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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..932bdb6 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #69188 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69188) diff --git a/old/69188-0.txt b/old/69188-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 390be86..0000000 --- a/old/69188-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6683 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Maida's little house, by Inez Haynes -Irwin - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Maida's little house - -Author: Inez Haynes Irwin - -Release Date: October 20, 2022 [eBook #69188] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Charlene Taylor, Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was - produced from images generously made available by The - Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MAIDA'S LITTLE HOUSE *** - - -+-------------------------------------------------+ -|Transcriber’s note: | -| | -|Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | -| | -+-------------------------------------------------+ - - - - -MAIDA’S LITTLE HOUSE - -[Illustration] - - - - -Maida’s Little House - -BY -INEZ HAYNES IRWIN - -Author of -MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP, MAIDA’S LITTLE SCHOOL, -ETC. - -[Illustration: Decoration] - - -GROSSET & DUNLAP -Publishers : : New York - - - - -COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY -B. W. HUEBSCH, INC. - -_First printing, November, 1921_ -_Second printing, October, 1922_ -_Third printing, August, 1928_ -_Fourth printing, July, 1931_ - - -PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. - - - - -TO -BARBARA IVERSON HAYNES - - - - -CONTENTS - -CHAPTER PAGE - I. THE HOME COMING 7 - - II. THE PLAN 20 - - III. THE JOURNEY 31 - - IV. THE LITTLE HOUSE 44 - - V. MORNING 58 - - VI. AFTERNOON 72 - - VII. TWILIGHT 79 - - VIII. NIGHT 91 - - IX. PLANS 95 - - X. RESPONSIBILITY 103 - - XI. VISITORS 109 - - XII. BETSY’S FIND 125 - - XIII. DISCOVERY 140 - - XIV. THE TERROR 150 - - XV. ARTHUR’S ADVENTURE 156 - - XVI. MYSTERY 164 - - XVII. CRESCENT MOON BEACH 171 - -XVIII. EXPIATION 186 - - XIX. MAIDA’S MOOD 192 - - XX. MAIDA’S FIND 198 - - XXI. TRAGEDY 210 - - XXII. SILVA’S MESSAGE 219 - -XXIII. SILVA’S STORY 228 - - XXIV. GUESTS 244 - - XXV. THE END OF SUMMER 248 - - XXVI. PROMISE 256 - - - - -MAIDA’S LITTLE HOUSE - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE HOME COMING - - -“I wonder when Maida’s coming back?” said Rosie Brine as she approached -the trio of children who sat on the Lathrop lawn. - -The three were Laura Lathrop; her brother, Harold Lathrop; their -friend, Arthur Duncan. Rosie did not join them on the grass. She seated -herself in the hammock behind them and began to swing, first slowly, -then so violently that her black curls swept back and forth with her -swift progress and her speech came in jerks. “I wouldn’t mind--how long -I had to wait--if I only knew--when she was coming.” - -Nobody answered. Rosie had only asked a question that they all asked at -intervals, hoping against hope that somebody would make a comforting -guess. - -“I don’t believe she’s _ever_ coming back,” Rosie answered herself, -recklessly swinging almost over their heads. - -Arthur Duncan, a big broad-shouldered boy with tousled thick brown hair -beating down over his forehead and almost veiling eyes as steady as -they were black, answered this. “Oh Maida’s coming home some time. She -promised and she always keeps her promises.” - -“When we were going to school,” put in Laura Lathrop, “it was bad -enough. But we didn’t have time to miss her so much then. But now that -school’s over and there’s nothing to do--Oh, how I wish she were here!” - -“Well, what good would it do?” Harold Lathrop asked. Harold and Laura -looked much alike although Laura was slim and brown-haired and Harold -flaxen and a little stout. But both had blue eyes and small, regular -features. - -“We wouldn’t see anything of her,” Harold continued, “she’d he going -away somewhere for the summer and we wouldn’t have a chance to get to -know her until fall.” - -“Maida’d never do that,” Rosie Brine declared emphatically. “She’d -manage some way to be with us for a while.” She brought the hammock to -a stop for a moment with the swift kick of a determined foot against a -tuft of grass. “There’s one thing I am sure of and that is that Maida -would never forget us or want to be away from us. She says that in -every letter I’ve got from her.” - -“Well, what are we going to do to-day?” Harold demanded. “I should -think from the way we sit here that we had not been counting up the -days to vacation for a month. Why Laura’s even had the hours all -numbered out on her calendar, so’s she could draw a line through them -every night.” - -“I wanted to have the minutes marked out too,” Laura admitted, “but it -took too much time.” - -“What are we going to do?” Harold persisted. “Here it is the first day -of vacation, and we sit here saying nothing. You think of something, -Arthur, you always can.” - -Arthur Duncan rolled over face downwards on the grass. “I can’t think -of anything to do this morning,” he admitted. “It’s so hot ... and I -feel so lazy ... seems to me I’d just like to lie here all day.” - -It was hot that late June day in Charlestown. Not a breeze stirred the -shrubs of the Lathrop lawn. The June roses drooped; the leaves seemed -wilting; even the blue sky looked thick and sultry. Huge white clouds -moved across it so lazily that it was as though they too felt the -general languor. The children looked as children generally look at the -close of school, pale and a little tired. Their movements were listless. - -Just outside the gate of the Lathrop place was Primrose Court; a little -court, lined with maples and horse-chestnuts with shady little wooden -houses set behind tiny gardens, in their turn set within white wooden -fences. At one corner of Primrose Court and Warrington Street, set -directly opposite a school house, was a little shop. And over the shop -printed in gold letters against a background of sky blue, hung a sign -which read: - - - MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP - - -In Primrose Court, the smaller children were playing as briskly as -though there were no such thing as weather. Brown-eyed, brown-haired, -motherly Molly Doyle, quick, efficient but quiet, was apparently -acting as the wife and mother of an imaginary house. Smaller and -younger, Timmie Doyle, her brother, a little pop-eyed, brownie-like -boy, slow-moving and awkward, was husband and father. There were four -children in this make-believe household. Quite frequently, little Betsy -Hale, slim, black-eyed and rosy-cheeked and little Delia Dore, chubby -and blonde with thick red curls, attempted to run away; were caught and -punished with great thoroughness. Apparently Dorothy and Mabel Clark, -twin sisters, one the exact duplicate of the other, with big, round -blue eyes and long round golden curls, were the grown-up daughters -of this make-believe family. They were intent on household tasks, -thrusting into an imaginary stove absolutely real mud pies and sweeping -an imaginary room with an absolutely real dust-pan and brush. - -Aside from this active scene, everything was quiet. Farther down the -Court, doves had settled; were pink-toeing about feeding busily; -preening and cooing. - -“Sometimes,” Laura said thoughtfully, “I feel as though I had dreamed -Maida. If the Little Shop were not here with her name over the door and -all of you to talk about her with me, I should believe I had just waked -up.” She stopped a moment. “If it had been a dream how mad I should be -to think I _had_ waked up.” - -“Do you remember how exciting it was when Maida first came to live over -the Little Shop?” Rosie exclaimed. - -“I should say I did!” It was Laura who answered her. “Wasn’t it -wonderful when all that pretty furniture came for their rooms?” - -“Yes, and the canaries and the great geraniums for the windows,” Rosie -added eagerly. - -“The most wonderful thing though,” Arthur went on, “was when the sign -went up. It was such a pretty sign--MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP in gold painted -on blue. And--” - -“Gee, how wild we all were to see Maida!” Harold said. - -“I don’t know what I expected,” Rosie’s voice was dreamy, “but I -certainly was surprised when Maida appeared--” - -“Lame,” Arthur concluded for her, “like Dicky. But they’re both all -right now. Dicky certainly is and Maida was when she left for Europe.” - -“I often think,” Harold began again after a little pause, “of when we -first met her and she used to talk of the things her father gave her, -we thought she was telling lies.” - -“I never thought she was telling lies,” Rosie expostulated. “I loved -her too much for that. I knew Maida wouldn’t tell lies. I thought she’d -just dreamed those things. I remember them all--her mother’s mirror and -brush and comb of gold with her initials in diamonds.... And the long -string of pearls that she used to wear that came to her knees.... And a -dress of cloth of gold trimmed with roses and a diamond, like a drop of -dew, in the heart of every rose.” - -“Yes, and the peacocks at her father’s place, some of them white,” -Arthur interrupted. - -“And don’t you remember,” Harold went on, “we all thought she was crazy -when she said that once he gave her for a birthday present her weight -in twenty-dollar gold-pieces.” - -“And a wonderful birthday party,” Laura added eagerly, “with a Maypole -and a doll-baby house big enough to go into and live--” - -“I don’t wonder we didn’t believe it all,” Rosie declared with -conviction, “It sounds like a fairy tale. And then it turned out that -she was the daughter of a great millionaire and _every word_ of it was -true. Do you remember how we asked Mr. Westabrook at Maida’s Christmas -tree if it was all true and he said that it was?” - -“I’d like to see those white peacocks,” Dicky said dreamily. - -“I’d like to see that doll-baby house,” Laura added wistfully. - -“I’d like to see the gold comb and brush and mirror with the -diamonds,” Rosie declared, “and that dress with the roses and the -diamond dew-drops. I like to look at precious stones. I like things -that sparkle.” - -At this thought, she herself sparkled until her eyes were like great -black diamonds in her vivid brilliant face. - -“I’d like to see that pile of twenty-dollar gold-pieces,” Harold said. - -“Oh I wish she’d come back,” Rosie sighed. The sparkle all went out of -her face and she stopped swinging. - -A door leading into Primrose Court opened with a suddenness that made -them all jump. A boy with big eyes, very brown and lustrous, lighting -his peaked face and straight hair very brown and lustrous, framing it, -came bounding out. He ran in the direction of the group on the lawn, -and as he ran he waved something white in his hand. The doves flew away -before him in a glittering V. “Hurrah!” he yelled. - -“Gee, how Dicky can run!” Arthur Duncan exclaimed. “Who’d ever believed -that one year ago, he was wearing an iron on his leg? He--” - -“Oh what is it, Dicky?” Rosie Brine called impatiently. - -Dicky had by this time reached the Lathrop gate. - -“A post card from Maida,” he shouted. - -“Does she say when she’s coming home?” Laura asked quickly. - -“No,” Dicky answered. He threw himself down among them; handed the post -card to Rosie who had leaped from the hammock. It passed from hand to -hand. Harold, the last to receive it, read it aloud. “Love to everybody -and how I wish I could see you all!” was with the date, all it said. - -“Nothing about coming home,” exclaimed Rosie, “Oh dear, how -disappointed I am.” - -“Where’s it from?” Arthur asked, as though suddenly remembering -something. “The last post card was from Paris.” - -“London,” Dicky answered. - -“London,” Arthur echoed, “she told me that when she came home, she’d -sail from England.” - -“Did she?” Rosie asked listlessly. “She never told me that, but you -see, she says nothing of sailing. She’s probably going to spend the -summer there. I remember that she told me of a beautiful place they -lived in one summer in England. She said that there was a forest -not far from the house where Robin Hood and his men used to meet. -Probably she will go there.” Rosie stopped for a minute and then the -listlessness in her voice changed to a kind of despair. “I don’t -believe she’ll ever come back.” - -“I know she will,” Dicky announced with decision. “The last thing Maida -said was, ‘I’ll come back,’ and she always keeps her promises.” - -“I wouldn’t be surprised if she came back this summer some time,” -Arthur said. “Anyway I know she said they’d sail from England.” - -“Yes but by that time we’ll all be away.” Laura’s voice held a -disappointed note. “We’re going to Marblehead in a week or two for the -whole summer and you’re going to Weymouth, Rosie, aren’t you?” - -Rosie nodded. “Only for two weeks though.” - -“Where are you going?” Laura asked Arthur. - -“I don’t know. When my father gets his two weeks’ vacation, maybe we’ll -take a tramp somewhere, that is if it doesn’t come after school has -begun.” - -“And where are you going, Dicky?” Laura went on. - -“Nowhere. We’re going to stay here in Charlestown. Primrose Court will -be my vacation. Mother says she will try to take us to City Point or -Revere or Nantasket every Sunday. Now what are we going to do to-day?” - -“We might go upstairs in the cupola and play games,” Harold suggested. - -“No I don’t want to stay in the house the first day of vacation,” Rosie -announced discontentedly. - -“Let’s play stunts,” suggested Dicky who, since his lame leg had -recovered, could never seem to get enough of athletic exercise. - -“Too hot,” decided Laura. - -“Hide-and-go-seek,” suggested Arthur. - -“Too hot,” decided Harold. - -“Follow-My-Leader,” suggested Dicky. - -“Too hot,” decided Rosie. - -“Hoist-the-Sail,” suggested Arthur. - -“Too hot,” decided Laura. - -“Prisoners’ Base,” suggested Harold. - -“Too hot,” decided Rosie. - -“Tag,” suggested Arthur. - -“Too hot,” decided Harold. - -Laura burst out laughing. “Every game anybody proposes is too hot for -somebody else. I say let’s all lie face downwards and think and think -and _think_ until somebody gets an idea of something new that we can -do.” - -Everybody adopted her suggestion. The four on the grass turned over, -lay like stone images carved there. Rosie turned over in the hammock. - -“I wish Maida’d come home!” came from her in muffled accents before -she, too, subsided. - - * * * * * * * - -A whole minute passed. Nobody moved. Even Rosie kept rigid. - -Into the silence floated the note of a far-away automobile horn. It was -not so much a call or warning as a gay carolling, a long level ribbon -of sound which unwound itself continuously and, drifting on the soft -spring air, came nearer and nearer. It stopped for a moment ... started -again ... continued more and more gayly ... ran up and down a trilled -scale once more.... - -The stone images stirred uneasily. - -The horn grew louder.... In a moment it would pass Primrose Court.... -The horn ended in a high swift call.... The car stopped.... - -The stone images lifted their heads. - -A girl, lithe but strong-looking with wide-apart big gray eyes gleaming -in a little face, just touched in the cheek with pink, with masses of -feathery golden hair hanging over her blue coat, was stepping out of -the car. - -The images flashed upright; leaped to their feet. - -“It’s Maida!” Rosie Brine called as she sped like an arrow shot from a -bow towards the automobile. “Oh, Maida! Maida! Maida! Maida!” - -“It’s Maida!” the others took it up and raced into the Court. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE PLAN - - -“When did you land?” “Why didn’t you let us know?” “How long are you -going to stay?” “Did your father come too?” “Where’s Billy Potter?” -“How’s Dr. Pierce?” And “Oh how you’ve grown!” - -Maida tried to answer them all; to hug each of the girls who were -hugging her all together; to hold out a hand to each of the three boys -who seemed all to shake both her hands at once; to manage to kiss Betsy -Hale, who hearing the name Maida shouted, vaguely recalled that there -had once been a Maida whom she loved; and who thereupon, hung tight to -one of her legs; to manage to kiss Delia Dore who had no remembrance -of Maida whatever but in imitation of Betsy, hung tight to the other -leg; and in addition to call to Molly and Timmie and Dorothy and Mabel -who remembered her perfectly and who danced like little wild Indians on -the outskirts of the crowd, yelling, “Maida’s come back! Maida’s come -back!” at the top of their lungs. - -All this took much less time to happen than it has taken to describe, -and it was suddenly interrupted by the rapid opening of the door to the -Dore yard. A little old Irish woman with silvery hair and with a face -as wrinkled as a nut, came rushing out, her arms extended calling, “My -lamb’s come back! My lamb’s come back!” - -Maida ran to her and hugged her ecstatically. “Oh, dear Granny Flynn!” -she said, “Dear, dear Granny Flynn!” - -Then there appeared back of Granny Flynn, Mrs. Dore--Granny Flynn’s -daughter; Delia and Dicky Dore’s mother--who had to be met in the same -affectionate way. Mrs. Dore was a tall, brown, fresh-complexioned -woman. It was from her that Dicky inherited his brown coloring and -Delia her sparkling expression. - -“I’d never know you for the same child,” Mrs. Dore said. - -Of course the grown people claimed Maida’s attention first. They -showered her with questions and she answered them every one with all -her old-time courtesy and consideration. Was she well? Well! But look -at her! When did she land? She had landed the day before in New York; -had come on the midnight to Boston. Where was she living? At their -home on Beacon Street. Would she stay to lunch? Yes! Yes! _Yes!_ Her -father had said that if she were invited, she could spend the whole -rest of the day in Primrose Court; he would send the car for her late -in the afternoon. Where was she going after that? Her father would tell -them all this afternoon. He had some plans, but they weren’t worked -out yet. Would she be in Boston for a few days? Probably. Then, during -that time, wouldn’t she like to come back to her own rooms over MAIDA’S -LITTLE SHOP? _Would she?_ Oh goody, she could telephone her father to -bring her some clothes.... It went on and on until the older children -stood first on one foot and then on the other with impatience; and the -younger ones went back to their house-keeping game and their frequent -punishments. - -But finally the curiosity of this group of grown-ups was satisfied and -the children claimed their prey. A clamorous group--every one of them -telling her some bit of news and all at once--they made the tour of the -Court. They called on Mrs. Lathrop, who mercifully forebore to ask more -than five minutes of questions; and on the Misses Allison, a pair of -middle-aged maiden ladies. Here the confusion doubled itself because -of the noisy screams of Tony the parrot. - -Tony kept calling at the top of his croaking voice, “What’s this all -about?” Each of the children tried to tell him, but he was apparently -dissatisfied with their explanations; for he only called the louder and -with greater emphasis, “I _say_--_what_ is this all about?” Finally, in -despair he exclaimed, “Good-night, sweet dreams,” and subsided. - -At length, the six of them--Maida, Rosie, Laura, Arthur, Dicky and -Harold--retired to the Lathrop lawn and plumped down on the grass. They -talked and talked and talked.... - -“How you have grown, Maida!” Rosie said first. “How tall you are and -strong-looking!” She would have added, “And how pretty!” if the boys -had not been there, but shyness kept her from making so personal a -comment in their presence. - -“That’s exactly what I was thinking about you,” Maida laughed, “but -then you have all grown, Arthur particularly.” In her candid, friendly -way, she surveyed them, one after another. “You are taller too, Laura, -and I believe even your hair has grown.” - -“It certainly has,” Laura admitted. Laura’s hair was extraordinarily -long and thick. It hung in two light-brown braids, very glossy, not a -hair out of place, to below Laura’s waist. At the tip of each braid was -a big pale blue bow. - -“As for you, Rosie, you are still taller than I, I’m afraid.” - -“Let’s measure,” Rosie answered springing to her feet. - -The two girls stood shoulder to shoulder. Rosie, it proved, was a -little the taller. Maida continued to look at her after they had -resumed their places on the grass. “What a beauty she is,” she thought; -and she too was withheld by shyness and a sense of delicacy from making -this comment before the others. - -Rosie was certainly handsome. Tall, active, proud-looking; great -black eyes lighted by stars; a mass of black hair breaking into high -waves and half curls; cheeks as smooth as satin and stained a deep -crimson--ivory-white, jet-black, coral-crimson--that was Rosie. Maida -had always called her Rose-Red. - -“But the greatest change has come in Dicky and me,” Maida ended. “We -have both lost our lameness. You don’t limp, Dicky, and I don’t. Let’s -race to the gate and back.” - -Dicky was on his feet in a minute. Arthur called, “One to make ready, -two for a show--” At the word, “_Go_” they were off. Dicky was more -active but Maida was taller. The race finished a tie. - -The blood which Maida’s running brought to her cheeks painted roses -there; not the deep crimson roses which bloomed perpetually in Rosie’s -face but transient blossoms, delicately pink. And under that flush, her -face, a healthy ivory, looked well. Her big gray eyes were filled with -happiness and the torrent of her pale-gold feathery hair seemed to gush -from her head like living light. - -They sat and talked until luncheon and immediately after luncheon -gathered on the lawn and talked again. Maida still had questions to ask -and comments to make. - -“You have all grown,” she said once, “but somehow I think the little -children have grown the most and Dorothy and Mabel more than anybody! -Their eyes still look like great blue marbles and their hair as though -it had been curled over a candlestick. Isn’t it marvelous how they -keep exactly the same height. Twins are magical creatures, aren’t -they? As for Betsy and Delia--they’re great big girls. I suppose Betsy -still runs away every chance she gets. On the whole I think Molly and -Timmie have changed the least. Does Timmie still fall into all the -‘pud-muddles?’ Molly still looks like a darling brown robin and Timmie -like a brown bogle. Don’t you remember I used to call them Robin and -Bogle.” - -The children answered all her questions. Yes, Betsy still ran away. No, -Bogle had quieted down. He didn’t fall into “pud-muddles” any more. Of -course they had their questions to ask Maida about her year in Europe. -And she told them of her experiences in Italy, Switzerland, France, -and England. But though she answered them instantly, and with the -fullness of detail which had always been her characteristic, it seemed -at moments as though her mind were not all on what she was saying. Once -or twice, she even interrupted herself to start something which had -nothing to do with her subject. But apparently, both times, she thought -better of it and checked a tongue which obviously was yearning to speed -on in the interest of that unknown subject. - -“There’s something you want to tell us Maida,” Dicky guessed shrewdly -once. “But you won’t let yourself.” - -Maida blushed furiously but her eyes danced. She did not answer. Rosie, -thereupon, continued to watch her closely. “Maida Westabrook, you’re -almost bursting over something,” she said once; then as though with an -inspiration, “You’ve got a plan of some kind and I know it.” - -Again Maida blushed and this time she laughed outright. “Wait and see!” -was all she said, however. - -After they had talked themselves out, they showed Maida the accumulated -treasures of the last year. The wood-carving, which was Arthur’s -accomplishment and the paper-work which was Dicky’s, had improved -enormously. The beautiful box of tools that Mr. Westabrook had -presented to the one and the big box of paints that he had given the -other, were of course important factors in the improvement. Laura still -danced beautifully and she danced her latest dance for Maida--a Spanish -fandango. Harold was raising rabbits and he showed his entire family -to Maida. At the urge of all this work, Rosie, who hated the sight of -a needle, had taken in despair, to knitting. She could endure knitting -she told Maida because the work grew so fast. She herself said though -that the less said about the results of her labor, the better. And -Maida frankly agreed with her when she examined some of it. - -After this the group returned to the yard for more talk. - -Somehow they didn’t feel like playing games. Late in the afternoon, -they sprinkled the flower beds and hosed the lawn for Mrs. Lathrop. -Then as this made further sitting on the grass impossible, they retired -to the tiny Dore yard with its amusing little flower bed and its one -patch of grass. There was just about room for their group there. They -sat down. Again they asked Maida about her travels. But now Maida was -distinctly absent-minded. Suddenly in the midst of a description of -Pompeii, there sounded a long, faint far-away call of an automobile -horn. It broke, like a fire-rocket, into a flurry of star notes; then -dropped a long liquid jet of sound which, again like a fire-rocket, -dropped another shower of notes. The effect on Maida was electric. She -came upright, quivering. - -“That’s father,” she said. “_Now_ I can tell you what I’ve been biting -my lips all the morning to keep back. I didn’t want to tell you until -he was here to talk to your fathers and mothers. But, oh, we’ve got -such a beautiful plan for the summer-- Oh it’s so wonderful that it -seems like a fairy tale.” - -The long jet of sound lengthened ... came nearer.... - -“Father wants you all to come to spend the summer with us at Satuit. -He’s going to do the most beautiful thing you ever heard of in your -life. Just as he gave me Maida’s Little Shop, he is going to give me -Maida’s Little House. _He_ is going to live in the Big House where -he can have all the grown-up company he wants and _we_ are going to -live in the Little House. The Little House is so far away from the Big -House that nobody would ever guess we were there. Oh, but it’s all so -beautiful and there are so many things to tell about it that I don’t -know where to begin. For one thing he’s going to let us all help in-- -We girls are to do our part in the--And the boys are to take care of -the-- Oh it is such a duck of a house! Built very near a great big pond -and not so very far off--the ocean. And there’s a wood and House Rock -and the Bosky Dingle ... and.... Oh, I don’t know how to tell you about -it....” - -She stopped for breath. - -The horn came nearer and nearer. - -The five faces stared at her. For one astounded instant nobody could -speak. - -“Oh Maida!” at last Rosie breathed. The two girls threw themselves upon -her; Arthur rose and then suddenly sat down again but Dicky kept quite -still his eyes full of stars. “I knew you’d have some plan, Maida,” he -said. Harold, unexpectedly, turned a somersault. - -“I know I’m dreaming,” Laura almost whispered. - -The horn stopped. A great gray car turned into Primrose Court. A -man, middle-aged, tall, massive and with a pronounced stoop to his -shoulders, stepped out. He turned a head, big and shaggy as a buffalo, -in the direction of Maida’s Little Shop. The piercing eyes, fierce and -keen as an eagle’s, seemed to penetrate its very walls. This was Jerome -Westabrook whom the world called, “Buffalo” Westabrook. - -Maida dashed out of the yard, the children trailing her. - -“Oh father, father, I’ve told them, I’ve told them! I couldn’t keep it -any longer after I heard the horn.” - - - - -CHAPTER III - -THE JOURNEY - - -As the train drew into the Satuit Station, it seemed to spill children -from every door. Counting them carefully, Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore -found to their great relief that the twelve, with whom they started, -were still all with them. But--big and little--they were all so full -of the excitement of the trip that it looked as though, at any moment, -they might vanish in the strange country which surrounded them. Arthur, -leading the two boys, started an investigation of the station. The -three big girls followed. Only the little children, tired by the -trip and awed to quiet by the unfamiliar surroundings, stayed close -to the women’s skirts. Timmie’s big full eyes surveyed in wonder the -strange new world. Delia, who had fallen comfortably asleep in her -mother’s arms, suddenly waked up, rubbing her eyes, and looked about -her. “Oh take me back to Shalstown!” she wailed in a sudden attack of -homesickness and fortunately fell asleep again. - -“Oh here’s the car!” Maida called. - -A big comfortable limousine came round the bend of the road. The driver -alighted, and came forward. “Here I am at last, Miss Maida,” he said, -his hand to his cap. - -“Oh good afternoon, Botkins,” Maida greeted him. She introduced him to -Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore; then to the children. - -“I’m sorry I was late, ma’am,” Botkins said to Granny Flynn, “but I -nearly ran over a dog in the road. I stopped to see if it was all -right.” - -“And was it?” Rosie Brine, who had a passion for animals, asked eagerly. - -“Right as a trivet,” Botkins answered. - -“What is a trivet, Maida?” Rosie asked in a mystified aside. - -“I’ll show in a few minutes, goose,” Maida rejoined. “It’s an English -word.” - -Botkins, who was English also, began stowing the party away in the -automobile: Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore on the back seats; Betsy and -Delia between them; and Mollie and Timmie at their feet. Maida and -Laura each holding a very active Clark twin, occupied the little seats. -Rosie, to her great delight, was permitted to sit with the driver. The -three boys hung onto the running board. - -“We look like an orphan-asylum,” Arthur commented as, with a long call -of warning from the horn, they started off. - -The road stretched straight before them, wide and yellow, furred with -trees on both sides; then vanished under an arch of green as it turned -to the left. - -“Aren’t there any houses in Satuit, Maida?” Laura asked. - -“Plenty,” Maida answered. “We’ll come to some in a minute--then to -more. In a little while, we’ll go right through the town.” - -For a few moments nobody spoke; just watched for the first house. -Presently a little white farmhouse, gambrel-roofed and old, popped into -view at one side. - -“Oh did you see that lovely old well with the long pole?” Rosie -exclaimed from the front seat. - -“That’s a well-sweep,” Maida explained. “It has a bucket at one end.” - -“Oh see the ponies! One, two, three, four, five--” but the car shot -Laura past before she had all the ponies counted. - -“Gee, look at all those hens!” came from Arthur. “Must be a hundred!” - -And then followed a chorus of “Oh sees!” The beautiful big barn with -its wide doors! The lovely little pond covered with lily pads: The -trim little vine-covered summer house perched on the hill! Bee hives! -The old grave yard! - -And, “See the moo-cow!” piped up Betsy Hale and “Tee the moo-tow!” -Delia, as usual mimicked her. - -Timmie did not speak; but his big eyes, made bigger by wonder, mirrored -everything. - -“There’s the town!” Maida said finally and again for a few moments -there was silence. - -The town manifested itself at first only by scattered farmhouses. -But these began to draw closer and closer together until, finally, -they seemed almost to huddle about the beautiful little white church -standing amidst rows of old lichen-covered slate gravestones, and -pointing with a slender, delicately-cut-and-carved, white spire at the -blue sky. Stores were here too, a moving picture house; a small inn; a -post office; a garage. - -Then the road turned suddenly and for an instant it was almost as -though their speed would take them across the broad stretch of a -velvety green lawn into the blue harbor which expanded beyond. This -harbor bore here and there white-sailed boats. Not far away, a boy was -fishing from the side of a dory. There was a chorus of delighted _ohs_ -and _ahs_ from the car. But their speed did not abate for a moment. - -On they went and on; and soon the village was behind, far behind; -houses were drawing apart from each other. The forest was closing about -the farms, separating them.... Now the car was on the smooth hard road -again, thick tree growths on both sides. - -With a contented sigh, Betsy closed her eyes and fell fast asleep. -Delia had long ago surrendered to the sand-man. Molly was trying her -best to keep awake; but it was obvious that she could not hold out -long. Timmie’s eyes were beginning to film with fatigue, but he fought -it manfully. Even the Clark twins had become silent. But the other -children were as wide-awake as when they started. - -More yellow road and more yellow road--more green trees and more green -trees. In the front seat, Rosie bounced. “Oh Maida,” she called, “it -seems to me I can’t wait. Will we ever get there?” - -Maida’s eyes danced. “Oh in an hour or so,” she said airily. - -“An hour,” Laura groaned. “We have gone a thousand miles already.” - -Even as she spoke, the motor turned smoothly, the horn emitting a long -silvery gurgle. They entered, between two massive stone posts, a long -avenue which curved away in the distance like a wide gray tape thrown -amidst the trees. - -“Maida Westabrook you fibber!” Rosie exclaimed, “we’re here now!” - -Maida only twinkled. - -On they went. On both sides grew great trees. But, unlike the forests -that stretched away from the public roads which they had just -traversed, these woods had been freed of their underbrush. The grass -beneath them was like velvet and lying on it, as though liquid gold had -oozed or poured through the branches, shone tiny splashes and great -pools of sunlight. It looked as though the whole green earth were -caught in a golden net. - -On and on! To the impatient children it seemed that they went miles. - -“Oh!” Arthur Duncan exclaimed suddenly. And then, quite like a girl, -again and again, “Oh! Oh! Oh!” - -The car had turned so that it looked straight down into a cleared -glade. At the end of the vista, a group of deer, dappled in white all -over their lovely, dead-leaf brown bodies, lifted their heads, and with -their great soft eyes surveyed the car. But they stared for such a -tiny fraction of a second that it scarcely seemed that the thing had -happened at all for--flash! There was a glimpse of white as they turned -tail. They vanished as instantly, as completely, as miraculously as -though they were ghosts. - -“Oh _Maida_!” Rosie exclaimed. “Deer! How wonderful! Do they belong to -your father or are they wild?” - -“Those that you saw are dappled deer. Father had them brought here from -England,” Maida answered. “But once in a while we do see wild deer in -this country.” - -“Oh I’d like to see some _wild_ deer,” Arthur said. - -Dicky didn’t speak but his eyes were luminous. As for Harold, he was -still gasping with the surprise of it. - -On they went. The road curved and rippled like a ribbon being -constantly thrown ahead of them. Suddenly they came to a great cleared -space, smoother than any plush. Botkins stopped the car. At the end -towered a huge house of white marble, with terraces. On the lawn, which -stretched between the children and the house, grew, widely-separated, a -few stately trees; wine-glass elms, oaks; copper beeches and powdered -spruces. It was very still now and, unimpeded, the setting sun was -sending great golden shafts across that stretch of plushy grass. They -struck a pool of water in a marble basin in the middle of that emerald -velvet; and through the fountain which played about it. Here ... there -... yonder ... motionless in that liquid golden light ... were white -objects.... - -“What are those white things?” Dicky asked curiously. - -And then, one of the white objects arose, opened like a fan, spread to -a wonderful size its snow-white tail; moved in stately fashion along -the velvety-green lawn. - -“Maida!” Dicky gasped. “Not--Yes they are--white peacocks!” - -“Yes,” Maida answered. “White peacocks. I am so glad they were there. -Everything has happened just as I wanted it. Sometimes it will be days -before you see deer, although there are so many here. And sometimes -the peacocks wander to the back of the house. I knew you wanted to see -them, Dicky, and I’ve been hoping all along that they would be here for -you. There are seven. We have a dozen.” - -Dicky was listening with all his ears; but at the same time he was -looking with all his eyes. For out of the trees to the left, suddenly -appeared another pair of peacocks in full sail. Not white ones this -time; great prismatic, blue and green creatures--the sun struck bronze -lights out of them as they floated on. - -“It’s like a fairy tale,” Dicky breathed. - -“Are we going to live there?” Rosie asked in an awed tone. - -“Oh mercy no!” Maida answered. “That’s father’s house--the Big House. -Our house is ever so much nicer.” - -“I hope it isn’t any bigger,” Laura said, her voice a little awed too. - -Maida laughed a little. “No it’s not quite as big as that,” she -admitted. - -“Shall I go on, Miss Maida?” Botkins asked. - -“Yes, please Botkins,” Maida answered. And they continued to go -on through more winding, geometrically perfect, beautifully-kept, -gray roads; past armies and armies of trees: high, plumy-tipped, -feathery-trunked aristocratic elms; vigorous, irregular-shaped, -peasant-like oaks; clumps, gracefully-slender, fluttering a veil of -green leaves, of white birch; occasional pine, resinous and shining; -beeches; firs. Suddenly everybody exclaimed at once, “Oh see the pond!” - -“What pond is it?” Harold asked. - -“It’s called by some people Spy Pond,” Maida answered, “but I call it -the Magic Mirror. It’s our pond and I think I ought to be allowed to -call it what I want.” - -“I think so too,” agreed Laura. - -“What do you mean by _our_ pond?” Arthur asked. - -“Just what I say,” Maida replied promptly. “It’s our pond. It belongs -to my father and it’s a part of the grounds of Maida’s Little House. -We can go swimming in it every day. That is if we don’t prefer--” She -broke off in a little embarrassed laugh. - -“Oh Maida you are so full of secrets I could _kill_ you,” Rosie -threatened. - -Maida only laughed. - -They passed the pond which stretched for a considerable distance, long -and crescent-shaped between its tree-hung banks, and now they were in -the real forest. The road was smooth as always and beautifully-kept, -but on both sides, the forest had been left to grow as it pleased. It -was filled with underbrush. The tree trunks were obscured by great -bushes. Here and there through openings, the children could see -gigantic rocks thrusting great heads and shoulders out of the masses of -rusty-colored leaves. - -“Oh isn’t it lovely!” Rosie said in a perfect ecstasy. “Lovely, lovely, -lovely!” she went on repeating dreamily as though caught in a trance of -delight. She ended with a scream. “Did you see that? What was it Maida?” - -“A woodchuck,” Maida answered smilingly. - -Timmie awakened by Rosie’s scream, asked if there were any lions and -tigers about. Much disappointed at Maida’s _no_, he fell asleep again. - -And now they seemed to be going up hill, slowly but steadily up. Up, -up, up. The car had begun to speed a little. Ahead was another rounding -curve. Botkins took it with a flash. - -The car came out in front of-- - -It was one of the little colonial farmhouses a story-and-a-half in -height; weather-colored, slant-roofed; to which addition after addition -has been added by succeeding generations. It was set in an expanse -of lawn, cut cleanly in two by a path of irregularly-shaped, sunken -stones, dominated, one on either side, by twin elms of enormous girth -and amplitude. The house faced the east. - -The additions, which now merged into one long structure, had gone off -to the right and the north where they joined a big barn. This barn -was the same velvety, gray weather-color as the house but with great -doors painted a strange deep old blue which had faded to an even -stranger, deeper blue. The sun struck into the open door and shot -over the shining sides of half-a-dozen brilliantly colored canoes -lying face-downwards on the floor; glittered in the bright-work of -half-a-dozen bicycles, drawn up in a line. - -The front door of the house opened as the automobile came in sight and -a colored man and woman, young and smiling, came out to meet them. The -automobile seemed to explode children, who started over the lawn of the -house. - -What a house it was! - -The pointed-topped, pillared vestibule entrance was covered with -roses which smothered it in a pink bloom. Hollyhocks, not blooming -yet, marched in files along the front of the house. Lilacs, in heavy -blossom, bunched in hedges at the ends. At one side, a trumpet vine, -with a trunk as thick as iron cable, had crept to the very top spine -of the house, was crawling towards the single ample chimney which -protruded from the middle of the roof. At the other side, a graceful -elm thrust close to the shingles. A syringa bush and a smoke bush grew -in front. But charming as was the house, interesting as was the barn, -the children’s eyes did not linger long on either of them, because -inevitably their gaze fixed on that Annex which made an intermediate -house between them. For in the middle of it--yes _in_ it and _through_ -it--grew an enormous gnarled oak. Its trunk emerged from the roof -and its long level branches spread over it in every direction. More -than that--above that roof--securely caught in those flatly-growing, -widely-spread branches was a little Tree House. - -The colored pair were almost on them now. - -“Good afternoon Floribel,” Maida greeted them, “Good afternoon Zeke. -Let me introduce you to Mrs. Flynn and Mrs. Dore.” - -Then she turned to the rest of the group. - -“Children,” she commanded in a tone of happy pride, “behold Maida’s -Little House.