy's enthusiasm diminished perceptibly. + +That evening Mr. and Mrs. Breynton were out to tea, and Tom was off +fishing. Mrs. Breynton left Mrs. Littlejohn's supper in a basket on the +shelf, and told Gypsy where it was. Gypsy had been having a great frolic +in the fresh hay with Sarah Rowe, and came in late. No one but Winnie was +there. She ate her supper in a great hurry, and went out again. Patty saw +her from the window, and concluded she had gone to Mrs. Littlejohn's. + +That night, about eleven o'clock, some one knocked at Mrs. Breynton's +door, and woke her up. + +"Who is it?" she called. + +"Oh, mother Breynton!" said a doleful voice; "what _do_ you suppose I've +done now?" + +"I'm sure I don't know," said Mrs. Breynton, with a resigned sigh. + +"I hope she hasn't been walking in her sleep again," said Mr. Breynton, +nervously. + +"Forgotten Mrs. Littlejohn's supper," said the doleful voice through the +key-hole. + +"Why, Gypsy!" + +"I know it," said Gypsy, humbly. "Couldn't I dress and run down?" + +"Why, no indeed! it can't be helped now. Run back to bed." + +"Just like Gypsy, for all the world!" said Tom, the next morning. "Always +so quick and generous, and sorry for people, and ready to do, and you can +depend on her just about as much as you could on a brisk west wind!" + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +PEACE MAYTHORNE + + +"After you have seen Mrs. Littlejohn, and explained why she went +supperless last night," said Mrs. Breynton, "I want you to do an errand +for me." + +"What is it?" asked Gypsy, pleasantly. She felt very humble, and much +ashamed, this morning, and anxious to make herself useful. + +"I want you to find out where Peace Maythorne's room is,--it is in the +same house,--and carry her this, with my love." + +Mrs. Breynton took up a copy of "Harper's Magazine," and handed it to +Gypsy. + +"Tell her I have turned the leaf down at some articles I think will +interest her, and ask her if the powder I left her put her to sleep." + +"Who is Peace Maythorne?" asked Gypsy, wondering. "Is she poor?" + +"Yes." + +"How funny to send her a 'Harper's,'" said Gypsy. "Why don't you give her +some money, or something?" + +"Some things are worth more than money to some people," said Mrs. +Breynton, smiling. + +"Why! then you had been into that house before I found Mrs. Littlejohn?" +said Gypsy, as the thought first struck her. + +"Oh, yes; many times." + +Gypsy started off, with the Magazine under her arm, wondering if there +were a house in town, filled with these wretched poor, in which her mother +was not known as a friend. + +Her heart sank a little as she climbed the dark stairs to Mrs. +Littlejohn's room. She had begged of her mother a tiny pailful of green +peas, with which she hoped to pacify the old woman, but she was somewhat +in dread of hearing her talk, and ashamed to confess her own neglect. + +Mrs. Littlejohn was eating the very nice breakfast which Mrs. Rowe had +sent over, and groaning dolefully over it, as Gypsy entered. + +"Good morning," said Gypsy. + +"Good morning," said Mrs. Littlejohn, severely. + +"I went out to play in the hay with Sarah Rowe, and forgot all about your +supper last night, and I'm just as sorry as I can be," said Gypsy, coming +to the point frankly, and without any attempt to excuse herself. + +"Oh, of course!" said Mrs. Littlejohn, in the tone of a martyr. "It's all +I expect. I'm a poor lone widdy with a bone broke, and I'm used to +bein'clock forgot. Little gals that has everything they want, and five +dollars besides, and promises me salmon and such, couldn't be expected to +remember the sufferin'clock and afflicted,--of course not." + +It was not an easy nor a pleasant thing to apologize to a person to whom +she had played the charitable lady the day before; and Mrs. Littlejohn's +manner of receiving the explanation certainly made it no easier. But +Gypsy, as the saying goes, "swallowed her pride," and felt that she +deserved it. + +"I've brought you some peas," she said, meekly. + +"Oh!" said the old woman, relenting a little, "you have, have you? Well, +I'm obleeged to you, and you can set 'em in the cupboard." + +Gypsy emptied her peas into a yellow bowl which she found in the cupboard, +and then asked,-- + +"Can I do anything for you?" + +"I'm terrible thirsty!" said Mrs. Littlejohn, with a long groan. "There's +some water in that air pail." + +Gypsy went into the corner where the pail stood, and filled the mug with +water; then, not being able to think of anything more to say, she +concluded to go. + +"Good mornin'clock," said Mrs. Littlejohn, in a forgiving tone; "I hope +you'll come agin." + +Gypsy secretly thought it was doubtful if she ever did. Her charity, like +that of most young people of her age and experience, was not of the sort +calculated to survive under difficulties, or to deal successfully with +shrewish old women. + +After inquiring in vain of the group of staring children where Peace +Maythorne's room was, Gypsy resorted to her friend, the red-faced woman, +who directed her to a door upon the second story. + +It was closed, and Gypsy knocked. + +"Come in," said a quiet voice. Gypsy went in, wondering why Peace +Maythorne did not get up and open the door, and if she did not know it was +more polite. She stopped short, as she entered the room, and wondered no +longer. + +It was a plain, bare room, but neat enough, and not unpleasant nor +unhomelike, because of the great flood of morning sunlight that fell in +and touched everything to golden warmth. It touched most brightly, and +lingered longest, on a low bed drawn up between the windows. A girl lay +there, with a pale face turned over on the pillows, and weak, thin hands, +folded on the counterpane. She might, from her size, have been about +sixteen years of age; but her face was like the face of a woman long grown +old. The clothing of the bed partially concealed her shoulders, which were +cruelly rounded and bent. + +So Peace Maythorne was a cripple. + +Gypsy recovered from her astonishment with a little start, and said, +blushing, for fear she had been rude,-- + +"Good morning. I'm Gypsy Breynton. Mother sent me down with a magazine." + +"I am glad to see you," said Peace Maythorne, smiling. "Won't you sit +down?" + +Gypsy took a chair by the bed, thinking how pleasant the old, pale face, +was, after all, and how kindly and happy the smile. + +"Your mother is very kind," said Peace; "she is always doing something for +me. She has given me a great deal to read." + +"Do you like to read?--I don't," said Gypsy. + +"Why, yes!" said Peace, opening her eyes wide; "I thought everybody liked +to read. Besides I can't do anything else, you know." + +"Nothing at all?" asked Gypsy. + +"Only sometimes, when the pain isn't very bad, I try to help aunt about +her sewing, I can't do much." + +"Oh, you live with your aunt?" said Gypsy. + +"Yes. She takes in sewing. She's out, just now." + +"Does your back pain you a great deal?" asked Gypsy. + +"Oh, yes; all the time. But, then, I get used to it, you know," said +Peace. + +"_All the time!_--oh, I am so sorry!" said Gypsy, drawing a long breath. + +"Oh, it might be worse," said Peace, smiling. + +"I've only lain here three years. Some people can't move for forty. The +doctor says I sha'n't live so long as that." + +Gypsy looked at the low bed, the narrow room, the pallid face and shrunken +body cramped there, moveless, on the pillows. Three years! Three years to +lie through summer suns and winter snows, while all the world was out at +play, and happy! + +"Well," said Gypsy, as the most appropriate comment suggesting itself; +"you _are_ rather different from Mrs. Littlejohn!" + +Peace smiled. There was something rare about Peace Maythorne's smile. + +"Poor Mrs. Littlejohn! You see, she isn't used to being sick, and I am; +that makes the difference." + +"Oh, I forgot!" said Gypsy, abruptly, "mother said I was to ask if those +powders she left you put you to sleep." + +"Nicely. They're better than anything the doctor gave me; everything your +mother does seems to be the best sort, somehow. She can't touch your hand, +or smooth your pillow, without doing it differently from other people." + +"That's so!" said Gypsy, emphatically. "There isn't anybody else like her. +Do you lie awake very often?" + +Peace answered in the two quiet words that were on her lips so often, in +the quiet voice that never complained,-- + +"Oh, yes." + +There was a little silence. Gypsy was watching Peace. Peace had her eyes +turned away from her visitor, but she was conscious of every quick, +nervous breath Gypsy drew, and every impatient little flutter of her +hands. + +The two girls were studying each other. Gypsy's investigations, whatever +they were, seemed to be very pleasant, for she started at last with a bit +of a sigh, and announced the result of them in the characteristic words,-- + +"I like you!" + +To her surprise, Peace just turned up her eyes and turned them away, and +the eyes were full of tears. After a moment,-- + +"Thank you. I don't see many people so young--except the children. I tell +them stories sometimes." + +"But you won't like me," said Gypsy. + +"I rather think I shall." + +"No you won't," said Gypsy, shaking her head decidedly; "not a bit. I know +you won't. I'm silly,--well, I'll tell you what I am by-and-by. First, I +want to hear all about you,--everything, I mean," she added, with a quick +delicacy, of which, for "blundering Gypsy," she had a great +deal,--"everything that you care to tell me." + +"Why, I've nothing to tell," said Peace, smiling, "cooped up here all the +time; it's all the same." + +"That's just what I want to hear about. About the being cooped up. I don't +see _how you bear it_!" said Gypsy, impetuously. + +Peace smiled again. Gypsy had a fancy that the smile had stolen one of the +sunbeams that lay in such golden, flickering waves, upon the bed. + +Too much self-depreciation is often a sign of the extremest vanity. Peace +had nothing of this. Seeing that Gypsy was in earnest in her wish to hear +her story, she quietly began it without further parley. It was very +simple, and quickly told. + +"We used to live on a farm on the mountains--father and mother and I. +There were a great many cattle, and so much ground it tired me to walk +across it. I always went to school, and father read to us in the evenings. +I suppose that's the way I've learned to love to read, and I've been so +glad since. I was pretty small when they died,--first father, then mother. +I remember it a little; at least I remember about mother,--she kissed me +so, and cried. Then Aunt Jane came for me, and brought me here. We lived +in a pleasant house up the street, at first. I used to work in the mill, +and earned enough to pay aunt what I cost her. Then one day, when I was +thirteen years old, we were coming out at noon, all of us girls, in a +great hurry and frolic, and I felt sick and dizzy watching the wheels go +round, and,--well, they didn't mean to,--but they pushed me, and I fell." + +"Down stairs?" + +"All the way,--it was a long, crooked flight. I struck my spine on every +step." + +"Oh, Peace!" said Gypsy, half under her breath. + +"I was sick for a little while; then I got better. I thought it was all +over. Then one day I found a little curve between my shoulders, and +so,--well, it came so slowly I hardly knew it, till at last I was in bed +with the pain. We had come here because it was hard times, and aunt had to +support me,--and then there were the doctor's bills." + +"Doesn't he say you can _ever_ get well? never sit up a little while?" + +"Oh, no." + +Gypsy gasped a little, as if she were suffocating. + +"And your aunt,--is she kind to you?" + +"Oh, yes." + +A certain flitting expression, that the face of Peace caught with the +words, Gypsy could not help seeing. + +"But I mean, real kind. Does she love you?" + +The girl's cheek flushed to a pale, quick crimson, then faded slowly. + +"She is very good to me. I am a great trouble. You know I am not her own. +It is very hard for her that I can't support myself." + +Gypsy said something just then, in her innermost thought of thoughts, +about Aunt Jane, that Aunt Jane would not have cared to hear. + +"If I could only earn something!" said Peace, with a quick breath, that +sounded like a sigh. "That is hardest of all. But it's all right somehow." + +"Peace Maythorne!" said Gypsy, in a little flash, "I don't see! never to +go out in the wind and jump on the hay, and climb the