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE LITTLE HOUSE - - -“Do you want to see the place now or wait until after supper?” Maida -asked after the last admiring exclamation had died, the last pair of -cramped legs had stretched themselves out. - -“I’m starved,” Rosie answered instantly, “but I must see everything -first.” - -The others echoed Rosie’s decision with a fury of enthusiasm. - -“We can’t see anything of the back of the house from here,” Arthur said -as though that clinched the matter. - -And so while Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore--the little children tagging -them in a daze of fatigue, shot with excitement--were being taken care -of by Floribel and Zeke, Maida led the older children on a voyage of -exploration. - -“Now first,” she said in a practical voice, “let’s go off a little -distance--so that I can show you the whole lay of the land.” - -The six of them returned almost to the spot where they had first -caught sight of the Little House. - -“I’m going to start by telling you a little of the history of the -house,” Maida began importantly. “This is the old Westabrook farmhouse -and my father was born here; and his father and his father. It was -built in 1645 and Westabrooks have lived in it from that day to this.” - -“Oh Maida!” Rosie said in an awed tone, “isn’t that wonderful! Is it -just the same as it was then?” - -“No, indeed,” Maida answered. “Almost every generation of Westabrooks -added something to the original house. The barn was built later and -also all those little additions--we call them the Annex--which connect -the house with the barn, but it was my father who made the sides of -them all windows.” - -“Who put the little house in the tree?” Dicky asked. - -“My grandfather.” - -“Wasn’t it wonderful that they left the tree!” Laura commented. - -“Yes. You see my grandmother loved that big old tree dearly and so they -saved it for her. Now where shall we go first?” - -“Up the tree!” everybody answered. - -“All right. I might have known you would have said that,” Maida -declared, “when I’m just _dying_ to show you the house.” - -The tree grew out of the middle of the Annex. The floor had been fitted -neatly about the tree-trunk. Stairs led up to the roof; and from the -roof, a short flight of steps led to the Tree House. One after another -the children mounted them. It took them into a little square room with -windows looking in all four directions. - -“Oh I can see Spy Pond--I mean the Magic Mirror!” Rosie exclaimed. - -“And from here you can see the Big House,” Laura exclaimed. “Not very -much--just a sort of shining....” - -“Oh--But--Look--See!” Dicky stuttered in his excitement. “From here you -can see the ocean!” - -The children deserted the other windows and rushed to Dicky’s side. In -the west appeared all a-sparkle what looked like a great heaving mass -of melted glass. On and on it stretched, and on, until it cut through -the vapory sky and disappeared forever. A few sail boats like great -gulls were beating their wings on its glittering surface. - -“Isn’t it wonderful?” Rosie said in a solemn voice. “It makes me feel -almost like not speaking.” - -“Wait until you see it in a nor’easter,” Maida promised, “or a great -thunder storm.” - -“Just think,” Arthur said, “all my life I’ve wanted to learn to sail a -boat--” - -“You will sometime,” Maida interrupted, “but father says we’ve all got -to learn to swim before we can get into a sailboat.” - -“I know how to swim,” Arthur stated in an off-hand voice. “All boys do.” - -“I don’t,” Dicky remonstrated. - -“Well you will in a week,” Maida promised. - -Harold had all this time been keenly examining the ocean, the curving -line of shore. - -“What’s that island off there, Maida?” he asked. - -“Everybody else calls it Spectacles Island, because it’s shaped like a -pair of spectacles. But I call it Tom Tiddler’s Ground, because nobody -lives there. I don’t see why I shouldn’t call it what I want. It’s _my_ -island.” - -“Your island,” Rosie repeated. “Oh Maida, you lucky girl.” - -Maida flushed and looked ashamed. “I mean _our_ island,” she corrected -herself. - -“Well,” Rosie said in a meditative tone, “with a farmhouse in the -country, the ocean with an island in it in front of it; a forest with -deer in back of it; and a pond--Maida can you think of anything else -that we could possibly have?” - -“Well there might be a volcano on the island,” Maida suggested, “a -grotto somewhere like the Blue Grotto of Capri; and then of course we -have no glaciers, geysers, hot springs, deserts or bogs--” - -“Oh you goose!” Rosie interrupted. “You know we couldn’t have any of -those things.” - -“We might have a cave,” Arthur said. “Are there any caves around here, -Maida?” - -“Not that I know of,” Maida answered. “Now let me show you the rest of -the place. You’ve been so busy looking at the ocean that you haven’t -noticed there’s a tennis court and a croquet-ground just below.” - -The five excited faces peered out of the open window down through the -tree branches and there was, indeed, a great cleared velvety lawn -with wickets and stakes at one end and a tennis court marked in white -kalsomine at the other. - -“Now,” Maida said, “come into the house. Oh I forgot to tell you that I -call this tree Father Time because it’s the oldest one on the place. -It’s too bad that I named all these things years ago because you could -have had the fun of naming them too.” - -“But I like all your names, Maida,” Dicky declared. - -Climbing down the narrow stairs, Maida conducted them through the two -rooms of the Annex which lay between the Tree Room and the Little -House. The tiny procession marched first into the kitchen which was the -second of these rooms--a big sunny room, the walls painted a deep blue -and hanging against them great pans and platters of brass and copper. -From the kitchen, they entered the dining room; a big room also which -ran the entire width of the house all doors and windows on the western -side. A long, wide table in the center; chairs along the walls; and a -pair of mahogany sideboards facing each other from the ends--these were -its furnishings. - -They passed through a door on the eastern wall. - -“Now,” Maida said, “we are in the original house. This used to be the -old kitchen. Now it’s the living room. Look at the great fireplace with -the oven at one side. This big wooden shovel was used to put the pans -of bread in and to take them out. See how sweet all the old paneling -is! That’s been here from the beginning and the old H hinges and the -old butterfly hinges! And these darling little closets! And those big -old beams with the spatter work on them. Father had this great fender -built around the fireplace so that the little children couldn’t fall -into it when there’s a fire.” - -“Are we going to have fires in that enormous place?” Rosie asked. - -“I wish the temperature would fall to below zero,” Laura declared -recklessly. - -“I should think it would take four-foot logs,” Arthur had been -examining the fireplace. Crouching down he had even walked into it; -stared up into the chimney. - -“It does,” Maida informed him proudly. “Oh, there, Rosie,” she pointed -to a little triangular brass object on the hearth, “is a trivet!” - -Rosie pounced on it. “It looks like a brass cricket! What’s it for?” - -“To put the tea pot on, close to the fire so it will keep hot.” - -Out of the living room through the northern door they came into one of -the two smaller front rooms. The walls were lined with books. And here -was a big table with a reading lamp, a desk, a few comfortable chairs. - -“This is the library,” Maida announced proudly. - -“I’d like to shut myself up here for a month,” Dicky, who was a great -reader, said wistfully. “It looks as if all the books were interesting.” - -“Oh they are!” Maida assured him. “The Lang Fairy Books and Grimm and -Andersen, George McDonald and Louisa M. Alcott and Howard Pyle and -Stevenson and Kipling, and all the nicest books that father and Billy -Potter and Dr. Pierce and I could think of. And lots more that they -selected that I had never heard of.” - -From the library, they went out doors through the little vine-covered -vestibule. - -From upstairs came the voice of Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore putting the -younger children to bed. - -“We three girls,” Maida explained, “have rooms at the front of the -house on the second floor. The nursery is back over the dining room.” - -“Where do we sleep?” Harold asked. - -“You boys,” Maida replied, “are going to sleep in the barn.” - -“Gee _whillikins_!” Dicky exclaimed. “What fun that’ll be!” - -“I’d rather sleep in a barn than any place I know,” Arthur said. - -“It’s pretty good fun sleeping in a tent,” Harold threw in. - -“I was going to say,” Arthur went on, “except out of doors in the -woods.” - -“Now which shall I show you first,” Maida asked, “the boys’ rooms or -the girls’ rooms?” She did not wait for an answer. “Come on girls,” she -continued in a tone of resignation. “We’ve got to show the boys their -place first. They won’t look at anything until they’ve seen them!” - -The procession moved toward the barn. - -The lower floor--roomy, raftered, sweet-smelling--was empty except -for the canoes; a small run-about; the bicycles; a phonograph; a big -chest; garden tools. Maida led the way to the second floor. The railed -stairway ran close to the side of the barn, brought them through a -square opening in the ceiling, into another big room--the second story. -Here, in each of three corners, were army cots; beside each cot, a -tall chiffonier. On top of each chiffonier were toilet articles in a -simple style; beside each chiffonier a chair. - -“That’s your bathroom over there.” Maida pointed to the fourth corner -which was partitioned off. “It has a shower. I don’t expect you’ll use -it much because we’ll be bathing every day in the Magic Mirror. You -hang your clothes on hooks behind these curtains. You see you each have -a closet of your own.” - -The boys were of course opening chiffonier drawers; pulling aside -curtain-draped closets; examining the shower. Their curiosity appeased, -they made for down-stairs--and the canoes. - -“Now while you boys are examining the barn, would you girls like to -explore upstairs in the house?” Maida asked. - -“I’m just dying to see my own room,” Laura declared firmly. - -The two girls pelted across the lawn in the wake of Maida’s eager -footsteps. They ran up the tiny steep flight of stairs, exactly -opposite the little vestibule entrance. It brought them into a small -hall from which opened four small slant-roofed chambers. - -“This is my room,” Maida said, pointing to one of the south -chambers--the back room on the right of the stairs. “I have always -slept there when we have been in the house. I love it because of the -great tree outside my window. I have always called this tree, Mother -Nature, to go with Father Time. So you see I have a father tree and a -mother tree! When there’s a storm the boughs make such a sweet sound -rubbing against my walls. And often little twigs tap on my window, and -sometimes it sounds exactly as though the leaves were whispering to me.” - -“Oh Maida!” Rosie exclaimed, “I never saw anything so lovely in all my -life. How I love that bed and that sweet little cricket.” - -The room was simple--it held but a big, double, old-fashioned canopied -bed; an old-fashioned maple bureau; and an old-fashioned maple desk; -a little straight slat-backed chair in front of the desk and a little -slat-backed rocker by one of the windows--but it was quaint. In front -of the rocker was a cricket as though just ready for little feet. - -The flowered wall-paper matched the chintz curtains and the chintz -ruffles on the little cricket. Under the window, in a little -old-fashioned child’s chair, sat a great rag doll, and beside her was a -little hair-cloth trunk. - -“Yes, it _is_ perfectly lovely,” Laura agreed, “but oh Maida, do show -me my room.” - -“What a selfish goop I am!” Maida exclaimed in contrition. “Your room, -Rosie, is in front of mine, and Laura’s across the hall.” - -The three little girls tumbled pell-mell into the front room. It did -not differ much from Maida’s or from Laura’s across the way--except -where the key-note of Maida’s wall-paper and chintzes were yellow, that -of Rosie’s was crimson and Laura’s blue. In each there was a double -canopied bed; a little old-fashioned bureau; a little old-fashioned -cricket; two quaint little old-fashioned chairs. But all these things -differed in detail and although the rooms showed a similarity, they -also showed an individuality. Rosie and Laura went wild with excitement. - -“Oh look at my sweet, _sweet_ closet!” Laura called from her room. -“What a queer shape with the roof slanting like that. And a baby window -in it!” - -“And the windows,” Rosie took it up from her room, “four, eight, -twelve, sixteen, _twenty-four panes_! And such queer glass; all full of -bubbles and crinkles and wiggle-waggles!” - -And the beaming Maida, running frantically from the one room to the -other and from the other to the one, was saying, “Yes, aren’t they -lovely little closets--running under the eaves like that? I am so glad -you like them. I was afraid you would think they were queer. Yes, -that’s old old glass. All the window glass in the house is old and some -of it is such a lovely color.” - -After a while, the frantic shutting and opening of desk drawers, bureau -drawers, and closet drawers, ceased. The _oh’s_ and _ah’s_ died down -from lack of breath. Maida led the way into the south room at the -left. “This is the guest chamber. And now,” she added, heading the -file through a door at the back of the small hall which led into a big -long room, “we’re out of the main house and in the Annex. This is the -Nursery. It is over the dining room.” - -The Nursery was a big room with a little bed in each corner; miniature -tables and chiffoniers all painted white. - -“Molly, Timmie, Dorothy, Mabel,” Maida pointed to the four beds. “Delia -will sleep in that room at the left with her mother and Betsy in this -room at the right with Granny Flynn. You see both these rooms open into -the Nursery and Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore can keep an eye on what’s -going on here.” - -“They’ll have to keep two eyes on it--if Betsy’s here,” Rosie -prophesied. - -“Now, except for the laundry and some empty rooms in the Annex, I think -you’ve seen everything. Everything, that is, except Floribel’s and -Zeke’s room. I don’t suppose you want to see them. And besides I’d have -to ask their permission.” - -“If I see another thing this day,” Rosie declared desperately, “I shall -die of happiness _this minute_.” - -Fortunately however, she was not called upon to gaze on any object -which would have resulted in so speedy a demise. For just at that -moment the cow-bell rang. - -“That’s supper,” Maida explained. - -Reinforcing the cow-bell’s call, came Mrs. Dore’s voice: “You must come -down now, children. Your supper is on the table, all nice and hot.” - - - - -CHAPTER V - -MORNING - - -The sun poured through the windows onto Maida’s bed. She stirred. -Was it a bird calling her? No. It was the phonograph. She peeped out -the window. Arthur had brought the phonograph to the opening of the -barn door. It was playing, “Bugle Calls of the American Army.” It was -reveille that she was listening to. - -The door to her bed-chamber flew open and Rosie, her heavy curls -flying, her black eyes sparkling, precipitated herself across the room. -“Oh Maida!” she exclaimed. “Isn’t it wonderful? I am not _dreaming_ am -I? Ow!” as Maida pinched her. “I have been awake for I don’t know how -long, listening to the birds and everything. I have been waiting ever -so long for you to wake up. I thought you would never stir.” - -“Well now that I’m awake, I’ll dress as soon as possible,” Maida -promised. “We’ve got a long day before us. Let’s go in and get Laura -up.” - -Laura was still deep in slumber. Indeed she showed a marked -disinclination to awaken. Rosie charitably assisted her efforts by the -application to her face of a very wet--and a very cold--sponge. For -some reason, this action precipitated a pillow fight. In the midst -of it, the breakfast bell sounded but they paid no attention to it. -Finally Granny Flynn had to call: “Stop that running about, children, -and get dressed. Breakfast’ll be on the table in a minute.” - -When the second bell rang, the boys came in from the barn and the -twelve children, Granny Flynn at one end of the table and Mrs. Dore at -the other, sat down to a breakfast of fruit, oatmeal, eggs, and all the -milk they wanted. - -After breakfast, Maida said, “Now, first, I want to show the six little -children where’s the nicest place for them to play. Do the rest of you -want to come?” - -The rest _did_ want to come. Perhaps Laura voiced their sentiments -when she said, “That’s a great idea, Maida. Get the little children -interested, so they won’t be forever tagging us.” - -Maida led the way to the side of the house--the north. They crossed an -expanse of lawn, came to an opening in the stone wall. Beyond looked -like unbroken forest. But from the break in the wall, threading its way -through the trees, appeared a well-worn path. They followed it for a -few rods. It ended flush against a big sloping rock. - -“This,” Maida said triumphantly, “is House Rock.” - -The children swarmed over it. - -“Isn’t it a beauty!” Rosie exclaimed. - -It was a beauty--and especially for play purposes. It was big, cut up -by stratification into all levels--but low. At its highest end, it was -not three feet from the ground. Trees shaded it; bushes hedged it; -mosses padded it. No wonder it had been named House Rock; for it was a -perfect setting for those housekeeping games in which little children -so delight. - -“Now, listen to me, little six,” Maida began. - -But Arthur interrupted, “Why that’s a great name for them--the Little -Six. And we,” he added triumphantly, “are the Big Six.” - -“Molly and Mabel and Dorothy and Betsy and Delia and Timmie,” Maida -started again, “all of you, listen! You are the Little Six. This is -your playground. There are some toys in the house; dolls and doll’s -dishes and doll’s furniture, which you can bring here to play house -with. But you are not to go far from the Rock. And when you hear the -cow-bell, you must always return to the Little House.” - -“Is that all,” Laura asked eagerly, “and now can we leave the Little -Six and go exploring?” - -The Little Six waited, dancing with excitement, impatient for the first -time in their lives to have the big children go. - -“Not yet,” Maida responded, “just one more thing for the Little Six.” - -She led the way around House Rock to its high end. From there another -well-worn path started off. The children followed her down its curving -way. Not far from House Rock, it came into a big circular enclosure; -grassy and surrounded by trees. - -“What’s this, Maida?” Arthur asked. - -“It’s a Fairy Ring,” Maida answered solemnly. - -“A Fairy Ring,” Dicky repeated in an awed tone. “Is it really a Fairy -Ring?” - -“That’s what I’ve always called it,” Maida replied. “I don’t know what -it is, if it isn’t a Fairy Ring. I have never seen anything like -it--except in England and there they always call them Fairy Rings, and -besides nobody knows what it was used for.” - -Arthur strolled around the entire circumference of the Ring keenly -examining the ground and the surrounding trees. - -“It looks like a wood clearing to me,” he said in a low tone to Maida -when he rejoined the group. - -Betsy, silenced for the first time in her five years of experience, -suddenly exploded. “Oh goody! goody! goody!” she exclaimed. “Now the -fairies will come and play with us. I’ve always wanted to see a fairy. -Now I’m going to see one!” - -“I don’t believe they’s any such things as fairies,” Timmie declared -sturdily. - -“Oh Timmie,” Dorothy Clark remonstrated, “I should think you’d be -ashamed of yourself. Of course they’s fairies.” - -“Well, anyway,” Timmie still sturdily stood his ground, “if they are, I -don’t believe they’ll come and play with us.” - -“Well, I believe they will,” Mabel Clark reinforced her sister. - -But Betsy was capering up and down the length and breadth of the Fairy -Ring. “I know the fairies will come!” she sang aloud. “I know the -fairies will come! I know the fairies will come!” - -When the older children left the Fairy Ring, all six of the little -children were capering too. The last thing they heard was Delia’s -mimicking words: “I know the fairz tum! I know the fairz tum! I know -the fairz tum!” - -“That’s over,” Maida said. “I told Granny Flynn,” she explained, “that -I’d show the little children a nice place to play. Now let’s go into -the living room and talk. There are a whole lot of things that I’ve got -to tell you that I haven’t had time to tell you yet.” - -Although it was a June day--and as warm and sunny as June knows how -to be--they gathered about the big fireplace where already logs were -piled and ready to burn. The boys sat on the fender; the girls drew up -chairs. After they were all comfortable Maida began. - -“Father says that this first week we can all rest. It’s to be our -vacation, but after that, we’ve got to work. Father says that there are -some things that every girl ought to know how to do and some things -every boy ought to know. And we’re going to learn those things living -in the Little House.” - -Rosie’s eyes danced. “Hurry!” she urged Maida. - -Maida drew a long breath. “There’s so much of it. You see there’s -a good deal of work about the house, although it seems so small. -Floribel--she’s the colored maid--is going to do the cooking and Zeke, -her husband, will attend to most of the outside work. Of course Granny -Flynn and Mrs. Dore will run everything. But we girls are to take care -of our own rooms and the flower garden.” - -“Oh goody, goody!” Rosie exclaimed, “I love flowers!” - -“We are to keep the house decorated with flowers. And once every week, -we are to do the housekeeping for the entire day--that’s Floribel’s and -Zeke’s day off. That day, we have to plan the meals; do the marketing; -cook the food; wash and wipe the dishes.” - -“Gee, I’m glad I’m not a girl,” Harold said jubilantly. - -“Oh your turn comes now,” Maida declared. “You boys have got to weed -and water the vegetable garden; gather vegetables whenever they are -needed; run errands; take care of the tennis court.” - -“For my part,” Laura declared, “I wish we did _all_ the cooking. I love -it.” - -“You wouldn’t love it if you did it for sixteen people,” Maida -commented in a scandalized tone. - -“It’s just as though we were all alone by ourselves,” Rosie declared -jubilantly. - -“We are,” Maida stated. “We’re three miles from the Big House. We -shan’t see any of father’s company. Father has closed one of the -roads that leads to the Little House and the other is a secret one -that nobody but he and Botkins and I know. Your parents are invited -to visit you whenever they wish. Of course father will come to see us -occasionally. And let me tell you he will come when we least expect -it. And if everything isn’t in apple-pie-order--Of course there’s the -telephone if we should need help--or anything happened--But otherwise -we’re almost all alone in the world.” - -“It’s like a story book,” Dicky commented. - -“Maida!” Rosie said, “you speak of a flower garden and a vegetable -garden but I don’t remember that you showed them to us last night.” - -“No, I didn’t,” Maida explained. “We were all getting so tired. But -I’ll show them to you now. Come!” - -She led the way through the living room; through the dining room to -the back door of the house. Then she turned north. “This room is the -laundry,” she said. “And here,” pointing to an enclosure, set off by a -high vine-grown lattice, “is the drying yard.” They were now walking on -a path which ran between the house and a file of cypresses, standing -trim and tall and so close that they made a hedge. Maida led the way -to the corner where there was an opening. There a great rectangle -surrounded by cypresses was a garden--all roses. The bushes were -already in rich bloom, great creamy white ones and great pinky white -ones. Others were deep pink, golden yellow, a rich dark crimson. - -“This is the rose garden,” Maida explained. “Beyond,” she led the -way into still another cypress-guarded square, “is the old-fashioned -garden. There are nasturtiums here and phlox and pansies and peonies -and lots of other things I can’t remember, and in the fall there’ll be -dahlias and asters.” - -Rosie shook herself with joy. “I shall love working in this garden,” -she declared. “This afternoon let’s fill all the vases in the house -with roses.” - -“All right,” Maida agreed absently. “Now I’m going to show you the -vegetable garden.” - -“I know where that is,” Arthur boasted. “I got up early and explored.” - -Maida led the way past the croquet ground, past the tennis court to -another cypress-bordered square. Here, in parallel lines, were rows -of green sprouts. The earth must have been turned over in the spring, -indeed it might have been turned over in the previous fall, rich loam -and cultivator added. It looked like freshly-grated chocolate. - -“Gracious, I think I could make fudge of that earth,” Rosie exclaimed. - -“How tidy it looks,” Laura commented. - -“Yes,” Maida agreed. “That’s because the gardener has put it in perfect -condition for you boys. But after this, you’ve got to take care of it -yourselves. And weeds grow like--like--” She paused for a comparison. - -“Like sixty!” Arthur finished it for her. “I know; I’ve weeded my -aunt’s garden in Maine. Believe me it’s hot work. The thing to do is to -work a little every day--that’s the only way you can keep ahead of the -weeds.” - -“Sure, early in the morning!” Dicky remarked. - -“How did you know that, Dicky?” Maida asked curiously. - -“I just happened to read it in a book,” Dicky explained. - -“Now, when I tell you,” Maida went on, as one suddenly remembering the -rest of her instructions, “that we shall have to go to bed at nine -and get up at seven, I have told you all I have to tell you. Father’s -very strict about our sleep. He says we must have ten hours. There’s -one exception. Saturday night, when we can sit up until ten and Sunday -morning when we can sleep until eight. Now, how would you like to go to -the Magic Mirror?” - -“Oh I’ve been on pins and needles every moment since we got up wanting -to go to that Pond,” Rosie declared, “but then I want to see everything -at once.” - -“Arthur, do you know how to row a canoe?” Dicky asked. - -“No, I don’t,” Arthur admitted. - -“I do,” said Harold with a slight accent of superiority, “but you don’t -_row_ a canoe. You row a _boat_ and you _paddle_ a canoe.” - -“Does it take long to learn?” Dicky asked with great interest. - -“No, and it’s as easy as pie when you get the hang of it, but you fall -overboard a hundred times before you do that.” - -“I can’t swim,” Dicky said disconsolately. - -“Never mind, Dicky,” Maida comforted him, “you’ll soon learn. Can you -swim Rosie?” - -“Yes. I’ll teach you Dicky. You begin first with water wings and then--” - -In the meantime, following Maida’s lead, they were moving north. - -“Hi!” Arthur remonstrated. “The way to the Pond--I mean the Magic -Mirror--is over in that direction.” - -“This is another way to it,” Maida explained. “Once you’ve taken it, -you’ll never take any other.” - -A little path disengaged itself from the trees which fringed the lawn, -began to wind away, almost hidden, among the trees. The children -followed Maida in Indian file. For a few moments they could hear Granny -Flynn calling to the younger children; then the voices gradually died -away; bird voices took their places; the calm and the hush of the deep -forest fell upon them. - -“Oh isn’t it wonderful!” Rosie said in an awed tone. “It makes me feel -like--It makes me feel like--Well, it’s like being in church.” - -On both sides the fresh green of the trees made an intricate screen -through which the sunlight poured and splashed. The birds kept up -their calls; and many insects called too. A bee buzzed through a tiny -interval of silence; then a crow cawed. The road turned, dipped, sank. - -“Isn’t this pretty?” Maida exclaimed as they descended into a hollow -with high, thick, blossoming wild-rose bushes on both sides. - -Involuntarily, the Big Six stopped and looked about them. They stood -in a little dimple in the earth--bushes growing thick and high on its -sides. - -“How hot it is down here,” Laura commented, “and how sweet it smells.” - -“I call it the Bosky Dingle,” Maida explained. - -“What does Bosky Dingle mean?” Dicky enquired. - -“It’s a poetry phrase,” Maida told him. “It means a kind of woody -hollow.” - -“There’s the Pond!” called the practical Harold. - -The children broke into a run. - -They came out on a cleared space with a boat-house and a long jetty, -leading from a newly-shingled shed into the water. “This is for the -canoes,” Maida explained. She unlocked the door and showed a single -wide empty room. - -“Oh let’s go home and get the canoes and bring them down here,” Arthur -explained. “I’m wild to try them.” - -“It will take two to carry each canoe,” Harold explained, “and we need -bathing suits.” - -“There are bathing suits at home for all of us,” Maida explained. -“Shall we turn back?” She asked this question politely, but she said it -a little reluctantly. - -Rosie seemed to see her reluctance. - -“Did you have another plan, Maida?” Rosie demanded. - -“Well you see,” Maida answered slowly, “there’s a gypsy camp half way -round the Magic Mirror and I thought you might like to visit it.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -AFTERNOON - - -“A gypsy camp!” Arthur repeated. “Sure I’d love to go.” - -“Gypsies!” Laura shrank a little. “I think I’d be scared of gypsies.” - -“You wouldn’t be scared of these gypsies,” Maida promised. “I’ve known -them ever since I was a little girl. I am very fond of them.” - -“Well let’s go,” Arthur said, shifting from one foot to another in -impatient excitement. - -The procession started again. - -“Tell us more about the gypsies, Maida,” Arthur demanded at once. - -“There isn’t very much to tell, except that they’ve come here every -summer ever since I can remember and, indeed, long before I was born. -Father has always permitted them to camp on this ground, rent free. I -don’t seem to remember much about them when I was very little, except -that I used to go and buy baskets with Granny Flynn and they always -told Granny’s fortune. ‘Cross my palm with silver,’ they say. That -means, ‘Put some money in my hand!’” - -“How many are there?” Dicky enquired. - -“Not many. Perhaps a dozen. Let me see there’s Aunt Save and Uncle Save -the father and mother, and Aunt Vashti, the old, old grandmother. She -would frighten even you, Rosie--She looks like a witch. But she’s very -kind and I’m very fond of her. And there’s Esther and Miriam, their -daughters and Hector and Tom, their husbands; and their children. And -then there are always three or four relatives--different ones every -year--who come up from the South with them.” - -“They go South then every winter?” Arthur continued. - -“Yes,” Maida answered. She continued to give them her memories of the -gypsies through the rest of the long, shaded, greenly-winding walk, and -the children asked many questions. Presently the trail expanded ahead -into a clearing. - -“There they are!” Arthur called. - -The clearing was surrounded by pines. Against this background, a group -of tents pointed their weather-stained pyramids up from the brown -pine-needles. In the middle, a fire was burning. A black pot, hanging -from a triangle of stout sticks, emitted a cloud of steam and a busy -bubbling. A wagon stood off among the trees and tethered by a long -rope two horses were feeding. A trio of hounds, two old and one young, -rose as the children approached; made slowly in their direction. An -old woman, so wrinkled that her face looked as though it could never -have been smooth, with great hoops of gold in her ears, a red kerchief -on her head and a black one around her neck, stood watching the pot. A -little distance off, a younger woman, buxom and brown, mended. Three -men, one middle-aged, two younger, sat smoking. - -“Those dogs won’t bite us Maida,” Laura said in a panic, “will they?” - -“Oh no,” Maida said, “they know me. Hi Lize! Hi Tige!” she called. -The hounds burst into a run; came bounding to her side; leaped up -and licked her face. Maida staggered under the onslaught, but Arthur -expertly seized their collars, held them. - -The excitement in the gypsy camp was immediate. “It’s Maida!” ran a -murmur from mouth to mouth. The young woman leaped to her feet. The old -woman, less alert but still nimble, sprang from the grass also. They -all, even the men, came forward, smiling eagerly. Maida shook hands -with them and introduced her friends. - -“When did you get here?” Maida asked. “I’ve had Zeke come down here -every day for a week looking for you--every day until yesterday, when -in the excitement of our arrival, he neglected to come.” - -“We came yesterday,” they explained. They were most of them, dark, with -longish hair and flashing dark eyes but their look was very friendly. -They asked Maida a multitude of questions about her father and Granny -Flynn, her trip abroad. Finally Maida asked them if they had any -baskets ready for sale. - -“A few,” Mrs. Savory said looking pleased. “Oh Silva, bring the baskets -out! Maida you have never seen Silva and Tyma, have you? They’re my -sister’s children. My sister died last summer and now they’re living -with us.” - -A voice answered, “In a moment.” It was a child’s voice and yet it -had a curious grown-up accent as of an unusual decision of character. -The doors of one of the tents parted and a girl’s head appeared in -the opening. The children stared at her. For an instant nobody spoke. -The head disappeared. When the girl emerged, her hands were full of -baskets. Behind her came a lad very like her but older. - -Silva Burle was a slender brown girl. She did not look any older than -Rosie; but she was much taller--and she was as tawny as Rosie was dark. -Her hair, a strange amber color, hung straight to her shoulders where -the ends turned upwards, not in a curl, but in a big soft wave. Her -eyes were not big but they were long; they were like bits of shining -amber set under her thin straight brows. Her skin was a tanned amber -too. She wore a much-patched rusty dark skirt with a white middy -blouse, a tattered, yellow-ribbon tie. - -Tyma, her brother, was slim too but strong-looking, active. He had a -dark skin and hair so black that there was a purple steeliness about -it. In all this swarthy coloring, his eyes, a clear blue, seemed -strange and unexpected. His brows were thick and they lowered as the -eyes under them contemplated the group of children. Silva’s lips curled -disdainfully upwards. - -Silva nodded briefly when her aunt performed the simple introduction, -“This is Maida and her friends, Silva,” but Tyma merely stared. Then -turning his back, he strolled away to where the horses were feeding; -untethered one of them. With a single leap of his athletic body, he -was on its back. In another instant, the green leaves of the forest -closed around him as he disappeared riding bare-back into it. - -“What beautiful baskets you have Silva!” Maida said politely. - -Silva did not deign to answer. She spread her handiwork out on -the table which stood not far from the fire and then, leaving her -prospective customers to their choice, went over to the fire; sat down -before it, her back to the children. - -Aunt Save seemed to feel dimly that something was wrong. She moved over -to the table and began displaying the baskets. - -Maida made an effort to relieve her embarrassment. “Oh Aunt Save,” she -said, “what do you suppose is the first thing I am going to do when I -get time?” Without waiting for an answer, she went swiftly on. “I’m -going to wash and iron all Lucy’s clothes and pack them nicely away in -a little old hair-cloth trunk which I found in the attic. Lucy,” she -explained to her friends, “is a great big rag-baby doll that Aunt Save -made for me when I was little. It’s as big as a baby two years old. I -was fonder of it than any doll I have ever had, and so Granny Flynn -made it a whole outfit of clothes--all the things a baby should have. -I am going to pack them away and keep them for my daughter.” - -“Oh, do you mean that rag-baby doll that’s sitting in the little chair -in your room?” Rosie asked. “And that little queer brown trunk under -the window where the tree is?” - -This slant of the conversation seemed to interest Silva for she turned -a little; listened intently to what followed. - -“Yes, that’s Lucy,” Maida answered. “All her clothes are in that trunk.” - -“When I made that doll for you,” Aunt Save said, “I didn’t think you’d -play with it long. None of us thought you were going to live.” - -“That was before my illness,” Maida explained to the other children, -“when I was so lame.” - -“I told your father,” Aunt Save went on, “that there was only one thing -that could save you. And that was to go South and live with us in the -piny woods and be a little Romany for a year. But he couldn’t seem to -let you go for so long.” - -“Oh Aunt Save!” Maida exclaimed. “How I would have loved that! However -it all came out right because father gave me my Little Shop and I made -all these new friends.” - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -TWILIGHT - - -“I think that Silva Burle was just horrid!” Rosie burst out suddenly. -“Just horrid!” she repeated with an enraged accent. “I never took such -a dislike to a girl in my life. I just simply despise her!” - -The three little girls were in the rose garden. It was just after -luncheon and Granny Flynn had said they must do something in the way of -quiet exercise, before they went to swim in the Magic Mirror. They had -decided to decorate the house with flowers. - -“She was rather horrid, wasn’t she?” Maida agreed absently. “So was her -brother.” - -“You expect boys to have bad manners,” Laura commented scathingly, “but -a girl ought to behave herself better than that. She made me so mad I -wanted to stick my tongue out at her.” - -“I wanted to box her ears,” announced Rosie fiercely. - -“She seemed to take such a dislike to us--just on sight!” Maida went -on. “I don’t understand it. We didn’t do anything to her. We--” - -“Why we’d never even seen her before,” Rosie interrupted in a crescendo -of irritation. - -“She acted as though,” Maida went straight on, “she was afraid of us -for some reason, as though she thought we were going to do--” She -paused--“well I don’t know what,” she concluded. - -“I hope we never see the disagreeable thing again,” Laura said. - -“We probably will,” Maida declared. “We’ll be going to the gypsy camp -all the time, but of course she won’t come to the Little House.” - -“If she does,” Rosie threatened, “I’ll tell her to go home.” - -Rosie looked cross and she was cross. Ever since the return from the -gypsy camp her tempestuous brows had not smoothed out their knots. Her -eyes alternately burned and flashed and her cheeks were like red roses -on fire. - -Characteristically--because she wore red whenever she could--Rosie had -gathered only the crimson roses. She held a great bunch of them now, -and she stood stripping them of their thorns. Laura’s roses were pink; -Maida’s yellow. - -“I should think this would be enough,” Maida suggested in a moment. -“Let’s put them in the vases.” - -“Shall we mix them all together?” Rosie asked. “One color to each room -is really prettier. Just think