mountains, and run +and row and snowball,--why, it would _kill_ me! And you lie here so sweet +and patient, and you haven't said a cross word all the while you've been +telling me about it. I don't understand! How can you, _can_ you bear it?" + +"I couldn't, if I didn't tell Him," said Peace, softly. + +"Whom?" + +"God." + +There was a long silence. Gypsy looked out of the window, winking very +hard, and Peace lay quite still upon the bed. + +"There!" said Gypsy, at last, with a jump. "I shall be late to school." + +"Oh," said Peace, "you haven't told me anything about yourself; you said +you would." + +"Well," said Gypsy, tying on her hat, "that's easy enough done. I'm silly +and cross, and forgetful and blundering." + +"I don't believe it," said Peace, laughing. + +"I am," said Gypsy, confidentially; "it's all true; and I'm always tearing +my dresses, and worrying father, and getting mad at Winnie, and bothering +Miss Melville, and romping round, and breaking my neck! and then, when +things don't go right, how I scold!" + +Peace smiled, and looked incredulous. + +"It's just so," said Gypsy, giving a little sharp nod to emphasize her +words. "And here you lie, and never think of being cross and impatient, +and love everybody and everybody loves you, and--well, all I have to say +is, if I were you I should have scolded everybody out of the house long +before this!" + +"You mustn't talk so about me," said Peace, a faint shadow of pain +crossing her face. "You don't know how wicked I am--nobody knows; I am +cross very often. Sometimes when my back aches as if I should scream, and +aunt is talking, I hide my face under the clothes, and don't say a word to +her." + +"You call _that_ being cross!" said Gypsy, with her eyes very wide open. +She buttoned on her sack, and started to go, but stopped a minute. + +"I don't suppose you'd want me to come again--I'm so noisy, and all." + +"Oh, I should be so glad!" said Peace, with one of those rare smiles: "I +didn't dare to ask you." + +"Well; I'll come. But I told you you wouldn't like me." + +"I do," said Peace. "I like you very much." + +"How funny!" said Gypsy. Then she bade her good-by, and went to school. + +"Mother," she said, at night, "did you have any particular reason in +sending me to Peace Maythorne?" + +"Perhaps so," said Mrs. Breynton, smiling. "Why?" + +"Nothing, only I thought so. You were a very wise woman." + +A while after she spoke up, suddenly. + +"Mother, don't the Quakers say good matches are made in heaven?" + +"Who's been putting sentimental ideas into the child's head?" said her +father, in an undertone. + +"Why, Gypsy Breynton!" said Winnie, looking very much shocked; "you hadn't +ought to say such things. Of course, the brimstone falls down from hell, +and they pick it up and put it on the matches!" + +"What made you ask the question?" said Mrs. Breynton, when the laugh had +subsided. + +"Oh, I was only thinking, I guessed Peace Maythorne's name was made in +heaven. It so exactly suits her." + +After that, the cripple's little quiet room became one of the places Gypsy +loved best in Yorkbury. + +Two or three weeks after that Mrs. Littlejohn, who had been gaining +rapidly in strength and good temper under Mrs. Breynton's wise and kindly +care, took it into her head one morning, when she was alone, to walk +across the room, and look out of the window. The weakened limb was not in +a fit state to be used at all, and the shock given to it was very great. +Inflammation set in, and fever, and the doctor shook his head, and asked +if the old woman had any friends living anywhere; if so, they had better +be sent for. But the poor creature seemed to be desolate enough; declared +she had no relatives, and was glad of it; she only wanted to be let alone, +and she should get well fast enough. + +She never said that when Mrs. Breynton was in the room. Gypsy went down +one evening with her mother, to help her carry a bundle of fresh +bed-clothing, and she was astonished at the gentleness which had crept +into the old withered face and peevish voice. Mrs. Littlejohn called her +up to the bed, just as she started to go. + +"I say, little gal, I told ye a fib the day ye fust come. I did have a +dinner, though it war a terrible measly one--Mrs. Breynton, marm!" + +Mrs. Breynton stepped up to her. + +"What was that ye read t'other day, 'bout liars not goin'clock into the +kingdom of heaven?--I 'most forgot." + +Gypsy crept out, softly. She was wondering how her mother had managed her +charity to this fretful old woman so wisely, that her words, unfitly +spoken, were becoming a trouble to herself, and her hours of increasing +pain turned into hours of late, faint repentance. Perhaps the charm lay in +a certain old book, dog-eared and worn, and dusty from long disuse on the +cupboard shelf. This little book Mrs. Breynton had found, and she had read +in it many times, until that painful groaning ceased. + +And so one night it chanced that the old yellow cat sat blinking at the +light, and the yellow, furrowed face turned over on the pillow and smiled, +and lay still. The light burned out, and the morning came; the cat jumped +purring upon the bed, and seeing what was there, curled up by it, with a +mournful mewing cry. + +"Peace Maythorne says," said Gypsy, "that if Mrs. Littlejohn went to +heaven, she will be so happy _to find she doesn't scold_! Isn't it funny, +in Peace, to think of such things?" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +CAMPING OUT + + +Do you remember Mr. Gough's famous story of the orator who, with a great +flourish of rhetoric as prelude, announced to his audience the startling +fact that there was a "gre--at difference in people?" On the strength of +this original statement, it has been supposed that there were a variety of +tastes to be suited in selecting for the readers of "Gypsy Breynton" the +most entertaining passages of this one summer in her life. The last two +chapters were for the quiet young people. This one is for the lively young +people--the people who like to live out of doors, and have adventures, and +get into difficulties, and get over them. The quiet people aforesaid need +not read it, if they don't want to. + +Did you ever "camp out"? + +If you ever did, or ever very much wanted to, you will know how Gypsy felt +one morning after her summer vacation had begun, and she was wondering +what she should do with herself all day, when Tom came into her room and +said,-- + +"Gypsy, don't you wish you were a boy? I'm going to spend a week at +Ripton, with Hallam." + +"Mr. Hallam!" exclaimed Gypsy. Mr. Guy Hallam was a lawyer about thirty +years old; but Tom had the natural boy's feeling about "mistering" any +one, that he had gone on fishing excursions with, ever since he could +remember; while Gypsy was more respectful. + +"Ripton!" said Gypsy, again; "Oh, dear me!" + +"And going to camp out and have a fire, and cook our trout, and shoot our +rabbits," said Tom, with an aggravating appearance of indifference, as if +these were only a specimen of innumerable delights unmentioned. + +"Oh, dear _me_!" said Gypsy, with a long sigh. + +"There are several disadvantages in being a girl, my dear, as you will +find out, occasionally," said Tom, with a lordly air. + +"Girls are just as good as boys!" answered Gypsy, flashing up. + +"Only they can't camp out." + +"I'm not so sure of that, sir." + +"Indeed!" + +"Girls do camp out; I've heard about it; parties of ladies and gentlemen +go out up on the Adirondacks. You might take Sarah Rowe and me." + +Tom smiled a very superior smile. + +"Come, Tom, do--there's a good fellow!" + +"Take along a couple of girls that can't fish, and scream when you shoot a +squirrel, and are always having headaches, and spraining their ankles, and +afraid to be left alone? No, thank you!" + +"I can fish, and I'm no more afraid to be left alone than you are!" said +Gypsy, indignantly. "I'll go and ask mother." + +She ran down stairs, slamming all the doors, and rushed noisily into the +parlor. + +"Oh, mother! Tom's going to camp out with Mr. Guy Hallam, and can't Sarah +and I go, too?" + +"Oh, what now?" said Mrs. Breynton, laughing, and laying down her work. + +"Only for a week, mother, up Ripton--just think! With a tent and a fire, +and Mr. Hallam to take care of us." + +This last remark was a stroke of policy on Gypsy's part, for Tom had come +in, and it touched a bit of boy's pride, of which Gypsy was perfectly +aware he had a good deal. + +"As if I couldn't take as good care of you as Guy Hallam, or the next +man!" he said, in an insulted tone. + +"Then Tom is willing you should go," observed Mrs. Breynton. + +"Why--I don't know," said Tom, who had not intended to commit himself; "I +didn't say so." + +"But you will say so--now, there's a dear, good Tom!" said Gypsy, giving +him a soft kiss on one cheek. Gypsy did not very often kiss Tom unless he +asked her, and it was the best argument she could have used; for, though +Tom always pretended to be quite above any interest in such tender +proceedings, yet this rogue of a sister looked so pink and pretty and +merry, with her arms about his neck and her twinkling eyes looking into +his, that there was no resisting her. Gypsy was quite conscious of this +little despotism, and was enough of a diplomatist to reserve it for rare +and important occasions. + +"We--ell," said Tom, slowly; "I don't know as I care, if Hallam +doesn't--just for once, you understand; you're not to ask me again as long +as you live." + +"There, there!" cried Gypsy, clapping her hands, and jumping up and down. +"Tom, you are a cherub--a wingless cherub. Now, mother!" + +"But supposing it rains?" suggested Mrs. Breynton. + +"Oh, we'll take our water-proofs." + +"The tent will be dry enough," put in Tom, bringing in his forces like a +good soldier, now he was fairly enlisted. + +"But if you catch cold and get sick, my dear; Tom won't want to cut short +his excursion to bring you home." + +"There's Mr. Fisher, right on top of the mountain; he'd bring me in his +wagon. Besides, I wouldn't be silly enough to get sick." + +"But Sarah might." + +"Sarah does as I tell her," said Gypsy, significantly. "I should take care +of her." + +"But Mrs. Rowe may not be willing Sarah should go, and Mr. Guy Hallam must +be asked, Gypsy." + +"Well, but----," persisted Gypsy; "if Mrs. Rowe and Mr. Hallam and +everybody are willing, may I go?" + +"Well," said Mrs. Breynton, after a few minutes' thinking, "I guess so; if +Tom will take good care of you; and if you will promise to go to Mr. +Fisher's the rainy nights--I mean if it rains hard." + +"Oh, mother, mother Breynton! There never was such a dear little woman in +this world!" + +"Why, my _dear_!" said Mr. Breynton, when he heard of it; "how can you let +the child do such a thing? She will fall off the precipice, or walk right +into a bear's den, the first thing." + +"Oh, I'll trust her," answered her mother, smiling; "and then, Mrs. Fisher +will be so near, and so ready to take care of her if it is cold or wet; it +isn't as if she were going off into a wild place; of course, then, I +shouldn't let her go without some grown woman with them." + +"Well, my dear, I suppose you know best. I believe I agreed to let you do +as you pleased with your girl, seeing she's the only one." + +Mrs. Rowe was willing if Mrs. Breynton were willing; Mr. Guy Hallam had no +objections. Sarah was delighted, Gypsy radiant, Tom patronizing, and +Winnie envious, and so, amid a pleasant little bustle, the preparations +began, and one sunny morning the party stowed themselves and their baggage +comfortably away in Mr. Surly's double-seated wagon (much to the horror of +his excellent wife, who looked out of the window, and wondered if Miss +Rowe did expect that wild young un of hers to come home alive), and +trotted briskly out of Yorkbury, along the steep, uneven road that led to +the mountain. + +Ripton was a long ride from Yorkbury, and the wagon was somewhat crowded, +owing to the presence of Mr. Surly, who was by no means a thin man, and +who acted as driver. He was to return with his "team," as the Vermont +farmers invariably call their vehicles, and when the party were ready to +come home Mr. Fisher was to be hired to bring them down. It would have +been unsafe for any but an experienced driver to hold the reins on those +mountain roads, as Gypsy was convinced, afresh, before the ride was over. + +For the first few miles the way led along the beautiful valley of the +Otter