how lovely the living room will be with -these great red roses everywhere.” - -“Rosie, you shall decide where the flowers go to-day, and the next time -Laura, and the next time me. That’s the only fair way,” Maida declared. - -Indoors, Maida took them to the long closet lined with shelves, lighted -by one window and furnished with a small sink, a table and three -chairs, which she called the Flower Closet. On the shelves were vases -and bowls of all colors and sizes; some high and slender; some squatty -and low; of glass and china. For a few minutes conversation languished. -The three little girls were all busy making their selection from -these receptacles; cutting away too long stems and too heavy foliage; -removing thorns. - -Rosie as usual--her movements were always as swift as -lightning--finished her work first. She came into the living room -where Maida and Laura--the result of Laura’s idea--were trying bunches -of yellow roses in low jars against bunches of pink ones in high ones. - -“I wish I could get that Silva Burle out of my mind,” Rosie burst out -with a sudden return of her irritation. “I keep thinking of her and I -get so mad I’d just like to--” - -“Granny says we can go down to the Pond now,” Arthur called suddenly, -popping in the door. “We boys have been lugging the three canoes down -to the Magic Mirror and believe me it’s some hot work. Granny says that -we must put on our bathing suits here to-day.” - -Boys and girls raced to their rooms. In a surprisingly brief time they -were back again in bathing suits and bathing shoes; the girls with -rubber caps in brilliant colors. - -“Granny says, as Dicky’s the only one that can’t swim, we must all -promise to look after him,” Arthur added warningly on their way to the -Pond. - -“I can look after myself,” Dicky remarked huffily. - -“I’m only telling you what Granny said,” Arthur stated. Apparently -Granny had put other responsibilities on him because he went on. “I -know you swim in deep water, Rosie, because I’ve seen you, and you too -Harold. But how about you Laura?” - -“Well--I’ll show you,” Laura promised caustically. - -“You’ll have to,” Arthur told her, “before I’ll let you go over your -head.” He turned to Maida. “How about you?” - -“I’m not a fast swimmer nor a strong one,” Maida declared, “but I am -quite accustomed to deep water. I used to go over the side of the yacht -with father every morning in the Mediterranean, and I can swim forever -without getting tired out.” - -“All right,” Arthur said. And then, “All in that’s going in!” he -shouted suddenly as the jetty came in sight. He burst into a run and -the file of children raced after him. Over into the water they went in -five tempestuous dives. Only Dicky remained watching them. They came -up almost simultaneously. Arthur and Harold, as a matter of natatorial -compliment, threw into each other’s faces the mud and weeds they had -brought up in their hands. Then they all struck for the middle of the -Pond. They swam with varying degrees of speed--Arthur first as became -his superior size and strength, his superior skill at all things. -Curiously enough Laura, who cut through the water like a thrown knife, -kept a close second to him. The others struggled behind, Maida always -in the rear. - -They turned over and stared into the shining sky. - -“Now tell us a story Maida!” Rosie said. - -Maida began obediently. “Once upon a time,” she said to the -accompaniment of five pairs of hands beating the water, “there lived -a little girl by the name of Rosie. She was probably the naughtiest -little girl in the world--” - -“How about Silva Burle?” Rosie interrupted quickly. “You forget her.” - -“I’ll tell you what you _do_ forget,” Laura took it up, “poor Dicky -standing there all alone on the pier.” - -“Gee,” was all Arthur said, but he turned and swam back, the rest -following him. - -“I’m going to give you your first swimming lesson now,” Arthur called -to the disconsolate figure watching them. Arthur swam in shore. He -commanded Dicky to wade into the pond up to his waist. - -“Now,” he said, putting one hand under Dicky’s chin, “drop down slowly -until you’re lying flat on the water. I’ll hold you by the chin and by -your bathing suit in the back. Now listen! You’re to do exactly what I -tell you. You’ll think I’m going to drop you but I cross my throat I -won’t. But you see that you follow my directions.” - -In a few minutes Dicky was paddling frantically, his eyes almost -bulging out of his head, his lips pursed together; his waving arms and -kicking feet beating the water almost to a lather. “Breathe the way -you always do!” Arthur was shouting. “You poor fish, open your mouth. -Suppose you do swallow some water. It won’t hurt you. Haven’t you ever -drunk any water in your life? Don’t kick up and down. Make your legs go -the way a frog’s does. Don’t go so _fast_. Now I’ll count for you. One! -Two! Three! Four! Breathe, you poor prune! How do you expect you’re -going to swim without any breath in your body?” - -The others paddled about, adding their jeers or suggestions; but at -times they frequently deserted for a longer swim. Laura displayed a -number of water tricks--she was as graceful in her swimming as in her -dancing and for a short dash she could go fast. She dove forward, -sideways, and backwards. She sat upright in the water. She turned over -and over in a somersault. Her strength was nothing to that of Rosie’s -however, who seemed never to tire of any physical exercise. - -“That will be enough for to-day, Dicky,” Arthur decided finally. “Now -put on these water wings and practice the way I’ve been telling you. -Breathe the way you always do and don’t go too fast. Don’t go into deep -water yet. If the wings should fall off or bust--” - -“Burst!” corrected Rosie promptly. - -“Collapse,” Arthur substituted with unexpected elegance, “you’ll sink -like a stone.” - -“I’ll stay near the shore,” Dicky promised docilely. “You bet,” he -added, “I don’t want to make a hole in the water.” - -Shaking off his pedagogical duties, Arthur set off alone for the -middle of the Pond, swimming with the long powerful strokes which -characterized him, his head almost under water. - -“What a stroke he has!” Maida commented admiringly. “I’d give anything -if I could cut through the water like that. Why--why who’s that?” - -Two heads appeared bobbing on the water at the other side of the -lake. No one of the children had seen anybody emerge from the woods. -The strangers must have come around the curve. The heads came forward -straight towards the middle of the lake. Arthur had reached his goal; -was floating placidly, his arms folded at the back of his neck. -Involuntarily, the other children stood silent and watched. Nearer the -two heads came to Arthur--nearer and nearer. One of them had thick -tossed black hair; the other lighter hair, satiny as the inside of a -nut where the sun caught it on the top of the head; wet and dark as -strings of seaweed in the neck. - -“It’s Silva and Tyma Burle,” Rosie exclaimed suddenly. “Oh how they can -swim!” - -The two young gypsies had drawn near enough to Arthur for the children -to measure their progress. - -“I never saw a girl swim like that,” Laura said with a touch of envy. -“She swims just like a boy.” - -Arthur, his ears sunk below the level of the water, had apparently -heard nothing. But now suddenly he threw himself on his side and -paddling just enough to keep afloat, watched the approaching pair in -amazement. - -On the Burles came, their eyes fixed on Arthur, their expressions quite -non-committal. Arthur waited. - -Suddenly a terrible thing happened! Silva threw up her hands and -screamed. Tyma, a little in advance, turned and swam to her rescue, but -once he had reached his sister’s side she caught him about the neck. It -was all over in a second. The two sank together. The children on the -jetty shrieked. Maida burst into tears. Harold started out at once for -the fatal spot. Rosie made as though to follow him. - -“Don’t Rosie,” Laura said with sudden coolness. “You’ll only be in the -way.” - -In the meantime, Arthur swam instantly for the spot where brother and -sister had disappeared. He dived at once; staying under the water for -what, to the frightened group on shore, seemed an incredible time. But -he came up; filled his lungs with air; dived again. For the third time -he appeared on the surface. For the third time he dived. - -Suddenly many rods away on the top of the water appeared two -heads--Silva’s and Tyma’s. Simultaneously Arthur came up gasping -for air. The Burles managed to wave a hand; broke into high jeering -laughter; then swam rapidly towards the other shore. By this time, -Harold had reached Arthur’s side. Together they started after the -practical jokers but both the boys were spent with their first long -swim of the year. After a while, they turned and rejoined their friends -on the shore. - -“Can you beat that?” Arthur demanded. His face had taken on the black -look that rage, with him, always developed. Rosie’s eyes darted -lightnings. Maida had stopped crying and her eyes had changed too. Not -glowering like Rosie’s, they had grown suddenly dark. Laura looked -stupefied. Dicky had turned white. Great shadows jumped out under his -eyes. - -“That was the most dreadful thing I ever saw in my life,” Maida -asserted in a voice, almost a whisper. “You might have drowned, Arthur.” - -“I’ll get even with them for that,” Arthur said in a quiet voice. “You -wait.” - -“I don’t blame you,” Rosie declared. “I’m so mad I don’t know what I -wouldn’t do.” - -“I don’t believe they’re worth taking any notice of,” Laura decided -contemptuously, “gypsies like that. Why don’t you tell their aunt, -Maida?” - -“I’d like to,” Maida answered, “but I guess I won’t. I like Aunt Save -too much.” - -“Anyway,” Harold pointed out, “it isn’t anything that concerns them. -It’s all between us children.” - -“No, I wouldn’t want any grown people to get mixed up in this at all,” -Arthur said. “I wouldn’t say anything about it to Granny Flynn or Mrs. -Dore. It’ll only worry them and nobody’s the worse for it. We didn’t do -anything to be ashamed of anyway.” - -“Ashamed of!” Rosie echoed stormily. “You were only trying to save -their lives.” - -“No,” Maida agreed, “I won’t say anything about it. I think you’re -right Arthur.” - -The Burles had reached the opposite shore by this time. Before they -disappeared into the woods, they raised their voices in a long derisive -shout. - -As Arthur listened his face grew blacker and blacker. “Do all the -yelling you want!” he called, “I’ll get even with you, my fine young -gypsies!” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -NIGHT - - -The women were too busy to take any notice of the children when they -returned except to ask them if they had a good swim. - -“I feel like reading,” Maida said with a determined air. She marched -into the library. “There’s a book here I haven’t read for a long time, -_At the Back of the North Wind_.” She went on as though talking to -herself. “It’s one of the loveliest stories I ever read. I don’t know -but what it’s my favorite of all. I feel like reading it now. It’s so -cool ... there’s a great beautiful woman in it ... the North Wind....” -Her voice melted into silence, as her hand seized a worn brown book. -She dropped into one of the big chairs; seemed to forget entirely about -her companions. - -The others--partly because there seemed nothing else to do--followed -her example. - -“Oh, here’s _A Journey to the Centre of the Earth_!” Dicky announced -joyously. “I haven’t seen it since Maida took it to Europe.” He -absorbed himself in the big thick volume. - -Rosie and Laura contented themselves respectively with _Little Men_ -and _Little Women_, and Harold began for the third time _Kidnapped_. -But Arthur found a newly published book describing the exploration of -Africa in a flying machine. He pored over it; gradually became absorbed. - -It had been late afternoon when they returned. Nearly an hour drifted -by. That coolness, which announces the approach of dusk, set in. - -“Well,” Maida said at last, breathing a long relieved sigh, “I’ve got -rid of my temper. If I hadn’t taken a book when I did, I’m sure I’d -have burst into pieces. If everybody has read all he wants to, let’s -try the tennis court.” - -They tried the tennis court (although only Maida and the two Lathrops -played tennis) but to such good effect and with so great a fascination -that they returned to it after supper. Arthur, as was to be expected -with his coolness and game sense, progressed rapidly under Harold’s -instructions. The others found it the most difficult thing they had -ever attempted. They were hot and tired when finally approaching dark -made it impossible for them to see the balls. - -They adjourned to the Tree Room where, in hammock and chairs, they -talked and talked. - -Gradually the talk grew desultory; sank to an occasional silence. - -“I was rummaging about in the barn early this morning,” Arthur said -out of the reflective quiet in which he had long been immersed, “and -I found all kinds of things in a big chest--base-balls and bats; -foot-ball stuff and boxing gloves. Do you know how to box, Harold?” - -“No,” Harold replied, “never tried it.” - -“Want to learn?” Arthur inquired. “I’ll teach you. I’d like the -practice.” - -“Sure,” Harold said. “When will we begin?” - -“To-morrow,” Arthur responded. - -“What do you want to practice boxing for, Arthur?” Rosie asked -curiously. - -“Oh I thought I might need it sometime,” Arthur answered evasively. He -smiled into the dark. - -“Say!” Rosie burst out suddenly, “did anybody besides me get sun-burned -to-day?” - -“Well, I didn’t mention it,” Laura answered sleepily, “but I feel as if -my face were on fire.” - -“Oh! Oh!” Maida exclaimed contritely. “I forgot to warn you to be sure -to wear hats this first day or two. Are you burnt, Arthur?” - -“To a cinder,” Arthur declared, “but I’ve been burnt before. I don’t -mind it so very much.” - -“And you Dicky?” Maida went on. - -Dicky’s answer was a grimace. - -“And Harold?” Maida continued in a despairing voice. - -“I shall be one big blister to-morrow,” Harold prophesied grimly. - -“Oh my goodness!” wailed Maida futilely. “It’s all my fault. Well it’s -half-past eight,” she added after a pause. “According to rules we can -sit up until nine, but I’m going to bed now. I never was so tired in -all my life.” - -“I’m falling asleep where I am,” Rosie admitted, “and as for Laura, she -_is_ asleep.” - -This was the first day at the Little House. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -PLANS - - -“Now,” Maida announced at breakfast a week later, “we’ve had all -the vacation we’re going to get--at least all that the Big Six get. -To-morrow begins our work. Father said we could plan it ourselves how -it was to be done and unless our plans were bad ones, we could keep -right on with them. Now I propose that, right after breakfast, you -boys go to the barn and make a program of your work. We girls will -stay here and make a program for ourselves. You remember what it is -you’re expected to do?” Notwithstanding protests that they remembered -everything, she recited briefly again to the boys the list of their -duties. - -After breakfast, as directed, the Big Six divided. The boys proceeded -to the barn. The girls settled themselves in the big, comfortable -living-room, began to discuss the work that they were to do. Rosie, in -some inexplicable way, soon took control; was handling the situation in -the practical, efficient way that was typical of her. - -“Do you know how to make a bed, Maida?” she asked. - -“No,” Maida answered dolefully, “I never made one in my life. It looks -easy though.” - -“It’s easy to make a bed _badly_,” Rosie said with emphasis. “How about -you Laura?” - -“Well,” Laura replied slowly, “I _have_ made one.” - -Rosie groaned. “I know what it will look like,” she commented. “Now I -_can_ make a bed,” she boasted. “Right after we finish this, I’ll take -you upstairs and show you both. Now, how about cooking?” - -Maida looked aghast. “I never cooked anything in my life.” - -“That’s what I thought,” Rosie remarked grimly. “How about cooking, -Laura?” - -“I can make pop-overs, one-two-three-four cake and cup-custard,” Laura -stated proudly. “And, oh yes, fudge!” - -“Is that all?” Rosie asked scornfully. - -“Yes,” Laura admitted. - -“Can either of you make a fire?” Rosie went on. - -Two meek _noes_ were the answer. - -“Well, as far as I can see,” Rosie decided, “we’ve got to begin at the -very beginning. Now I’ve been thinking this matter over and it seems -to me there’s only one fair way of doing it and that is for us to weed -the flower garden _all together_ every morning; each one of us to take -care of their own room--” - -“_Her_ own room,” Maida corrected. She added roguishly, “I thought you -were beginning to feel too important, Rosie.” - -“All right, smarty-cat! _Her_ own room. Then when it comes to -Floribel’s day out, we’ll take turns in planning the three meals. But -every Thursday, one of us must have the day in charge. On that day the -other two are only assistants.” - -“Rosie,” Maida exclaimed, “I think you are perfectly wonderful! That -seems to me to be absolutely all right. Don’t you think so, Laura?” - -“Yes,” Laura answered equally enthusiastic, “I think it’s marvelous.” - -“Well, then,” Rosie began again, “let’s begin to plan meals for this -Thursday.” - -They were deep in this interesting task when the boys returned from the -barn. They compared plans. - -The boys’ plan did not differ so very much from the girls’ except that, -when it came to the work in the vegetable garden they had decided to -weed in rotation. Also in rotation, they were to sprinkle garden and -tennis court nightly, to roll the tennis court daily. Each boy was to -make his own bed. There was a typewriter in the library and they spent -the next half-hour typing out these plans and making as many copies as -there were children. Then they pinned them up in their rooms. - -“Say,” Arthur declared suddenly, “you girls have got to show us how to -make a bed. I suppose I could make one, after a fashion, but I never -have. I don’t know how to begin.” - -“I do,” said Harold unexpectedly. “I learned how to make beds last -summer at camp. I’ll show you.” - -“Show us now,” Arthur demanded. - -The three boys started in the direction of the barn. - -“Let’s go too,” Rosie whispered. “Isn’t it a joke to think of boys -trying to make beds? I’d like to see the bed after Harold has finished -with it.” - -The girls tagged the boys; followed them upstairs into the barn. - -At once Harold began in the most business-like way to strip the bed. It -was apparent that on arising he had pulled the covers back to air. Then -with swift, efficient movements, he began to re-make it. - -“Goodness!” Rosie exclaimed humbly in a moment, “I can’t make a bed as -well as that. I’m going to learn too.” - -Indeed, the bed looked like a mathematical problem which had just been -solved, and as Harold proceeded to clean up the room in the way he -had learned at camp, the others followed him with respectful glances. -Harold tidied the three chiffoniers and the three closets. When he -finished, the room had a look of military perfection. - -“Now,” he commanded, “Arthur you make your bed and Dicky you make -yours; I’ll supervise the job.” - -“I’m going right back to my room and re-make my bed, Harold,” Maida -declared. “It looks as though somebody had driven an automobile over -it.” - -“I will too,” admitted the humbled Rosie. “Think of having a boy teach -you how to make a bed!” - -The boys rejoined the girls after a while and again they went over -their plans. In the midst of it all, Granny Flynn came in to see what -was keeping them so quiet. They showed her the typewritten schedules -and she approved them highly. “They ought to work like a charm,” she -averred. - -And indeed, it seemed as though her prophecy were a true one. About -the same hour the next morning, twin alarm-clocks rang out; one in the -barn, another in Maida’s room. Very soon after, a sleepy boy--Arthur -had volunteered for the first day in the garden--emerged from the barn; -three sleepy girls from the house. They weeded busily for half an hour. -In the meantime, another sleepy boy was rolling the tennis court which -had been hosed the night before. Then came breakfast. Immediately after -breakfast, rooms were made speckless. - -With the girls, this continued to be a kind of game. They not only -prided themselves on keeping their chambers clean, but they actually -tried to match the flowers they placed there to the chintzes and -wallpapers. - -“It’s fun to take care of these darling rooms,” Rosie declared again -and again. “They’re so little I feel as though we ought to buy a doll’s -broom and a doll’s carpet-sweeper and a doll’s dust-pan and brush. I -never saw such sweet furniture in all my life, and how I love the roof -slanting down like that!” - -“I feel that way too--exactly as though I were putting a doll’s house -in order,” Laura coincided happily. - -As for the boys--they bothered with no flowers. Indeed a military -plainness prevailed in the barn. This of course meant also a military -neatness to which no one of them was accustomed but Harold. Harold -constituted himself critic-in-chief. And he proved a stern critic -indeed. He would not permit the sheets on the bed to deviate one hair’s -breadth from perfect horizontality or absolute verticality. A bit of -paper on the floor elicited an immediate rebuke. He even stipulated the -exact spots on the chiffonier-tops where brush, comb and mirror were to -be kept and he saw that the other boys kept them there. The victims of -his passion for military order had to roll their pajamas in a certain -way and put them in a certain place. A similar neatness characterized -the closets. Coats and trousers had to be hung on special hangers; ties -on special hooks. As for bureau drawers--Harold maintained that there -was a place for everything and woe to Dicky or Arthur when everything -was not in its place. - -Immediately after the rooms were done in the morning came errands. The -first morning, Granny let the Big Six do all the marketing, even what -could have been done over the telephone; so that they could get to know -where the shops were. They proceeded on their bicycles, with Maida for -a guide, to Satuit Center. Maida took them to the Post Office; to the -butcher; the grocer; the coalman; the wood-man; the hardware shop; the -ice cream establishment--even to the little dry-goods shops and to the -cobbler. She introduced them to all these village authorities. - -“After to-day,” Maida explained, “we’ll have to do only part of -Granny’s marketing for her. And only one of us need attend to it.” - -“Oh let’s do it every day--and all together,” Dicky burst out -impulsively. - -“You think you’ll enjoy that because it’s new to you,” Maida laughed, -“but you’ll soon get tired of it. No, we’d better take turns.” - -Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday went by. More and more certainly Granny -Flynn’s prophecy seemed on the way to be proved true. The twin sets of -plans worked perfectly. It looked as though the summer were going by -without a hitch. Then came Thursday--Floribel’s and Zeke’s day out. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -RESPONSIBILITY - - -Really, as Rosie pointed out, the work for Floribel’s and Zeke’s day -out began the morning before. You had to make sure then that there was -enough raw material in the house for the three meals of the next day. -Therefore, early Wednesday morning before they went to market, the -three girls sat down at the typewriter and worked out the program of -their three meals. - -“Rosie, you take charge of this first day,” Maida urged, “you’ve had -so much more experience than Laura or me. Don’t you think she ought, -Laura?” - -“I certainly do,” Laura agreed with conviction. “Thank goodness, -breakfast is always easy. It’s fruit, and breakfast food and eggs. -Thank goodness too, that fruit grows already made. Just think how much -work it would be if we had to cook oranges and peaches, or if we had -to shell berries. And what a blessing milk is! How nice of the cow to -deliver it all cooked.” - -“Well, then,” Rosie began, taking the situation in hand at once, “let’s -start with fruit. Let’s have oranges--” - -“Oh let’s!” interrupted Maida excitedly, “I know a perfectly beautiful -way to prepare oranges. You cut the skins into quarters and then into -eighths while they’re still on the orange. You don’t pull them off, but -you turn them back, so that the orange stands in the midst of petals of -its own peel--just like a gold pond-lily.” - -“All except Delia’s orange,” Laura put in. - -“I notice that Mrs. Dore gives her orange juice. And after she has -squeezed it, she strains it very carefully.” - -“All right, Laura,” Rosie agreed again, at once, “you can attend to the -oranges.” - -“I think we’d better have prepared breakfast-food this first -breakfast,” Maida suggested. “We are bound to make a lot of mistakes in -cooking; but we can’t hurt anything that just comes out of a box.” - -“Yes, you’re right, Maida,” Rosie agreed. “Now, shall we have an -omelette? I know how to cook omelettes. No, I guess we’d better have -boiled eggs. They’re the easiest, and I don’t want to make any mistakes -the first day if possible.” - -“Well that settles breakfast,” Maida declared with satisfaction. “Now -what are we going to have for dinner?” - -“I’d like to have a fish chowder,” Rosie suggested. “We haven’t had one -this summer. Most everybody likes chowder. And then,” she added with a -smile, “it’s the only thing I know how to cook.” - -“Then we’ll have it, Rosie,” Maida decided. - -“I’ll teach you to how to make chowder if you like,” Rosie offered. - -“Oh will you, Rosie?” Maida asked ecstatically. “I love fish chowder. -I’ve never in all my life had enough. How I would enjoy making it.” - -“And then,” Rosie continued, “for dessert, we’ll have a bread pudding. -It’s the only pudding I know how to make.” - -Laura drew a long breath, “What’ll we eat next Thursday?” she asked in -a serious tone. “I don’t know how to cook anything but popovers and -custards and cake. Maida doesn’t know how to cook anything at all. And -you are cooking, this first Thursday, everything you know.” - -Rosie sighed too. “Well we’ll consider next Thursday when it comes,” -she decided wisely, “and besides Granny and Mrs. Dore or Floribel will -teach us how to cook anything--they said they would. And now we come to -supper.” - -However supper was not so easy for Laura as for the other two, -because Rosie immediately decided that Laura should make some of her -one-two-three-four cake. The rest of the meal was to be bread and -butter, some of the preserves left over from the year before, with -which the house was richly provided; and great pitchers of milk. - -“We’ve got to do the cooking for this whole day ourselves,” Maida -sighed. “There isn’t a thing in which the boys can help us.” - -“No,” Rosie admitted regretfully, “and I wanted to make them work too. -Next week,” she added, “they’ll be busy enough because we’ll have ice -cream and they’ll have to turn the freezer.” - -The girls pinned up their schedule of meals on the kitchen wall; set -the alarm clock for an incredibly early hour; went to bed at eight, -instead of nine, very serene in their minds. - - -The record of their first day was probably as good and as bad as that -of most amateur cooks. In the early morning, the little girls moved so -noiselessly about the big kitchen and talked in such low tones that -Mrs. Dore said she had not heard a sound until the breakfast bell rang. -The first two courses of breakfast went off beautifully. Then they -discovered they had boiled the eggs twelve minutes. Granny declared -that they must eat them because eggs were expensive. Perhaps it was -to take away the sting from this mistake that Mrs. Dore remarked that -she had never seen oranges look so beautiful as these--in their curled -golden calyxes. - -When it came to luncheon, there were mistakes again; but not such -serious ones. Rosie’s chowder was hot and perfectly delicious; only -there wasn’t enough of it. Rosie herself nobly went without; but the -children clamored for more. On the other hand, she had made enough -bread pudding for a family twice their size. Here the boys eagerly came -to the rescue and demanded three helpings each. - -Supper was very successful. Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore congratulated -Rosie warmly upon it. - -“Well I didn’t make any mistakes for this meal,” Rosie said dryly, -“because there wasn’t anything that I cooked.” - -However Granny continued to praise the three tired little girls. - -“It’s foine little cooks you’ll make,” she prophesied. - -In the glow that this praise developed, they washed and wiped the -dishes, chattering like magpies. And then, following the impulse which -emerged from that happy glow, they cleaned up Floribel’s kitchen; -re-arranged and re-decorated it. - -They re-arranged and re-decorated to such good purpose that, the next -day, Floribel said privately to Mrs. Dore. “It sho do look beautiful. -Ah’se never seen a kitchen lak it, but Ah can’t find a _single thing_.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -VISITORS - - -After the second Thursday, which was Floribel’s and Zeke’s day out, -came the second Saturday of the children’s stay in the Little House, -and on that Saturday all the parents came to Satuit from Charlestown -to see how their children were getting on: Mr. and Mrs. Brine, Mr. and -Mrs. Lathrop, Mr. and Mrs. Clark, Mr. and Mrs. Doyle, Mr. and Mrs. -Hale. Arthur had no mother but Mr. Duncan appeared with the rest. Mr. -Westabrook appeared at odd moments and helped entertain the guests. -The children of these parents were so excited that Maida and Dicky -lamented loudly that they had no relatives to show the Little House. -This was before the train which brought all these guests arrived. -Afterwards, they had no time to regret anything. The hospitality of -the Little House was stretched to its furthest expansion. The boys, -bunking in tents, hastily erected on the lawn, gave up their beds to -their fathers. The girls, sleeping on extra cots in the nursery, gave -up their beds to their mothers. This did not take care of the entire -company. All the rooms in the Annex were filled. - -It was a two days, equally busy for hosts and guests. The children -were determined to show their parents everything and the parents were -equally determined to see everything. One instant Mr. and Mrs. Doyle -could be seen being dragged off by Molly and Timmie to view House Rock; -the next, Mr. and Mrs. Clark, herded by the twins, were being pulled in -the direction of the Fairy Ring. Laura and Rosie displayed every detail -of house and barn to their parents. Arthur took his father on two long -explorations through the woods. Betsy celebrated the arrival of Mr. and -Mrs. Hale by her first attempt to run house and the Magic Mirror, and -brought back away. She was caught half way between them in triumph, her -big eyes sparkling with the mischief which always filled them when she -was successful in accomplishing her purpose. - -Perhaps though, Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore enjoyed more than anybody -this break in their country life; for a happy smile never left Granny’s -wrinkled face, and Mrs. Dore talked to the visitors all day long. - -The company left on a late Sunday afternoon train with an invitation -to come every future week-end; and it looked as though life in the -Little House would go on as usual. - -However, Monday proved to be an equally exciting day as the two which -had preceded it. For when the children--Big Six and Little Six--came -back from their swim in the afternoon, they saw, lying placidly on the -lawn, the figure of a strange man--asleep or awake they could not at -first make out. - -The figure decided that for them by leaping to its feet in what seemed -one athletic jerk. - -“It’s Billy Potter!” shrieked Maida. - -“Billy!” “Billy!” “Billy!” the others made chorus. And they raced over -to his side; threw themselves in one scrambled heap upon him. Being of -athletic build, Billy Potter sustained that shock splendidly. - -Billy Potter was one of the oldest friends the Little Shop had had. He -was a reporter on a Boston paper, a great favorite with Mr. Westabrook, -whom he had many times interviewed; and a devoted friend of Maida’s -whom he called Petronilla. It was the first time the children had seen -him since Maida left for Europe. - -He was rather short--Billy Potter--blue-eyed and golden-haired; the -eyes very blue and very observant; his hair closely woven into a thick -curly thatch. - -The children alternately hugged and thumped him. - -“Why haven’t you been here before, Billy?” Maida said, “I’ve been at -home two weeks now.” - -“Only because I wasn’t in Boston,” Billy declared. “I’ve been away on -my vacation. I had to take it early this year. I couldn’t have come -over here at this moment, but that I’m on a story.” - -When Billy Potter spoke of a “story,” he meant the account which he -wrote of events for his paper. “I’m on a kidnapping case,” he explained -over their heads to Mr. Westabrook. “I may be here in Satuit on and off -for a few days. And if invited, I might become a guest of this noble -establishment.” - -“Oh do come, oh do, oh do!” the children entreated. - -“All right,” Billy agreed, “I’m only waiting for an invitation, -Petronilla.” - -“Well here it is,” said Maida. - -“I accept,” Billy Potter laughed. - -The children had to take him the rounds too. He wondered at and -exclaimed over the vegetable garden. He exclaimed over and wondered at -the flower garden. He went in swimming in the Magic Mirror, and showed -them many new water tricks. He inspected House Rock with the Little -Six. He climbed to the Tree Room with the Big Six. He declared that the -Tree Room was where he must sleep. And he did sleep there, although it -took all the ingenuity that he possessed, plus the assistance of the -three boys, to pull a cot up into it. - -And while Billy Potter was still a guest, as though, as Maida said, -_wonders would never cease_, Dr. Pierce suddenly appeared on the scene. - -Dr. Pierce was the Westabrook family physician. He had known Maida all -her life and called her Pinkwink. He too had often visited the Little -Shop; had been one of its advisors. - -The children deserted Billy for a moment and threw themselves pell-mell -on the old physician. He stood braced for the shock which made every -one of the tight gray curls on his head quiver and brought the -twinkliest of twinkles to his happy old eyes. - -“Well, _Pinkwink_!” he exclaimed, “is this the little girl who used to -have cheeks as white as paper and eyes like a burnt hole in a blanket? -And are these those pale, washed-out, colorless, slim-jim-looking city -children I used to know?” - -He hugged all the girls impartially, shook hands with the boys; then he -too made the rounds of the place. - -He played all his old games on them; drawing Betsy out to tell her -exploits; listening with great enjoyment to Molly and Timmie; and never -ceasing to pretend that Dorothy and Mabel were one girl with a magic -power of being in two places at once. - -“You must come oftener, Dr. Pierce,” Maida said when at last they found -themselves seated in the living room. - -“Oh I’m coming often enough,” Dr. Pierce said. “You’ll get good and -tired of me before I have finished with you. I’m coming at regular -intervals to see that you don’t drown yourselves or get ivy-poison, or -sun-stroke or lockjaw or any of those things that children are so fond -of. I shall make regular inspections. In fact I am going to make one -this visit. Now that I speak of it, this strikes me as a good time. -Line up over there against the wall, all of you, and stick out your -tongues.” - -Life fell into regular habits after a while. For work--two hours every -morning, except on Thursdays, took care of that. On Thursdays, however, -it was a matter of several hours. For play--it seemed as though the -rest of the long golden days was all play. - -After the household tasks came bathing which had become a habit as -regular as eating. Bathing was almost the best fun they had--especially -for Dicky. - -Dicky soon rejected the water wings. He was swimming now--not of course -as fast or as well as the others--but swimming with that fresh joy -which only the amateur knows. The others were perfecting strokes of -various kinds and practising fancy diving of various sorts. Arthur was -of course the best and strongest performer among them. Maida would -never be more than a fair swimmer nor Harold; but Rosie had soon -out-distanced Laura, was beginning to work into Arthur’s class. However -Laura was still, would probably always be, the most graceful of them -all. - -The afternoons were spent in walking and playing tennis; the evenings -were given up to reading and games. - -It looked at first as if their program would never vary. The beautiful -weather kept up and the beautiful country seemed full of diversion. -Occasionally came a dark day and then the boys devoted themselves to -boxing in the barn; their shouts and laughter would reach even to the -Little House. On those occasions Mrs. Dore and Granny would gather the -girls about them; set the older ones to mending or to teaching Molly -and the Clark twins how to sew. - -The Big Six kept running into the Burles although the appearance of any -of the Little House children on the path leading to the gypsy camp was -a signal for Silva and Tyma to disappear instantly into the bushes. -The children frequently came across the young gypsies peddling their -baskets in the village--at the pleasant Wampum Arms which was the -Satuit hotel; or at the quiet farmhouses along the road. In the long -walks that they occasionally took in the woods, Maida and her friends -were likely to happen upon the outlaw pair. If the Burles saw the girls -coming, they quickly looked and walked the other way. The two gypsies -were not however much bothered with attentions from the Little House -children, for since the experience at the Magic Mirror, the latter -never voluntarily glanced in their direction. - -Once Rosie came home almost breathless with rage. “What do you think -has just happened, Maida?” she asked indignantly. “I was coming along -the path when I saw a little opening in the bushes. It looked so pretty -that I thought I’d cut into it. Just then I saw Silva Burle running--oh -running like _sixty_--although she had a bottle of milk under her arm. -She heard me coming and suddenly she disappeared through the bushes. -But before she got away she made--oh the horridest face at me. I was so -mad--” - -“She certainly is a strange girl,” Maida remarked in a perplexed tone. -“I don’t understand why she acts so. We’ve never done anything to her. -Why should she treat us like this?” - -Arthur also reported that once, early in the morning, he caught -sight of Silva Burle flying along the path ahead of him, a bundle -of--he could not tell what--under her arms. At the sound of his -footsteps--Arthur said it was exactly as though she were afraid of -something he might do--though, he added, what she expected him to do, -he couldn’t guess, she flew to cover like a rabbit; actually vanished -from his sight. - -But the most disagreeable of all was Laura’s experience. Rosie -pointed out to her the little opening among the trees which had so -interested her. The next day, passing it alone, it occurred to Laura -that she would find out where it led. Like Rosie she walked through -the underbrush--but she got farther than Rosie did. Suddenly she came -against a trailing tree branch; she started to climb over it. One -foot had planted itself. She lifted the other and--splash! A pail of -water, hung on an over-hanging branch, fell on her, drenching her from -head to foot. It spoiled the gloss of her freshly-ironed muslin frock -of course, but it spoiled her temper more. Maida pondered all this -evidence, utterly perplexed. Why the Burles should have taken such a -dislike to them all she could not guess. She did not speak of it to -her father because she was afraid he might complain to Aunt Save. And -Maida did not want to make trouble for her friend. But under promise -of secrecy, she discussed the situation with Billy Potter. For once, -that astute young gentleman had no explanation of a curious social -phenomenon. - -Billy Potter was coming to see them regularly now; so was Mr. -Westabrook. They both had long talks with the children, collectively -and separately. - -One afternoon as they were sitting in the living room a curious -revelation occurred. Arthur was talking about the forest. It was plain -to be seen that it fascinated him beyond measure. Often he would wake -early in the morning; slip down to the Magic Mirror; canoe himself -across its dawn-swept, glossy surface to the other side; wander for an -hour or more in the woods. - -“I guess I’ll have to make a forester out of you,” Mr. Westabrook said -that afternoon. “I hope you don’t stay up late at night.” His remark -was not a question, only a comment. - -Arthur flushed, remained silent. Mr. Westabrook continued to look at -him. And now his look was a question. - -“Twice--” Arthur faltered finally--“when the moon was full. I wanted to -see if I could come up to some of your deer.” - -“Well, did you manage?” Mr. Westabrook asked. - -“Only once,” Arthur answered. “If they get the smell of you--good -night! But I read in a book here in the library how to work around so’s -the wind wouldn’t carry it--and one night, I watched a group feeding -and tossing their horns nearly five minutes.” - -“It’s a pretty sight,” Mr. Westabrook remarked. “I guess if I were a -boy I couldn’t resist that myself. But I want you to promise me that -you’ll make these explorations only the three nights that the moon is -full.” - -Arthur promised readily. - -“Oh father,” Maida begged, “couldn’t I do it too?” - -Her father shook his head. “No I guess you little girls must stay in -your beds. Yes you too Dicky,” as Dicky’s lips opened automatically, -“and you Harold. Sometime perhaps but not now. Arthur is older and -bigger. He can take care of himself. Now,” he concluded quickly as if -determined to give envy no time to develop, “come out into the barn. I -hear there’s some good boxing going on here. Besides I want you to show -me how your tennis is improving.” - - -The Little Six continued to play near or in the house directly under -Granny Flynn’s or Mrs. Dore’s watchful eye. Occasionally they were -permitted to wade in the lake, but only when one of the grown-ups -accompanied them. For the most of their time, they were contented to -frequent Home Rock. - -Maida had told the Little Six that there were toys awaiting them in -the Little House. These included dolls of all sizes; doll furniture; -little sets of dishes, china and pewter. Granny eked these out with the -store of saucerless cups and cupless saucers, the cracked bowls and -plates which linger on the outskirts of all respectable china closets. -The children were permitted to carry pails of water over to House Rock -and there, in its shade, miniature housekeeping began. - -From every level, glassy-eyed dolls, sitting placidly in little chairs, -or lying placidly in little beds, surveyed the landscape. Every morning -the small mothers burst into an orgy of house-cleaning, sweeping rock -rooms, dusting doll furniture, washing doll dishes. Every afternoon, -there broke out a fury of baking. Hundreds of delicious mud pies were -mixed, baked and then abandoned to that limbo, to which all mud pies -are sooner or later consigned. When this play gave out, the ingenious -Mrs. Dore set them to cutting out paper dolls; and to making, in -scrap-books hastily improvised from brown paper, innumerable rooms, -furnished with advertisement furniture, cut from magazines. This -involved endless hours of cutting in which scissors disappeared as -though by witchcraft and reappeared as though by magic; endless hours -of pasting from which the small interior decorators returned splashed -with flour paste from head to foot. - -When in turn this game lost its savor, the resourceful Mrs. Dore -designed paper houses, these architectural wonders, made from the -endless piles of rejected paper boxes which the under-the-eaves closets -of the Little House contained. The Little Six were as much delighted -with the Little House and its neighborhood as the Big Six. But unlike -the Big Six--with the exception of Betsy--they were content with -near-by joys. But Betsy had never recovered from her tendency to run -away. - -Once or twice she slipped off the House Rock and started to make -through the green forests in any direction that occurred to her. But -she was always caught. Caught--because after her first straying, Mrs. -Dore put on the efficient little Molly the burden of keeping a watch -upon her. And Molly watched Betsy--watched her with the same quiet, -supervising care which she had always brought to her guardianship of -the self-willed, stubborn Timmie. After a while, astute Betsy came to -realize that a guard was always near and, for the time being ceased to -stray. - -“She’ll do it sometime,” Dicky prophesied again and again. “She always -has and she always will.” - -The children recovered from their first attack of sunburn; but they -succumbed to another and another. The second attack was not so painful -and the third was scarcely noticed. The red in their faces deepened to -a brown which was like the protection of armor against the sun. The -blue-eyed and fair-haired ones--Maida and the two Lathrops--freckled; -but Rosie turned a deeper rose-bronze every day; Dicky was fast -changing to the color of a coffee bean and Arthur threatened to become -pitch-black. As for the Little Six, Maida said they were “just colonies -of freckles”; and colonies in which layer had grown on layer. - -“I can’t believe you are the same children I saw in the city a little -over two weeks ago,” Buffalo Westabrook remarked on his second visit. -“First I was afraid you were working too hard. When Maida sent me -the program of your work, it looked to me as if you were undertaking -altogether too much, but you certainly thrive on it.” - -“Well we play more than we work,” Rosie explained. - -“I never was so hungry in all my life,” Laura declared, “and I fall -asleep the moment my head touches the pillow.” - -“All right,” Buffalo Westabrook laughed. “You’re doing so well I’ll -leave it all in your hands.” - -He always surveyed both the flower garden and the vegetable garden when -he came--surveyed them with much interest. He always went into the barn -and made an examination of the boys’ quarters. - -And so with work and play, July wore itself away. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -BETSY’S FIND - - -The Big Six--as the older children were now called--were returning -from their swim. A shower, early in the morning, had delayed the -bathing hour until afternoon. And their pent-up spirits had exploded in -prolonged skylarking in the water. It was late afternoon when they came -in sight of the Little House. They threw themselves under one of the -twin elms on the front lawn, a little warm from their walk home. And -as the Big Six languidly talked, the Little Six came, in single file, -along the trail which led from House Rock. - -“Where’s Betsy?” the sharp-eyed Rosie called. - -“I sent her back for her dolly,” Molly explained gravely. “She forgot -and left Hildegarde on House Rock. Hildegarde was all dressed up in her -best clothes and I didn’t fink she ought to stay out all night long.” - -“That’s right, Molly,” Maida applauded the little girl. “Take just as -good care of your dollies as you do of yourselves. And then when you -grow up, they’ll still be with you--like Lucy.” - -Molly, heading the file turned suddenly and walked soberly over to -Maida’s side. She knelt down on the grass beside her. “Maida,” she -said, “when we first came down here, you said if we were very _very_ -good, we could play with Lucy some rainy day.” - -Maida laughed up into the earnest little face. The key-note of Molly’s -coloring was brown just as Delia’s was red, Betsy’s black, and the -Clark twins pink-and-white. Molly’s serious little face, from which -hung two tight thick little braids, had, even in her wee childhood, a -touch of motherliness; and indeed she brooded like a warm little mother -bird over the entire rest of the group. - -“So I did,” Maida said. - -“But we’ve only had free rainy days,” Molly complained. - -The Big Six laughed. Molly could not pronounce t and her failure in -this respect always entertained the Big Six. They all reached out and -knocked the elm trunk. “Knock wood!” they called to Molly; and Molly, -not at all understanding what it was all about, obediently tapped the -tree with her dimpled knuckles. - -“And you didn’t let us have Lucy those free days,” Molly stated -reproachfully. - -“But if you wait long enough, Molly,” Maida excused herself, “you are -sure to have a big three-days’ storm. And I promise you you shall have -Lucy all three days.” - -“And the little hair frunk?” Molly questioned eagerly. - -“Yes,” Maida agreed, “the little hair frunk.” - -“Cross you froat!” Molly demanded. - -“Yes, cross my froat,” Maida agreed and crossed it. - -“Oh goody!” Molly skipped away on the wings of ecstasy. - -“Did Betsy come back?” Dicky asked carelessly. - -“I didn’t notice,” Maida answered absently, “I wasn’t looking.” - -But after a while the supper bell rang. The children filed into the -dining room and took their places. One chair was vacant. - -“Where’s Betsy?” Mrs. Dore immediately asked. - -Everybody looked puzzled and nobody answered. - -“I told her to go and get her dolly,” Molly asserted. - -Nobody paid any attention to her. - -“She’s probably up-stairs in the nursery,” Mrs. Dore decided. “Once or -twice she’s fallen asleep up there--she’s got so tired playing.” - -She left the room and the children heard her running over the stairs. -In a moment or two, they heard her footsteps coming back--at a swifter -pace. - -“She isn’t there,” Mrs. Dore said in a quiet voice. “Nor in any one of -the upstairs rooms. Now before you eat, children, scatter about the -place and see if you can find her.” - -“She’s run away,” Dicky asserted. “I told you she would.” - -“I told her to go back for her dolly,” Molly reiterated gravely. - -As Mrs. Dore had ordered, the children scattered. They searched the -house, the Annex, the barn, the Tree House, the two gardens, and the -adjacent trails. No Betsy! By this time, Floribel and Zeke, looking -very serious, had joined in the search. Granny Flynn, obviously -frightened, was wringing her hands. Mrs. Dore’s face had turned -serious too, but she was quite mistress of herself. - -“We’ll wait a few minutes,” she ordered slowly, “and then if we haven’t -found her, we’ll telephone the Big House. In the meantime, Granny, -you see that the children have their supper. The rest of you,” she -addressed the Big Six, “must go without your supper for a while. I want -you to help.” - -The Big Six wanted to help of course. For a moment or two they wandered -about aimlessly--a haphazard group; with Mrs. Dore and Floribel and -Zeke trying to direct all at once. Suddenly Arthur Duncan took command -of the situation. He ran into the house and emerged with his arms full -of things; the cow-bell with which Floribel called the children to -meals and four electric flash-lights. “Laura,” he commanded, handing -her the cow-bell, “I want you to stand here at the door and ring this -bell at regular intervals. I’m going to divide the rest of you into -pairs and send you off in different directions. We’re losing time, -all bunched together like this. Now Mrs. Dore, if you and Dicky will -go to the Magic Mirror and hunt the woods there--and Floribel, you -and Rosie take the House Rock direction. Zeke, you and Harold search -in front, across the road. Maida and I’ll beat the woods back of the -house. Remember, don’t any one of you go out of hearing of the bell. -And if any of you find Betsy, come back and ring the bell hard--without -stopping.” - -The four pairs scattered, north, south, east and west. For a few -moments Maida could hear the others crashing through the woods. She -caught their voices ... getting farther and farther away ... calling -“Betsy!” ... “Betsy!” ... fragments of sentences. Finally as she -and Arthur plunged deeper and deeper into the forest, she got only -broken blurred calls. At length these too died away. The silence of -the immeasurable, immemorial forest closed about her and Arthur. The -oncoming dusk seemed to be pouring like a great, gradual-growing flood -upon them. - -“There isn’t any chance of our losing Betsy forever, Arthur?” Maida -asked once in a hushed voice. - -“Not a chance,” Arthur answered. “If we don’t find her, your father -will. In five minutes he can get enough men together to beat these -woods. And by midnight they can cover every spot of them.” - -“They are awfully big woods, Arthur,” Maida commented a little -fearfully. - -“But a gang of men working systematically,” Arthur explained, “could -get through them in no time. Why the year my father and I camped out -in Maine, there was a child lost in a forest a hundred times as big as -this, but the whole village turned out and they found her in an hour.” -Arthur did not add that the child was only three. He went on. “You see, -little children can’t walk very fast. They are likely to go round in -circles any way. And they soon get tired out. We shall probably find -her asleep.” - -“But if she’s fast asleep,” Maida remarked, “she can’t help us by -answering our calls.” - -To this Arthur answered, “Perhaps our calls will wake her.” - -In the meantime, they searched every bit of ground thoroughly. At the -foot of tree trunks, beside rocks, under bushes, Arthur thrust the rays -of his electric flash-light. At intervals, he called to Maida and at -intervals Maida called to him. It grew darker and darker. - -“There, there’s the moon!” Arthur said in a relieved tone. “It’s going -to help a good deal--having a full moon.” Following his pointing -finger, Maida caught a faint, red glow through the trees. They searched -a little longer. - -“Arthur, I can barely hear the bell,” Maida exclaimed suddenly. - -Arthur sighed. “I was just thinking of that,” he said. “I guess we’ll -have to go back to the Little House and telephone the Big House.” - -They turned and walked in the direction of the cow-bell. They were too -preoccupied with the sense of their unhappiness to talk. Once only -Maida said, “She’s one of the darlingest little girls I ever knew. If -anything happened to Betsy--And then how could we tell her mother?” - -When they came out on the lawn of the Little House, they found Floribel -and Rosie sitting there. A minute later, Zeke and Harold appeared from -one direction and, after an interval, Mrs. Dore and Dicky from another. -They all had the same anxious, slightly-terrified look. - -“I’ll call up the Big House now,” Mrs. Dore said quietly. “We can’t -handle this alone any longer.” She started towards the door and -automatically the others followed her in a silent, down-cast file. - -And then suddenly, Rosie screamed, “There’s Betsy now!” - -The whole group turned; stood petrified. - -Maida followed Rosie’s scream with “And what is she carrying in her -arms?” - -And then the whole group broke and ran in the direction of House Rock. - -Betsy was coming down the trail toward the Little House. The moon was -fairly high now and it shown full on the erect little figure and the -excited sparkling little face. Her dress was soiled and torn. Her -hair ribbon had gone and her curls hung helter-skelter about her rosy -cheeks. Her great eyes shone like baby moons as her gaze fell on the -group running towards her. A trusting smile parted her red lips; showed -all her little white mice teeth. - -“She’s carrying a fawn!” Arthur exclaimed as he neared her. “Why, it -can’t be a day old!” - -Betsy _was_ carrying a fawn. As they surrounded her, she handed it -trustfully over into Arthur’s extended hands. “I finded it myself,” she -announced proudly. “I ranned and I ranned and I ranned. And it runned -and it runned and it runned. But I ranned faster than it runned and -pretty soon it was all tired out and I catched it.” - -This was all of her adventure that they ever got out of Betsy. -Conjecture later filled in these meager outlines; that Betsy had -been coming home with her doll, Hildegarde, when this stray from the -Westabrook preserves crossed her path. Dropping Hildegarde--they found -her a few moments later, not far from House Rock--she chased the poor -little creature over trails, through bushes, across rocks until she ran -him down. Then picking him up in her arms, she found the path by some -lucky accident and came home. - -“Mother of God!” Mrs. Dore said, hugging Betsy again and again, “the -child looked like the young St. John coming down the path.” - -Floribel lifted Betsy in her arms and carried her the rest of the way, -a very excited little girl proudly telling her story again and again. - -“I ranned and I ranned and I ranned,” she kept repeating, “and he -runned and he runned and he runned--” - -The other children tried to help in the process by holding onto -dangling legs and arms, by patting the little thickly-curly head and -by reaching up to kiss the round rosy cheeks. All except Arthur, who -carried the exhausted little fawn. - -Once home, Betsy was the center of attention for only a moment. She was -given her supper; a warm soothing bath and put immediately to bed. Then -the fawn took the center of the stage. - -The capable Arthur found a big basket which he filled with soft cloths; -placed the exhausted little creature in it. He _was_ exhausted; for -when Arthur first put him on the floor, his legs gave out under him. He -spraddled, all four legs flat, on the rug in front of the fireplace--as -Rosie said, “exactly like a wet mosquito.” Then Arthur heated some -milk; dipped a corner of a handkerchief into it; gave it to the fawn to -suck. It was a slow process; for the fawn did not seem to understand -this strange method of being fed. At length, Arthur thought of a better -scheme. Procuring an eye-dropper from the medicine-chest, he poured the -warm fluid, drop by drop, into the little creature’s mouth. - -All the time the children knelt around the basket in a circle. - -“How sweet it is,” Rosie who adored animals, kept saying. “Look at its -big eyes and its beautiful head!” - -“I’d love to take it in my arms,” Maida exclaimed, again and again, -“only I know I would frighten it to death. See how it trembles if we -get too near!” - -The little children, who had been allowed one glimpse of the deer, -went up-stairs chattering like little magpies. Betsy, tired with her -long hunting, had fallen asleep the instant she struck the pillow. But -the rest were in such a high state of excitement that it was almost an -hour before the last of them calmed down. It was not easy that night to -drive the Big Six to bed. - -When the denizens of the Little House waked the next morning, their -tiny forest guest was lying in his basket, bright-eyed as usual. For -an hour after his breakfast and theirs, they hovered about him making -all kinds of plans in regard to his future. But these dreams were -rudely shattered when Mrs. Dore informed them that she had told Mr. -Westabrook, over the telephone, the whole episode and that he was -sending a man that day to bring the deer back to the Big House. - -“Oh I don’t see why we have to give him up!” Maida declared in -heart-broken accents. “What fun it would be to have a deer all our own -and watch him grow. Just think when his horns came!” - -“Oh, Maida!” Rosie begged, “do call your father up and tease him to let -us keep him. Just think of having a baby fawn running about the house.” - -Both the Sixes, Little and Big, added their entreaties to Rosie’s. - -“I don’t think it would be any use, Maida,” Mrs. Dore quietly -interrupted. “Your father said if by chance any stranger brought a -dog here, he would kill the little fawn the moment he caught him. And -then when the fawn himself grew bigger, and developed horns, he might -even be dangerous. Besides Betsy,” as Betsy burst into loud wails -of, “I finded him myself. I ranned and I ranned and I ranned--” “Mr. -Westabrook said he would send you something nice to take the fawn’s -place.” - -“But the fawn’s alive,” Rosie expostulated in a grieved tone. “And -nothing can be as nice as a live creature.” - -“He said this would be alive too,” Mrs. Dore comforted her. - -“Oh _what_?” Rosie asked. - -Mrs. Dore’s eyes danced. “It’s a surprise. I’m not to tell it.” - -Only half appeased, the children hung around the house, waiting to see -what the _live_ thing was. In the middle of the morning, a run-about -drew up in front of the Little House and one of Mr. Westabrook’s men -alighted from it. He was wearing a long loose coat, but he had nothing -in his arms. He took the little fawn, basket and all, and placed it in -the run-about. The children tagged his every movement, followed with -their eyes his every motion. After the fawn was safely installed on the -seat beside him, he turned on the engine. - -Betsy burst into tears. - -“Oh that’s the little girl,” the man exclaimed, as though suddenly -remembering something, “who found the fawn, isn’t it?” - -Through her sobs Betsy began, “I ranned and I ranned and I--” - -“Well then,” the man said, “I guess I’ve got something for you.” He -reached into one of the pockets of his big coat and brought out a tiny, -nondescript bundle of loose white fur; of helpless waving black paws; -big bulging winking black eyes; a curly queue of tail; an impertinent -sniffing nose--a baby bull dog. He handed it to Betsy. Betsy’s tears -dried in a flash. She hugged the puppy close to her warm neck; ran with -him to the house. The children raced after her, and the run-about, -utterly forgotten, disappeared down the road. - -“Let’s call it Fawn,” Rosie said, and Fawn it was. - -Fawn adopted the Little House as her home at once. She was a very -affectionate person and she soon grew to love devotedly every member of -the household. They all loved her devotedly in return; but none loved -her more than Betsy; and Betsy’s dog she always remained. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -DISCOVERY - - -“Do you know I think it would be fine if we went off some day this week -on a picnic,” Laura said unexpectedly one morning. “I just love to go -on picnics. And we haven’t had one yet.” - -“Oh Laura!” Maida agreed ecstatically, “What a wonderful idea! I love -picnics too! I adore picnic food and I never yet have had all the -hard-boiled eggs I want. How did you come to think of it?” - -“I thought of it last night just before I fell asleep.” Laura’s voice -sparkled with pride. “It was all I could do to keep from going in -your rooms and waking you and Rosie up to tell you about it. I was so -excited that I couldn’t fall asleep and so I made a perfectly beautiful -plan. I thought we might put up lunches; then get into our bathing -suits; paddle across the Magic Mirror to the other side and spend the -day there--we have never really explored the other side. I’m sure it’s -perfectly lovely there and we’ll have a wonderful time.” - -“Let’s do it to-morrow,” Rosie took up with Laura’s plan immediately. -“We can get up early; cook the eggs and make the sandwiches. There’ll -be enough cake left over. And don’t let’s--oh listen, everybody! -Remember not to forget the salt. People always forget the salt on -picnics.” - -“It’s ice cream day to-morrow,” Harold said sadly. “We’ll miss it if we -are not home to freeze it.” - -“No, if you boys will get up early and make it, we can take it along in -the freezer with us,” Rosie suggested daringly. - -“Sure!” Arthur was highly enthusiastic. “I don’t care how early I have -to get up to make ice cream. I’d rather do that than go without it.” - -All other conversation was banished for the day. They kept thinking of -things they would like to take with them--and stopped only short of the -bicycles. - -“I should think,” Maida said once, “that we were going to Africa for -six months at least. Remember one thing though--_don’t forget the -salt_!” - -They were so afraid that they wouldn’t wake in time that they wound -their alarm clocks to the very last notch. They did wake in time -however. In fact they had to put the alarm clocks under the bed clothes -and pile pillows on top of them to keep from waking the rest of the -household. With much whispering and many half-suppressed giggles the -girls managed to get into bathing suits; went down stairs and began -their work in the kitchen. Although the exact number of eggs and -sandwiches had been decided on the day before, they held many low-toned -colloquies on the subject. - -“Remember,” Laura said, “you can always eat twice as much at a picnic -as anywhere else. I don’t know why it is,” she concluded thoughtfully, -“but even things you don’t like taste good. _Be sure not to forget the -salt!_” - -By the time Floribel appeared to get their breakfasts, they were nearly -famished but nevertheless they ate hurriedly, so great was their -longing to get off. Arthur shouldered the ice cream freezer. Between -them, the girls carried the luncheon. The little children had to be -led to the side of the house, so as not to witness their elaborate -burden-laden departure. As it was acute little Betsy apparently guessed -that something was going on which did not include her. As the Big Six -disappeared down the trail they could hear Granny Flynn soothing her -whimperings. - -It was a beautiful day. The sun was not yet high enough in the heavens -for it to be hot. Indeed dew still lay over everything. But there was a -languor in the atmosphere which warned them that it would be hot enough -later. The pond was indeed a Magic Mirror. It was like glass. Not a -ripple roughed its surface and everything on the shore was so perfectly -reflected that it looked painted on the water. The children wasted no -time on the view. They pulled the four canoes out of the boat house -and began loading them. Arthur paddled alone in one with the ice cream -freezer and the lunch. Harold paddled alone in the second with the rugs -and the hammock; the others went, two to a canoe. The little fleet kept -close. - -“Isn’t it a beautiful place?” Rosie asked joyously, trailing her hand -in the water, “It’s like fairy land to-day. How I wish I could see some -fairies or goblins or something strange!” - -“I’d be content to see some white peacocks,” Dicky said soberly. - -“Oh Dicky!” Maida exclaimed, “I’ve never taken you to see the white -peacocks as I promised. I’ll do that just as soon as I can.” - -“I’d rather see some deer.” Harold remarked. - -“Well all I ask,” Laura was very emphatic, “is not to see two -people--Silva and Tyma Burle.” - -“I don’t think we’ll run into them,” Maida declared thoughtfully, “It’s -a long time since any of us have seen them--over two weeks I should -say. Perhaps they’ve gone away.” - -“No,” Arthur called from his canoe, “I saw them in the village -yesterday.” - -The landing was effected with no difficulty, although here of course -there was no pier. They followed the trail through the woods for a long -way, trying to find a place to camp. One spot attracted some; a second -attracted others; but for a long time, no place attracted them all. - -“There are too many stones here,” Rosie would say, “it won’t be -comfortable to sit down.” - -“And it’s too sunny here,” Maida commented. “It’ll melt the ice cream -and the butter--and everything.” - -“That place slants,” Laura made the third objection, “we want a nice -flat spot.” - -“I think I hear water,” Dicky cried suddenly. - -“Water!” Maida repeated, “Water! How can you hear it? There’s no water -here. I never saw any brook around here. I can’t hear any water.” - -Neither could anybody else; yet Dicky persisted that he heard the sound -of running water. - -“You wait here,” he exclaimed suddenly, “let me see if I can find it.” -He disappeared through the trees. He came running back in a few minutes -obviously excited. “I haven’t found it yet,” he explained, “but I -certainly hear it plainer and plainer the farther I go.” - -The others swarmed into the bushes. Dicky led the way like a little -human divining rod. - -“I hear water,” Rosie announced electrically. “Hark!” - -They all stopped and listened. One by one they got the soft tinkle. -Encouraged they kept on, rounding bushes and leaping rocks. The noise -grew louder and louder. A rough trail suddenly appeared. They raced -over it as fast as their burdens would permit. The sound was now a -lovely musical splash. They came out on an open space, surrounded by -pines and thickly carpeted with pine needles. At one side a great rock -thrust out of the earth. Close beside it ran a tiny brook and just -beyond the lee of the rock, the brook fell into a waterfall not more -than a foot high. The children went wild with delight. - -“Do you mean to tell me, Maida Westabrook, that you never knew this was -here?” Rosie demanded. - -“I never did,” Maida declared solemnly. “I have never seen it. I have -never heard anybody mention it. Isn’t it a darling? What shall we call -it? We must give it a name.” - -Nobody had any names ready and everybody was too excited to think. In -fact, at once they began wading up and down the little brook. They -explored the neighborhood. Not far off they came upon a curious patch -of country. A cleared circle, surrounded by pine trees and carpeted -with pines, was filled with irregular lines of great rocks that lost -themselves in the bushes on either side. - -“I believe this is a moraine,” Maida exclaimed suddenly. “I’ve seen -moraines in Europe.” - -“What’s a moraine?” the others asked. - -Maida explained how once the earth had been covered with great -icecaps called glaciers and how in melting these glaciers had often -left--streaking the earth’s surface--great files and lines of rock. -“We’ll ask father to come here some day,” she ended. “He’ll know all -about it. Billy Potter too--he knows everything.” - -After a while, they came back to the waterfall. They swept aside the -pine needles; spread the tablecloth on the ground; took food from the -baskets; set it about in an inviting pile. The ice cream had not melted -an atom in the freezer. The sandwiches, done up in wet napkins, were -quite fresh. The eggs looked as inviting as hard-boiled eggs are bound -to look. Everything was all right except that--and this produced first -consternation, then laughter--there was no salt. - -“We all reminded everybody else to remember the salt,” Maida said in -disgust, “and so nobody put it in the basket.” - -Everybody but Rosie was busy. And Rosie, as though bewitched, was -wandering about, gazing up this vista and down that one; examining -clumps of bushes. - -“Come, Rosie, lunch is most ready,” Maida called to her. And as Rosie -didn’t answer, “_What_ are you doing?” - -“I’m looking for--” Rosie’s voice was muffled. “I thought I saw -something--Oh come and see what I’ve found!” Now her voice was sharp -and high with excitement. - -The children rushed pell-mell in the direction of the voice. Rosie had -gone farther than they thought. Indeed she had disappeared entirely. -She had to keep calling to guide them. When they came to her at last, -she was standing with her back against a tree, the look on her face -very mystified, holding in her arms-- - -“A doll!” Maida exclaimed. “Who _could_ have dropped it? Nobody ever -comes here but us.” - -It was a cheap little doll of the rag-baby order perfectly new, -perfectly clean and dry. - -“How did you come to find it?” Laura enquired. - -“Well it’s the strangest thing,” Rosie answered in a queer quiet -voice. “I was just poking around here, not thinking of anything -particularly.... And then I thought I saw something moving--a white -figure. I started towards it and then.... And then it seemed to me that -something was thrown through the air. Now when I try to remember, I -can’t be sure I really did see anything thrown through the air and yet -I sort of _feel_ that I did. Anyway I ran to see what it was. When I -got there, this doll was lying in the path.” - -“How curious!” Maida commented. “You must have imagined the figure, -Rosie. See, there’s nobody here.” - -A little awed, the children stared through the trees, this way and -that. But they stood stock still. - -“Yes, I must have imagined it,” Rosie admitted. “Still when I try to -make myself believe I didn’t see anything, something inside tells me I -did.” - -“Let’s look about,” Arthur suggested. They scattered exploring; diving -into bush clumps, and peering behind rocks. Fifteen minutes went by. - -“Well we’ve found nothing.” Arthur ended the search as he had begun it. -“Let’s go back and eat lunch.” - -“Oh let’s!” begged Harold. “I never was so hungry in all my life.” - -“Nor I!” “Nor I!” came from the others. Maida alone remained -thoughtful. She led the file, however, back to the waterfall. And it -was she who suddenly stopped and called, “Look! Look what’s happened--” -She stopped as though her breath had given out. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -THE TERROR - - -In the midst of the clearing, the paper tablecloth still lay on the -ground, a great shining rectangle of white. Scattered about, crumpled, -soiled, or torn were the paper napkins. Everything else, even the ice -cream from the freezer, had disappeared. - -“Why, who took it?” Arthur demanded in a dazed voice. “Who _could_ have -taken it?” he went on in a puzzled one. “Is any one of you playing a -joke?” he asked suddenly of the others. - -Everybody protested his innocence. - -“We haven’t been gone more than fifteen minutes,” Arthur went on. -“Let’s look about. It doesn’t seem to me anybody could have carried all -that stuff far and we not get a glimpse of it. It might be tramps.” - -“One thing is certain,” Maida protested, “tramps didn’t do it. There -are never any tramps in Satuit.” - -The children started their search. They looked behind trees and under -bushes; but they showed a tendency to keep together. They talked the -matter over, but instinctively their voices lowered. They kept glancing -over their shoulders. They found nothing. - -“It’s like Magic,” Maida commented in a still voice. “You were saying, -Rosie, that you wished you could see some fairies or goblins. It looks -to me as though the goblins had stolen our lunch.” - -Arthur alone did not leave the clearing. He stood in the center -pivoting about, watching every vista and gnawing his under lip. His -face was more perplexed that any of them had ever seen it. - -“Well if we don’t find our lunch pretty soon,” he said after a while, -“we’ve got to go back home to get something to eat.” - -“Perhaps somebody’s playing a joke on us,” Rosie suggested, “and if we -wait for a while, they’ll bring the lunch back.” - -There seemed nothing else to do. So, rather sobered by this mysterious -event, the children seated themselves in a group by the brook. - -“I can’t wait very much longer,” Laura admitted dolefully. “I’m nearly -starved. I was so excited about the picnic that I hardly ate any -breakfast.” - -“Just a few minutes more,” Arthur begged. “Maida, please tell us a -story.” - -“Once upon a time,” Maida began obligingly, “six boys and girls were -cast away on a great forest with nothing to eat. It was a forest filled -with gob--Hark!” she interrupted herself, “What’s that?” - -From somewhere--not the forest about them, nor the sky above: it seemed -actually to issue from the earth under them--came a strange moaning -cry. The children jumped to their feet. The boys started apart. The -girls clung together. The cry grew louder and louder. It was joined by -a second voice even more strange; and then a third entered the chorus. - -It was too much. - -The little group, white-faced and trembling, broke and made for the -trail. The girls started first. The boys staid still, irresolute; -but as the uncanny sound grew louder and louder, soared higher and -higher, they became panic-stricken too. They ran. Arthur, ending the -file, walked at first. But finally even his walk grew into a run. The -others leaped forward. They bounded over the trail, gaining in terror -as they went. In some way, they got into the canoes but half a dozen -times their trembling and fumbling nearly spilled them out. It was not -until they were well out into the middle of the Magic Mirror that their -composure came back. - -“What do you suppose it was?” Maida asked, white faced. - -“It couldn’t have been a ghost could it?” dropped from Laura’s shaking -lips. - -“No.” Arthur dismissed this theory with complete contempt. - -“I should think it was a crazy person,” Harold declared. “Is there a -lunatic asylum around here, Maida?” - -“No,” Maida replied. - -“Is there any crazy person about here?” - -Maida shook her head. - -“I think it was a tramp who first stole our lunch,” Arthur guessed -shrewdly, “and then decided to frighten us away.” - -“I think the wood is haunted.” Rosie shivered. - -“Nonsense!” Maida exclaimed. - -“Well I wish I hadn’t run away,” Arthur burst out impatiently. “I wish -I’d stayed.” - -“So do I, Arthur,” Maida agreed vigorously. “That’s the first time I -ever ran away from anything in my life.” - -“Let’s go back,” Arthur suggested. - -Laura burst into tears. “Oh, please don’t,” she begged. “I’m frightened -to death.” - -“We won’t go, Laura dear,” Maida reassured her, “don’t worry.” She -continued after an interval of thought, “And don’t let’s tell Granny -Flynn and Mrs. Dore about that screaming. Let’s say that our lunch was -stolen while we were away. If I tell them all of it, they won’t let us -go on another picnic.” - -“Well, believe me, I don’t want to go on another picnic,” Laura said, -her eyes streaming still. - -However, by the time they had reached the jetty and had tethered the -canoes, they were more composed. When they reached the Little House -even Laura had begun to smile, to admit that the tramp theory was -probably the correct one. - -Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore looked very much concerned when they heard -the story. They asked many questions. Finally they decided with Arthur -that tramps were the answer to the strange happening. Maida persisted -though that tramps were never permitted in Satuit. - -The next morning Arthur strolled down to the lake alone. In a little -while, he came running back white with rage. “What do you suppose has -happened?” he called while still running up the trail. “We didn’t lock -the canoes in the boathouse last night and somebody has made a great -hole in all four of them.” - -The Big Six rushed down to the Magic Mirror. It was only too true. -Four of their canoes were ruined. The children stood staring at them, -horrified. - -“I don’t think tramps would do this,” Arthur said slowly. “They’d steal -them, but there’d be no sense in destroying them.” - -“No,” Maida said slowly. “This looks as though we had an enemy who is -determined to make us as unhappy as possible.” - - - - -CHAPTER XV - -ARTHUR’S ADVENTURE - - -It was after eleven, a cloudless night and a beautiful one. A great -white moon filled the sky with white light and covered the earth with -a thin film of silver. The barn door opened slowly and noiselessly. -Arthur emerged. Padding the grass as quickly as possible, he moved in -the direction of the trail; turned into it. For a while he proceeded -swiftly. But once out of hearing of the Little House he moved more -slowly and without any efforts to deaden his footsteps. That his -excursion had a purpose was apparent from the way that, without pause -or stay of any kind, he made steadily forward. It was obvious that the -Magic Mirror was his objective. - -He dipped into the Bosky Dingle and there, perhaps because the air was -so densely laden with flower perfumes, he stopped. Only for an instant -however. After sniffing the air like some wild creature he went on. -Presently he came out on the shore of the lake. Taking a key from his -pocket, he opened the little boathouse in which, since the accident, -the canoes were nightly locked; pulled one of them out; shoved it into -the water. He seated himself in it and started to paddle across the -pond. - -Curiously enough, however, he did not strike straight across the Magic -Mirror. He kept close to the edge as though afraid of observation; -slipped whenever he could under overhanging boughs; took advantage -of every bit of low-drooping bush. So stealthy and so silent was his -progress indeed that from the middle of the lake he might not have -been observed at all. This was however a slow method. It was nearly -midnight when he reached the point about opposite the boathouse, which -was apparently his objective. He stopped short of it, however; tied -the canoe to a tree trunk, just where a half-broken bough concealed -it completely; stepped lightly ashore. Apparently he had landed here -before. There developed, under the moonlight, a little side trail which -led in the direction of the main trail. He took it. - -Now his movements were attended by much greater caution. He went -slowly and he put his feet down with the utmost care even in the -cleared portions of the trail. Wherever underbrush intervened, he took -great care to skirt it or, with a long quiet leap or a prolonged -straddle, to surmount it so that no sound came from the process. It -was surprising, in a boy so lumbering and with feet and hands so -large, with what delicacy he picked his way. Indeed, he moved with -extraordinary speed and a surprising quiet. - -A little distance up the trail, he turned again. This time, he took a -path so little worn that nothing but a full moon would have revealed -its existence. Arthur struck into it with the air of one who has been -there before; followed it with a perfect confidence. At times, it -ceased to be a path at all; merged with underbrush and low trees. But -he must, on an earlier excursion, have