Creek, and then grew suddenly steep as they began to ascend the +mountain. Such beautiful pictures unfolded before them, as they wound +slowly up, that even Gypsy did not feel like talking, and it was a very +silent party. + +They passed through pine forests, dense and still, where the wind was +hoarse, and startled squirrels flew over the fallen trunks and boughs of +ruined trees. They rode close to the edge of sheer precipices four hundred +feet down, with trout-brooks, like silver threads, winding through the +gorges. Great walls of rock rose above and around them, and seemed to shut +them in with a frown. Sharp turns in the road brought them suddenly to the +edge of abysses from which, in dark nights, they might have easily ridden +off. Gay flowers perfumed the fresh, high winds, and rank mosses grew and +twined, and hung thickly upon old stones and logs and roadside banks, +where the mountain sloped steeply. Far above were the tops of those tall, +sentinel trees, called, by Vermonters, the Procession of Pines, the tower +above their lesser comrades two by two, regular, solemn, and dark against +the sky for miles of forest-track. Between these were patches and glimpses +of a sky without a cloud. Gypsy had seen it all many times before; but it +was always new and grand to her; it always made the blood leap in her +veins and the stars twinkle in her eyes, and set her happy heart to +dreaming a world of pleasant dreams. + +She was leaning back against the wagon-seat, with her face upturned, to +watch the leaves flutter in the distant forest-top, when Mr. Surly reined +up suddenly, and the wagon stopped with a jerk. + +"I declare!" said Mr. Guy Hallam. + +"Waal, this is sum'at of a fix neow," said Mr. Surly, climbing out over +the wheel. + +"What's the matter?" asked Gypsy and Sarah, in one breath, jumping up to +see. + +"Matter enough," said Tom. + +For, turning a sharp corner just ahead of them, was a huge wood-cart, +drawn by two struggling horses. The road was just wide enough for one +vehicle; where their wagon stood, it would have been simply impossible to +place two abreast. At their right, the wooded slope rose like a wall. At +their left, a gorge two hundred feet deep yawned horribly, and the +trout-brook gurgled over its stones. + +"You hold on there," shouted the driver of the wood-cart; "I'll turn in +here anigh the mountain. You ken git by t'other side, can't you?" + +"Reckon so," said Mr. Surly, measuring the distance with his eye. He +climbed in again, and took the reins, and the driver of the wood-cart +wheeled up into a semi-circular widening of the road where a sand-heap had +been dug away. The space left was just wide enough for a carriage to pass +closely without grazing the wheels of the wood-cart, or the low log which +formed the only fence on the edge of the ravine. + +"Oh, we shall certainly tip over and be killed! Oh dear, let me get out!" +cried Sarah, as the wagon passed slowly forward. + +"Hush up!" said Gypsy, quickly. "Tom won't let us go, if you act so. Don't +you suppose four grown men know better than we do whether it's safe? I'm +not afraid a bit." + +Nevertheless, Gypsy and Tom, and even Mr. Hallam, looked narrowly at the +old frail log, and down into the gorge where the water was gurgling. Once +the wheels grazed the log, and it tilted slightly. Sarah screamed aloud. +Mr. Surly knew what he was about, however, and knew how to do it. He +passed on safely into the wider road, and the wood-cart rattled composedly +on. + +"There a'r'd a ben a purty close shave in the night," he remarked, coolly, +pointing with his whip down the precipice. "There was a team went down +here five years ago,--jist off that maple-tree there,--horse, wagin, and +all, an'clock two men, brothers they was, too; one man hung onto a branch +or suthin'clock, and was ketched and saved; t'other one got crushed to +jelly. It was a terrible dark night." + +Even Gypsy gave a little shiver during this entertaining conversation, and +was glad they had come up in the daytime. + +Mr. Surly drove to a certain by-road in the woods, where he left them, and +returned home; and the party proceeded on foot, with their baggage, to the +place Mr. Hallam had chosen as a camp-ground. + +It was a pleasant spot, far enough in the woods to be still and wild, near +enough to the little settlement on top of the mountain to be free from +bears, as Sarah had required to be informed ten separate times, on the +way. There was a little, natural clearing among the trees, which Mr. +Hallam and Tom made larger by cutting down the shrubbery and saplings. +They had brought hatchets with them, as well as guns, knives, and +fish-hooks. It seemed very warlike and real, Gypsy thought--quite as if +they intended to spend the rest of their lives there. She almost wished a +party of Indians would come and attack them, or a bear or a wolf. + +Having selected a smooth, level spot for the tents, Mr. Hallam thought +they had better put them up immediately. It chanced that he and Tom each +owned one, which was a much better arrangement than the dividing of one +into two apartments. The two were placed side by side, and the girls' tent +was distinguished and honored by a bit of a flag on top, and an extra fold +of rubber-cloth in front, to keep out the rain. There was also a ditch dug +around it, to drain off the water in case of a severe storm. + +"Besides, if it rains very hard, they can be sent to Mr. Fisher's," said +Tom. + +"Catch me!" said Gypsy. "Why, it would be all the fun to sleep out in the +rain." + +While Mr. Hallam and Tom were setting up the tents--and it took a long +time--the two girls busied themselves unpacking the baggage. + +They were really astonished to find how much they had brought, when it was +all taken out of the baskets and boxes and bags, and each article provided +with a place within or without the tents. To begin with, the little girls +had each a bag of such things as were likely to be necessary for their +mountain toilet, consisting principally of dry stockings; for, as Gypsy +said, they expected to wet their feet three or four times a day, and she +should enjoy it for once. Then they had brought their long waterproof +cloaks, in which they considered themselves safe from a deluge. There were +plenty of fish-lines, and tin pans and kettles, and knives and steel +forks, and matches, and scissors and twine and needles, and the endless +variety of accoutrements necessary to a state of highly-civilized +camp-life. There were plates and mugs and pewter teaspoons,--Mrs. Breynton +would not consent to letting her silver ones go,--and Gypsy thought the +others were better, because it seemed more like "being wild." Indeed, she +would have dispensed with spoons altogether, but Sarah gave a little +scream at the idea, and thought she couldn't possibly eat a meal without. +Then the provision basket was full of bread and butter and cake and pies, +and summer apples and salt and pepper, and Indian meal and coffee, and +eggs and raw meat, and fresh vegetables. They expected, however, to live +chiefly on the trout which Mr. Hallam and Tom were to catch, and Mrs. +Fisher would supply them with fresh milk from her dairy. + +The girls made their toilet arrangements in one corner of their tent. A +rough box served as a dressing-table, and Sarah had brought a bit of a +looking-glass, which she put on top of it. They collected piles of sweet, +dry leaves for a bed, and a certain thoughtful mother had tucked into +their bags a pair of sheets and a blanket; so they were nicely fitted out. +Gypsy had a secret apprehension that they were preparing for a very +luxurious sort of camp-life. After a little consultation, they decided to +make two rooms out of their tent, as they were sadly in need of a kitchen. +Accordingly they took their heavy blanket shawls, tied them together by +the fringe, and hung them up as a curtain across the middle of the tent. +The front apartment served nicely as a kitchen, and the provisions and +crockery were moved in there, in spite of Tom's ungallant remark that he +and Mr. Hallam should never see any of the pies he knew. + +By way of recompense, he took the guns, and all dangerous implements, +under his own care. + +The afternoon was nearly spent, when their preparations were at last +completed, and they were ready to begin house-keeping. + +"Let's have supper," said Gypsy. Gypsy was always ready to have supper, +whenever dinner-time was passed. + +"We haven't a single trout," said Tom. + +"It is rather late to fish," said Mr. Hallam. "The little girls are tired +and hungry,--indeed we all are, for that matter,--and I guess we will have +supper." + +Gypsy installed herself as housekeeper-in-general, and she and Sarah lost +no time in unpacking the cake and bread and butter. Tom collected some +light, dry brushwood for a fire, and he and Mr. Hallam made the coffee. It +seemed as if no supper had ever tasted as that supper did. The free +mountain air was so fresh and strong, and the breath of the pines so +sweet. It was so pleasant to sit on the moss around a fire, and eat with +your fingers if you chose, without shocking anybody. Then the woods looked +so wide and lonely and still, and it was so strange to watch the great red +sunset dying like a fire through the thick green net-work, where the +pine-boughs and the maple interlaced. + +For about five minutes after supper was cleared away, when the great +shadows began to darken among the trees, Sarah discoursed in a vague, +scientific way, about the habits of bears, and Gypsy had a dim notion that +she shouldn't so very much object to see her mother come walking up the +mountain, seized with an uncontrollable desire to spend a night in a tent. +But Tom was so pleasant and merry, and Mr. Hallam told such funny stories, +that they were laughing before they knew it, and the evening passed +happily away. + +Gypsy could not sleep for some time that night, for delight at spending a +night out doors in a real tent on a real mountain, that was known to have +an occasional real bear on it. She did not feel afraid in the least, +although Sarah had a very uncomfortable way of asking her, every ten +minutes, if she were perfectly _sure_ it was safe. + +"Oh, don't!" said Gypsy, at last. "I am having such a good time thinking +that I'm really here. You go to sleep." + +Sarah was so much accustomed to doing as Gypsy told her, that she turned +over and went to sleep without another word. It was not a good thing for +Gypsy to be so much with just such a girl as Sarah. She was physically the +weaker of the two, as well as the more timid, and she had fallen into a +habit of obeying, and Gypsy of commanding, by a sort of mutual tacit +agreement. It was partly for this reason, as was natural enough, that +Gypsy chose her so often for a companion, but principally because Sarah +never refused any romp or adventure; other timid girls liked to have their +own way and choose their own quiet plays. Sarah's timidity yielded to +Gypsy's stronger will. If Gypsy took a fancy to climb a ruined windmill, +Sarah would scream all the way, but follow. If Gypsy wanted to run at full +speed down a dangerous steep hill, where there were walls to be leaped, +and loose, rolling stones to be dodged, Sarah scolded a little, but went. + +A girl more selfish than Gypsy would have been ruined by this sort of +companionship. Her frank, impulsive generosity saved her from becoming +tyrannical or dictatorial. The worst of it was, that she was forced to +form such a habit of always taking the lead. + +She lay awake some time that night after Sarah had fallen asleep, +listening to the strange whispers of the wind in the trees, and making +plans for to-morrow, until at last her happy thoughts faded into happy +dreams. + +She did not know how long she had been asleep, when something suddenly +woke her. She was a little startled at first by the unfamiliar sight of +the tent-roof, and narrow, walled space which shut her in. The wind was +sighing drearily through the forest, the distant scream of an owl had an +ugly sound; and--why no--but yes!--another sound, more ugly than the cry +of a night-bird, was distinct at the door of the tent--the sound of a +quick, panting breath! + +Gypsy sat upright in bed, and listened. + +It grew louder, and came nearer; quick, and hoarse, and horrible--like the +breathing of a hungry animal. + +Sarah slept like a baby; there was not a movement from Tom and Mr. Hallam +in the other tent; everything was still but that terrible sound. Gypsy had +good nerves and was not easily frightened, but it must be confessed she +thought of those traditionary bears which had been seen at Ripton. She had +but a moment in which to decide what to do, for the creature was now +sniffing at the tent-door, and once she was sure she saw a dark paw lift +the sail-cloth. She might wake Sarah, but what was the use? She would only +scream, and that would do no good, and might do much harm. If it were a +bear, and they kept still, he might go away and leave them. Yet, if it +were a bear, Tom must know it in some way. + +All these thoughts passed through Gypsy's mind in that one instant, while +she sat listening to the panting of the brute without. + +Then she rose quickly and went on tiptoe to the tent-door. Her hand +trembled a little as she touched the canvas gently--so gently that it +scarcely stirred. She held her breath, she put her eye to the partition, +she looked out and saw---- + +Mr. Fisher's little black dog! + +Tom was awakened by a long, merry laugh that rang out like a bell on the +still night air, and echoed through the forest. He thought Gypsy must be +having another fit of somnambulism, and Sarah jumped up, with a scream, +and asked if it wasn't an Indian. + +The night passed without further adventure, and the morning sun woke the +girls by peering in at a hole in the tent-roof, and making a little round +golden fleck, that danced across their eyelids until they opened. + +They were scarcely dressed, when Tom's voice, with a spice of mischief in +it, called Gypsy from outside. The girls hurried out, and there he sat +with Mr. Hallam, before a crackling fire over which some large fresh trout +were frying in Indian meal. + +"Oh, why didn't you let us go, too?" said Gypsy. + +"We took the time while you were asleep, on purpose," said Tom, in his +provoking fashion. "Nobody can do any fishing while girls are round." + +"Tom doesn't deserve any for that speech," said Mr. Hallam, smiling; "and +I shall have to tell of him. It happens that I caught the fish while a +certain young gentleman was dreaming." + +"O--oh, Tom! Well; but, Mr. Hallam, can't we go fishing to-day?" + +"To be sure, you can." + +"How long do you suppose you'll stand it?--girls always give out in half +an hour." + +"I'll stand it as long as you will, sir!" + +Tom whistled. + +The trout were done to that indescribable luscious point of brown +crispness, and the breakfast was, if possible, better than the supper. + +After breakfast, they started on a fishing excursion down the gorge. It +was a perfect day. It seemed to the girls that no winds from the valley +were ever so sweet and pure as those winds, and no lowland sunshine so +golden. The brook foamed and bubbled down its steep, rocky bed, splashed +up jets of rainbow spray into the air, and plunged in miniature cascades +over tiny gullies; the wet stones flashed in the light upon the banks, and +tall daisies, peering over, painted shifting white outlines of themselves +in the swelling current and the shallow pools; here and there, too, where +the water was deep, the fish darted to the surface, and darted out of +sight. + +"Isn't it _beau_--tiful!" cried Sarah. + +"Pretty enough," said Gypsy, affecting carelessness, and trying to unwind +her line in as _au fait_ and boyish a manner as possible. + +"You girls keep this pool. Mr. Hallam and I are going a little ways up +stream," said Tom. "Now don't speak a word, and be sure you don't scream +if you catch a fish by any chance between you, and frighten them all +away." + +"As if I didn't know that! Here, Sarah, hold your rod lower," said Gypsy, +assuming a professional air. Mr. Hallam and Tom walked away, and the girls +fished for just half an hour in silence. That is to say, they sat on the +bank, and held a rod. Sarah had had one faint nibble, but that was all +that had happened, and the sun began to be very warm. + +"I'm going out on those stones," said Gypsy. "I believe I see a fish out +there." + +So she stepped out carefully on the loose stones, which tilted ominously +under her weight. + +"Oh, you'll fall!" said Sarah. + +"Hush--sh! I see one." + +Up went the rod in the air with a jerk, over went the stone, and down went +Gypsy. She disappeared from sight a moment in the shallow water; then +splashed up with a gasp, and stood, dripping. + +"Oh, dear me!" said Sarah. + +Tom came up, undecided whether to laugh or scold. + +"Well, Gypsy Breynton, you've done it now! Now I suppose you must go +directly home, and you'll catch cold before you can get there. This is a +pretty fix!" + +"N--no," gasped Gypsy, rubbing the water out of her eyes; "I have dry +clothes up in the tent. Mother said I should want them. I guess I'll go +right up. I'm--rather--wet, I believe." + +Tom looked at his watch, as Gypsy toiled dripping up the bank. The +temptation was too great to be resisted, and he called out,-- + +"Precisely half an hour! Gypsy, my dear, I'd stay all long, as the boys +do, by all means!" It was a very good thing about Gypsy, that she was +quite able to relish a joke at her own expense. She laughed as merrily as +Tom did, and the morning's adventure made quite as much fun as they would +have gained from a string of perfectly respectable fishes, properly and +scientifically caught, with dry feet and a warm seat on the bank under a +glaring sun. Mr. Hallam and Tom brought up plenty for dinner; so no one +went hungry. + +That afternoon, it chanced that the girls were left alone for about one +hour. Mr. Hallam had taken Tom some distance up the stream for a +comfortable little fish by themselves, and left the girls to prepare +supper, with strict injunctions not to go out of sight of the tents. + +They were very well content with the arrangement for a while, but at last +Gypsy became tired of having nothing but the trees to look at, and +suggested a visit to the brook. She had seen some checker-berry leaves +growing in the gorge, and was seized with a fancy to have them for supper. +Sarah, as usual, made no objections, and they went. + +"It's only just out of sight of the tent," said Gypsy, as they ran down +over the loose stones; "and we won't be gone but a minute." + +But they were gone many minutes. They had little idea how long the time +had been, and were surprised to find it growing rapidly dark in the forest +when they came panting back to the tent, out of breath with the haste they +had made. + +"They must be back by this time," said Gypsy; "Tom!" + +There was no answer. + +"Tom! Thom-as! Mr. Hallam!" + +A bird chirped in a maple-bough overhead, and a spark cracked out of the +smouldering hickory fire; there was no other sound. + +"I guess they're busy in their tent," said Gypsy, going up to it. But the +tent was empty. + +"They haven't come!" exclaimed Sarah. + +"It's real mean in them to leave us here," said Gypsy, looking round among +the trees. + +"You know," suggested Sarah, timidly, "you know Mr. Hallam said we were to +stay at the tents. Perhaps they came while we were gone, and couldn't find +us, and have gone to hunt us up." + +"Oh!" said Gypsy, quickly, "I forgot." She turned away her face a moment, +so that Sarah could not see it; then she turned back, and said, slowly,-- + +"Sarah, I'm very sorry I took you off. This is rather a bad fix. We must +make the best of it now." + +"Let's call again," said Sarah, faintly. + +They called again, and many times; but there was no reply. Everything was +still but the bird, and the sparks that crackled now and then from the +fire. The heavy gray shadows grew purple and grew black. The little +foot-paths in the woods were blotted out of sight, and the far sky above +the tree-tops grew dusky and dim. + +"We might go to Mr. Fisher's,--do, Gypsy! I can't bear to stay here," said +Sarah, looking around. + +"No," said Gypsy, decidedly. "We can't go to Mr. Fisher's, because that +would mislead them all the more. We must stay here now till they come." + +"I'm afraid!" said Sarah, clinging to her arm; "it is so dark. Perhaps +we'll have to stay here alone all night,--oh, Gypsy!" + +"Nonsense!" said Gypsy, looking as bold as possible; "it wouldn't be so +dreadful if we did. Besides, of course, we sha'n't; they'll be back here +before long. You go in the tent, if you feel any safer there, and I'll +make up a bright fire. If they see it, they'll know we've come." + +Sarah went into the tent, and covered her head up in the bed-clothes; but +in about ten minutes she came back, feeling a little ashamed of her +timidity, and sat down by Gypsy before the fire. It was a strange +picture--the ghostly white tents and tangled brushwood gilded with the +light; the great forest stretching away darkly beyond; the fitful shadows +and glares from the flickering fire that chased each other in strange, +uncouth shapes, among the leaves, and the two children sitting there alone +with frightened, watching eyes. + +"I'm not a bit afraid," said Gypsy, after a silence, in a tone as if she +were rather arguing with herself than with Sarah. "I think it's rather +nice. Tom left his gun all loaded, and we can defend ourselves against +anything. I'm going to get it, and we'll play we're Union refugees hiding +in the South." + +So she went into Tom's tent, and brought out his gun. + +"Look out!" said Sarah, shrinking, "it may go off." + +"Go off? Of course it can't, unless I pull the trigger. I know how to +manage a gun,--hark! what's that?" + +"Oh dear, oh dear!" said Sarah, beginning to cry. "I know it's a bear." + +"Hush! Let's listen." + +They listened. A curious, irregular tramping round broke the stillness. + +Gypsy stood up quickly, and put the gun into position upon her shoulder. + +"It isn't Tom and Mr. Hallam,--then there would be two. This is only one, +and it doesn't sound like a man, I declare." + +"Oh, it's a bear, it's a bear! We shall be eaten up alive,--oh, Gypsy, +Gypsy!" + +"Keep still! I can shoot him if it is; but I know it isn't; just wait and +see." + +The curious sound came nearer; tramped through the underbrush; crushed the +dead twigs. Gypsy's finger was on the trigger; her face a little pale. She +thought the idea of the bear all nonsense; she did not know what she +feared; the very mystery of the thing had thoroughly frightened her. + +"Keep still, Sarah; you hit me. I don't want to fire till I see." + +"Oh, it's coming, it's coming!" cried Sarah, starting back with a scream. +She clung, in her terror, to Gypsy's arm; jerked it; the trigger snapped, +and a loud explosion echoed and re-echoed and reverberated among the +trees. + +It was followed by a sound the most horrible Gypsy had heard in all her +life. + +It was a human cry. _It was Tom's voice._ + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE END OF THE WEEK + + +Gypsy threw down the gun, and threw up her hands with a curious quick +motion, like one in suffocation, who was trying to find a voice; but she +did not utter a sound. + +There was an instant's awful stillness. In that instant, it seemed to +Gypsy as if she had lived a great many years; in that instant, even +Sarah's frightened cries were frozen. + +Then the bushes parted, and some one sprang through. Gypsy knew the face +all blackened and marred with powder--the face dearer to her than any on +earth but her mother's. So she had not killed him--thank God, thank God! + +"Gypsy, child!" called the dear, familiar voice; "what ails you? You +haven't hurt me, but why in the name of all danger on this earth did you +touch----" + +But Tom stopped short; for Gypsy tottered up to him with such a white, +weak look on her face, that he thought the rebound of the gun must have +injured her, and caught her in his arms. + +"You're not going to faint! Where are you hurt?" + +But Gypsy was not hurt, and Gypsy never fainted. She just put her arms +about his neck and hid her face close upon his shoulder, and cried as if +her heart would break. + +It was a long time before she spoke,--only kissing him and clinging to him +through her sobs,--then, at last,-- + +"Oh, Tom, I thought I had killed you--I thought--and I loved you so--oh, +Tom!" + +Tom choked a little, and sat down on the ground, holding her in his lap. + +"Why, my little Gypsy!" + +Just then footsteps came crashing through the underbrush, and Mr. Hallam +ran hurriedly up. + +"Oh, you've found them! Where were they? What has happened to Gypsy?" + +"Let me go," sobbed Gypsy; "I can't talk just now. I want to go away and +cry." + +She broke away from Tom's arms, and into the tent, where she could be +alone. + +"What has happened?" repeated Mr. Hallam. "We came home in less than an +hour, and couldn't find you. We have been to Mr. Fisher's, and hunted +everywhere. I was calling for you in the gorge when Tom found you." + +Sarah was left to tell their story; which she did with remarkable +justness, considering how frightened she was. She shared with Gypsy the +blame of having left the tents, and insisted that it was her fault that +the gun went off. Before the account was quite finished, Gypsy called Tom +from the tent-door, and he went to her. + +She was quiet, and very pale, + +"Oh, Tom, I am so sorry! I didn't think I should be gone so long." + +"It was very dangerous, Gypsy. You might have been lost, or you might have +had to spend the night here alone, while we were hunting for you." + +"I know it, I know it; and Sarah was so frightened, and I was too, a +little, and Sarah thought you were a bear." + +"I have told you a great many times that it is _never_ safe for you to +touch my gun," said Tom, gravely. He felt that Gypsy's carelessness might +have brought about too terrible consequences, both to herself and to him, +to be passed by lightly; and he had an idea that, as long as her mother +was not there to tell her so, he must. + +But Gypsy dropped her head, and looked so humble and wretched, that he had +not the heart to say any more. + +Gypsy was sure all the pleasure of her camping-out was utterly spoiled; +but there was a bright sun the next morning, and Tom was so kind and +pleasant, and the birds were singing, and the world didn't look at all as +if she had nearly killed her brother twelve hours before, so she found she +was laughing in spite of herself, and two very happy days passed after +that. Mr. Hallam made a rule that he or Tom should keep the girls +constantly in sight, and that, during the time spent in excursions which +they could not join, they should remain in Mr. Fisher's house. He said it +was too wild a place for them to be alone in for any length of time, and +he was sorry he left them before. + +Gypsy did not resent this strict tutelage. She was very humble and +obedient and careful as long as they stayed upon the mountain. Those few +moments, when she clung sobbing to Tom's neck, were a lesson to her. She +will not forget them as long as she lives. + +At the end of the fourth day, just at supper time, a dark cloud sailed +over the sky, and a faint wind blew from the east. + +"I wonder if it's going to rain," said Mr. Hallam. They all looked up. +Gypsy said nothing; in her secret heart, she hoped it would. + +"What about sending the girls to Mrs. Fisher's?" asked Tom, when they were +washing the dishes. + +"Oh, no, no, it won't rain, I know--let us stay, Mr. Hallam, please. Why, +I should feel like a deserter if I went off!" pleaded Gypsy. + +The dark cloud seemed to have passed away, and the wind was still. After +thinking a while, Mr. Hallam decided to let them stay. + +In the middle of the night, Gypsy was awakened by a great noise. The wind +was blowing a miniature hurricane through the trees, and the rain was +falling in torrents. She could hear it spatter on the canvas roof, and +drop from the poles, and gurgle in a stream through the ditch. She could +hear, too, the loud, angry murmur of the trout brook and the splashing of +hundreds of rivulets that dashed down the slope and over the gorge into +it. + +She gave Sarah a little pinch, and woke her up. + +"Oh, Sarah, it's come! It's raining like everything, and here we are, and +we can't get to Mr. Fisher's--isn't it splendid?" + +"Ye-es," said Sarah; "it's very splendid, only isn't it a little--wet? +It's dropping right on my cheek." + +"Oh, that's nothing--why, here I can put my hand right down into a puddle +of water. It's just like being at sea." + +"I know it. Are people at sea always so--cold?" + +"Why, I'm not cold. Only we might as well wear our water-proofs. The +leaves _are_ a little damp." + +So they put on their tweed cloaks, and Gypsy listened to the wind, and +thought it was very poetic and romantic, and that she was perfectly happy. +And just as she had lain down again there came a great gust of rain, and +one of the rivulets that were sweeping down the mountain splashed in under +the canvas, and ran right through the middle of the tent like a brook. +Sarah jumped up with energy. + +"O--oh, it's gone right over my feet!" + +"My shoes are sailing away, as true as you live!" cried Gypsy, and sprang +just in time to save them. + +The dinner-basket and a tin pail were fast following, when Tom appeared +upon the scene, and called through the wall of shawls,-- + +"Girls, you'll have to go to Mrs. Fisher's. Be quick as you can!" + +"I don't want to a bit," said Gypsy, who was sitting in a pool of water. + +"Well, I'm going," announced Sarah, with unheard-of decision. "Camping out +is very nice, but drowning is another thing." + +"Well--I--suppose it _would_ be a--little--dryer," said Gypsy, slowly. + +The girls were soon dressed, and Tom lighted a lantern and went with them. +A few peals of thunder growled sullenly down the valley, and one bright +flash of lightning glared far through the forest. Sarah was afraid she +should be struck. Gypsy was thinking how grand it was, and wished she +could be out in a midnight storm every week. + +It was after midnight, and every one at Mr. Fisher's was asleep; but Tom +knocked them up, and Mr. Fisher was very much amused, and Mrs. Fisher was +very kind and hospitable, and built up a fire, and said they should be +perfectly dry and warm before they went to bed. + +So the girls bade Tom good-night, and he went back to Mr. Hallam, and +they, feeling very cold and sleepy and drenched, were glad enough to be +taken care of, and put to bed like babies, after Mrs. Fisher's good, +motherly fashion. + +"Sarah," said Gypsy, sleepily, just as Sarah was beginning to dream. "A +feather-bed, and--and _pil_lows! (with a little jump to keep awake long +enough to finish her sentence) are a little better--on the whole--than a +mud--pud----" + +Just there she went to sleep. The next day it poured from morning till +night. That was just what Mr. Hallam and Tom liked, so they fished all +day, and the girls amused themselves as best they might in Mr. Fisher's +barn. The day after it rained in snatches, and the sun shone in little +spasms between. A council of exigencies met in Mr. Hallam's tent, and it +was unanimously decided to go home. Even Gypsy began to long for civilized +life, though she declared that she had never in all her life had such a +good time as she had had that week. + +So Mr. Fisher harnessed and drove them briskly down the mountain, and +"from afar off" Gypsy saw her mother's face, watching for her at the +door--a little anxious; very glad to see her back. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +GYPSY'S OPINION OF BOSTON + + +Just at the end of the vacation, it was suddenly announced that Miss +Melville was not going to teach any more. + +"How funny!" said Gypsy. "Last term she expected to, just as much as +anything. I don't see what's the reason. Now I shall have to go to the +high school." + +It chanced that they were remodelling some of the rooms at the high +school, and the winter term, which would otherwise have commenced in +September, was delayed till the first of October. + +Gypsy had jumped on all the hay-cocks, and picked all the huckleberries, +and eaten all the early Davises, and gone on all the picnics that she +could, and was just ready to settle down contentedly to school and study; +so the news from Miss Melville was not, on the whole, very agreeable. What +to do with herself, for another long month of vacation, was more than she +knew. + +She wandered about the house and sat out among the clovers and swung on +the gate, in a vague, indefinite sort of way, for two weeks; then one +morning Mrs. Breynton read her a letter which set her eyes on fire with +delight. It was an invitation from her aunt to spend a fortnight in +Boston. It so happened that Gypsy had never been to Boston. It was a long +day's journey from Yorkbury, and Mr. Breynton was not much in favor of +expensive travelling for the children while they were very young; arguing +that the enjoyment and usefulness would be doubled to them when they were +older. Besides, Gypsy's uncle, though he was her father's brother, had +seldom visited Yorkbury. His business kept him closely at home, and his +wife and daughter always went to the seaside in summer; so the two +families had seen very little of each other for years. + +Mrs. Breynton, however, thought it best Gypsy should make this visit; and +Gypsy, who had lived twelve years in a State which contained but one city, +considered going to Boston very much as she would have considered going to +Paradise. + +It took a few days of delightful hurry and bustle to get ready. There was +much washing and mending and altering, sewing on of trimmings and letting +down of tucks, to be done for her; for Mrs. Breynton desired to spare her +the discomfort of feeling "countrified," and Yorkbury style was not +distinctively _a la Paris_. She told Gypsy, frankly, that she must expect +to find her cousin Joy better dressed than herself; but that her wardrobe +should be neat and tasteful, and in as much accordance with the prevailing +mode as was practicable; so she hoped she would have too much self-respect +to be troubled by the difference. + +"I hope I have," said Gypsy, with an emphasis. + +The days passed so quickly that it seemed like a dream when she had at +last bidden them all good-by, kissed her mother just ten times, and was +fairly seated alone in the cars, holding on very tightly to her ticket, +and wondering if the men put her trunk in. Although she was so little used +to travelling, having never been farther than to Burlington or Vergennes +in her life, yet she was not in the least afraid to take the journey +alone. Her mother felt sure she could take care of herself, and her father +had given her so many directions, and written such careful memoranda for +her, of changes of cars, refreshment stations, what to do with her check, +and how to look after her baggage, that she felt sure she could not make a +mistake. Being a bright, observing child, fearless as a boy, and not in +the least inclined to worry, she had no trouble at all. The conductor was +very kind; an old gentleman, who was pleased with her twinkling eyes and +red cheeks, gave her an orange, and helped look after her baggage; two old +ladies gave her fennel and peppermints; and before she reached Boston she +was on terms of intimacy with six babies, a lapdog, and a canary-bird. +Altogether, it had been a most charming journey, and she was almost sorry +when they reached the city, and the train rolled slowly into the dark +depot. + +The passengers were crowding rapidly out, the lamps were lighted in the +car, and she felt a little lonely sitting still there, and waiting for her +uncle. She had not waited but a moment, however, when a pleasant, +whiskered face appeared at the car-door, and one of those genial, +"off-hand" voices, that sound at once so kindly and so careless, called +out,-- + +"O--ho! So here's the girl! Glad to see you, child. This way; the hack's +all ready." + +She was hurried into a carriage, her trunk was tossed on behind, and then +the door was shut, and they were driven rapidly away through a maze of +crooked streets, glare of gaslights, and brilliant shop-windows, that +bewildered Gypsy. She had a notion that was the way fairy-land must look. +Her uncle laughed, good-naturedly, at her wide-open eyes. + +"Boston is a somewhat bigger village than Yorkbury, I suppose! How's your +father? Why didn't he come with you? Is your mother well? And that +boy--Linnie--Silly--what do call him?" + +"Winnie, sir; and then there's Tom." + +"Winnie--oh, yes! Tom well, too?" + +Before the ride was over, Gypsy had come to the conclusion that she liked +her uncle very much, only he had such a funny way of asking questions, and +then forgetting all about them. + +The driver reined up at a house on Beacon Street, and Gypsy was led up a +long flight of steps through a bright hall, and into a room that dazzled +her. A bright coal-fire was glowing in the grate, for it was a chilly +evening, and bright jets of gas were burning in chandeliers. Bright +carpets, and curtains, furniture, pictures, and ornaments covered the +length of two parlors separated only by folding-doors, and mirrors, that +reached from the floor to the ceiling, reflected her figure full length, +as she stood in the midst of the magnificence, in her Yorkbury hat and +homemade casaque. + +"Sit down, sit down," said her uncle; "I'll call your aunt. I don't see +where they are; I told them to be on hand,--Kate, where's Mrs. Breynton?" + +"She's up-stairs, sir, dressing," said the servant, who had opened the +door. + +"Tell her Miss Gypsy has come; sit down, child, and make yourself at +home." + +Gypsy sat down, and Mr. Breynton, not satisfied with sending a message to +his wife, went to the foot of the stairs, and called,-- + +"Miranda!--Joy!" + +A voice from somewhere above answered, a little sharply, that she was +coming as fast as she could, and she told Joyce to go down long ago, but +she hadn't stirred. + +Gypsy heard every word, and she began to wonder if her aunt were very glad +to see her, and what sort of a girl her cousin must be, if she didn't obey +her mother unless she chose to. Just then Joy came down stairs, walking +very slowly and properly, and came into the parlor with the manners of a +young lady of eighteen. She might have been a pretty child, if she had +been dressed more plainly and becomingly; but her face was pale and thin, +and there was a fretful look about her mouth, that almost spoiled it. + +Gypsy went up warmly, and kissed her. Joy had extended the tips of her +fingers to shake hands, and she looked a little surprised, but kissed her +politely, and asked if she were tired with the journey. Just then Mrs. +Breynton came in, with many apologies for her delay, met Gypsy kindly +enough, and sent her up-stairs to take off her things. + +"Who trimmed your hat?" asked Joy, suddenly. + +"Miss Jones. She's our milliner." + +"Oh," said Joy, "mine is a pheasant. Nobody thinks of wearing velvet +now--most everybody has a pheasant." + +"I shouldn't like to wear just what everybody else did," Gypsy could not +help saying. She hung the turban up in the closet, with a little +uncomfortable feeling. It was a fine drab straw, trimmed and bound with +velvet a shade darker. It was pretty, and she knew it; it just matched her +casaque, and her mother had thought it all the more lady-like for its +simplicity. Nevertheless, it was not going to be very pleasant to have her +cousin Joy ashamed of her. + +"Oh, oh, how short they wear dresses in Yorkbury!" remarked Joy, as Gypsy +walked across the room. "Mine are nearly to the tops of my boots, now I'm +thirteen years old." + +"Are they?--where did I put my bag?" said Gypsy, carelessly. Joy looked a +little piqued that she did not seem more impressed. + +"There's dinner," she said, after a silence, in which she had been +secretly inspecting and commenting upon every article of Gypsy's attire. +"Come, let's go down. Mother scolds if we're late." + +"Scolds!" said Gypsy. "How funny! my mother never scolds." + +"Doesn't she?" asked Joy, a little wonder in her eyes. + +"It seems so queer to have dinner at six o'clock," said Gypsy, +confidentially, as they went down stairs. "At home they are just sitting +down to supper." + +Joy laughed patronizingly. + +"Oh, yes; I suppose you're used to country hours." + +For the second time, Gypsy felt uncomfortable. She would very much have +liked to ask her cousin what there was to be ashamed of in being used to +country hours, when you lived in the country. But they had reached the +dining-room door, and her aunt was calling out somewhat fretfully to Joy +to hurry, so she said nothing. + +After supper, her uncle said she looked very much like her father, hoped +she would make herself at home, thought her a little taller than Joyce, +and then was lost to view, for the evening, behind his newspaper. Her aunt +inquired if she could play on the piano, was surprised to find she knew +nothing more classical than chants and Scotch airs; told Joy to let her +hear that last air of Von Weber's; and then she took up a novel which was +lying partially read upon the table. When Joy was through playing, she +proposed a game of solitaire. Gypsy would much rather have examined the +beautiful and costly ornaments with which the rooms were filled, but she +was a little too polite and a little too proud to do so, unasked. + +"What do you play most?" she asked, as they began to move the figures on +the solitaire board. + +"Oh," said Joy, "I practise three hours, and that takes all the time when +I'm in school. In vacations, I don't know,--I like to walk in Commonwealth +Avenue pretty well; then mother has a good deal of company, and I always +come down." + +"Only go to walk, and sit still in the parlor!" exclaimed Gypsy; "dear +me!" + +"Why, what do you do?" + +"Me? Oh, I jump on the hay and run down hills and poke about in the +swamp." + +_"What?"_ + +"Push myself round on a raft in the orchard-swamp; it's real fun." + +"Why, I never heard of such a thing!" said Joy, looking shocked. + +"Well, it's splendid; you ought to come up to Yorkbury, and go out with +me. Tom would make you a raft." + +"What _do_ the people say?" said Joy, looking at her mother. + +"Oh, there aren't any people there to see. If there were, they wouldn't +say anything. I have just the nicest times. Winnie and I tipped over last +spring,--clear over, splash!" + +"You will ruin your complexion," remarked her aunt, laying down her novel. +"I suppose you never wear a veil." + +"A veil? Dear me, no! I can't bear the feeling of a veil. I wore one in +the cars through, to keep the cinders off. Then, besides that, I row and +coast, and,--oh, I forgot, walking on the fences; it's real fun if you +don't tumble off." + +_"Walking on the fences!"_ + +"Oh, yes. I always go in the fields where there's nobody round. Then I +like to climb the old walls, where you have to jump when the stones roll +off from under you." + +Mrs. Breynton elevated her eyebrows with a peculiar expression, and +returned to her novel. + +Gypsy was one of those happy people who are gifted with the faculty of +always having a pleasant time, and the solitaire game was good enough, if +it hadn't been so quiet; but when she went up to bed, she looked somewhat +sober. She bade Joy good-night, shut herself into the handsomely-furnished +room which had been given her, sat down on the floor, and winked hard +several times. She would not have objected at that moment to seeing her +mother, or Tom, or pulling her father's whiskers, or squeezing Winnie a +little, or looking into the dear, familiar sitting-room where they were +all gathered just then to have prayers. She began to have a vague idea +that there was no place like home. She also came to the conclusion, very +faintly, and feeling like a traitor all the time, that her Aunt Miranda +was very fashionable and very fretful, and did not treat Joy at all as her +mother treated her; that Joy thought her countrified, and had never walked +on a fence in all her life; that her uncle was very good, but very busy, +and that a fortnight was a rather long time to stay there. + +However, her uncle's house was not the whole of Boston. All the delights +of the great, wonderful city remained unexplored, and who could tell what +undreamed-of joys to-morrow would bring forth? + +So Gypsy's smiles came back after their usual punctual fashion, and she +fell asleep as soon as her head touched the pillow, to dream that she was +sitting in Tom's lap, reading an Arabic novel aloud to Winnie. + +It might have been about half an hour after, that she woke suddenly with a +terrible feeling in her lungs and throat, and sat up in bed gasping, to +see the door burst open, and her aunt come rushing in. + +"Is the house on fire?" asked Gypsy, sleepily. + +"House on fire! It might have been. It's a wonder you're alive!" + +"Alive," repeated Gypsy, bewildered. + +"Why, child, you blew out the gas!" said her aunt, sharply, throwing open +the windows. "Didn't you know any better than that?" + +"I'm so used to blowing out our lamps," said Gypsy, feeling very much +frightened and ashamed. + +"Country ways!" exclaimed her aunt. "Well, thank fortune, there's no harm +done,--go to sleep, like a good girl." + +Gypsy did not relish being told to go to sleep like a good girl, when she +had done nothing wrong; nor did her aunt's one chilly kiss, at leaving +her, serve to make her forget those few sharp words. + +The next morning, after breakfast, Joy proposed to go out to walk, and +Gypsy ran up to put on her things in great glee. One little circumstance +dashed damply on it, like water on glowing coals. + +"How large your casaque is about the neck," said Joy, carelessly. "I like +mine small and high, with a binding." + +Gypsy remembered what her mother said: and, because her casaque happened +to be cut after Miss Jones's patterns instead of Madame Demorest's, she +did not feel that her character was seriously affected; but it was not +pleasant to have such things said. Her cousin did not mean to be unkind. +On the contrary, she had taken rather a fancy to Gypsy. She was simply a +little thoughtless and a little vain. Joy is not the only girl in Boston, +I am afraid, who has hurt the feelings of her country visitors in that +careless way. + +"You've never seen the Common, I suppose, nor the Public Gardens?" said +Joy, as they started off. "We'll walk across to Boylston Street,--dear me! +you haven't any gloves on!" + +"Oh, must I put them on?" said Gypsy, with a sigh; "I'm afraid I sha'n't +like Boston if I have to wear gloves week-days. I can't bear the feeling +of them." + +"I suppose that's what makes your hands so red and brown," replied Joy, +astonished, casting a glance at her own sickly, white fingers, which she +was pinching into a pair of very tight kid gloves. + +"Here are the Gardens," she said, proudly, as they entered the inclosure. +"Aren't they beautiful? I don't suppose you have anything like this in +Yorkbury. We'll go up to the Common in a minute." + +Gypsy looked carelessly around, and did not seem to be very much impressed +or interested. + +"I'd rather go over into that street where the people and the carriages +are," she said. + +"Why!" exclaimed Joy; "don't you like it? See the fountains, and the deer +and the grass, and all." + +"I like the deer," said Gypsy; "only I feel so sorry for them." + +"Sorry for them!" + +"Why, they look so as if they wanted to be off in the woods with nobody +round. I like the rabbits better, jumping round at home under the +pine-trees. Then I think the trout-brook, at Ripton, is a great deal +prettier than these fountains. But then I guess I should like the stores," +she said, apologetically, a little afraid she had hurt or provoked Joy. + +"I never saw anybody like you," said Joy, looking puzzled. When they came +to Tremont, and then to Washington Street, Gypsy was in an ecstasy. She +kept calling to Joy to see that poor little beggar girl, or that funny old +woman, or that negro boy who was trying to stand on his head, or the +handsome feather on that lady's bonnet, and stopped every other minute to +see some beautiful toy or picture in a shop-window, till Joy lost all +patience. + +"Gypsy Breynton! don't keep staring in the windows so; people will think +we are a couple of servant girls just from down East, who never saw +Washington Street before!" + +"I never did," said Gypsy, coolly. + +But she looked a little sober. What was the use of Boston, and all its +beautiful sights and busy sounds, if you must walk right along as if you +were going to church, and not seem to see nor hear any of the wonders, for +fear of being called countrified? Gypsy began to hate the word. + +"You must take your cousin to the Aquarial Gardens," said Mr. Breynton to +Joy, at dinner. + +"Oh, I'm tired to death of the Aquarial Gardens," answered Joy; "none of +the girls I go with ever go now, and I've seen it all so many times." + +"But Gypsy hasn't. Try the Museum, then." + +"I can't bear the Museum. The white snakes in bottles make me so nervous," +said Joy. + +"A white snake in a bottle! Why, I never saw one," said Gypsy, with +sparkling eyes. + +"Well, I'll go with you, child, if Joy hasn't the politeness to do it," +said her uncle, patting her eager face. + +"Mr. Breynton," said his wife, petulantly, "you are _always_ blaming that +child for something." + +Yet, in the very next breath, she scolded Joy, for delaying her practising +ten minutes, more severely than her father would have done if she had told +a falsehood. + +Mr. Breynton was very busy the next day, and forgot all about Gypsy; but +the day after he left his store at an early hour, and took her to the +Museum, and out to Bunker Hill. That was the happiest day Gypsy spent in +Boston. + +The day after her aunt had a large dinner company. No one would have +imagined that Gypsy dreaded it in the least; but, in her secret heart, she +did. Joy seemed to be perfectly happy when she was dressed in her +brilliant Stuart plaid silk, with its long sash and valenciennes lace +ruffles, and spent a full half hour exhibiting her jewelry-box to Gypsy's +wondering eyes, and trying to decide whether she would wear her coral +brooch and ear-rings, which matched the scarlet of the plaid, or a +handsome malachite set, which were the newer. + +Gypsy looked on admiringly, for she liked pretty things as well as other +girls; but dressed herself in the simple blue-and-white checked foulard, +with blue ribbons around her net and at her throat to match,--the best +suit, over which her mother had taken so much pains, and which had seemed +so grand in Yorkbury,--hoped her aunt's guests would not laugh at her, and +decided to think no more about the matter. + +The first half hour of dinner passed off pleasantly enough. Gypsy was +hungry; for she had just come home from a long walk to Williams & +Everett's picture gallery, and the dinner was very nice; the only trouble +with it being that, there were so many courses, she could not decide what +to eat and what to refuse. But after a while a deaf old gentleman, who sat +next her, felt conscientiously impelled to ask her where she lived and how +old she was, and she had to scream so loud to answer him, that it +attracted the attention of all the guests. Then the dessert came and the +wine, and an hour and a half had passed, and still no one showed any signs +of leaving the table, and the old gentleman made spasmodic attempts at +conversation, at intervals of ten minutes. The hour and a half became two +hours, and Gypsy was so thoroughly tired out sitting still, it seemed as +if she should scream, or upset her finger-bowl, or knock over her chair, +or do some terrible thing. + +"You said you were twelve years old, I believe?" said the old gentleman, +suddenly. This was the fifth time he had asked that very same question. +Joy trod on Gypsy's toes under the table, and Gypsy laughed, coughed, +seized her goblet, and began to drink violently to conceal her rudeness. + +"Twelve years? and you live in Vermont?" remarked the old gentleman +placidly. This was a drop too much. Gypsy swallowed her water the wrong +way, strangled and choked, and ran out of the room with crimson face, +mortified and gasping. + +She knew, by a little flash of her aunt's eyes, that she was ashamed of +her, and much displeased. She locked herself into her own room, feeling +very miserable, and would not have gone down stairs again if she had not +been sent for, after the company had returned to the parlors. + +She did not dare to disobey, so she went, and sat down in a corner by the +piano, where she hoped she should be out of sight. + +A pleasant-faced lady, sitting near, turned, and said,-- + +"Don't you play, my dear?" + +"A little," said Gypsy, wishing she could have truthfully said no. + +"I wish you would play for me," said the lady. + +"Oh, I shouldn't like to," said Gypsy, shrinking; "I don't know anything +but Scotch airs." + +"That is just what I like," said the lady. "Mrs. Breynton, can't you +persuade your niece to play a little for me?" + +"Certainly, Gypsy," said her aunt, with a look which plainly said, "Don't +think of it." + +Gypsy's mother had taught her that it was both disobliging and affected to +refuse to play when she was asked, no matter how simple her music might +be. So, not knowing how to refuse, and wishing the floor would open and +swallow her up, she went to the piano, and played two sweet Scotch airs. +She played them well for a girl of her age, and the lady thanked her, and +seemed to enjoy them. But that night, just as she was going to bed, she +accidentally overheard her aunt saying to Joy,-- + +"It was very stupid and forward in her. I tried to make her understand, +but I couldn't--those little songs, too! Why, with all your practice, and +such teachers as you have had, I wouldn't think of letting you play before +anybody at your age." + +Gypsy cried herself to sleep that night. + +Just a week from the day that she came to Boston, Gypsy and Joy were out +shopping in Summer Street. They had just come out of Hovey's, when they +met a ragged child, not more than three years old, crying as if its heart +were broken. + +"Oh, dear!" cried Gypsy; "see that poor little girl! I'm going to see +what's the matter." + +"Don't!" said Joy, horrified; "come along! Nobody stops to speak to +beggars in Boston; what _are_ you doing?" + +For Gypsy had stopped and taken the child's two dirty little fists down +from her eyes, and looked down into the tear-stained and mud-stained face +to see what was the matter. + +"I--I don't know where nobody is," sobbed the child. + +"Have you lost your way? Where do you live?" asked Gypsy, with great, +pitying eyes. Gypsy could never bear to see anybody cry; and then the +little creature was so ragged and thin. + +"I live there," said the child, pointing vaguely down the street. +"Mother's to home there somewhars." + +"I'll go with you and find your mother," said Gypsy; and taking the +child's hand, she started off in her usual impulsive fashion, without a +thought beyond her pity. + +"Gypsy! Gypsy Breynton!" called Joy. "The police will take her home--you +mustn't!" + +But Gypsy did not hear, and Joy, shocked and indignant, went home and left +her. + +In about an hour Gypsy came back, flushed and panting with her haste. Joy, +in speechless amazement, had looked from the window and seen her _running_ +across the Common. + +Her aunt met her on the stairs with a face like a thunder-cloud. + +"Why, Gypsy Breynton, I am ashamed of you! How _could_ you do such a thing +as to go off with a beggar, and _take hold of her hand_ right there in +Summer Street, and go nobody knows where, alone, into those terrible Irish +streets! It was a _dreadful_ thing to do, and I should think you would +have known better, and I really think I must write to your mother about it +immediately!" + +Gypsy stood for a moment, motionless with astonishment. Then, without +saying a word, she passed her aunt quickly on the stairs, and ran up to +her room. Her face was very white. If she had been at home she would have +broken forth in a torrent of angry words. + +Kate, the house-maid, was sweeping the entry. + +"Did you know there was going to be another great dinner to-day, miss?" +she said, as Gypsy passed her. + +Gypsy went into her room, and locked her door. Another of those terrible +dinner-companies, and her aunt so angry at her! It was too much--she could +not bear it! She looked about the room twice, passed her hand over her +forehead, and her face flushed quickly. + +One of Gypsy's sudden and often perilous resolutions was made. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +NO PLACE LIKE HOME + + +No one came to the room. After a while the front door opened and shut, and +she saw, from the window, that her aunt and Joy were going out. She then +remembered that she had heard them say they had some calls to make at that +hour. Her uncle was at the store, and no one was now in the house besides +herself, but the servants. + +"All right," she said, half aloud; "I couldn't have fixed it better." + +For half an hour she stayed in her room with the door locked, and any one +listening outside could have heard her moving briskly about, opening +drawers and shutting closet doors. Then she came down stairs and went out. +She was gone just about long enough to have been to the nearest hack-stand +and back again. A few minutes after she returned, the door-bell rang. + +"I'll go," she called to Kate; "it's a man I sent here on an errand, and I +shall have to see him." + +"Very well, miss," said Kate, and went singing down the back-stairs with +her broom. + +"This way," said Gypsy, opening the door. She led the way to her room, and +the man who followed her shouldered her trunk with one hand, and carried +it out to a carriage which stood at the door. Gypsy went into her aunt's +room and left a little note on the table where it would be easily seen, +threw her veil over her face, felt of her purse to be sure it was safe in +her pocket, and ran hastily down stairs after him, and into the carriage. +The man strapped on her trunk, slammed the door upon her, and, mounting +his box, drove rapidly away. Kate, who happened to be looking out of one +of the basement windows, saw the carriage, but did not notice the trunk. +She supposed Gypsy was riding somewhere to meet her aunt or uncle, and +went on with her dusting. + +The carriage stopped at the Fitchburg depot, and Gypsy paid her fare and +went into the ladies' room. The coachman, who seemed to be an +accommodating man, though a little curious, brought her a check, and hoped +she'd get along comfortable; it was a pretty long journey for such a young +creetur to take alone. + +Gypsy thanked him, and going up to the ticket-master, asked him something +in a low tone. + +"In just an hour!" said the ticket-master, in a loud, business-like voice. + +"_An hour!_ So long as that?" + +"Yes, ma'am." + +Gypsy drew her veil very closely about her face, and sat down in the +darkest corner she could find. She seemed to be very much afraid of being +recognized; for she shrank from every new-comer, and started every time +the door opened. + +"Train for Fitchburg, Rutland, Burlington!" shouted a voice, at last, and +the words were drowned in the noise of hurrying feet. + +Gypsy took a seat in the rear car, by the door, which was open, so that +she was partially concealed from the view of the passengers. Just before +the train started, a tall, whiskered gentleman walked slowly through the +car, scanning the faces on each side of him. + +"You haven't seen a little girl here, dressed in drab, with black eyes and +red cheeks, have you?" he asked, stopping just in front of Gypsy. + +Several of the passengers shook their heads, and one old lady piped out on +a very high key,-- + +"No, sir, I hain't!" + +The gentleman passed out, and shut the door. Gypsy held her breath. It was +her uncle. + +He looked troubled and anxious. Gypsy's cheeks flushed,--a sudden impulse +came over her to call him back,--she started and threw open the window, +but the engine-bell rang, the train puffed slowly off, and her uncle +disappeared in the crowd. + +As she was whirled rapidly along through wharves and shipping and lumber, +away from the roar of the city, and out where woods and green fields lined +the way, she began, for the first time, to think what she was doing, and +to wonder if she were doing right. Her anger at her aunt, and the utter +disappointment and homesickness of her Boston visit, had swept away, for a +few moments, all her power of reasoning. To get home, to see her +mother,--to hide her head on her shoulder and cry,--this was the one +thought that had turned itself over and over in her mind, on that quick +ride from Beacon Street, and in that hour spent in the dark corner of the +depot. Here she was, running like a thief from her uncle's house, without +a word of good-by or thanks for his hospitality, with no message to tell +him where she had gone but that note, hastily written in the first flush +of her hurt and angry feelings. And the hurrying train was whirling her +over hill and valley faster and farther. To go back was impossible, go on +she must. What had she done? + +She began now, too, to wonder where she should spend the night. The train +went only as far as Rutland, and it would be late and dark when she +reached the town--far too late for a little girl to be travelling alone, +and to spend a night in a strange hotel, in a strange place. What should +she do? + +As the afternoon passed, and the twilight fell, and the lamps were +lighted, and people hurried out at way-stations to safe and waiting homes, +her loneliness and anxiety increased. Just before entering Rutland, a +young man, dressed in a dandyish manner, and partially intoxicated, +entered the car, and took the empty seat by Gypsy. She did not like his +looks, and moved away slightly, turning to look out of the window. + +"No offense, I hope?" said the man, with a foolish smile; "the car was +full." + +Gypsy made no reply. + +"Travelling far?" he said, a moment after. + +"To Rutland, sir," said Gypsy, feeling very uneasy, as she perceived the +odor of rum, and wishing he would not talk to her. + +"Friends there?" said the man again. + +"N--no, sir," said Gypsy, reluctantly. "I am going to the hotel." + +"Stranger in town? What hotel do you go to?" + +"I don't know," said Gypsy, hurriedly. The car was just stopping, and she +rose and tried to pass him. + +"I will show you the way," he said, standing up, and reeling slightly as +he tried to walk. Gypsy, in despair, looked for the conductor. He was +nowhere to be seen. The crowd passed out, quite careless of the frightened +child, or regarding her only with a curious stare. + +"It's only a little way," said the man, with an oath. + +"Why, sakes a massy, if this ain't Gypsy Breynton!" + +Gypsy turned, with a cry of joy, at hearing her name, and fairly sprang +into Mrs. Surly's arms. + +"Why, where on airth did you come from, Gypsy Breynton?" + +"I came from Boston, and that man is drunk, and,--oh, dear! I'm so glad to +see you, and I've got to go to a hotel, and I didn't know what mother +would say, and where did you come from?" said Gypsy, talking very fast. + +"I come from my sister Lucindy's, down to Bellows Falls, and I'm going to +Cousin Mary Ann Jacobs to spend the night." + +"Oh!" said Gypsy, wistfully. + +"I don't see how a little gal like you ever come to be on a night train +alone," said Mrs. Surly, with a keen, curious look at Gypsy's face; "but I +know your ma'd never let you go to a hotel this time o' night, and Mary +Ann she'd be delighted to see you; so you'd better come along." + +Gypsy was so happy and so thankful, she could fairly have kissed +her,--even her, Mrs. Surly. Cousin Mary Ann received her hospitably, and +the evening and the night passed quickly away. Mrs. Surly was very +curious, and somewhat suspicious on the subject of Gypsy's return to +Yorkbury, under such peculiar circumstances. Gypsy said that she left +Boston quite suddenly, that they were not expecting her at home, and that +she took so late a train for several reasons, but had not thought that it +went no further than Rutland, till she was fairly started; which was true. +More than this, Mrs. Surly could not cross-question out of her, and she +soon gave up trying. + +Cousin Mary Ann wanted Mrs. Surly's company another day; so Gypsy took an +early train for Yorkbury alone. + +Gypsy never took any trouble very deeply to heart, and the morning +sunlight, and the sight of the dear, familiar mountains, drove away, to a +great extent, the repentant and anxious thoughts of the night. + +As the train shrieked into Yorkbury, she forgot everything but that she +was at home,--miles away from Boston, her mother near, and Tom, and the +dear old days of paddling about on rafts, and having no dinner-parties to +disgrace herself at, and no aunt to be afraid of. + +It seemed as if every one she knew were at the station. Mr. Surly was +there, under strict orders from his wife, to watch for her every train +till she came; and Mr. Fisher was there, just down on an errand from the +mountains; and Mrs. Rowe and Sarah were walking up the street; and Agnes +Gaylord was over at the grocer's, nodding and smiling as Gypsy stepped +upon the platform; and there, too, was Mr. Simms, who had been somewhere +in the cars, and who stepped into the coach just after she did. + +"Why, Miss Gypsy!--why, really! You home again, my dear? Why, your father +didn't expect you!" + +"I know it," said Gypsy. "Are they all well?" + +"Oh, yes, yes, all well,--but to give them such a surprise! It is so +exactly like you, my dear." + +"I don't like Boston," said Gypsy, coloring. "I had a horrid time, and I +came home very suddenly." + +"Don't like Boston? Well, you _are_ a remarkable young lady!" exclaimed +Mr. Simms, and relapsed into silence, watching Gypsy's flushed and eager +face, as people watch a light coming back into a dark room. + +"We have missed you up at the store, my dear," he said, after a while. + +"Have you? I'm glad. Oh! who's that with Miss Melville out walking under +the elm-trees?" + +"I guess it's Mr. Hallam." + +"Oh, to be sure," interrupted Gypsy, looking very bright. "I see,--Mr. Guy +Hallam. Now I guess I know why she wouldn't teach school!" + +"They are to be married in the spring," said Mr. Simms. + +"Just think!" said Gypsy. "How funny! Now she'll have to stay at home and +keep house all day,--I think she's real silly, don't you?" + +Of all the many remarkable things that Miss Gypsy had ever said, Mr. Simms +thought this capped the climax. + +Now the coach had rattled up the hill, and lumbered round the corner, and +there was the old house, looking quiet and pleasant and dear, in the +morning sunlight. Gypsy was so excited that she could not sit still, and +kept Mr. Simms in a fever of anxiety, for fear she would tumble out of the +coach windows. It seemed to her as if she had been gone a year, instead of +just one week. + +She sprang down the carriage-steps at a bound, and ran into the house. Her +mother was out in the kitchen helping Patty about the dinner. She heard +such a singing and shouting as no one had made in the house since Gypsy +went away, and hurried out into the front entry to see what had happened. +Tom ran in from the garden, and Winnie slid down on the banisters, and Mr. +Breynton was just coming up the yard, and Patty put her head in at the +entry door, wiping her hands on her apron, and everybody must be kissed +all round, and for a few minutes there was such a bustle, that Gypsy could +hardly hear herself speak. + +"What has brought you home so soon?" asked her mother, then. "We didn't +look for you for a week yet." + +"Oh, I hate Boston!" cried Gypsy, pulling off her things. "I didn't like +anything but the Museum and Bunker Hill; and Joy wore silk dresses, and +wouldn't let me look in the shop-windows, 'n I took a poor, little +beggar-girl home, and you can't run round any, and Aunt Miranda told me +she'd tell you, and I hate it, and she's just as cross as a bear!" + +"Your aunt cross!" said her mother, who could make neither beginning nor +end of Gypsy's excited story. + +"I guess she is," said Gypsy, with an emphasis. "Oh, I _am_ so glad to get +home. Where's the kitty, and how's Peace Maythorne and everybody, and +Winnie has a new jacket, hasn't he?" + +Mr. and Mrs. Breynton exchanged glances. They saw that something was +wrong; but wisely considered that that time was not the one for making any +inquiries into the matter. Mrs. Breynton thought, also, that if Gypsy had +been guilty of ill-temper or rudeness, she would confess it herself. She +was right; for as soon as dinner was over, Gypsy called her away alone, +and told her all the story. They were shut up together a long time, and +when Gypsy came out her eyes were red with crying. + +All that Mrs. Breynton said does not matter here; but Gypsy is not likely +soon to forget it. A few words spoken, just as the conversation ended, +became golden mottoes that helped her over many rough places in her life. + +"It is all the old trouble, Gypsy,--you 'didn't think.' A little +self-control, a moment's quiet thought, would have saved all this." + +"Oh, I know it!" sobbed Gypsy. "That's what always ails me. I'm always +doing things, and always sorry for them. I mean to do right, and I cannot +remember. What shall I do with myself, mother?" + +"Gypsy," said her mother, very soberly, "this will never do. You _can_ +think. And Gypsy, my child, in every one of these little thoughtless words +and acts God sees a _sin_." + +"A sin when you didn't think?" exclaimed Gypsy. + +"You must learn to think, Gypsy; and He will teach you." + +Her mother kissed her many times, and Gypsy clung to her neck, and was +very still. Whatever thoughts she had just then, she never told them to +any one. + +The afternoon passed away like a merry dream. Gypsy was so happy that she +had had the talk with her mother; so glad to be kissed and forgiven and +loved and helped; to find every one so pleased to see her back, and home +so dear, and the mountains so blue and beautiful, and the sunlight so +bright, that she scarcely knew whether she were asleep or awake. She must +hunt up the kitten, and feed the chickens, and take a peep at the cow, and +stroke old Billy in his stall; she must see how many sweet peas were left +on the vines, and climb out on the shed-roof that had been freshly +shingled since she was gone, and run down to the Kleiner Berg, and over to +see Sarah Rowe. She must know just what Tom had been doing this +interminable week, just how many buttons Winnie had lost off from his +jacket, and what kind of pies Patty had baked for dinner. She must kiss +her mother twenty times an hour, and pull her father's whiskers, and ride +Winnie on her shoulder. Best of all, perhaps, it was to run down to Peace +Maythorne's, and find the sunlight golden in the quiet room, and the pale +face smiling on the pillow; to hear the gentle voice, when the door +opened, say, "Oh, Gypsy!" in such a way,--as no other voice ever said it; +and then to sit down and lay her head upon the pillow by Peace, and tell +her all that had happened. + +"Well," said Peace, smiling, "I think you have learned a good deal for one +week, and I guess you will never _un_learn it." + +"I guess you'll be very sorry you went to Bosting," remarked Winnie, in an +oracular manner, that night, when they were all together in their old +places in the sitting-room. "The Meddlesome Quinine Club had a concert +here last Wednesday, and we had preserved seats. What do you think of +that?" + +This is a copy of the letter that found its way to Beacon Street a few +days after:-- + +"My dear Uncle and Aunt Miranda: + +"I am so sorry I don't know what to do. I was so tired sitting still, and +going to dinner-parties, and then auntie was displeased about the +beggar-girl (I took her home, and her mother was just as glad as she could +be, and so poor!) and so I felt angry and homesick, and I know I oughtn't +to have gone to such a place without asking; but I didn't think; and then +I came home in the afternoon train, but I didn't think when I did that +either. Mother says that was no excuse, and I know it was very wicked in +me to do such a thing. Mrs. Surly met me in the cars at Rutland, and took +me to spend the night with her cousin, Mrs. Mary Ann Jacobs; so I got +along safely, and nothing happened to me, but one drunken man that kept +talking. + +"Mother says I have done a _very_ rude and unkind thing, to leave you all +so, when you had invited me there, and been so good to me. I know it. I +had a real nice time when I went to see Bunker Hill and the Museum with +uncle; and, of course, it was my own fault that I didn't like to wear +gloves, and choked so at dinner. + +"Mother says you will never want to see me there again; and I shouldn't +think you would. Seems to me I never did such a thing in all my life, and +you haven't any idea how badly I feel about it. But I know that doesn't +help it any. + +"I've made up my mind never to do anything again till I've thought it all +over as many as twelve times. Mother says two or three would do, but I +think twelve would be safer. + +"I wish you'd let Joy come up here. I'd take her boating and riding, and +up to Ripton, and down to the swamp, and everything, and try to make up. + +"I don't suppose you will ever care anything more about me; but I wish +you'd please to excuse me and forgive me. + + "Your affectionate niece, + "Gypsy. + +"P. S.--Winnie's cat has the _cun_ningest little set of kittens you ever +saw. They're all blind, and they have such funny paws." + +-------------------------------------------------------------------------- + +TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES + +1. Punctuation has been normalized to contemporary standards. + +2. Frontispiece relocated to after title page. + +3. Typographic errors corrected in original: + p. 48 an to on ("Winnie jumped on board") + p. 58 mits to mitts ("pair of black mitts") + p. 119 friend' to friend's ("in her friend's eyes") + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Gypsy Breynton, by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GYPSY BREYNTON *** + +***** This file should be named 18582.txt or 18582.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/5/8/18582/ + +Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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