blazed a pioneer way through -those obstacles because each time he made without hesitation for the -only spot which offered egress; emerged on the other side with the -same quiet and dispatch. He went on and on, proceeding with a greatly -increased swiftness but with no diminution of his caution. - -After a while, he came into ordered country. Obviously he had struck -the cleared land that, for so many acres, surrounded the Big House. Now -he moved like a shadow but at a smart clip. He had the confident air -of one familiar with the lay of the land. After a while, he struck a -wide avenue of trees--Mr. Westabrook had taught him its French name, -an _allee_. This was one of five, all beginning at the Big House and -ending with a fountain or a statue. Arthur proceeded under the shade of -the trees until he came out near the Big House. Then he swung himself -up among the branches of a tree; found a comfortable crotch; seated -himself, his back against the trunk. With a forked stick he parted the -branches; watched. - -The moon was riding high now and, as the night was still cloudless, it -was pouring white fire over the earth. The great lawn in front of the -Big House looked like silvered velvet. Half way down its length, like -a jet of shredded crystal, the fountain still played into its white -marble basin. Out of reach of its splashing flood, as though moored -against its marble sides, four swans, great feathery heaps of snow, -slept with their heads under their wings. As Arthur stared a faint -perturbation stirred the air, as though somewhere at the side of the -house--unseen by him--a motor pulsed to rest. Presently a high, slim -dog--Arthur recognized it to be a Russian boar-hound; white, pointed -nose, long tail--came sauntering across the lawn. He poked his nose -into the basin of the fountain. One of the swans made a strange, low -sleepy cry; moved aimlessly about for an instant, then came to rest -and to sleep, apart from his companions. The hound moved into the -shrubbery; returned to the lawn. - -As though the swan’s call or the dog’s nosing had evoked it, one of the -white peacocks emerged from the woods, spreading his tail with a superb -gesture of pride and triumph. The long white hound considered the -exhibition gravely. The peacock, consciously proud, sauntered over the -velvet surface of the lawn for a while alone. Then a companion joined -him and another. Finally, there were three great snowy sails floating -with a majestic movement across the grass. The display ended as soon -as it began. One of the trio suddenly returned to the treey shade; the -other two immediately followed. The lawn was deserted by all except the -fountain, which kept up untiringly its exquisite plaint. The boar-hound -sped noiselessly towards the house. - -Arthur waited for a moment; then he slipped down from the tree; made -back over the way in which he had come. But he did not pursue the same -trail. He made a detour which would take him further around the lake. -And if he seemed cautious before, now he was caution itself. He moved -so slowly and carefully that no human could have known of his coming, -save that he had eyes, or ears or a nose superhumanly acute. And Arthur -had his reward. - -Suddenly he came to an opening, which gave, past a little covert, on a -glade. And at the end of the glade, a group of deer were feeding in the -moonlight. Arthur did not move after his discovery of them; indeed he -seemed scarcely to breathe. There were nearly a dozen. The bucks and -does were pulling delicately at the brush-foliage; the fawns browsed -on the grass. In spite of Arthur’s caution, instinct told them that -something was wrong. The largest buck got it first. He stopped feeding, -lifted his head, sniffed the air suspiciously. Then one of the does -caught the contagion. She too lifted her head and for what, though -really a brief moment, seemed a long time, tested the atmosphere with -her dilated nostrils. Then the others, one after another, showed signs -of restlessness. Only the little fawns continued to stand, feeding -placidly at their mothers’ sides. But apparently the consensus of -testimony was too strongly in favor of retreat. For an instant, the -adults moved anxiously. Then suddenly as though the word of alarm had -been whispered into every velvety ear--dash! Flash! There came a series -of white gleams as all their short tails went up. And then the glade -was as empty as though there were no deer within a hundred miles. - -Arthur went on. And now, as though he hoped for still another reward -of his patience, he moved with even greater care. But for a long time, -nothing happened. In the meantime clouds came up. Occasionally they -covered the moon. Then, the light being gone, the great harbors and the -wide straits between the clouds seemed to fill with stars. The moon -would start to emerge; her light would silver everything. The smaller -stars would retreat leaving only a few big ones to flare on. - -Such an obscuration had come. And while the moon struggled as though -actually trying to pull herself free, a second cloud interposed itself -between her and the earth. The world turned dark--almost black. - -The effect on Arthur was however to make him pick his way with an -even greater care. The trail here was not a blind one. It was the one -that ran presently into the path that led from the gypsy camp to the -Moraine. Ahead, Arthur could just make out the point where the trails -crossed. - -Suddenly the moon came out with a great vivid flare. It was as though -an enormous searchlight had been turned on the earth. Something--it -seemed the mere ghost of a sound--arrested Arthur’s footsteps. He -stopped; stood stock still; listened; watched. - -Something or somebody was coming up the trail from the direction of -the gypsy camp. In a moment he would pass the opening. It was human -apparently, for the sound was of human footsteps. They came nearer and -nearer. A straight, light figure with hair that gleamed, as though -burnished, passed into the moonlight.... It was Silva Burle. - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - -MYSTERY - - -Arthur’s first inclination was to call. But something within him warned -him not to do that. Something just as imperative advised him to another -course of action. He waited a moment or two to let Silva get far enough -ahead, so that she could not possibly hear his footsteps. Then he -followed her. - -She walked with an extraordinary swiftness--so swiftly indeed that -Arthur was put to it to keep up with her. However she had the advantage -over him in that she knew the trail perfectly. Her feet stumbled over -no obstacles; her arms hit no protruding branches; her face brushed -against no scratchy twigs. She moved indeed as though it were day. -Arthur was in a difficult situation. He must walk quickly to keep up -with her; but if he walked too quickly she would certainly hear him. - -Presently she came to the place in the trail where it turned at right -angles on itself. Arthur, anticipating this, stopped in the shadow of -a tree in the far side of the path. Silva turned swiftly. It happened -that she did glance indifferently backwards over the way in which she -had come. But she could not have seen Arthur; for she went on at the -same composed high pace. But Arthur saw that she was carrying under her -arm a bottle of milk. - -Arthur quickened his cautious footsteps; came in his turn to the fork -in the trail. There was Silva ahead, her white skirt fluttering on -both sides of her vigorous walking, much as the white foam of the sea -flutters away from the prow of the ship. She kept straight on and -Arthur kept straight on. The moon dipped behind clouds and dove out of -them; flashed her great blaze on the earth and shadowed it again. On -and on they went, the stalker and the stalked. They were approaching -the Moraine. Big stones began to lift out of the underbrush on either -side. Some were like great tables, flat and smooth; comfortable and -comforting. Others were perturbing--like huge monsters that had thrust -themselves out of the earth, were resting on their front paws or their -haunches even. Layers of rust-colored leaves--the leaves that had -been for many years falling--lay between them. And now and then the -moonlight caught on the rocks with a black glisten and on the leaves -with a red gleam; for the dew was falling. - -Arthur began to wonder what he should do. He somehow took it for -granted that Silva was going to the Moraine; mainly because there -seemed no other place for her to go; though for what purpose he could -not guess. If for any reason she stopped there, he must soon become -visible to her. Indeed there were only two courses for him to take: -retreat by the path over which he had come or through the wood on -either side. He could not make up his mind to turn back. If he took the -second course, he would undoubtedly get lost. He would have to wait for -daylight to find his way home and that, he recognized at once, would be -stretching inexcusably the generous liberty which Mr. Westabrook had -given him. He might call to Silva. But again something inside seemed -to warn him not to make his presence known. He continued to follow the -vigorous figure ahead. - -As though she were approaching the end of her journey, Silva was -hurrying faster and faster. Arthur hurried too. Silva broke into what -was a half run. It would have been, Arthur felt, a complete run, if she -were not carrying the bottle of milk so carefully. Arthur seethed with -perplexity. Why was she speeding so? What could she possibly have to do -at this spot and at this hour? What could require such urgent haste? -Well, perhaps he would know in another moment. - -And then suddenly strange things happened all at once. - -Silva’s rapid progress had, as it apparently neared its object, become -less careful. At any rate, an overhanging briar caught her hair; pulled -her up sharply. In her first effort to extricate herself, Silva turned -completely about; caught sight of Arthur’s figure a little way down the -trail. - -She started so convulsively that even Arthur could see it. Then with a -swift wrench of her slender hand she tore her hair away; turned and ran -like a deer in the direction of the Moraine. - -Arthur ran too. And as he ran he called, “Don’t be afraid, Silva. It’s -Arthur Duncan from the Little House. Don’t mind me! I won’t hurt you.” - -But Silva only redoubled her speed. Arthur redoubled his. He was -gaining swiftly on her. He entered the Moraine. On the other side -Silva was just disappearing from it. “I tell you,” he called, “I’m not -going to hurt you. Stop! I want to speak to you!” - -Silva did not answer. He heard a frenzied floundering among the -underbrush. For the noise Silva made, she might have been an elephant. -And then suddenly came silence--silence utter and complete. - -Had she fainted? What could be the matter? What a silly girl to act -like that! Arthur rushed across the Moraine; penetrated the woods on -the other side. - -Silva had disappeared as completely as though she had vanished into -the air. Arthur stared about him like one waking from a dream. Then he -began to search for her. Around rocks, into clumps of bushes he peered. -Nobody. Nothing. - -“Silva Burle!” he called. “Silva! Silva! Where are you?” And then -because he was genuinely alarmed, “Please answer. Please! I’m afraid -you’re hurt.” Another search over a wider area. He mounted rocks this -time. Remembering how Silva could climb, he stared upwards into trees. -He crawled on hands and knees through every little thicket he found. -And all the time he kept calling. Still nobody. Still nothing. As far -as he could see, he was absolutely alone in that part of the wood. - -After half an hour, he gave it up. But he was a little alarmed and very -much humiliated. He walked back over the trail to the Magic Mirror -and all the time his head was bent in the deepest thought. He found -the canoe; absently slid into it; mechanically paddled himself across -the water. And all the time he continued to think hard. “It’s like a -dream,” he thought. “I’d think anybody else was dreaming who told me -this.” - -When he reached the barn, the whole mysterious episode seemed to -float out of his mind in the great wave of drowsiness which suddenly -beat through him. He fell immediately into slumber. But his sleep was -full of dreams, all so strange that when he awoke in the morning, his -experience of the night before threatened for a moment to take its -place among them. “But I didn’t dream the peacocks or the deer,” he -said to himself. “And I know I didn’t dream Silva!” - -He said nothing of his experience to any of the other children, though -he found himself strangely tempted to tell Maida. But a kind of shyness -held him back. At times it occurred to him that Silva might be lying -injured somewhere in the woods. But always some instinct made him -believe that this was not true. - -Halfway through the morning Granny Flynn sent him on an errand to the -village. As he came out of the Post Office, he ran into Silva Burle -just about to enter it. He tumbled off the wheel which he had just -mounted. - -“Say,” he said without any other greeting, “where did you disappear to -last night?” - -“Last night!” Silva repeated in a bland tone of mere curiousness. “What -do you mean by _last night_?” - -“You know very well what I mean,” Arthur persisted. “Last night in the -Moraine--in the woods.” - -“In the Moraine--in the woods,” Silva repeated. “I don’t know what -you’re talking about. I didn’t sleep in the woods last night. I slept -in my tent as usual.” - -Arthur looked at her hard. “Well,” he said after a moment, “either -you’re telling the biggest whopper I ever listened to or you were -walking in your sleep.” - -“Walking in my sleep,” Silva said scornfully, “you’re crazy.” And she -passed on. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - -CRESCENT MOON BEACH - - -It was drawing near the middle of August. And now with each sunrise, -the fun at the Little House seemed to double itself. - -“I never saw such a place as this,” Rosie wailed once. “There aren’t -hours enough to do all the things you want to do every day; and not -days enough to do all you want to do every week.” - -There was some justice in Rosie’s complaint. The day’s program of -swimming, tennis, croquet, bicycling, reading and games had been broken -into by the coming of the berry season. Blueberries and blackberries -were thick in the vicinity and the children enjoyed enormously eating -the fruit they had gathered. - -Floribel taught the little girls how to make blueberry cake and -blackberry grunt and on their teacher’s day out, the Little House was -sure to have one of these delicacies for luncheon and another for -dinner. The Big Six tried to do everything of course; and as Laura -complained, they succeeded in doing everything badly and no one thing -very well. One day Maida appeared at the table with a radiant look of -one who has spawned an idea. - -“Granny,” she said, “we haven’t had a picnic on the beach yet. Every -summer we go to the beach once at least. Can’t we go this week on -Floribel’s day out? We girls will cook the luncheon and pack it all up -nicely.” - -“But the beach is pretty far away,” Mrs. Dore said warily. “How far is -it? Could you walk to it?” - -“It’s between four and five miles,” Maida answered hazily. “You see -the little children could go in the motor and the rest of us--the Big -Six--could go on our bicycles.” - -“But I don’t think,” Mrs. Dore said, “that I’d like you children to go -so far away without a grown person with you.” - -“Yes, of course,” Maida said, “you and Granny come too.” - -“But with Zeke and Floribel away,” Mrs. Dore protested, “who would -drive the automobile?” - -Maida’s face fell. “Oh,” she exclaimed, “I never thought of that.” - -All the faces about the table--they had grown bright in anticipation of -this new excursion--grew dark. - -Zeke had already taught Arthur and Harold to run the machine, but Mr. -Westabrook’s orders against unlicensed persons driving it, were strict. -For a moment it looked as though the ocean-picnic must be given up. - -“I think,” Maida faltered, “if I ask my father to lend us Botkins and -the big car, he’d do it.” - -Mrs. Dore shook her head. “I wouldn’t like to have you do that, Maida,” -she said. “Your father has given us everything that he thinks necessary -for this household.” She added gratefully, “And more than any of us had -ever had in our lives before. I should certainly not like you to ask a -single thing more of him.” - -Again gloom descended on the Big Six. And then hope showed her bright -face again. - -“Ah’ll tell you what Ah’ll do,” Floribel, who was waiting on table, -broke in. “Zeke and Ah’ve wanted fo’ a long time to see the big ocean. -Now eff yo’ll let the lil’ children go on dat pic-a-nic, Mis’ Dore, -Zeke and Ah’ll go with them and tak’ the best of care of them.” - -“Oh _would_ you, Floribel?” Rosie asked. - -“Well, in that case,” Mrs. Dore decided thoughtfully, “I don’t see why -you shouldn’t all go.” - -Madness at once broke out in both Sixes, Little and Big. Laura, Maida -and Rosie leaped to their feet and danced about the room. The little -children beat on the table with their spoons and the three boys -indulged in ear-splitting whistles. - -The next Thursday, Floribel, Zeke, the Little Six and the lunch, packed -somehow into the machine, the Big Six on their bicycles, streaming -ahead like couriers, started off for the beach. - -“Thank goodness we’ve remembered the salt this time,” Rosie said to -Arthur as they mounted their wheels, “I took care of that myself.” - -It was a beautiful day, cool as it was sunny, brisk as it was warm. The -winding road led through South Satuit and then over a long stretch of -scrub-pine country, straight to the beach. - -Just as they emerged from the Westabrook estate into South Satuit, -Maida’s bicycle made a sudden swerve. “Why I just saw Silva Burle!” she -called in a whisper to Rosie. “She was walking along the trail towards -the Little House. I wonder what she is doing there?” - -“Well you may be very sure she isn’t calling on _us_,” Rosie declared, -“and if she is I’m delighted to think that Granny will say, ‘Not at -home!’” - -“Still,” Maida said thoughtfully, “that trail leads directly to the -Little House. She must be going there for some reason.” - -“Probably,” Laura remarked scornfully, “she’s hoping she’ll meet some -of us, so’s she can make faces at us.” - -The automobile arrived at the beach first and the cyclists came -straggling in one after another. Crescent Moon Beach was like a deeply -cut silver crescent, furred at each tip of the crescent with a tight -grove of scrub-pines which grew down to the very water’s edge. Beyond -it, except for a single island, stretched unbroken the vast heaving -blue of the Atlantic. Under the lee of the southern tip of the crescent -was a line of half-a-dozen bath houses. - -“What a wonderful, wonderful beach!” Laura commented. - -“And there’s that island,” Dicky said, “that we see from the Tree -House--Spectacles Island, didn’t you say--oh no, I remember, Tom -Tiddler’s Ground. How I wish I could swim out to it. I have never been -on an island in my life. Could you swim as far as that, Arthur?” - -Arthur laughed. “I should say not. Nobody but a professional could do -that--and perhaps he’d find it some pull. It’s much longer than it -looks, Dicky. Distances on the water are very deceiving.” - -“What’s on the Island, Maida?” Dicky went on curiously. “Have you ever -been there?” - -“Oh yes,” Maida answered, “once. I went on father’s yacht but I was -such a little little girl that I have only one impression--of great -trees and enormous rocks and thick underbrush.” - -Dicky sighed. “I wish we could go on a picnic there!” - -“What’s that over there?” Harold demanded, pointing to a spot far out -where a series of poles, connected by webs of fish-net, rose above the -water’s surface. - -“Oh that’s a fish weir,” Maida declared electrically. “I’d forgotten -all about that. You see the tide’s going out. It goes out almost two -miles here. And if we follow it up, we can get into the weir and come -back before the tide overtakes us.” - -Maida explained the situation to Floribel. Floribel turned to Zeke for -advice. Zeke corroborated Maida’s story. He had, he said, been in that -weir several times himself. Floribel said she would stay on the beach -with the Little Six while Zeke accompanied the Big Six. When they came -back, she added, lunch would be all spread out on the beach. - -“The last bath house,” Maida informed them, “is ours. Now let’s get -into our bathing suits at once because we have no time to lose.” - -It was only partially low tide when they arrived but it almost seemed -to the children that they could see the water slipping away towards the -horizon. When they emerged from the bath house, a patch of eelgrass, -not far off, made a brilliant green spot in the midst of the golden -sand. As the Big Six started towards the fish weir, the Little Six were -splashing about in the warm shallows near shore. - -“Oh what fun this is!” Rosie said. “I love salt-water bathing more than -fresh water--I don’t know why. But somehow I always feel so much gayer.” - -The salt water seemed to have an effect of gayety on all of them. -They chattered incessantly when they were not laughing or singing. -At times they came to hollows between the sand bars where the water -was waist-high, but in the main, the water came no farther than their -knees; and it continued to recede steadily before them. Sand-bar after -sand-bar bared itself to the light of the sun--stretched before them -in ridges of solid gold. Eelgrass--patch after patch--lifted above -the water; spread around them areas of brilliant green. Above, white -clouds and blue ether wove a radiant sky-ceiling. And between, the -gulls swooped and soared, circled and dashed, emitting their strange, -creaking cries. It seemed an hour at least to the Big Six before they -reached the weir, but in fact it had taken little more than half that -time. - -Zeke found the entrance to the weir and they followed him in. Here the -water was waist-deep. Zeke explained the plan of the weir. It was, he -pointed out, nothing but a deep-sea trap for fish. The fish entered -through the narrow opening into a channel which led into the big -inner maze. Although it was very easy for them to float in, it was a -very difficult matter finding the way out. Caught there, as the tide -retreated, they stayed until the fisherman arrived with his cart and -shoveled them ignominiously into it. - -“Oh, oh!” Laura shrieked suddenly. “This place is full of fish. One -just passed me! Oh, there’s another! And another!” - -But by this time both the other girls were jumping and screaming -with their excitement; for fish were darting about them everywhere. -The boys, not at all nervous of course and very much excited, were -trying to drive the fish into corners to find out what they were. Zeke -identified them all easily enough--cod, sculpins, flounders, and perch. - -“What’s that big thing?” Arthur exclaimed suddenly. “Jiminy -_crickets_!” he called excitedly. “It’s the biggest turtle I ever laid -my eyes on.” - -The girls shrieked and stayed exactly where they were, clinging -together. But the males all ran in Arthur’s direction. - -“Dat’s some turtle, believe muh,” commented Zeke. - -“I’m going to take it home,” Arthur declared, “and put it in the Magic -Mirror.” - -“The Magic Mirror!” Laura echoed. “Why I would never dare go in -swimming if I knew that huge thing was there.” - -“We’ll keep it tied up with a rope,” Arthur went on excitedly. “It -can’t get where we go in swimming because the rope won’t be long -enough. Come on, fellows, help me get it.” - -“How are you going to catch it?” Harold demanded. - -“Lasso it!” Arthur declared, untying a stout rope which hung from one -end of the weir posts. - -The prospect of catching such big game was too tempting for the males -of the party. And so while the girls dashed madly about, trying to get -out of their reach, screaming with excitement and holding on to each -other for protection, but really enjoying the situation very much--the -boys chased the turtle from corner to corner, until finally Arthur -managed to lasso a leathery paw and tie it captive to a weir post. How -he did this, he himself found it hard to say, because the water was -lashed to a miniature fury by the flounderings of both the turtle and -its captors. It was probably pure accident, he was humble enough to -assert. But having caught the creature, they were not content until -they had brought him ashore, and so the procession started beachwards, -Arthur pulling the turtle at the end of the rope. - -It was a huge turtle at least two feet in diameter. It had wide -leathery flappers, a wicked looking head--as big, Rosie said, as her -alarm clock. But its shell was beautifully marked. - -As they approached the beach they could see the great square of the -tablecloth laid out on the sand and Floribel busy piling up sandwiches -and hard-boiled eggs; fruit and cake. The Little Six came running to -meet them and then it became a problem to keep them out of the way -of the turtle’s snapping jaws. They had no difficulty however, with -Floribel, who screamed with terror at the sight of the strange creature -and would not allow them to bring it onto the beach. They ended by -mooring it, by means of a large rock, in one of the pools near the -shore. - -Then, forgetting their prey for a while, they sat down to lunch. They -were ready to do full justice to it. - -“Lord_ee_!” Floribel exclaimed once. “Dey’se salt enough here for an -army--shuah! Who put all dat salt in the basket?” - -The three girls burst into giggles. - -“I was so sure we’d forget the salt,” Maida said, “that I put in a pair -of salt-cellars.” - -“I put in three,” declared Rosie. - -“And I put in four,” confessed Laura. - -After lunch, following the orders which Mrs. Dore had given them, they -sat on the beach for an hour before they went in bathing again. This -prolonged itself to much more than an hour because they began making -the inevitable collections of shells and stones to take home. Floribel -said that moon-stones were sometimes found on this beach and there -instantly began a frantic search for the small, translucent white -stones. Of course everybody found several of what he supposed were -invaluable gems. By this time the tide, which had turned just as they -left the fish weir, was now galloping up on the beach in great waves. -They had to pull the turtle farther and farther in shore. At length -they all went in bathing again; the Big Six diving through the waves -and occasionally getting “boiled”--which was the local term for being -whirled about--for their pains. Floribel permitted the Little Six to -play only in the rush of the waves after they broke. - -After five o’clock, blissfully tired, excitedly happy, they piled the -little children into the machine; packed the turtle in the big lunch -hamper, tied the cover securely over him and started home. - - -Wild with excitement and the news of their find, they dashed into the -Little House. - -“Oh Granny you’ll never guess what we’ve brought home with us,” Maida -exclaimed. - -“And oh what a wonderful day we’ve had,” Rosie added. - -“And how tired we are and how hungry,” Laura concluded. - -The little children were all chattering with excitement; the boys were -attending to the turtle in the barn, preparatory to taking it to the -Magic Mirror. - -“I’m glad you’ve had a good time, children,” Granny said gravely. “Your -father is here, Maida, and he wants to see you all in the living room.” - -Something seemed to have gone out of the gayety of the day. What it was -or what made it go or where it went, Maida could not guess. Perhaps -it was a quality in Granny’s air and words. At any rate she said -instantly, “I’m going right in there, Granny, and Rosie will you please -tell the boys to come at once?” - -Rosie too had caught an infection of this seriousness. She sped to the -barn. In three minutes, the Big Six had gathered in the living room. -Mr. Westabrook was sitting on the couch in front of the fire. - -“Good afternoon, children,” he said quietly. “I told Granny to ask -you to come here the instant you came home, because I had something -to say to you. It occurred to me to-day that I would come over to the -Little House when you didn’t expect me and make an inspection. Hitherto -I have come regularly every Sunday. This is Thursday. I’m glad I did -because I found that neither the flower garden nor the vegetable -garden had been weeded for the last three days. The barn was in a very -disorderly confusion. I asked Granny how the girls had left their rooms -and although she didn’t want to tell me, she had to say that the beds -were not made and apparently nothing had been done. But the worst thing -of all that I have to say is that I find that the tennis court is all -kicked up as though it had been played on after a shower without having -first been rolled.” - -There was an instant of silence in the room; a silence so great that -everybody could hear quite plainly the ticking of the grandfather’s -clock. Arthur spoke first. - -“Mr. Westabrook,” he said in a low voice, “we ought to be ashamed of -ourselves and I certainly am. After all your kindness to us--I won’t -try to make any excuses because there are no excuses we can make.” - -“It’s all my fault,” Harold admitted, “I’m supposed to run the boys’ -end of the work and I have not held them up to keeping everything -right.” - -“It isn’t your fault,” Dicky declared hotly, “no more than mine or -Arthur’s. We’re all to blame.” - -“I’m awfully ashamed of myself, Mr. Westabrook,” Rosie confessed almost -in a whisper. “I wouldn’t blame you if you _never_ forgave us, but I -hope you will.” - -“I don’t know how we got this way,” Laura said in perplexity. “We began -right.” - -“We’ve been having such a good time,” Maida explained in a grave tone, -“that we’ve just let ourselves get careless.” - -“Then,” Mr. Westabrook advised them, rising, “try not to let yourselves -get careless again.” He shook hands all around; and kissed his -daughter. “Fair warning,” he said, “I don’t know when I’m coming again, -but it won’t be when you expect me.” - -It was a very subdued and a very tired little trio of girls who -went up-stairs and attended to their rooms. It was an even more -subdued--though a less tired--trio of boys who put the barn in order -and then trailing the turtle at the end of his rope, walked down to the -Magic Mirror, and tied him to a tree, and deposited him in the water -there for the night. - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII - -EXPIATION - - -A very quiet group of children gathered at breakfast the next morning. -Conversation was intermittent and devoted mainly to piling offers of -assistance in the housework on Granny and Mrs. Dore. - -“When you have finished your own work, we’ll see,” Mrs. Dore steadily -answered all these suggestions. - -The children finished their work in record time and with the utmost -care. The girls swept and dusted their chambers. They washed the -furniture, the paint and the windows. Everything was taken out of -closets and bureau-drawers, shaken and carefully put back. They shook -rugs. The boys in a frenzy of emulation followed a program equally -detailed. Having accomplished all this, the Big Six again begged for -more work and Granny and Mrs. Dore, taking pity on the penitent little -sinners, thought up all kinds of odd jobs for them to perform. - -At length, Maida said, “Now we’ve done all the work we can do, there’s -one other thing I’d like to see attended to. I woke up in the middle -of the night--I don’t know what woke me--but I began at once to think -of that turtle--that poor, horrid turtle. And it suddenly came into my -head that it was a very cruel thing to put a creature in fresh water -who is accustomed to salt water. I suppose it’ll kill him in time, -won’t it?” she appealed to Arthur. - -“Gee _whillikins_,” Arthur answered, “I never thought of that! Of -course he’ll die. But what are we going to do about it?” - -“I thought,” Maida began very falteringly, “if you would let us, -Granny, we’d ask Zeke to drive us over to the beach and we’d take the -turtle and put him back in the water where he came from. We won’t stay -there but a moment.” - -“I don’t see why you shouldn’t do that,” Mrs. Dore accorded them -thoughtfully. - -“And as for me, I’ll be glad to be well rid of the craythur,” Granny -said shudderingly. - -So it was settled. After luncheon, the three boys went down to the -Magic Mirror, hauled the poor awkward beast out of the water; pulled -it along the trail to the barn. They loaded it into the lunch hamper -again; stowed it in the automobile; and then Zeke drove them to the -beach. - -Once there, they lifted the hamper out of the machine, removed the -cover and dumped its living contents onto the sand. - -There was no question as to the turtle’s wishes in this matter. Without -an instant’s hesitation, he turned in the direction of the ocean; -and lumbered toward it over the sand--lumbered awkwardly but with a -surprising swiftness. The waves were piling in, like great ridges of -melted glass, green edged with shining, opalescent filigree. They -shattered themselves on the sand and seemed miraculously to turn into -great fans of green emerald trimmed with pearl-colored, foam lace. - -The turtle struck the broken wave ... swam into it ... dove through -the next wave ... and the next ... and the next.... Suddenly they lost -sight of him. - - -When they returned, still unnaturally quiet, to the Little House, to -their great surprise Billy Potter came forward to meet them. - -Their subdued spirits took an involuntary jump. Nevertheless they -greeted their guest in an unusually quiet way. Billy’s perceptions, -always keen, apparently leaped in an instant of calculation to the -truth. After a while, in which he devoted himself to the Little Six, -he suggested that the Big Six take a walk with him. They accepted the -invitation with alacrity and plunged into the woods. - -When they were out of sight of the Little House, “Now what’s the -matter?” Billy Potter suddenly demanded. - -They told him; all at once; each interrupting the other, piling -on excuses and explanations; interrupted with confessions and -self-accusals. - -“We feel that we’ve treated Mr. Westabrook rottenly,” Arthur concluded. - -“And we don’t know what to do to show him we’re sorry,” Rosie after a -pause added. - -“That’s pretty bad,” Billy commented. “Now let’s think of some way out -of this.” He himself meditated for an interval, falling into a study so -deep that no one of the children dared interrupt it. - -“I’ll tell you,” he burst out after a while, “Why not invite Mr. -Westabrook down for an afternoon--to make another inspection of the -house--and to stay for supper. You probably haven’t shown him for a -long time how well you can cook.” - -“No, we haven’t,” Maida said. “I think father has eaten only one meal -that we girls cooked.” - -“I think that would be lovely,” Rosie agreed. - -“Let’s do it as quickly as possible,” Arthur suggested. “This is Friday -morning. Why don’t you invite him for Monday night?” - -The children caught the suggestion at once. That night, working -together--for Billy Potter stayed over only one train--they painfully -drafted a formal invitation to Mr. Westabrook to spend Monday afternoon -with them and stay to supper. They posted it the next morning and -almost by return mail, they received a formal acceptance. - -Monday was a day of the most frantic work that the Little House had -ever seen. Everything was swept that could be swept; dusted that -could be dusted; washed that could be washed; polished that could be -polished. Rosie even washed off the stepping stones that led to the -Little House. And Maida not to be outdone, shined the brass knocker -on the door and the knob. Laura was only stopped in time from pinning -flypaper, which she had bought with her own pocket money, on the -outside of the screen door. - -“There are no flies in the house,” Mrs. Dore protested, “and we can’t -catch all the flies in the outside world.” - -The boys cleaned the barn, the little cellar to the house, its tiny -garret. They rolled and re-rolled the tennis court. They begged for -other work and Mrs. Dore gave them all the table silver to polish and -some pots, obstinately black, to scrape. - -When Mr. Westabrook came, the place looked, as he said, as though they -had cleaned the outside with manicure tools and the inside with the -aid of a microscope. The supper which, in deference to Mr. Westabrook, -included a single hot dish, consisted of one of Rosie’s delicious -chowders; one of Maida’s delicious blueberry cakes; one of Laura’s -delicious salads; and a freezer full of the boys’ delicious ice-cream. - -Mr. Westabrook said that he had eaten meals all over the United States -and in nearly every country in Europe and he could not recall any one -that he had enjoyed more than this. - -That night the Big Six went to bed with clear consciences. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX - -MAIDA’S MOOD - - -“What are you so quiet about, Maida?” Dicky asked at breakfast a few -mornings later. “I don’t think you’ve said a word since you’ve got up.” - -“Haven’t I?” Maida replied. But she added nothing. - -At first because of the noise which prevailed at breakfasts in the -Little House, nobody noticed Maida’s continued silence. Then finally -Rosie Brine made comment on it. “Sleepy-head! Sleepy-head!” she teased. -“Wake up and talk. You’re not in bed asleep. You’re sitting at the -table.” - -Maida opened her lips to speak but closed them quickly on something -which it was apparent, she even repented thinking. She shut her lips -firmly and maintained her silence. - -“S’eepy-head! S’eepy-head!” the little mimic, Delia, prattled. “Wate up -and tot. Not in bed as’eep. Sitting at table.” - -Everybody laughed. Everybody always laughed at Delia’s strenuous -efforts to produce as copious a stream of conversation as the -grown-ups. But Maida only bit her lips. - -The talk drifted among the older children to plans for the day. - -“Perhaps you will give us your views, Miss Westabrook,” Laura said -after some discussion, with a touch of purely friendly sarcasm. “That -is if you will condescend to talk with us.” - -“Oh can’t I be quiet once in a while,” Maida exclaimed pettishly, -“without everybody speaking of it!” She rose from the table. “I’m tired -of talking!” She walked quickly out of the dining room and ran upstairs -to her own chamber. The children stared for a moment petrified. - -“Why I never saw Maida cross before,” Rosie said in almost an awed -tone. “I wonder what can be the matter. I hope I didn’t say anything--” - -“No, of course you didn’t,” Arthur answered. “Maida got out of the -wrong side of her bed this morning--that’s all.” - -“Well,” Laura concluded generously, “if anybody’s got a right to be -cross once in a while, it’s Maida. She’s always so sweet.” - -After breakfast, the children separated, as was the custom of the -Little House, to the early morning tasks. But Rosie and Laura lingered -about, talking in low tones, before one went to the library and the -other into the living room to do her daily stint of dusting. After this -work was finished, they proceeded to the garden and plucked flowers -together. - -It was phlox season and Laura cut great bunches of blossoms that ran -all the shades from white to a deep magenta through pink, vermilion, -lavender and purple-blue. But Rosie chose caligulas--changelessly -orange; zinnias--purple, garnet, crimson; marigolds--yellow and gold. - -“Oh how lovely they look,” Laura exclaimed burying her face in the -delicately-perfumed mass of phlox. She put her harvest on a rock and -helped Rosie with the more difficult work of gathering nasturtiums. The -vines and plants were now full of blossoms. It was impossible to keep -ahead of them. They picked all they could. - -“I hope Maida isn’t sick,” Laura said after a while. - -“I don’t believe she is,” Rosie reassured her. - -“I wonder if we ought not to go up to her room,” Laura mused. “Let’s!” - -Rosie reflected. “No, I think we’d better wait until after we’ve come -back from the errands. Maida wants to be alone so seldom that I guess -we’d better not interrupt her. Besides I heard her slam her door hard -and then lock it. I guess that means she doesn’t want anybody around -for a time.” - -“I guess it does too,” Laura agreed. “It isn’t my turn to go to market, -but I’m going with you this morning, Rosie. It’ll give Maida a chance -to be alone for a while.” - -The little girls trundled their bicycles out of the barn; mounted them -and speeded down the long trail which led to the road. - - -In the meantime, Maida still remained in her room. She made her bed -with fierce determined motions, as though it were a work of destruction -rather than construction. She dusted her bureau with swift slapping -strokes. Then she sat down by the window. Why was she cross, she didn’t -know; but undoubtedly she _was_ cross. She didn’t want to go anywhere; -she didn’t want to play games; to see anybody; least of all to talk. -Why--when ordinarily she was so sociable, she should have this feeling -she had no idea. Nevertheless it was there. - -From various directions, sound of voices came to her; Rosie’s and -Laura’s from the garden; the boys from the barn; the little children -from House Rock. Rosie and Laura were nearer, but she could not hear -what they were saying. And of course she made no attempt to listen. -Later she heard them go around to the barn--she knew they were off on -the morning marketing. Still Maida continued to sit listlessly looking -out of the window. - -A long time seemed to go by. - -Presently she heard in the distance, the sound of Laura and Rosie -returning. They were evidently in a great state of excitement. She -could hear them chattering about something as they came up the trail to -the house. She did not feel like talking, but she knew it was her duty -to meet them, to apologize for her rudeness, to go on with the usual -games of the day. She caught the rattle with which the two girls put -their bicycles in place; then their swift rush to the kitchen. At the -door she got in Rosie’s high excited tones, “Where’s Maida, Granny?” - -“Still upstairs,” Granny answered. “I haven’t heard her stir.” - -“We’ve got something to tell her,” Rosie went on swiftly. - -“And the most dreadful thing has happened,” Laura put in -simultaneously. Then talking together in phrases that broke one against -the other or overlapped, “A dreadful accident ... Silva Burle ... this -morning ... she was on her bicycle ... man just learning to run an -automobile ... knocked her off ... picked up senseless.... It happened -in front of Fosdick house ... took her in ... there now....” - -“How is the poor choild?” Maida heard Granny ask compassionately. - -“Nothing broken,” Laura answered eagerly, “but it was a long time -before she came to.” - -“She’s not unconscious any longer,” Rosie concluded the story. “She’s -asleep, but she moans and mutters all the time.” - -Maida listened, horrified. She felt that she ought to go downstairs and -talk with the girls. She felt that she ought to get on her bicycle, go -at once to see Silva. - -Apparently Mrs. Dore said something to that effect; for Rosie answered -promptly, “Oh no, nobody’s allowed to see her yet.” - -Somehow if she could not go to Silva, Maida did not feel like talking. -Not yet at any rate. Why not get away from the house until her strange -mood passed? - - - - -CHAPTER XX - -MAIDA’S FIND - - -Maida crept slowly out of her room; stole softly down the stairs; ran -quietly to a side entrance; opened the screen door gently; closed it -inaudibly; dashed down the trail to the Magic Mirror. She arrived at -the boathouse panting. But she did not wait to recover her breath. -Quickly she unlocked the door and pulled out one of the canoes, leaped -into it so swiftly that she almost upset it, paddled as rapidly as she -could towards the center of the lake. - -It was an unusually hot day. And paddling was hot work. The water -looked tempting. Maida battled with a temptation, which she had never -known before, to jump overboard just as she was in her fresh clean -dress and take a long swim. But she knew that Granny Flynn would -disapprove of this and she relinquished her project with a tired sigh. -She did not stop paddling until she reached the other side of the lake. -Then she drew the canoe in close to the shore, under an overhanging -tree; lay down in it; stared vacantly up at the sky. - -“I know what’s the matter with me,” she thought suddenly. “I’m tired. I -didn’t sleep well last night. I had a dreadful dream--Now what was that -dream? It was a nightmare really and it seemed to last so long. What -was it--Oh _what_ was it?” - -She groped in her memory in the way one does to remember a haunting but -elusive dream. It was like trying, in pitch darkness, to pick out one -rag from scores of others in a rag bag. Then suddenly a ray of light -seemed to pierce that darkness and she put her hand on the right rag. - -Very late, long after midnight indeed, it seemed to her that somebody -came into her room, that she half-waked; spoke. That somebody did not -answer and she fell asleep again. Yes, she remembered now, that that -somebody seemed to come in through the window. She fell asleep and yet -not entirely asleep.... That somebody moved about the room ... looked -at everything.... That somebody stopped near the little hair-cloth -trunk which contained Lucy’s clothes. After a while ... that somebody -went away ... through the window.... But all night long, a sense -of trouble and disturbance kept bringing Maida out of deep sleep to -ruffled wakefulness; then sent her back into a heavy and fatiguing -slumber. - -Thinking this over and staring up at the blue sky, Maida drifted off to -sleep. She woke--it must have been nearly two hours later--perfectly -refreshed. But she did not go back immediately to the Little House. -Instead, the sight of a columbine in the woods made her determine -to land. She knew that Rosie particularly loved the columbines and -pursuing, half absently, the trail which went to the Moraine, she soon -gathered a great armful. - -Maida became so absorbed in this pleasant duty of reparation that she -went further than she intended. In fact, it was with a real sense -of surprise--and a slight tingle of terror--that suddenly she found -herself at the approach to the Moraine itself. She had not been -there since the extraordinary day of the picnic and although she had -not let her mind dwell on the curious experience of that occasion, -she had by no means forgotten it. For a moment, she hesitated about -going further. And then she caught a glimpse, across the rust-brown -pine-needle-covered expanse, of a great clump of columbines faintly -nodding their delicate heads. Involuntarily Maida dashed across the -Moraine and picked them. More appeared beyond. She picked all these and -then just beyond, she caught sight of a tiny field of columbines. Maida -moved in their direction, plumped herself down in the midst of their -beautiful living carpet. It was cool there and quiet. The pines held -the sun out, although their needles were all filmed with iridescence; -but they let little glimpses of the sky through their branches. Some -strange wood insect burst into a long strident buzz. - -Suddenly there came, as though from the very ground under her feet, a -long wailing cry. - -Maida turned white. Her heart leaped so high that she felt with another -such impulse it would break through her chest. She jumped to her feet, -still clutching her flowers, raced across the Moraine into the path. -She had not gone very far before something stopped her; not an obstacle -but a thought. She had expected, remembering the day of the picnic, -that the voice would be joined by two others. This did not happen. That -first voice maintained its eerie call. The thought was, “That cry is -not the cry of anything frightening like a goblin or a wild animal, or -a tramp--it is the wail of a baby.” - -Maida stood for a moment just where she had stopped. The cry began -again. Terror surged through Maida. But she clinched her hands and -made herself listen. Yes, that was what it was--the wail of a baby. -Could it be some little baby animal crying for its mother--a fawn -like Betsy’s or--and here Maida’s hair rose on her head again--a baby -bear? Her common sense immediately rejected this theory. There were no -bears in the woods. And if it were a baby deer, she would be ashamed -of being afraid of a baby deer when Betsy showed no fear. For another -interval she stood still fighting her cowardice. Then suddenly she -took her resolution in hand. “I’m going to find out _what_ it is,” she -said aloud. Perhaps she was assisted in this by the cessation of the -mysterious wail. Only for a moment however! Her resolution received -another weakening blow by the sudden resumption of the uncanny noise. -But she did not actually stop, she only faltered. For the farther she -walked across the Moraine, the more it sounded like the crying of--not -a baby animal--but a regular baby. Suddenly all Maida’s fear vanished -forever. “I am not afraid any more,” she said to herself. And she -wasn’t. - -The hard thing was to discover where the cry came from. It seemed under -her feet. She plunged here, there, beyond--everywhere, looking up and -down but finding nothing. Then she began a more systematic search. -Starting with the very edge of the Moraine she took every rock as it -came along, searched around and over it, each clump of bushes, parted -them and walked through them. Still the cry kept up. Occasionally she -stopped to listen. “That baby’s sick,” she said once, and later, “I do -believe it’s hungry.” - -Ahead, a big rock thrust out of the earth like an elephant sitting on -its haunches. At one side, two bushes grew at so acute an angle and -with branches so thickly leaved, that the great surface of the rock was -concealed. Maida parted them. - -Underneath there was no rocky surface. The bushes concealed a small low -opening to what looked like a cave. Was it a cave? Where did it lead? -How far? Would--and again Maida’s heart spun with terror--would she -confront an enraged mother bear if she entered it? But these questions -all died in Maida’s mind. For, emerging undisputedly from the cave, -came the fretful cry of a baby. - -Without further question, Maida dropped to her hands and knees and -crawled into the opening. Crawled _down_ rather; for the entrance -sloped at first. Then, it began to grow level. The crying grew louder. - -It was a big cave. The end was lost in shadow but in the light from the -entrance, Maida could see something lying, not far off, on a heap of -bed clothes. As she looked, a tiny hand came up and waved in the air. -Maida could not stand upright yet. But she hurried over to that tiny -hand. She was beginning to get the glimmer of a little white face. - -It _was_ a baby. - -The baby put up its hands to her. Maida lifted it from the ground -and made rapidly backwards to the cave opening. It was a lovely -baby--Maida decided that at once--a girl, getting towards a year old, -brown-complexioned with a thick shock of dark hair and big brown eyes. -For a moment, it looked at Maida in surprise and even in baby distrust; -then it began to cry. Its open mouth displayed four little white teeth. - -Maida put the baby down on the soft grass in the shade of some bushes. -She returned to the cave. She found a candle there; some matches in an -iron box. She lighted the candle. There was one pile of baby clothes, -unironed though perfectly clean, but in tatters. Beside them was -another pile. Somehow these seemed familiar. Maida looked closely. - -They were Lucy’s clothes. - -Then--lightnings poured through Maida’s mind--It was not a -dream--Somebody had come into her room ... robbed her ... robbed little -Lucy.... But she must not think of that now, with a crying, perhaps a -starving baby on her hands. Further back was a bundle of hay, pressed -down as though somebody older slept there. There was a little alcohol -lamp and the materials for warming milk; milk bottles but no milk. - -Maida returned to the baby, who had resumed its crying; took it into -her lap; rocked it. - -What should she do? The baby must belong to somebody. But where was -that somebody? It was hungry now. She felt sure of that. It seemed to -her that she ought to take the baby home. And yet suppose the parent -should come back? Then she would be in the position of stealing a baby. -What should she do? She could not go off and leave it. Nor could she -stay indefinitely. She had not even told them at the Little House -where she was going. They would be worried about her. They would -think that, like Betsy, she was lost. Pretty soon they might send out -searching parties. How she regretted her pettishness of the morning. -And still if it had not been for that, she would not have come here; -would not have found the baby. What _should_ she do? - -She put her hands over her eyes, as though shutting out the sight of -things made it easier to think. Perhaps it did. For suddenly it came to -her that the first thing to consider was the baby. Babies must not be -neglected. Babies must be fed. It was a serious matter for them to go -too long without their milk. Suddenly she pulled her little red morocco -diary from her pocket; tore out a page. With the little pencil that lay -in the loop of the diary she wrote: - - - I have taken your baby to my home--the Little House. It is at - the end of the trail just across the lake. I was afraid you had - deserted her and she would get sick and die. I am sorry if you are - worried, but you can have your baby at once by claiming her. - - -A phrase slipped from she knew not where into her mind. She concluded -with it: “and proving property.” She signed her own name and under it -wrote, “Daughter of Jerome Westabrook, financier.” - -Her mind made up, Maida worked quickly. Holding the baby in her -arms, she walked swiftly down the trail to the canoe. Here a problem -presented itself. - -She could not hold the baby in her arms, nor could she let the hot -sun of that hot August day pour on the little head. After a great -deal of difficulty and some maneuvering, she managed to stand up some -thickly-leaved branches so that they made a shade. She placed the baby -on one of the canoe cushions in its shadow; stepped into the canoe. - -Never had Maida paddled so carefully or so well. On the other side, -she tethered the canoe; lifted the baby out. She had cried all the way -across the lake and was still crying fitfully. - -“Somebody may come and break the canoe,” Maida surmised swiftly, “but I -can’t wait to put it away.” She hurried in the direction of the Little -House. “What a surprise I’ve got for them,” her thoughts ran. She was -toiling along slowly now, for by this time, the baby had grown heavy as -lead. Maida had to stop many times to rest her arms. Her back ached as -though it would break. “They’ll all want to keep this baby forever and -I wish we could.” - -But the surprise was not all for the others, nor indeed much as -compared with their surprise for Maida. For as Maida neared the house, -Rosie came flying down the path. Maida saw that her face was white and -that great tears were pouring down her cheeks. - -“Oh, Maida,” she sobbed, “where have you been? We’ve been looking -for you everywhere. A most terrible thing has happened. Poor Mrs. -Dore”--she burst for an instant into uncontrollable sobbing; then -composed herself, “--fell down the cellar stairs and broke her leg. -We’ve had a dreadful time--Where did you get that baby?” - -“In a cave,” Maida answered faintly. “Will you carry her, Rosie, I’m so -tired. Go on quickly. Tell me all about it--” - -Rosie took the baby into her expert arms; continued. “Well, Arthur -called up the Satuit doctor and he came with an ambulance and they’ve -taken her to the Satuit Center hospital. Granny Flynn had to go with -her--and we’re all alone. We’ll have to run the house ourselves until -Granny can get back. Poor Dicky feels dreadful and now we’ve got this -baby on our hands. Everything happens at once, doesn’t it? Gracious, -I’ll have to give this poor little thing something to eat right off. -That’s a hungry cry.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXI - -TRAGEDY - - -Indoors was the scene and sound of confusion. Delia, sensing the panic -that lay in the atmosphere, was crying wildly for her mother. The -other children, unchecked, were running about the house in a game that -seemed an improvised combination of tag and hide-and-go-seek. Their -excited cries rang from above. Arthur was at the telephone trying -to get Central. Beside him, a pencil ready to take down anything of -importance, very wan-faced and pale, drooped Dicky. From the dining -room came the clatter of plates as Harold and Laura went practically to -work to set the table. - -Arthur stared at Maida and Rosie as they entered with their strange -bundle; stopped his telephoning to say, “Where did you get that baby?” - -“I’ll tell you in a moment,” Maida said wearily, “but now we’ve got to -work fast and I never was so tired in my life. Oh Dicky dear, I’m so -sorry for you! Poor, poor, Mrs. Dore and poor, poor Granny!” - -But it was Rosie who really took the situation in charge, Rosie who so -loved babies, Rosie who having helped so long in the care of her own -little brother, knew exactly what to do. - -“Tell Laura to get some milk from the ice chest, Arthur!” she commanded -crisply, “and warm it up on the stove as quickly as possible. Then -bring it upstairs to us. Maida, you come with me!” Rosie marched up to -the bathroom and Maida meekly followed. On the first floor, “Get Mrs. -Dore’s sewing board!” Rosie ordered and Maida got it. In the bathroom, -Rosie placed the sewing board across the tub, close to the hand bowl; -began to undress the baby. - -There were few things to take off. They were all loose, comparatively -clean, but ragged. Soon the little creature lay on the soft towels that -Rosie had spread on the sewing board, kicking feebly. The removal of -her clothes seemed to ease her. Her cry abated its violence a bit. Only -what was the translation of a baby sob came now and then. Rosie filled -the bowl with warm water, then with the gentlest of soothing strokes -and using the softest sponge she could find, she began to bathe the -baby. Its crying died down completely. It responded to this cooling -treatment with a little soft coo that drew from Maida, “Oh the little -darling. Don’t you love her already, Rosie?” - -“I love all babies,” Rosie said in a business-like tone, sopping the -little girl’s downy head. She dried her carefully--deft little pattings -that seemed merely pettings--with the finest towel she could get. - -“Run to Mrs. Dore’s room and get Delia’s powder!” she commanded briefly -again. When Maida returned, she covered the little glowing form with -the cool powder. The baby’s eyelids began to droop. - -“See how sleepy it is,” Rosie said with a kind of triumph. “Ah there -comes Laura. Oh I wonder if she had the sense to put the milk in one of -Delia’s old bottles?” - -Laura had had the sense to do this, and was obviously proud of her -foresight. Very expertly, Rosie turned a few drops from the bottle onto -the back of her hand; decided it was not too hot; inserted the nipple -in the baby’s mouth. The little girl pulled on it like one famished; -pulled so hard and long and deep that Rosie had, once or twice, to take -the bottle away to keep her from choking. The little hands always -reached out for the bottle and after a few instants Rosie gave it to -her again. - -In the meantime, Maida answered the stream of Laura’s questions, and -Laura answered the torrent of Maida’s. - -The baby pulled continuously at the bottle. Rosie had to lift the lower -end higher and higher. After a long while, the baby dropped the nipple -with a little sigh of relaxation. Her eyes, which had been growing -heavier and heavier closed ... opened ... closed.... - -Now she was asleep. - -“I don’t know what her feeding hours are,” Rosie said. “I’ll give her -another feeding at four this afternoon. I’m going to fix the alarm -clock so that I’ll wake at ten to-night, then I’ll let her go until -morning. I don’t believe she has more than one night feeding. Even if -she does, she can get along without it, one night. She seems famished -now though. I never saw such a hungry baby.” - -“You wake me up,” Maida said almost jealously. “Remember she’s _my_ -baby.” - -“Yes,” Rosie agreed, “I’ll wake you.” She knit her satiny brows. “I -wonder whose baby she is? They must be awfully worried about her by -this time.” - -“Oh, I left a note,” Maida protested. - -“Are you sure you left it where they’d see it?” - -Maida nodded. “I put a stone on it to hold it down and I surrounded it -by other pages that I tore out of my diary and put stones on them. You -could not fail to see it.” - -Rosie lifted the baby and carried it to her bed. “I don’t think she -could fall off,” she said. “But to make sure I’ll put chairs up against -her and bank her around with pillows. Now we’d better let her sleep.” - -In the meantime, Arthur had finished his telephoning. Mrs. Dore was as -well as could be expected; was resting quietly. The break was a simple -one. All she needed, in order to recover, was time and rest. The three -boys had managed to stop Delia’s sobs; had captured the five other -children and were keeping them quiet. Now they bombarded Maida with -questions. - -For the third time, Maida told the story of the baby. “Well, Maida, you -certainly were brave,” Laura declared, “to follow that noise until you -found out what it was. I would have run as fast as I could and as far -as I could. That is, if I hadn’t fainted.” - -“No,” Maida protested, “I wasn’t brave I wish I had been. At first I -was as frightened as I could be. But when it flashed on me that it was -a baby crying, it didn’t take any courage to find out where the baby -was.” - -“I wonder whose baby it is,” Harold said. - -Everybody said this at least once, everybody except Arthur, but Arthur -said nothing. He was thinking hard. - -“Something queer happened to me the other night,” he broke out -suddenly. “I didn’t tell you all about it because--because--Well -somehow I couldn’t. I didn’t know what the answer was and I was ashamed -that a girl could beat me like that.” - -“Like what?” Rosie demanded. “What are you talking about? Oh, Arthur, -do tell us!” - -Arthur related in all its detail his experience with Silva Burle. “It -made me wild,” he admitted, “to think that a girl could find a path -that I couldn’t see and get away from me when I could run twice as fast -as she--Well not twice as fast,” he corrected himself honestly, “but a -great deal faster.” - -“Well of course Silva’s a queer girl,” was Rosie’s comment. She added, -“She won’t be running down any paths for some time yet I’m afraid, poor -thing!” - -“I think Silva had something to do with that baby,” Arthur guessed -shrewdly. - -“What nonsense!” Rosie said briskly. “What would she be doing taking -care of somebody’s baby in the woods?” - -“But she had a bottle of milk under her arm,” Arthur persisted. - -“Yes,” Rosie said in an uncertain voice, “and that reminds me that I -have seen her before carrying bottles of milk.” - -“Oh I think somebody’s probably left that baby there for the day,” -Laura said, “some tramp--or somebody.” - -“But it must have been the baby crying that frightened us on the day of -the picnic,” Harold declared. - -“Well then,” Laura explained, “it was the same baby and the same -people, whoever they were, left the baby in the cave that day too.” - -The telephone rang. Arthur answered it. He listened for a moment, then -he said, “Yes, of course. We’ll be all right. Tell her not to worry.” -He turned to the others. “Poor Granny’s so upset that she wants to stay -near the hospital all night, so she can see Mrs. Dore the first thing -to-morrow morning. She asked if we could get along by ourselves until -Floribel came to-night and of course I said we could.” - -“Of course we can,” Maida reassured him. - -“Oh I’m so glad Granny can stay. It does seem as though everything came -at once.” - -“Things go by three’s,” Rosie asserted. - -“Well what are our three?” Maida inquired. “There was Mrs. Dore’s -accident, finding the baby and-- What’s the third?” - -“You wait,” Rosie prophesied loftily, “It’ll come. But now the thing to -do is to get lunch. Thank goodness for all those cooking lessons we’ve -had. Don’t you remember, Maida, that your father said that we’d never -know when we’d be put in a situation that we’d be very glad we could -cook.” - -“What shall we have for luncheon?” Maida asked and her voice quavered a -little. - -“We’d better look into the ice chest and see what’s there,” suggested -the practical Laura. - -“Oh here’s all this nice stew left over from day before yesterday!” -Rosie’s head was concealed by the ice chest door but her tone was that -of one who has found diamonds. “That’s nice because all we’ve got to do -to that is warm it up. I’ll attend to the stew.” - -“And here’s some delicious tarts,” Laura exclaimed, “that Granny must -have made this morning. We’ll have them for dessert.” - -“Now while I’m warming the stew,” Rosie commanded, “you two cut the -bread; fill the milk pitchers and put the butter on the table.” - -When they summoned the others to lunch, they found the seats all -changed about. This was the work of the practical Rosie. “You must each -of you take care of one of the children,” Rosie explained. “Now all of -you begin buttering the bread while I am dishing out the stew.” - -Laura had Betsy, and Dicky, Delia. Harold had one of the Clark twins -and Laura the other. Maida took care of both Timmie and Molly; so that -Rosie had nothing to do but serve. - -“My goodness, I never realized how much work Granny and Mrs. Dore do,” -Laura said once, “and how patient they are. Delia, that’s your fourth -slice of bread and butter. Now you _must_ drink your milk.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXII - -SILVA’S MESSAGE - - -“After the dishes are washed and wiped, let’s set the table for -supper,” Laura suggested. “Floribel will be so tired when she gets -home, and thinks of all the work she’ll have to do alone.” - -So the girls added this to the work they had already done. - -“Shall we go in bathing this afternoon?” Rosie asked when the last -knife and fork was in place. - -“You all go if you want,” Maida answered, “I don’t think I want to -swim. Somehow I feel as though I’d like to stay about the house. So -many things have happened that I’m worried about going away.” - -“So do I, Maida,” Laura agreed emphatically. - -So although the boys went in swimming as usual, the girls stayed at -home. - -“I feel tired, too,” Maida remarked. They took books from the library -and settled quietly in the Tree Room where they read and talked all -the afternoon. They were interrupted twice--once by the boys who, as -though they had a responsibility too, cut their swimming short--and by -the baby. - -When the baby awoke, late in the afternoon, Rosie brought her -downstairs into the air for a while. They all declared that she looked -quite a different child. A tinge of pink had come into her soft brown -cheeks and the warmth and moisture of her nap had curled the brown hair -in her neck. - -“Oh you sweet _sweet_ darling!” Maida kissed the little girl -ecstatically. “Oh how I wish your parents would give you to me! That’s -all we need in the Little House--a baby. Delia’s not quite little -enough.” She caught Delia and kissed her. - -“Delia bid dirl,” Delia protested. - -Even the boys were amused and entertained by their little visitor. -Arthur deigned to make faces for her. They amused her enormously, -and when Harold unloosed an ear-splitting whistle, she turned round, -delighted eyes in his direction. But that she was still tired was -evident; she kept falling into little naps. - -“I don’t think I’ll bathe her again so soon,” Rosie meditated with -knitted brows when they had taken her upstairs for the night. -“To-morrow I’ll give her a bath in the morning and another at night. -But now I’ll just wash her face and hands and let her have her bottle. -You do it this time, Maida and to-morrow,” added Rosie, generous -always, “we’ll take turns bathing and feeding her.” - -As they came downstairs Laura said, “I wonder what time it is. Oh half -past five!” - -“Five!” Maida exclaimed. “Why Floribel ought to have been home at five! -What train can she get now?” - -Nobody knew, but Arthur remembered there was a time-table in the -library. They clustered about him. To most of them it was as difficult -as Greek; but to Arthur, who had had some experience in traveling and -to Maida who had had a great deal, it did not seem insolvable. - -They puzzled over it together. - -“There’s a train at six from Boston and another at seven,” they finally -decided. “And that’s all.” - -“She must have lost the three from Boston,” Maida declared. “But the -six from Boston isn’t due here until eight. And in the meantime we’ll -have to get supper.” - -“Say let us boys help,” Arthur suggested. “It must be a big job -cooking for twelve. I know how to cook,” he added unexpectedly. - -“Where did you learn, Arthur?” Maida asked with interest. - -“Tramping with my father,” Arthur answered briefly. “We often camped in -the woods for days.” - -“Supper isn’t so hard as dinner,” Rosie said hopefully. “Now I propose -that we have a combination salad with hard-boiled eggs cut up in it. -You see there’s a lot of cold vegetables in the ice chest and we can -make a custard and orange pudding.” - -The whole group, three girls and three boys, bustled into the kitchen. -From a drawer full of aprons, Rosie took out enough for all of them. -The little girls wore the aprons as they should be worn, but in the -boys’ case, Rosie tied them around their necks. “I’ve seen boys cook -before,” she announced scornfully, “and when they get through, they -generally look as though they had fallen into a barrel of something.” - -The boys protested loudly. But to some extent Rosie’s pungent comment -seemed to be justified. Arthur for instance squeezed the orange juice -into his own eye. He yelled so loudly at this unexpected deluge that -Harold dropped an egg on his coat. - -“There I told you!” Rosie declared scathingly. “What did you pick out -an egg to drop for, Harold, why didn’t you drop a potato?” - -However pride goeth before destruction and the contemptuous Rosie was -soon caught up with; for clandestinely stealing a long sliver of ice -from the high ice box, she seized it in such a way that it slipped out -of her hand and dropped down her neck. - -“Serves you right,” Arthur declared with delight. With heartless -interest they all watched her wriggles before she was able to secure -and extricate the slippery, rapidly melting sliver. - -“You look as though you had had the hose squirted on you,” said Dicky. - -But their supper was good. The salad--lettuce with cold peas, string -beans, tomatoes and sliced eggs--was so pretty that Maida said she -thought it ought to be used as an ornament for the center of the table. -As for the custard and orange pudding--to which the gifted Laura had -added a delicious meringue--they ate and ate. - -“I never tasted anything so good in all my life,” Rosie sighed. “I wish -we’d made a bathtubful. Once I had a dream,” she went on pensively, -“where it looked as though I was going to have all the sweet things -to eat I wanted. I dreamed that when I came out in the morning to -go to school, the whole neighborhood was made of pink and white -candy--everything, houses, streets, lamp-posts. I took a big bite right -out of my fence.” - -“And what happened then?” Maida asked breathlessly. - -“I woke up, goose. Wouldn’t you _know_ that that was what would happen -with a whole worldful of candy to be eaten?” - -After talking a while longer, they all filed into the living room; -began to look about for their books. Suddenly the telephone bell rang. -Maida was nearest. “I hope nothing else has happened,” she said as she -took off the receiver. - -“I want to talk with Maida Westabrook,” came a girl’s voice over -the wire to her. Strange it was and yet it had a familiar ring; the -strangeness was its weakness and its breathlessness. - -“I am Maida Westabrook.” - -“Listen! I must talk quick. They will be back and stop me. I am Silva -Burle. They think I am asleep. I have tried to tell them. They won’t -listen. They think I am raving. I’m not. I’ve got my senses. My baby -sister, Nesta, is in a cave on the other side of the lake. Tyma is -away. There’s nobody to feed her. She’ll starve--” - -“I found her this afternoon, Silva,” Maida interrupted. “She’s upstairs -in the Little House now--fast asleep.” - -“Oh!” Silva’s voice dropped almost as though she were faint. Then -suspiciously, “Are you saying this to me because you think I’m raving? -Oh tell me the truth. I ask God to be my witness that I am telling -_you_ the truth.” - -“Yes, Silva,” Maida said steadily, “I am telling you the truth. I give -you my word of honor. I went across the lake this morning. I heard the -baby crying. I followed the sound and found her. Don’t worry any more -about her. We’ll keep her here just as long as you’re ill.” She started -to add the news of Mrs. Dore’s accident, of Granny’s and Floribel’s -absence, but a sudden discreet impulse bade her not to go on. Instead -she said, “How did you happen to have the baby in that cave?” - -“It’s a long story,” answered Silva weakly. “I can’t tell you now. Will -you come to see me to-morrow?” - -“Yes,” Maida agreed, “in the morning.” - -“You promise?” Silva’s weak voice entreated; it almost threatened. - -“I cross my throat and my heart!” Unseen by Silva, Maida solemnly -performed these rituals of the pledged word. - -“And you’re sure she’s all right?” - -“Sure,” Maida answered. “You ought to hear her laugh and coo.” - -“Ask her how often they feed her,” came from Rosie’s clear voice from -behind. Maida repeated the question. - -“Four times a day--at nine; at twelve; at three and at six, and then at -night.” - -“That’s what Rosie said,” Maida explained, “four in the day and one at -night.” - -“I can never thank you enough.” Silva’s voice had something in it that -Maida had never heard there before. “But some day-- Here they are -coming up the stairs. I must get back to bed.” Silva’s voice cut off -quickly. Maida listened for a while, but there was no sound. - -A babble of questions assailed her when she dropped the receiver. She -told them all she knew. - -“Who would have thought that baby would have turned out to be Silva -Burle’s sister!” Rosie remarked thoughtfully. - -“Well now,” Laura prophesied with a faint lilt of triumph, “I guess she -won’t be so pig-headed.” - -“Nesta,” Maida said. “What a sweet name! I’ll go to-morrow morning -at--” And then the telephone rang again. Maida took the message. “It’s -Floribel,” she announced in a serious voice. “They’ve lost the last -train. We’ve got to get breakfast.” - -“If we’re going to get up as early as that,” Laura declared, “I’m going -to bed now. I’m so tired that I’m cross.” - -“I told you things always go by three’s,” Rosie triumphantly reminded -them. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII - -SILVA’S STORY - - -When Maida woke up the next morning, it was to the sound of a baby’s -crying. It was not however a sick cry; it was a sleepy cry. She glanced -swiftly at the clock; then jumped out of bed. Rosie was standing in the -doorway, Nesta, wearing one of Delia’s nightgowns, in her arms. - -“You never woke me up, Rosie Brine,” Maida accused her friend. - -“I tried to,” Rosie replied. “Honest I did. But you couldn’t seem to -wake up. And when I realized what a day you had yesterday and what a -day might be before you, I thought it would be better to let you sleep. -Laura and I got breakfast. We’ve given the baby her bath and I am now -taking her to bed.” - -Maida kissed the little curly, dusky head. “She looks fine,” she said -approvingly. “I’m so glad I can give Silva such good news.” - -“What time did you say you had to call there?” - -“Ten o’clock.” - -“It’s now half past eight,” Rosie said. “And here comes Laura with your -breakfast.” - -As Rosie disappeared with her sleeping burden, Laura appeared at the -stairs carrying a tray. - -“Hop back into bed, Maida Westabrook,” she said serenely. “You’re going -to have your breakfast in bed this morning--like a princess.” - -Maida meekly hopped back as ordered and Laura placed the tray on the -bed in front of her. On it, the peel so divided that it looked like a -great golden-petaled flower, was an orange; a dish of oatmeal; an egg -in an egg cup; two pieces of toast; a small pitcher of milk; sugar. -Around the plate was wreathed nasturtiums, flowers and leaves. - -“Oh how good it looks!” Maida said; and then after a few moments of -enthusiastic eating, “Oh, how good it _tastes_! How dainty you’ve made -this tray, Laura! I’m sure you’re going to be the best housekeeper -among us. You like housekeeping, don’t you?” - -“I just love it,” Laura replied. - -“I hate it.” Rosie who now reappeared in the doorway, declared -emphatically. “I wish you could buy blocks of dishes the way you buy -blocks of paper; so’s you could tear off a clean set for every meal; -then burn them up. I wish you could buy blocks of clothes just the same -way.” - -“What a queer thing you are, Rosie!” Laura exclaimed. “I just love to -have pretty things, crocheted and knit and embroidered--dainty china -and glass--and keep everything neat and shining.” - -Maida reflectively tapped the top of her egg; meditatively removed -the little bit of broken shell; absently salted and buttered it; -thoughtfully tasted it. “I don’t know what I like,” she declared after -a while, “I like to do anything--if I’m doing it with people I love. -But I just despise to do anything with people I don’t like.” - -An hour later, Maida, one foot on the pedal of her bicycle was -accepting last orders in regard to marketing from Rosie and Laura; -giving equally hurried advice to them. - -“Don’t forget to buy all the different kinds of berries you can find,” -Rosie said. “Berries make such an easy dessert.” - -“And oh, if there are any tomatoes yet, order all you can find, Maida,” -Laura chimed in. “I can make so many things with tomatoes: tomato and -macaroni; tomato and crackers; stewed tomatoes and boiled tomatoes.” - -“And don’t let the fire go out,” Maida replied, “and always have some -one near the telephone if anybody calls up. And remember, if the baby -doesn’t seem all right, telephone for the doctor at once. Get the -hospital on the telephone at nine o’clock and ask how Mrs. Dore is this -morning.” Then mounting her machine in a flash, Maida was off like a -bird. - -“Who would ever have thought,” Rosie said looking after her, “that the -Maida Westabrook who first came to Primrose Court--so pale and thin and -lame--would ever grow into such a strong girl? Do you remember, Laura?” - -“Of course I do. My mother didn’t think she was going to live.” - -In the meantime, Maida was proceeding down the dewy trail, the prey to -some worry but with a gradually-growing, comfortable feeling that her -troubles were all over and that now things would go smoothly. She did -all the marketing that had been intrusted to her and was even able, -being the first on the spot, to secure a basket of early tomatoes for -Laura. As for berries--they were everywhere. Maida ordered, a little -recklessly, blueberries, blackberries, currants. It was ten o’clock -as she had agreed--Maida was a very prompt little girl, having been -brought up to promptness by a business-like father--ten o’clock to the -dot, when she walked up the Fosdick path and knocked on the door by -means of a big brass knocker. - -A maid servant opened the door; but just behind appeared a white-haired -lady in a black silk and black silk mitts; a three-cornered bit of -black lace on her soft hair. - -“You are Maida Westabrook,” she said smiling, “and you have come to see -our little invalid. She’s awake and waiting for you. If you will follow -me, I will take you to her.” - -Maida followed Mrs. Fosdick up broad carpeted stairs and down a long -sunny hallway. At the very end, the old lady pushed open a door. Silva -was lying on a day couch, placed near a back window which overlooked -the garden. A light gayly-flowered down puff covered her. Silva looked -white but her strange amber-colored eyes seemed to hold a drop of fire. - -“Good morning, Silva,” Maida said. - -“Good morning,” Silva answered, but she used the words awkwardly, like -one who has not been accustomed to this morning greeting. - -“I’m glad you are better,” Maida went on and then paused in a little -embarrassment. After an instant in which Silva said nothing she added, -“How did it happen?” - -Mrs. Fosdick interrupted. “I am going to leave you little girls alone -to talk. I know you’ll have things to tell each other,” her kind old -eyes smiled understandingly, “that you don’t want grown-ups to hear.” - -“Oh no,” Maida said involuntarily but this was only instinctive -politeness on her part. She very much desired to be alone with Silva. -Silva was apparently too honest to say anything. She waited until Mrs. -Fosdick’s footsteps were lost to hearing. Then she pulled herself -upright with a sudden jerk. “How’s Nesta?” she asked breathlessly. - -“She’s all right. She slept all night long without waking once--except -when Rosie fed her at ten--and this morning she looks as sweet and -dainty as a rose-bud. Don’t worry about Nesta, Silva. She’s all right. -It’s you we’re worrying about.” - -But this did not appear to interest Silva. “How did you find her?” she -demanded. - -Maida told the story of her visit to the Moraine Land, not leaving out -a detail. Silva listened intently, her strange eyes unwinkingly fixed -on Maida’s face. “What time was this?” Silva asked. - -Maida told her. - -“Oh she only missed one feeding then,” Silva said in a tone of acute -relief. “You can just imagine,” she went on, “when I came out of the -faint enough to remember about the baby, how I felt. I tried to tell -them here about Nesta, but nobody would listen to me. They thought I -was raving and I can’t blame them for that of course. I begged them, I -screamed at them; then suddenly I thought of you--why I don’t know. But -somehow I knew I could trust you. I asked them to call you up or let me -call you up. But they wouldn’t. ‘There! There!’ they would say, ‘Lie -down and sleep! You’ll be all right in the morning.’ Oh what I went -through! I thought I was going crazy! And then I heard somebody using -the telephone in the hall. And when they left me to go down to dinner, -I crept out and called you up. Nobody heard me. They don’t know yet -that I telephoned. I told them last night that I knew you’d come this -morning.” - -“It must have made you dizzy to stand up,” Maida said sympathetically. - -“It did. At first I thought I couldn’t stand it. But I had to do it and -so I did. You are sure Nesta is all right?” - -“_Sure!_” Maida reiterated, smiling. “But why didn’t you call up Aunt -Save?” - -“She was at the Warneford Fair. They all went. Tyma went too. Aunt -Save’s telling fortunes. Tyma and I have been making baskets for a -month. He thought he could probably sell them all in three days. We -talked it all over. One of us had to go and the other to stay with the -baby and of course I was the one to stay with Nesta. Tyma won’t be back -until to-morrow.” - -“But I don’t understand why Nesta was in the cave,” Maida declared in a -puzzled tone. - -Silva closed her eyes for a moment and she sighed. It was a long sigh -and a weary one to come from a little girl’s lips. - -“We’ve kept her there a month,” she said. “We stole her--Tyma and I.” - -“_Stole_ her!” Maida echoed in a shocked tone. “Stole her! From whom?” - -“From my father,” Silva answered and two big tears formed slowly in her -eyes. They hung on the end of her long lashes but they did not drop. -Maida handed Silva her handkerchief. Silva wiped the tears away. No -more came, and she went on with her story in a perfectly composed way. - -“It’s a queer story to tell and--and I’m so ashamed. You see my -mother died last February when Nesta was about three months old. -After mother’s death, we had all the care of her--Tyma and I. It was -very hard because my father--” She stopped for an instant and seemed -to choke on what she was going to say. Then she went on steadily. -“My father began to get drunk--more and more-- But that wasn’t the -worst. He began to treat us badly--and I was always worried about -Nesta--sometimes I was afraid he’d hurt her-- Sometimes--” She stopped -and looked at Maida imploringly. - -Maida nodded as though she understood. - -“He was worse to Tyma though, and so Tyma ran away. He joined Aunt Save -and she told him to stay with them. One day he was exploring the woods -and he discovered that cave. Well things got worse and worse at home-- -And-- And-- And then father told me he was going to be married again. I -didn’t like the--the one he was going to marry. I knew she didn’t mind -his drinking. She--used to drink too. She didn’t like me--nor Tyma--nor -Nesta. I could see that she didn’t want the care of Nesta. Tyma and I -could take care of ourselves, but I knew she would be cruel to Nesta.” - -Silva paused; for this time it was Maida’s eyes that filled. Silva held -out Maida’s handkerchief and Maida took it; and wiped her tears away. - -“Go on,” Maida said. - -“Tyma came back one night very late. Father never knew he was there. -He threw pebbles against my window and I came out and talked to him. -He told me a plan. It was for us to run away and take Nesta with us -and keep her hidden in the cave. He said he’d take the baby first. -Then after a few days, I was to go to live with Aunt Save. You see if -I was to run away with the baby, father would know. But if the baby -was stolen while I was with him and when he thought Tyma was with Aunt -Save, he could not blame it onto either of us.” - -“Oh Silva!” Maida gasped. “What a terrible thing to do-- I mean--” She -thought an instant. “What a terrible thing to _have_ to do! How could -you do it? I couldn’t.” - -“You can do anything,” Silva said in a voice strangely stern in one so -young, “if you have to do it. So we planned it all very carefully. -Tyma went back to Aunt Save and then he returned a few nights later. -While I was in the field with father, he took the baby and went back -with her to Satuit; put her in the cave. He went by night and almost -always through the woods. Nobody saw him. When Aunt Save woke up the -next morning, Tyma was in his tent.” - -“What did your father say?” - -“He was wild. He thought at once it was Tyma and he went over to see -Aunt Save. Tyma was there, but of course there was no baby about. Aunt -Save said that Tyma had no baby with him and father knew that Aunt Save -wouldn’t lie to him. She asked father if he didn’t want me to come and -live with her as long as he was going to get married. Father said yes -and when he came back, he told me to go to Aunt Save. He gave me my car -fare and I went.” - -“Didn’t he do anything more to find the baby?” Maida asked in a -horrified tone. - -“Oh yes--he hunted everywhere--he talked about her all the time. And -then after ten days or so he told the police and there were articles in -the newspapers with his picture and Nesta’s--it didn’t look anything -like her. Reporters came to see him. But after a while nobody cared. -People don’t care what happens to gypsies.” Silva’s voice was bitter. -“Then he got married and as his wife didn’t want Nesta, he stopped -bothering about her.” - -“And do you mean to tell me,” Maida said in an awed voice, “that you -kept the baby in the cave nearly two months?” - -“Ever since just after you children came to the Little House. We were -planning to steal Nesta when we saw you first. That’s why we had to -be so hateful to you-- We had to do everything we could to keep you -away from the cave. That’s why we acted so terribly that first day -when you were swimming in the lake and that’s why we broke your canoes -and that’s why we stole all your lunch the day of the picnic. That -day, Tyma was in the cave with the baby and I was bringing a bottle -of milk and a little doll for her. She was too little to play with a -doll, but I wanted her to have one. Rosie Brine caught sight of me. I -dodged around the bushes and got into the cave. I think she would have -thought she imagined me if I hadn’t dropped the doll. Tyma and I sat -there trembling.... And then we realized that you were going to eat -your lunches right near.... The baby was asleep; but we were frightened -to death for fear she would wake up and cry ... and then the idea -came to us to steal your lunches ... and ruin everything so you would -think tramps had been there.... And then the baby _did_ cry.... Oh how -frightened we were! Tyma and I clung to each other and the same idea -came to us both at once. I began to moan very loud. And so did Tyma. -And then you couldn’t trace the sound and it frightened you and you all -ran away. Tyma said you would never come back and you didn’t. That is, -except one night, when I saw Arthur Duncan.” - -“I never heard or read anything like this,” Maida declared solemnly. -“How did you manage to take care of the baby--and bathe her and feed -her?” - -“It was very hard,” Silva said simply. “Tyma and I took turns in -spending the night in the cave. Aunt Save never knew; for we waited -until everybody was asleep before we left the camp. I used to go once -in the morning to heat water and bathe her and once in the afternoon to -take her out in the sunlight. We made baskets all the time so that we -could buy milk. Getting the milk to her though without being seen--Oh -how we had to plan! I bought a little lamp and heated her milk over it. -And then I was so worried! I knew it was going to be very troublesome -in a little while because it was only a question of time before Nesta -would creep. Fortunately she was backward about everything--especially -walking. We planned to barricade the front of the cave. But what we -should do when winter came, we could not guess. And then we were so -bothered about clothes--” Silva stopped and cast her eyes downward. -“This is so hard to tell you!” - -“Go on!” Maida urged. - -“I broke into your house night before last, and stole some doll -clothes. That first day you came to visit Aunt Save, I heard you -talking with her about a doll you had as big as a baby, and how you -kept her clothes in a little hair-cloth trunk under your window in your -room. I watched the house until I found out which room was yours. There -was a great tree in front of it. And that night, when everybody had -gone to sleep, I climbed in your window and took all the doll clothes. -You see some nights were rainy and I was afraid she wouldn’t be warm -enough. Please excuse me if you can. I will give them all back.” - -Maida was silent for an instant struggling with the situation too -complicated for her young mind. - -“Of course,” she said at last in a tremulous voice, “stealing is always -wrong. I would have given you Lucy’s clothes if you had asked me for -them.” - -“I didn’t know that you would,” Silva faltered. “And I didn’t dare tell -you about Nesta.” - -“Of course I saw Lucy’s clothes in the cave,” Maida went on. Her eyes -were downcast. “Let’s not speak of it again. Very likely, I would have -done the same thing if I had been in your place-- Only I suppose I -wouldn’t have stolen the baby in the beginning.” She paused and then -added honestly, “But perhaps that’s only because I wouldn’t have had -the courage. What are you going to do now-- I mean when you get well?” - -“I don’t know--” Silva answered drearily. “I’ll have to wait until -Tyma comes back. Everybody’ll know then. Aunt Save will make me write -to father that I have Nesta. He’ll take Nesta away from me and that -dreadful woman will have the care of her--” - -And now Silva put her head in the hollow of her elbow and sobbed. But -they were not the sobs of a child. They were hard and tearless. They -shook Silva’s whole body. Maida rushed to her side. She put her arms -about Silva; kissed her again and again. “Don’t think of it any more, -Silva dear,” she begged. “I know it isn’t as bad as you fancy. Will you -let me tell my father about it? My father is a wonderful man. It is -almost as though he had magic power--like a genie. He’ll find some way -out for you, I’m sure. Will you let me tell him?” - -It was some moments before Silva’s whispered “Yes” came from between -her racking sobs. But very soon thereafter she sat up. “Here comes -somebody,” she whispered. “Please don’t say anything about Nesta.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - -GUESTS - - -When Maida turned the bend in the path just before it came out on the -Little House, she found Rosie, Laura, Arthur, Harold and Dicky drawn up -in a straight soldier-like line. - -“We have to report that--” they all chanted in a solemn voice. - -“Mother is very comfortable and will return to us in a week,” announced -the radiant Dicky. - -“Granny Flynn has come back,” announced the beaming Laura. - -“Floribel is in the kitchen,” announced the smiling Harold. - -“Zeke is in the garden,” announced the triumphant Arthur. - -“Your father is in the living room waiting for you,” announced the -sparkling Rosie. - -“My father!” Maida exclaimed in a happy voice. “My father! Oh what a -blessing that is!” She dropped her bicycle. “Oh Rosie, will you put my -wheel away for me? I want to see my father so much.” She didn’t wait -for Rosie’s hearty, “Yes, of course, goose!” but raced across the grass. - -In a few minutes an unprecedented activity broke out in the Little -House. Down stairs in the living room, Mr. Westabrook, who had been -most of the time glued to the telephone, was still telephoning. -Up-stairs in the Little House, Floribel was getting the spare room -ready for one guest. Up-stairs in the barn, Zeke was putting up a cot -for another. In the kitchen, Rosie was frantically making popovers. -Between the flower garden and the spare room, Laura and Maida were -swinging like a pair of active pendulums, decorating with flowers. -Outside on lawn and in vegetable garden, the boys were working -frantically putting everything in what Rosie called “apple pie order.” -Everywhere the smaller children, to whom for the moment nobody was -paying any attention, were getting in everybody’s way. - -About noon the big gray limousine appeared at the end of the trail. -Zeke hurried down to it. He and Botkins lifted out the slight figure -lying in the back, bore it up the path to the house and over the stairs -to the guest chamber. An excited queue of children--all the young -inhabitants of the Little House in fact--followed. - -“All right, Silva?” Maida was enquiring and to Silva’s faint “Yes,” -Rosie was saying, “We’re all awfully glad you’re going to be here -with us,” and “Just as soon as you are well enough, you’ve got to -teach us how to make those beautiful baskets,” Laura was contributing. -The boys didn’t seem to be able to do anything but they were making -attempts--highly unsuccessful ones to be sure--to assist the two men. - -Up-stairs, they left Silva alone with the girls. Maida immediately took -off the long rusty coat that Silva was wearing, her worn and stained -middy blouse; her ragged skirt; undressed her; put on first one of her -own simple white nightgowns and over it her favorite dressing gown -of organdie muslin with pink ribbon. Laura brought a pair of pink -bed shoes; slipped them on Silva’s slender feet. Rosie contributed a -boudoir cap of white lace with pink ribbons which she had managed to -fashion in the hour they had waited for Silva. And then in answer to -the beseeching look in Silva’s eyes, Rosie brought the cooing little -Nesta and put her in her sister’s arms. - -“My father is going to send for your father, Silva,” Maida explained. -“He is going to ask him to let you and Tyma and the baby stay with -us. Your father will say yes, Silva--people always say yes to my -father--and then if you like us, we want you to live with us as long as -we stay here.” - -“Only a few weeks longer,” Rosie added in a wailing voice, “then school -begins.” - -Silva, only half hearing, was kissing her little sister with violent -flurries of kisses. And her eyes were filling with tears. She made no -effort to check them because that would have been impossible. Finally -she put her head down on the arm of her chair and cried. The others -kept a frightened silence. Rosie, recovering first, noiselessly removed -Nesta. Silva made no attempt to keep her. Maida slipped into the -bathroom and came back with a wet face cloth and a towel; proceeded -to bathe Silva’s face. Silva submitted meekly. Laura disappeared and -returned with a bottle of toilet water with which she sprinkled Silva. - -“Oh you are so good to me,” Silva said when she could control her -voice. “And when I think of how I treated you-- I didn’t want to -though. I--I had to. But when I’m well, I’ll gladly show you how to -make baskets. And I know where the berries grow thickest and biggest -... I’ll take you to all my secret places ... I do thank you! I do! I -do! With all my heart!” - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - -THE END OF SUMMER - - -Outside all was wind, rain, confusion and destruction. Occasionally a -bough came crashing down to earth and always the branches of the great -tree beside Maida’s window, rubbed against the house. The wind veered -and whirled. One moment the rain was coming, like a shower of bullets, -against the window of one side; the next it was lashing, like a bundle -of twigs, against the glass of another. - -Inside was warmth, light, laughter and conversation. The older children -sat about the big fireplace in the living room. Rosie was on her knees -there, busily wielding a corn popper. Beside her sat Laura toasting -macaroons on the end of a long fork. Silva and Maida were bringing in -great pans of molasses candy which simply refused to cool. The boys -were fanning it in an effort to bring it to the tasting point. The -little children were running about, looking at books, or playing games, -according to their tastes, perfectly confident, as ever, that the -relentless hour of eight o’clock could be put off this one evening. -Mrs. Dore, quite herself again, was rocking Delia who had given way to -premature fatigue. In the midst of all this excitement Granny Flynn -read tranquilly from her _Lives of the Saints_. - -“I can’t believe the summer is over,” Rosie exclaimed suddenly. “I -_won’t_ believe it! Oh why can’t things like this go on for ever?” - -“I couldn’t believe it either,” Laura declared, “until this storm came. -The weather has been so warm up to now that I wouldn’t believe autumn -had come. But to-day and yesterday have been fallish.” - -“Autumn’s here,” Silva said, “when the goldenrod and asters come.” - -“I know it,” Maida agreed mournfully. “How glad I am when flowers -come and how sorry I am when they go! It makes you know that summer -is flying just to watch them disappear. If the flowers only stayed -after they came, you wouldn’t notice it so much. But they don’t. They -go--first the dandelions and then the violets; and then the daisies and -buttercups and wild roses and iris; then the elderberry and sumach; and -then the goldenrod and asters. But as soon as each one of these stops -blooming, you realize that _that_ part of the summer is gone. And as -soon as you see the red rose hips--” she twisted her hand through the -long necklace of crimson berries that she was wearing, “--then you know -that the fall has begun.” - -“I never thought of that before,” Laura exclaimed. “Wouldn’t it be -perfectly beautiful if they stayed until the end of the summer, even -the dandelions? Perhaps there wouldn’t be room for them all though.” - -“This storm makes me think of fall all right,” Arthur said. - -“Yes, and this fire,” Dicky chimed in. - -“It makes me think of _school_,” Harold declared. - -Everybody groaned. - -“Perhaps it’s the popcorn,” Rosie said, “and the apples. But somehow -I feel to-night just as though it were Halloween night. Oh, do you -remember the beautiful party we had at Laura’s last Halloween?” - -“Do I?” Maida answered. “I should say I did. It was the first Halloween -party I ever went to. I shall remember it as long as I live. I remember -sitting in the window of the Little Shop and watching all the pumpkin -lanterns come bobbing along Primrose Court. Oh how lovely it was!” - -“It doesn’t seem possible,” Rosie reiterated dreamily, although she -was vigorously shaking the popper, “that next Sunday night means -Charlestown again, and Monday morning, horrid school once more. -How shall we ever get used to being kept indoors? I shall stifle. -I shall miss everything--oh dreadfully. But the thing I shall miss -most is my lovely little room, out-of-doors. Oh no, it isn’t that,” -she contradicted herself, “the thing I shall miss most is the cave. -Everything that happens to us is like a story book; but the cave is -most like a story book of all. Oh how sorry I was when we came to the -end of it! I did so hope it would be a Mammoth Cave with a great big -river in it and fish without eyes and chambers with stalactites and -stalagmites.” - -“If it had been,” Tyma Burle said shrewdly, “people would have been -coming all the time to look at it and it wouldn’t be our cave any -longer. I have enjoyed tennis most of anything,” Tyma went on. “I think -it is the greatest game in the world.” - -“I don’t wonder you like tennis,” Laura exclaimed, “when you can beat -everybody at it. Oh, how mad it still makes me to think that when I’ve -been playing tennis for two years that Tyma has to give himself a -handicap when he plays with me.” - -Everybody laughed. They were always amused by the spectacle on the -tennis court of Laura’s rages when Tyma beat her so easily. - -“I have enjoyed the deer most,” Arthur declared. - -This specification of enjoyment had developed to a game now. Arthur -went on. “Having those deer about is the most like Robin Hood of -anything I’ve ever known. It’s like stories you read in Kipling -and Stevenson. When I come across a group of them in the woods, I -feel--well I give it up--I don’t know how I feel.” - -“I know what Dicky enjoys most,” Maida said. - -“What?” Dicky demanded. - -“The white peacocks.” - -Dicky admitted it. “But the swimming and the canoeing and the tennis, -too,” he added as though a little jealous for these new sports of his. -“But of course the white peacocks most-- Well, if Arthur thinks the -deer are like adventure stories I think the peacocks are like all the -fairy stories in the world come true. What do you enjoy most, Maida?” - -Maida thought carefully. “Everything! Having all of you here.” - -“Oh but what special thing, Maida?” Rosie pleaded. “There’s always one -thing you like better than others.” - -“Betsy’s badness, then,” Maida admitted. “I’ve never laughed so much in -all my life as at the things Betsy does. You see when I was a little -girl, I was so sick that I never did anything really naughty but -Betsy--Oh she’s such fun!” - -“I’ve enjoyed the keeping house part most,” Laura stated with -enthusiasm. “I never had the chance before to cook all the things I -wanted in a real kitchen--and dust rooms--and arrange things--and put -the flowers about. I just love setting the table for Sunday night -supper.” - -“I hate it,” burst out Rosie. “I hate every single thing you like, -Laura. But I’m glad you like it because then I don’t have to do it.” -Rosie poured the popper-full of white corn into a big brown bowl. “Now -don’t all grab at once!” She commanded, as a half-a-dozen eager hands -reached towards the table. “Wait until I pour melted butter on it. That -makes it perfectly _scrumptious_! There you are! Now each one of you -take a plate, and spoon the corn out on it.” - -The bowl passed rapidly from hand to hand. Rosie embedded her sharp -little teeth into the shining coral of a Baldwin apple. “Oh what a good -apple!” she said. - -“What did you enjoy most, Silva?” Maida asked curiously, her mouth full -of popcorn. - -“Oh, living in a house!” Silva answered instantly. “You don’t know -what fun that is to me. All my life I have lived either in a tent or a -wagon. All my life I have longed to live in a house with lace curtains -in the windows. How I love that little room of mine I can’t tell you! -And yet at first--Do you know--I was afraid I couldn’t stand it? It -seemed as though the walls were pressing in on me and I couldn’t get -enough air. Many and many a night, I got up and went downstairs in the -middle of the night and slept in the hammock. Sometimes I felt like a -bird in a cage--as if I was beating my wings the way I’ve seen birds -do.” - -“I’ve never got quite used to it,” Tyma confessed. “Sometimes, even now -I have to get up in the middle of the night and go out and sleep on the -grass.” - -“My!” Rosie exclaimed. “I should think that would be a hard bed. What -have you enjoyed most, Harold?” - -“Oh going all over the country on my bicycle,” Harold explained. “You -see always before we have gone to Marblehead Neck and you always have -to go so far before you come to any new country. But here you start out -in any direction and you are somewhere else before you know it.” - -The little children who, as the popcorn approached the eating point, -had been lured out of the room, now came in to say good night. As usual -they were rebellious about going to bed; but were comforted by the -promise of a long train-ride next Sunday. As Arthur tactfully concealed -the popcorn under his chair and Tyma mimicking him, shoved the apples -under the couch, the good nights were effected without tragedy. - -“How well they all look!” Maida said proudly. “They are as freckled and -sun-burned as they can be and fat as little butterballs!” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - -PROMISE - - -“What are you going to do in the winter, Maida?” Rosie asked. - -“I don’t know,” Maida answered. “Father hasn’t made up his mind yet and -it all depends of course upon what he is going to do.” - -“Then if he went to Europe, you’d go too?” - -“Yes,” Maida admitted. “But I don’t think we’ll go to Europe. At -least,” she added conscientiously, “he hasn’t said we would. I don’t -know what we’ll do.” - -“But if you don’t go to Europe, will you go to school?” Silva asked. - -“I don’t know,” Maida responded. “Perhaps I’ll have a governess.” - -“What would you rather do, Maida?” persisted Rosie. - -“I think I’d rather go to school,” Maida answered honestly. - -“And what kind of a school?” Rosie kept it up. - -“Oh the school you all go to--in Charlestown. I’d love that.” - -“Oh how I wish your father would let you,” Rosie declared fervently. -“Wouldn’t it be fun? But then you know all they could teach you there. -You know geography and history and literature.” - -“Oh but my arithmetic is dreadful,” Maida declared, “and my spelling, -and father says he is perfectly ashamed of my writing.” - -“But you speak French,” Laura said enviously, “and Italian!” - -“A very little Italian,” Maida confessed. - -“But you can read fairy tales in French,” Dicky said. “Oh what a lucky -girl!” - -“Yes, I _do_ think I’m lucky in that,” Maida agreed with him. - -“And if you aren’t very good in arithmetic, you know all about English -and French and Italian money,” Harold asserted. “I think that’s great!” - -“It’s very easy to learn that,” Maida said deprecatingly. “How I wish I -knew fractions and percentage and square root--like you, Rosie.” - -“Rosie was the smartest girl in the room in arithmetic,” Dicky -declared. “She could beat any one of us, and as for mental -arithmetic--whew! And she always won in the spelling matches.” - -“I never was in a spelling match in my life,” Maida said in a grieved -tone. “How I should enjoy it--except of course that I’d fail in the -first word they gave me.” - -“Yes,” Dicky informed her, “they always give you something like -_receive_ and _believe_ or _Mississippi_ or _separate_! I shall never -learn how to spell _separate_ as long as I live.” - -“I’ll tell you how to remember it,” Harold offered. “You know there’s a -city in South America called Para. Well, I always remember that there’s -a Para right in the middle of separate.” - -“Gee that makes it easy!” Dicky’s voice was grateful. “I won’t forget -that.” After an instant he added, “I hate school!” - -“So do I,” said Rosie. - -“So do I,” said Laura. - -“So do I,” said Arthur. - -“So do I,” said Harold. - -“I never went to school,” Maida said sadly. - -“Nor I,” admitted Silva. - -“Nor I,” admitted Tyma. - -“You’d want to go to school if you’d never had the chance,” Maida -announced to the quartette of discontented ones. “Isn’t that true?” She -appealed to Silva and Tyma. - -They both nodded. - -“Everybody wants what he doesn’t have,” Rosie said eagerly. “Now I -should like to travel like Maida.” - -“Who wouldn’t!” exclaimed Laura and Arthur together. - -“And I’d like to have a tutor,” Dicky declared. “Somebody to read to -you and answer all your questions. I should think that would be great.” - -“I don’t believe you would like school long, Maida,” Rosie went on. “At -least if you went to the same kind of school we go to. Isn’t that so, -Arthur?” - -Arthur nodded. “They’re no fun.” - -“When the teacher puts the arithmetic problems on the blackboard,” -Rosie said, “I always get them done in five minutes. I’m good in -arithmetic and they’re almost always correct. Then there’s nothing for -me to do until the rest of the children have finished but read in my -Reader that I’ve read through a million times; or my Geography that I -have read just as often; or in the Supplementary Reading that I know -just as well.” - -“That’s stupid,” Maida decided reflectively. - -“And then, when we have to write compositions, I nearly die,” Rosie -went on in the same discontented vein. “I hate compositions. I never -can think of anything to say. I always have to stay after school--” - -“Why Rosie, you write the most _wonderful_ letters,” Maida protested. -“Oh how I enjoyed getting them abroad! You told me all the things I -wanted to know and how I used to laugh at them too.” - -“Oh well, letters aren’t writing!” Rosie said scornfully. “Anybody can -write letters.” - -“I can’t,” Arthur declared, “I hate writing letters.” - -“I don’t think it’s easy to write letters,” Laura interrupted, -“although Maida and Rosie do it so easily. I think they’re just as hard -as a composition. If you can write a letter, you ought to be able to -write a composition, and if you can write a composition, you ought to -be able to write a letter.” - -“And then,” Arthur went on with the argument, “geography is so dull in -school. You never learn about the places you’d like to know about--like -Gibraltar and the Desert of Sahara and the North Pole and the jungles -of Africa and the Great Wall of China, and the Mammoth Cave and the -Grand Cañon. Or history. Now I’d like to study about Richard Cœur de -Lion and Robert Bruce and William Tell and Thermopylæ and the Alamo and -the Battle of Hastings and Waterloo and Gettysburg. But you never get -anything about them.” - -“Gracious!” Rosie commented, “I don’t even know what those are.” - -“Sometimes I like school,” Dicky said hesitatingly. - -“That’s because you have only gone to school one year,” Laura declared -scornfully. - -“Well I’d rather be with you in a school that wasn’t very interesting,” -Maida persisted, “than not be with you at all. Now next summer in the -Little House--” - -“Next summer!” Rosie interrupted. “_Oh Maida, is there going to be a -next summer?_” - -“Is there going to be a next summer?” Maida repeated. She stared about -the circle of faces; all very intent; all waiting almost with hushed -breath, for her reply. “Of course there’s going to be a next summer. -What made you think there wasn’t?” - -“You never said once there was going to be a next summer,” Dicky -accused her out of the hubbub which succeeded this statement. “Oh I -could jump up and down!” - -“I _shall_ jump up and down,” Rosie announced--and did until the glass -pendants to the candelabra tinkled. - -Maida could only repeat feebly, “But of course there’s going to be a -next summer. It never occurred to me to tell you so. I thought you -understood.” - -“Not only a next summer, but next summers,” a voice said back of them. - -They all started and then jumped to their feet. Mr. Westabrook, coming -in very quietly, had apparently caught much of their discussion. - -“A whole line of summers, all in a row,” he added as he took the easy -chair which Arthur pushed into the middle of the circle for him. He -helped himself to popcorn from the plate which Rosie filled and placed -in his lap; took one of the apples which Laura offered him; a piece of -the molasses candy which Tyma pressed upon him. “You’ve got a permanent -engagement with us every summer.” - -Again Rosie did what Dicky had threatened to do--she jumped up and -down. Laura danced the whole length of the room, turning out one after -another a series of the most beautiful pirouettes. Silva did not move -except to lean forward and stare intently at Mr. Westabrook. The boys -drew their chairs in a circle closer about him. - -“So you don’t think schools are very interesting?” Buffalo Westabrook -went on, bending his eagle glance on Arthur. - -“Not any I have ever been to,” Arthur answered promptly. - -“Do you think they could be made interesting?” Mr. Westabrook went on. - -“I’m not sure they could,” Arthur answered. - -But Rosie broke in with an impulsive, “Of course they could.” - -“How?” Mr. Westabrook asked with his disturbing brevity. - -“By letting you study the things you want, in the way you want to study -them,” Rosie answered immediately. - -“I guess that’s as good an answer as I could get,” Mr. Westabrook -admitted. “What would you say,” he went on very slowly after a pause, -“if we tried to have such a school as that _here_?” He continued -apparently unconscious of the excitement which was developing in his -hearers. “A school where, as Rosie says, you could study the things -you want to study, in the way you want to study them. A school with -plenty of books to read and dictionaries and encyclopedias and books -of reference to consult. A book with all the newest maps and globes. A -school with plenty of travel and discovery and exploration. A school -with gardens to grow. A school with a magic lantern, an aquarium, and--” - -Maida could contain herself no longer. “Father,” she burst out, “you’re -going to have such a school for us!” - -“I’ve got it,” Buffalo announced. “And you’re all going to that school -this winter.” - -“Oh my goodness,” Rosie said in a quiet awed voice, “if anything else -happens I shall die of happiness.” - -“Do our fathers and mothers know?” Laura asked. - -“Know,” Mr. Westabrook repeated, though very tranquilly, “they helped -to decide what you should study there.” - -“And we won’t be separated after all,” Dicky declared in a voice shaken -with happiness. - -“No.” - -“What’s the name of the school?” Harold asked. - -“It hasn’t any name yet,” Mr. Westabrook answered. - -“I know what to call it,” Arthur said, his face lighting up. “We’ve -had _Maida’s Little Shop_ and _Maida’s Little House_. Why not call it -_Maida’s Little School_?” - - -THE END - - - - -Three Stories of Fun and Friendship - -THE MAIDA BOOKS - -by INEZ HAYNES IRWIN - - -MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP - -In a darling little shop of her own Maida makes many friends with the -school children who buy her fascinating wares. - - -MAIDA’S LITTLE HOUSE - -All of her friends spend a happy summer in Maida’s perfect little house -that has everything a child could wish for. - - -MAIDA’S LITTLE SCHOOL - -Three delightful grownups come to visit and the children study many -subjects without knowing that they are really “going to school.” - -GROSSET & DUNLAP _Publishers_ NEW YORK - - - - -The MARY and JERRY MYSTERY STORIES - -By FRANCIS HUNT - - -THE MESSENGER DOG’S SECRET - -The big police dog Flanders carried a strange message in his collar. By -following its directions, Mary and Jerry Denton were able to bring a -lost fortune to someone in need. - - -THE MYSTERY OF THE TOY BANK - -Jerry Denton was saving for a bicycle, but when his little bank -strangely disappeared he had a big mystery to solve. With the aid of -Mary, several chums and a queer old sailor, this eager lad brought -about a happy solution. - - -THE STORY THE PARROT TOLD - -A fire in a pet shop started a long chain of adventures for Mary -and Jerry Denton. The tale the talking parrot told caused plenty of -excitement and mystery before the bird was restored to its rightful -owner. - - -THE SECRET OF THE MISSING CLOWN - -Mary and Jerry have many happy adventures at the circus while searching -for the missing clown and his beautiful pony, Silverfeet. - -GROSSET & DUNLAP _Publishers_ NEW YORK - - - - -THE MARY JANE SERIES - -By CLARA INGRAM JUDSON - - -Take a trip with Mary Jane. She is the heroine of this popular series -for young girls. You’ll find her a charming traveling companion. Her -good nature, her abounding interest in her friends and surroundings, -and her fascinating adventures both at home and abroad have endeared -her to thousands all over the country. - -MARY JANE--HER BOOK -MARY JANE--HER VISIT -MARY JANE’S KINDERGARTEN -MARY JANE DOWN SOUTH -MARY JANE’S CITY HOME -MARY JANE IN NEW ENGLAND -MARY JANE’S COUNTRY HOME -MARY JANE AT SCHOOL -MARY JANE IN CANADA -MARY JANE’S SUMMER FUN -MARY JANE’S WINTER SPORTS -MARY JANE’S VACATION -MARY JANE IN ENGLAND -MARY JANE IN SCOTLAND -MARY JANE IN FRANCE -MARY JANE IN SWITZERLAND -MARY JANE IN ITALY - -GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK - - - - -_There is the high, happy spirit of youth in these famous_ - -BOOKS FOR GIRLS - -by JANE D. ABBOTT - - -APRILLY - -The charming story of a young girl, child of the circus, and the -adventures which led to her goal of happiness. - - -HIGHACRES - -A school story of Jerry Travis and her chum Gyp Westley. A thread of -romance and mystery in Jerry’s life runs through the tale. - - -KEINETH - -How Keineth Randolph kept a secret--a war secret--for a whole year -makes one of the best stories ever written for girls. - - -RED ROBIN - -In attempting to bring happiness into the lives of mill workers, Robin -Forsythe, heir to a fortune, has many strange adventures. - - -HEYDAY - -Twenty-three! The heyday of life. Jay, a small town girl, finds -happiness in New York. - - -LARKSPUR - -Especially interesting to any Girl Scout because it is the story of a -Girl Scout who is poor and has to help her mother. - - -HAPPY HOUSE - -How an old family quarrel is healed through a misunderstanding and an -old homestead becomes a “happy house” in reality. - -GROSSET & DUNLAP _Publishers_ NEW YORK - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MAIDA'S LITTLE HOUSE *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law 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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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 <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: <span lang='' xml:lang=''>Maida's little house</span></p> -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Inez Haynes Irwin</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October 20, 2022 [eBook #69188]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Charlene Taylor, Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK <span lang='' xml:lang=''>MAIDA'S LITTLE HOUSE</span> ***</div> - -<div class="mynote"><p class="center">Transcriber’s Note:<br /><br /> -Obvious typographic errors have been corrected.<br /></p></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/front.jpg" alt="front" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> - -<p class="bold2">MAIDA’S LITTLE HOUSE</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/frontis.jpg" alt="Illustration" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/title.jpg" alt="Title page" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p> - -<h1>Maida’s Little House</h1> - -<p class="bold">BY</p> - -<p class="bold2">INEZ HAYNES IRWIN</p> - -<p class="bold">Author of<br />MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP, MAIDA’S LITTLE SCHOOL,<br />ETC.</p> - -<div class="center space-above"><img src="images/dec.jpg" alt="Decoration" /></div> - -<p class="bold space-above">GROSSET & DUNLAP<br /> -Publishers : : New York</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY<br /> -B. W. HUEBSCH, <span class="smcap">Inc.</span></p> - -<p class="center"><i>First printing, November, 1921</i><br /> -<i>Second printing, October, 1922</i><br /> -<i>Third printing, August, 1928</i><br /> -<i>Fourth printing, July, 1931</i></p> - -<p class="center space-above">PRINTED IN THE U. S. A.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">TO<br />BARBARA IVERSON HAYNES</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CONTENTS</h2> - -<table summary="CONTENTS"> - <tr> - <td colspan="2" class="left"><span class="smaller">CHAPTER</span></td> - <td><span class="smaller">PAGE</span></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>I. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The Home Coming</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>II. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The Plan</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>III. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The Journey</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>IV. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The Little House</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>V. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Morning</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_58">58</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VI. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Afternoon</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_72">72</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Twilight</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VIII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Night</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>IX. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Plans</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_95">95</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>X. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Responsibility</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_103">103</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XI. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Visitors</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_109">109</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Betsy’s Find</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XIII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Discovery</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_140">140</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XIV. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The Terror</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_150">150</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XV. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Arthur’s Adventure</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XVI. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Mystery</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_164">164</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XVII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Crescent Moon Beach</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_171">171</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XVIII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Expiation</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_186">186</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XIX. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Maida’s Mood</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XX. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Maida’s Find</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>XXI. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Tragedy</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_210">210</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XXII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Silva’s Message</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_219">219</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XXIII. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Silva’s Story</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XXIV. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Guests</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_244">244</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XXV. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">The End of Summer</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_248">248</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XXVI. </td> - <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Promise</span></td> - <td><a href="#Page_256">256</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p> - -<p class="bold2">MAIDA’S LITTLE HOUSE</p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER I</span> <span class="smaller">THE HOME COMING</span></h2> - -<p>“I wonder when Maida’s coming back?” said Rosie Brine as she approached -the trio of children who sat on the Lathrop lawn.</p> - -<p>The three were Laura Lathrop; her brother, Harold Lathrop; their -friend, Arthur Duncan. Rosie did not join them on the grass. She seated -herself in the hammock behind them and began to swing, first slowly, -then so violently that her black curls swept back and forth with her -swift progress and her speech came in jerks. “I wouldn’t mind—how long -I had to wait—if I only knew—when she was coming.”</p> - -<p>Nobody answered. Rosie had only asked a question that they all asked at -intervals, hoping against hope that somebody would make a comforting -guess.</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe she’s <i>ever</i> coming back,” Rosie answered herself, -recklessly swinging almost over their heads. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> - -<p>Arthur Duncan, a big broad-shouldered boy with tousled thick brown hair -beating down over his forehead and almost veiling eyes as steady as -they were black, answered this. “Oh Maida’s coming home some time. She -promised and she always keeps her promises.”</p> - -<p>“When we were going to school,” put in Laura Lathrop, “it was bad -enough. But we didn’t have time to miss her so much then. But now that -school’s over and there’s nothing to do—Oh, how I wish she were here!”</p> - -<p>“Well, what good would it do?” Harold Lathrop asked. Harold and Laura -looked much alike although Laura was slim and brown-haired and Harold -flaxen and a little stout. But both had blue eyes and small, regular -features.</p> - -<p>“We wouldn’t see anything of her,” Harold continued, “she’d he going -away somewhere for the summer and we wouldn’t have a chance to get to -know her until fall.”</p> - -<p>“Maida’d never do that,” Rosie Brine declared emphatically. “She’d -manage some way to be with us for a while.” She brought the hammock to -a stop for a moment with the swift kick of a determined foot against a -tuft of grass. “There’s one thing I am sure of and that is that Maida -would never forget us<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> or want to be away from us. She says that in -every letter I’ve got from her.”</p> - -<p>“Well, what are we going to do to-day?” Harold demanded. “I should -think from the way we sit here that we had not been counting up the -days to vacation for a month. Why Laura’s even had the hours all -numbered out on her calendar, so’s she could draw a line through them -every night.”</p> - -<p>“I wanted to have the minutes marked out too,” Laura admitted, “but it -took too much time.”</p> - -<p>“What are we going to do?” Harold persisted. “Here it is the first day -of vacation, and we sit here saying nothing. You think of something, -Arthur, you always can.”</p> - -<p>Arthur Duncan rolled over face downwards on the grass. “I can’t think -of anything to do this morning,” he admitted. “It’s so hot ... and I -feel so lazy ... seems to me I’d just like to lie here all day.”</p> - -<p>It was hot that late June day in Charlestown. Not a breeze stirred the -shrubs of the Lathrop lawn. The June roses drooped; the leaves seemed -wilting; even the blue sky looked thick and sultry. Huge white clouds -moved across it so lazily that it was as though they too felt the -general languor. The children<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> looked as children generally look at the -close of school, pale and a little tired. Their movements were listless.</p> - -<p>Just outside the gate of the Lathrop place was Primrose Court; a little -court, lined with maples and horse-chestnuts with shady little wooden -houses set behind tiny gardens, in their turn set within white wooden -fences. At one corner of Primrose Court and Warrington Street, set -directly opposite a school house, was a little shop. And over the shop -printed in gold letters against a background of sky blue, hung a sign -which read:</p> - -<p class="center">MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP</p> - -<p>In Primrose Court, the smaller children were playing as briskly as -though there were no such thing as weather. Brown-eyed, brown-haired, -motherly Molly Doyle, quick, efficient but quiet, was apparently -acting as the wife and mother of an imaginary house. Smaller and -younger, Timmie Doyle, her brother, a little pop-eyed, brownie-like -boy, slow-moving and awkward, was husband and father. There were four -children in this make-believe household. Quite frequently, little Betsy -Hale, slim, black-eyed and rosy-cheeked <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>and little Delia Dore, chubby -and blonde with thick red curls, attempted to run away; were caught and -punished with great thoroughness. Apparently Dorothy and Mabel Clark, -twin sisters, one the exact duplicate of the other, with big, round -blue eyes and long round golden curls, were the grown-up daughters -of this make-believe family. They were intent on household tasks, -thrusting into an imaginary stove absolutely real mud pies and sweeping -an imaginary room with an absolutely real dust-pan and brush.</p> - -<p>Aside from this active scene, everything was quiet. Farther down the -Court, doves had settled; were pink-toeing about feeding busily; -preening and cooing.</p> - -<p>“Sometimes,” Laura said thoughtfully, “I feel as though I had dreamed -Maida. If the Little Shop were not here with her name over the door and -all of you to talk about her with me, I should believe I had just waked -up.” She stopped a moment. “If it had been a dream how mad I should be -to think I <i>had</i> waked up.”</p> - -<p>“Do you remember how exciting it was when Maida first came to live over -the Little Shop?” Rosie exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“I should say I did!” It was Laura who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> answered her. “Wasn’t it -wonderful when all that pretty furniture came for their rooms?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, and the canaries and the great geraniums for the windows,” Rosie -added eagerly.</p> - -<p>“The most wonderful thing though,” Arthur went on, “was when the sign -went up. It was such a pretty sign—<span class="smaller">MAIDA’S LITTLE SHOP</span> in -gold painted on blue. And—”</p> - -<p>“Gee, how wild we all were to see Maida!” Harold said.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know what I expected,” Rosie’s voice was dreamy, “but I -certainly was surprised when Maida appeared—”</p> - -<p>“Lame,” Arthur concluded for her, “like Dicky. But they’re both all -right now. Dicky certainly is and Maida was when she left for Europe.”</p> - -<p>“I often think,” Harold began again after a little pause, “of when we -first met her and she used to talk of the things her father gave her, -we thought she was telling lies.”</p> - -<p>“I never thought she was telling lies,” Rosie expostulated. “I loved -her too much for that. I knew Maida wouldn’t tell lies. I thought she’d -just dreamed those things. I remember them all—her mother’s mirror and -brush and comb of gold with her initials in diamonds....<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> And the long -string of pearls that she used to wear that came to her knees.... And a -dress of cloth of gold trimmed with roses and a diamond, like a drop of -dew, in the heart of every rose.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, and the peacocks at her father’s place, some of them white,” -Arthur interrupted.</p> - -<p>“And don’t you remember,” Harold went on, “we all thought she was crazy -when she said that once he gave her for a birthday present her weight -in twenty-dollar gold-pieces.”</p> - -<p>“And a wonderful birthday party,” Laura added eagerly, “with a Maypole -and a doll-baby house big enough to go into and live—”</p> - -<p>“I don’t wonder we didn’t believe it all,” Rosie declared with -conviction, “It sounds like a fairy tale. And then it turned out that -she was the daughter of a great millionaire and <i>every word</i> of it was -true. Do you remember how we asked Mr. Westabrook at Maida’s Christmas -tree if it was all true and he said that it was?”</p> - -<p>“I’d like to see those white peacocks,” Dicky said dreamily.</p> - -<p>“I’d like to see that doll-baby house,” Laura added wistfully.</p> - -<p>“I’d like to see the gold comb and brush and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> mirror with the -diamonds,” Rosie declared, “and that dress with the roses and the -diamond dew-drops. I like to look at precious stones. I like things -that sparkle.”</p> - -<p>At this thought, she herself sparkled until her eyes were like great -black diamonds in her vivid brilliant face.</p> - -<p>“I’d like to see that pile of twenty-dollar gold-pieces,” Harold said.</p> - -<p>“Oh I wish she’d come back,” Rosie sighed. The sparkle all went out of -her face and she stopped swinging.</p> - -<p>A door leading into Primrose Court opened with a suddenness that made -them all jump. A boy with big eyes, very brown and lustrous, lighting -his peaked face and straight hair very brown and lustrous, framing it, -came bounding out. He ran in the direction of the group on the lawn, -and as he ran he waved something white in his hand. The doves flew away -before him in a glittering V. “Hurrah!” he yelled.</p> - -<p>“Gee, how Dicky can run!” Arthur Duncan exclaimed. “Who’d ever believed -that one year ago, he was wearing an iron on his leg? He—”</p> - -<p>“Oh what is it, Dicky?” Rosie Brine called impatiently. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> - -<p>Dicky had by this time reached the Lathrop gate.</p> - -<p>“A post card from Maida,” he shouted.</p> - -<p>“Does she say when she’s coming home?” Laura asked quickly.</p> - -<p>“No,” Dicky answered. He threw himself down among them; handed the post -card to Rosie who had leaped from the hammock. It passed from hand to -hand. Harold, the last to receive it, read it aloud. “Love to everybody -and how I wish I could see you all!” was with the date, all it said.</p> - -<p>“Nothing about coming home,” exclaimed Rosie, “Oh dear, how -disappointed I am.”</p> - -<p>“Where’s it from?” Arthur asked, as though suddenly remembering -something. “The last post card was from Paris.”</p> - -<p>“London,” Dicky answered.</p> - -<p>“London,” Arthur echoed, “she told me that when she came home, she’d -sail from England.”</p> - -<p>“Did she?” Rosie asked listlessly. “She never told me that, but you -see, she says nothing of sailing. She’s probably going to spend the -summer there. I remember that she told me of a beautiful place they -lived in one summer in England. She said that there was a forest -not far from the house where Robin<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> Hood and his men used to meet. -Probably she will go there.” Rosie stopped for a minute and then the -listlessness in her voice changed to a kind of despair. “I don’t -believe she’ll ever come back.”</p> - -<p>“I know she will,” Dicky announced with decision. “The last thing Maida -said was, ‘I’ll come back,’ and she always keeps her promises.”</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t be surprised if she came back this summer some time,” -Arthur said. “Anyway I know she said they’d sail from England.”</p> - -<p>“Yes but by that time we’ll all be away.” Laura’s voice held a -disappointed note. “We’re going to Marblehead in a week or two for the -whole summer and you’re going to Weymouth, Rosie, aren’t you?”</p> - -<p>Rosie nodded. “Only for two weeks though.”</p> - -<p>“Where are you going?” Laura asked Arthur.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know. When my father gets his two weeks’ vacation, maybe we’ll -take a tramp somewhere, that is if it doesn’t come after school has -begun.”</p> - -<p>“And where are you going, Dicky?” Laura went on. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Nowhere. We’re going to stay here in Charlestown. Primrose Court will -be my vacation. Mother says she will try to take us to City Point or -Revere or Nantasket every Sunday. Now what are we going to do to-day?”</p> - -<p>“We might go upstairs in the cupola and play games,” Harold suggested.</p> - -<p>“No I don’t want to stay in the house the first day of vacation,” Rosie -announced discontentedly.</p> - -<p>“Let’s play stunts,” suggested Dicky who, since his lame leg had -recovered, could never seem to get enough of athletic exercise.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Laura.</p> - -<p>“Hide-and-go-seek,” suggested Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Harold.</p> - -<p>“Follow-My-Leader,” suggested Dicky.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Rosie.</p> - -<p>“Hoist-the-Sail,” suggested Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Laura.</p> - -<p>“Prisoners’ Base,” suggested Harold.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Rosie.</p> - -<p>“Tag,” suggested Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Too hot,” decided Harold.</p> - -<p>Laura burst out laughing. “Every game anybody proposes is too hot for -somebody else. I say let’s all lie face downwards and think<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> and think -and <i>think</i> until somebody gets an idea of something new that we can -do.”</p> - -<p>Everybody adopted her suggestion. The four on the grass turned over, -lay like stone images carved there. Rosie turned over in the hammock.</p> - -<p>“I wish Maida’d come home!” came from her in muffled accents before -she, too, subsided.</p> - -<p class="center">* * * * * * *</p> - -<p>A whole minute passed. Nobody moved. Even Rosie kept rigid.</p> - -<p>Into the silence floated the note of a far-away automobile horn. It was -not so much a call or warning as a gay carolling, a long level ribbon -of sound which unwound itself continuously and, drifting on the soft -spring air, came nearer and nearer. It stopped for a moment ... started -again ... continued more and more gayly ... ran up and down a trilled -scale once more....</p> - -<p>The stone images stirred uneasily.</p> - -<p>The horn grew louder.... In a moment it would pass Primrose Court.... -The horn ended in a high swift call.... The car stopped....</p> - -<p>The stone images lifted their heads.</p> - -<p>A girl, lithe but strong-looking with wide-apart big gray eyes gleaming -in a little face,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> just touched in the cheek with pink, with masses of -feathery golden hair hanging over her blue coat, was stepping out of -the car.</p> - -<p>The images flashed upright; leaped to their feet.</p> - -<p>“It’s Maida!” Rosie Brine called as she sped like an arrow shot from a -bow towards the automobile. “Oh, Maida! Maida! Maida! Maida!”</p> - -<p>“It’s Maida!” the others took it up and raced into the Court.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER II</span> <span class="smaller">THE PLAN</span></h2> - -<p>“When did you land?” “Why didn’t you let us know?” “How long are you -going to stay?” “Did your father come too?” “Where’s Billy Potter?” -“How’s Dr. Pierce?” And “Oh how you’ve grown!”</p> - -<p>Maida tried to answer them all; to hug each of the girls who were -hugging her all together; to hold out a hand to each of the three boys -who seemed all to shake both her hands at once; to manage to kiss Betsy -Hale, who hearing the name Maida shouted, vaguely recalled that there -had once been a Maida whom she loved; and who thereupon, hung tight to -one of her legs; to manage to kiss Delia Dore who had no remembrance -of Maida whatever but in imitation of Betsy, hung tight to the other -leg; and in addition to call to Molly and Timmie and Dorothy and Mabel -who remembered her perfectly and who danced like little wild Indians on -the outskirts of the crowd, yelling, “Maida’s come back! Maida’s come -back!” at the top of their lungs. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> - -<p>All this took much less time to happen than it has taken to describe, -and it was suddenly interrupted by the rapid opening of the door to the -Dore yard. A little old Irish woman with silvery hair and with a face -as wrinkled as a nut, came rushing out, her arms extended calling, “My -lamb’s come back! My lamb’s come back!”</p> - -<p>Maida ran to her and hugged her ecstatically. “Oh, dear Granny Flynn!” -she said, “Dear, dear Granny Flynn!”</p> - -<p>Then there appeared back of Granny Flynn, Mrs. Dore—Granny Flynn’s -daughter; Delia and Dicky Dore’s mother—who had to be met in the same -affectionate way. Mrs. Dore was a tall, brown, fresh-complexioned -woman. It was from her that Dicky inherited his brown coloring and -Delia her sparkling expression.</p> - -<p>“I’d never know you for the same child,” Mrs. Dore said.</p> - -<p>Of course the grown people claimed Maida’s attention first. They -showered her with questions and she answered them every one with all -her old-time courtesy and consideration. Was she well? Well! But look -at her! When did she land? She had landed the day before in New York; -had come on the midnight to Boston. Where was she living? At their -home<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> on Beacon Street. Would she stay to lunch? Yes! Yes! <i>Yes!</i> Her -father had said that if she were invited, she could spend the whole -rest of the day in Primrose Court; he would send the car for her late -in the afternoon. Where was she going after that? Her father would tell -them all this afternoon. He had some plans, but they weren’t worked out -yet. Would she be in Boston for a few days? Probably. Then, during that -time, wouldn’t she like to come back to her own rooms over <span class="smaller">MAIDA’S -LITTLE SHOP</span>? <i>Would she?</i> Oh goody, she could telephone her -father to bring her some clothes.... It went on and on until the older -children stood first on one foot and then on the other with impatience; -and the younger ones went back to their house-keeping game and their -frequent punishments.</p> - -<p>But finally the curiosity of this group of grown-ups was satisfied and -the children claimed their prey. A clamorous group—every one of them -telling her some bit of news and all at once—they made the tour of the -Court. They called on Mrs. Lathrop, who mercifully forebore to ask more -than five minutes of questions; and on the Misses Allison, a pair of -middle-aged maiden ladies. Here<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> the confusion doubled itself because -of the noisy screams of Tony the parrot.</p> - -<p>Tony kept calling at the top of his croaking voice, “What’s this all -about?” Each of the children tried to tell him, but he was apparently -dissatisfied with their explanations; for he only called the louder and -with greater emphasis, “I <i>say</i>—<i>what</i> is this all about?” Finally, in -despair he exclaimed, “Good-night, sweet dreams,” and subsided.</p> - -<p>At length, the six of them—Maida, Rosie, Laura, Arthur, Dicky and -Harold—retired to the Lathrop lawn and plumped down on the grass. They -talked and talked and talked....</p> - -<p>“How you have grown, Maida!” Rosie said first. “How tall you are and -strong-looking!” She would have added, “And how pretty!” if the boys -had not been there, but shyness kept her from making so personal a -comment in their presence.</p> - -<p>“That’s exactly what I was thinking about you,” Maida laughed, “but -then you have all grown, Arthur particularly.” In her candid, friendly -way, she surveyed them, one after another. “You are taller too, Laura, -and I believe even your hair has grown.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It certainly has,” Laura admitted. Laura’s hair was extraordinarily -long and thick. It hung in two light-brown braids, very glossy, not a -hair out of place, to below Laura’s waist. At the tip of each braid was -a big pale blue bow.</p> - -<p>“As for you, Rosie, you are still taller than I, I’m afraid.”</p> - -<p>“Let’s measure,” Rosie answered springing to her feet.</p> - -<p>The two girls stood shoulder to shoulder. Rosie, it proved, was a -little the taller. Maida continued to look at her after they had -resumed their places on the grass. “What a beauty she is,” she thought; -and she too was withheld by shyness and a sense of delicacy from making -this comment before the others.</p> - -<p>Rosie was certainly handsome. Tall, active, proud-looking; great -black eyes lighted by stars; a mass of black hair breaking into high -waves and half curls; cheeks as smooth as satin and stained a deep -crimson—ivory-white, jet-black, coral-crimson—that was Rosie. Maida -had always called her Rose-Red.</p> - -<p>“But the greatest change has come in Dicky and me,” Maida ended. “We -have both lost our lameness. You don’t limp, Dicky, and I don’t. Let’s -race to the gate and back.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p> - -<p>Dicky was on his feet in a minute. Arthur called, “One to make ready, -two for a show—” At the word, “<i>Go</i>” they were off. Dicky was more -active but Maida was taller. The race finished a tie.</p> - -<p>The blood which Maida’s running brought to her cheeks painted roses -there; not the deep crimson roses which bloomed perpetually in Rosie’s -face but transient blossoms, delicately pink. And under that flush, her -face, a healthy ivory, looked well. Her big gray eyes were filled with -happiness and the torrent of her pale-gold feathery hair seemed to gush -from her head like living light.</p> - -<p>They sat and talked until luncheon and immediately after luncheon -gathered on the lawn and talked again. Maida still had questions to ask -and comments to make.</p> - -<p>“You have all grown,” she said once, “but somehow I think the little -children have grown the most and Dorothy and Mabel more than anybody! -Their eyes still look like great blue marbles and their hair as though -it had been curled over a candlestick. Isn’t it marvelous how they -keep exactly the same height. Twins are magical creatures, aren’t -they? As for Betsy and Delia—they’re great big girls. I suppose Betsy -still runs away every chance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> she gets. On the whole I think Molly and -Timmie have changed the least. Does Timmie still fall into all the -‘pud-muddles?’ Molly still looks like a darling brown robin and Timmie -like a brown bogle. Don’t you remember I used to call them Robin and -Bogle.”</p> - -<p>The children answered all her questions. Yes, Betsy still ran away. No, -Bogle had quieted down. He didn’t fall into “pud-muddles” any more. Of -course they had their questions to ask Maida about her year in Europe. -And she told them of her experiences in Italy, Switzerland, France, -and England. But though she answered them instantly, and with the -fullness of detail which had always been her characteristic, it seemed -at moments as though her mind were not all on what she was saying. Once -or twice, she even interrupted herself to start something which had -nothing to do with her subject. But apparently, both times, she thought -better of it and checked a tongue which obviously was yearning to speed -on in the interest of that unknown subject.</p> - -<p>“There’s something you want to tell us Maida,” Dicky guessed shrewdly -once. “But you won’t let yourself.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p> - -<p>Maida blushed furiously but her eyes danced. She did not answer. Rosie, -thereupon, continued to watch her closely. “Maida Westabrook, you’re -almost bursting over something,” she said once; then as though with an -inspiration, “You’ve got a plan of some kind and I know it.”</p> - -<p>Again Maida blushed and this time she laughed outright. “Wait and see!” -was all she said, however.</p> - -<p>After they had talked themselves out, they showed Maida the accumulated -treasures of the last year. The wood-carving, which was Arthur’s -accomplishment and the paper-work which was Dicky’s, had improved -enormously. The beautiful box of tools that Mr. Westabrook had -presented to the one and the big box of paints that he had given the -other, were of course important factors in the improvement. Laura still -danced beautifully and she danced her latest dance for Maida—a Spanish -fandango. Harold was raising rabbits and he showed his entire family -to Maida. At the urge of all this work, Rosie, who hated the sight of -a needle, had taken in despair, to knitting. She could endure knitting -she told Maida because the work grew so fast. She herself said though -that the less<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> said about the results of her labor, the better. And -Maida frankly agreed with her when she examined some of it.</p> - -<p>After this the group returned to the yard for more talk.</p> - -<p>Somehow they didn’t feel like playing games. Late in the afternoon, -they sprinkled the flower beds and hosed the lawn for Mrs. Lathrop. -Then as this made further sitting on the grass impossible, they retired -to the tiny Dore yard with its amusing little flower bed and its one -patch of grass. There was just about room for their group there. They -sat down. Again they asked Maida about her travels. But now Maida was -distinctly absent-minded. Suddenly in the midst of a description of -Pompeii, there sounded a long, faint far-away call of an automobile -horn. It broke, like a fire-rocket, into a flurry of star notes; then -dropped a long liquid jet of sound which, again like a fire-rocket, -dropped another shower of notes. The effect on Maida was electric. She -came upright, quivering.</p> - -<p>“That’s father,” she said. “<i>Now</i> I can tell you what I’ve been biting -my lips all the morning to keep back. I didn’t want to tell you until -he was here to talk to your fathers and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> mothers. But, oh, we’ve got -such a beautiful plan for the summer— Oh it’s so wonderful that it -seems like a fairy tale.”</p> - -<p>The long jet of sound lengthened ... came nearer....</p> - -<p>“Father wants you all to come to spend the summer with us at Satuit. -He’s going to do the most beautiful thing you ever heard of in your -life. Just as he gave me Maida’s Little Shop, he is going to give me -Maida’s Little House. <i>He</i> is going to live in the Big House where -he can have all the grown-up company he wants and <i>we</i> are going to -live in the Little House. The Little House is so far away from the Big -House that nobody would ever guess we were there. Oh, but it’s all so -beautiful and there are so many things to tell about it that I don’t -know where to begin. For one thing he’s going to let us all help in— -We girls are to do our part in the—And the boys are to take care of -the— Oh it is such a duck of a house! Built very near a great big pond -and not so very far off—the ocean. And there’s a wood and House Rock -and the Bosky Dingle ... and.... Oh, I don’t know how to tell you about -it....”</p> - -<p>She stopped for breath. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> - -<p>The horn came nearer and nearer.</p> - -<p>The five faces stared at her. For one astounded instant nobody could -speak.</p> - -<p>“Oh Maida!” at last Rosie breathed. The two girls threw themselves upon -her; Arthur rose and then suddenly sat down again but Dicky kept quite -still his eyes full of stars. “I knew you’d have some plan, Maida,” he -said. Harold, unexpectedly, turned a somersault.</p> - -<p>“I know I’m dreaming,” Laura almost whispered.</p> - -<p>The horn stopped. A great gray car turned into Primrose Court. A -man, middle-aged, tall, massive and with a pronounced stoop to his -shoulders, stepped out. He turned a head, big and shaggy as a buffalo, -in the direction of Maida’s Little Shop. The piercing eyes, fierce and -keen as an eagle’s, seemed to penetrate its very walls. This was Jerome -Westabrook whom the world called, “Buffalo” Westabrook.</p> - -<p>Maida dashed out of the yard, the children trailing her.</p> - -<p>“Oh father, father, I’ve told them, I’ve told them! I couldn’t keep it -any longer after I heard the horn.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER III</span> <span class="smaller">THE JOURNEY</span></h2> - -<p>As the train drew into the Satuit Station, it seemed to spill children -from every door. Counting them carefully, Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore -found to their great relief that the twelve, with whom they started, -were still all with them. But—big and little—they were all so full -of the excitement of the trip that it looked as though, at any moment, -they might vanish in the strange country which surrounded them. Arthur, -leading the two boys, started an investigation of the station. The -three big girls followed. Only the little children, tired by the -trip and awed to quiet by the unfamiliar surroundings, stayed close -to the women’s skirts. Timmie’s big full eyes surveyed in wonder the -strange new world. Delia, who had fallen comfortably asleep in her -mother’s arms, suddenly waked up, rubbing her eyes, and looked about -her. “Oh take me back to Shalstown!” she wailed in a sudden attack of -homesickness and fortunately fell asleep again. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Oh here’s the car!” Maida called.</p> - -<p>A big comfortable limousine came round the bend of the road. The driver -alighted, and came forward. “Here I am at last, Miss Maida,” he said, -his hand to his cap.</p> - -<p>“Oh good afternoon, Botkins,” Maida greeted him. She introduced him to -Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore; then to the children.</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry I was late, ma’am,” Botkins said to Granny Flynn, “but I -nearly ran over a dog in the road. I stopped to see if it was all -right.”</p> - -<p>“And was it?” Rosie Brine, who had a passion for animals, asked eagerly.</p> - -<p>“Right as a trivet,” Botkins answered.</p> - -<p>“What is a trivet, Maida?” Rosie asked in a mystified aside.</p> - -<p>“I’ll show in a few minutes, goose,” Maida rejoined. “It’s an English -word.”</p> - -<p>Botkins, who was English also, began stowing the party away in the -automobile: Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore on the back seats; Betsy and -Delia between them; and Mollie and Timmie at their feet. Maida and -Laura each holding a very active Clark twin, occupied the little seats. -Rosie, to her great delight, was permitted to sit with the driver. The -three boys hung onto the running board. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> - -<p>“We look like an orphan-asylum,” Arthur commented as, with a long call -of warning from the horn, they started off.</p> - -<p>The road stretched straight before them, wide and yellow, furred with -trees on both sides; then vanished under an arch of green as it turned -to the left.</p> - -<p>“Aren’t there any houses in Satuit, Maida?” Laura asked.</p> - -<p>“Plenty,” Maida answered. “We’ll come to some in a minute—then to -more. In a little while, we’ll go right through the town.”</p> - -<p>For a few moments nobody spoke; just watched for the first house. -Presently a little white farmhouse, gambrel-roofed and old, popped into -view at one side.</p> - -<p>“Oh did you see that lovely old well with the long pole?” Rosie -exclaimed from the front seat.</p> - -<p>“That’s a well-sweep,” Maida explained. “It has a bucket at one end.”</p> - -<p>“Oh see the ponies! One, two, three, four, five—” but the car shot -Laura past before she had all the ponies counted.</p> - -<p>“Gee, look at all those hens!” came from Arthur. “Must be a hundred!”</p> - -<p>And then followed a chorus of “Oh sees!” The beautiful big barn with -its wide doors!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> The lovely little pond covered with lily pads: The -trim little vine-covered summer house perched on the hill! Bee hives! -The old grave yard!</p> - -<p>And, “See the moo-cow!” piped up Betsy Hale and “Tee the moo-tow!” -Delia, as usual mimicked her.</p> - -<p>Timmie did not speak; but his big eyes, made bigger by wonder, mirrored -everything.</p> - -<p>“There’s the town!” Maida said finally and again for a few moments -there was silence.</p> - -<p>The town manifested itself at first only by scattered farmhouses. -But these began to draw closer and closer together until, finally, -they seemed almost to huddle about the beautiful little white church -standing amidst rows of old lichen-covered slate gravestones, and -pointing with a slender, delicately-cut-and-carved, white spire at the -blue sky. Stores were here too, a moving picture house; a small inn; a -post office; a garage.</p> - -<p>Then the road turned suddenly and for an instant it was almost as -though their speed would take them across the broad stretch of a -velvety green lawn into the blue harbor which expanded beyond. This -harbor bore here and there white-sailed boats. Not far away, a boy was -fishing from the side of a dory.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> There was a chorus of delighted <i>ohs</i> -and <i>ahs</i> from the car. But their speed did not abate for a moment.</p> - -<p>On they went and on; and soon the village was behind, far behind; -houses were drawing apart from each other. The forest was closing about -the farms, separating them.... Now the car was on the smooth hard road -again, thick tree growths on both sides.</p> - -<p>With a contented sigh, Betsy closed her eyes and fell fast asleep. -Delia had long ago surrendered to the sand-man. Molly was trying her -best to keep awake; but it was obvious that she could not hold out -long. Timmie’s eyes were beginning to film with fatigue, but he fought -it manfully. Even the Clark twins had become silent. But the other -children were as wide-awake as when they started.</p> - -<p>More yellow road and more yellow road—more green trees and more green -trees. In the front seat, Rosie bounced. “Oh Maida,” she called, “it -seems to me I can’t wait. Will we ever get there?”</p> - -<p>Maida’s eyes danced. “Oh in an hour or so,” she said airily.</p> - -<p>“An hour,” Laura groaned. “We have gone a thousand miles already.”</p> - -<p>Even as she spoke, the motor turned <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>smoothly, the horn emitting a long -silvery gurgle. They entered, between two massive stone posts, a long -avenue which curved away in the distance like a wide gray tape thrown -amidst the trees.</p> - -<p>“Maida Westabrook you fibber!” Rosie exclaimed, “we’re here now!”</p> - -<p>Maida only twinkled.</p> - -<p>On they went. On both sides grew great trees. But, unlike the forests -that stretched away from the public roads which they had just -traversed, these woods had been freed of their underbrush. The grass -beneath them was like velvet and lying on it, as though liquid gold had -oozed or poured through the branches, shone tiny splashes and great -pools of sunlight. It looked as though the whole green earth were -caught in a golden net.</p> - -<p>On and on! To the impatient children it seemed that they went miles.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” Arthur Duncan exclaimed suddenly. And then, quite like a girl, -again and again, “Oh! Oh! Oh!”</p> - -<p>The car had turned so that it looked straight down into a cleared -glade. At the end of the vista, a group of deer, dappled in white all -over their lovely, dead-leaf brown bodies, lifted their heads, and with -their great soft eyes <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>surveyed the car. But they stared for such a -tiny fraction of a second that it scarcely seemed that the thing had -happened at all for—flash! There was a glimpse of white as they turned -tail. They vanished as instantly, as completely, as miraculously as -though they were ghosts.</p> - -<p>“Oh <i>Maida</i>!” Rosie exclaimed. “Deer! How wonderful! Do they belong to -your father or are they wild?”</p> - -<p>“Those that you saw are dappled deer. Father had them brought here from -England,” Maida answered. “But once in a while we do see wild deer in -this country.”</p> - -<p>“Oh I’d like to see some <i>wild</i> deer,” Arthur said.</p> - -<p>Dicky didn’t speak but his eyes were luminous. As for Harold, he was -still gasping with the surprise of it.</p> - -<p>On they went. The road curved and rippled like a ribbon being -constantly thrown ahead of them. Suddenly they came to a great cleared -space, smoother than any plush. Botkins stopped the car. At the end -towered a huge house of white marble, with terraces. On the lawn, which -stretched between the children and the house, grew, widely-separated, a -few stately trees; wine-glass elms,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> oaks; copper beeches and powdered -spruces. It was very still now and, unimpeded, the setting sun was -sending great golden shafts across that stretch of plushy grass. They -struck a pool of water in a marble basin in the middle of that emerald -velvet; and through the fountain which played about it. Here ... there -... yonder ... motionless in that liquid golden light ... were white -objects....</p> - -<p>“What are those white things?” Dicky asked curiously.</p> - -<p>And then, one of the white objects arose, opened like a fan, spread to -a wonderful size its snow-white tail; moved in stately fashion along -the velvety-green lawn.</p> - -<p>“Maida!” Dicky gasped. “Not—Yes they are—white peacocks!”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida answered. “White peacocks. I am so glad they were there. -Everything has happened just as I wanted it. Sometimes it will be days -before you see deer, although there are so many here. And sometimes -the peacocks wander to the back of the house. I knew you wanted to see -them, Dicky, and I’ve been hoping all along that they would be here for -you. There are seven. We have a dozen.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> - -<p>Dicky was listening with all his ears; but at the same time he was -looking with all his eyes. For out of the trees to the left, suddenly -appeared another pair of peacocks in full sail. Not white ones this -time; great prismatic, blue and green creatures—the sun struck bronze -lights out of them as they floated on.</p> - -<p>“It’s like a fairy tale,” Dicky breathed.</p> - -<p>“Are we going to live there?” Rosie asked in an awed tone.</p> - -<p>“Oh mercy no!” Maida answered. “That’s father’s house—the Big House. -Our house is ever so much nicer.”</p> - -<p>“I hope it isn’t any bigger,” Laura said, her voice a little awed too.</p> - -<p>Maida laughed a little. “No it’s not quite as big as that,” she -admitted.</p> - -<p>“Shall I go on, Miss Maida?” Botkins asked.</p> - -<p>“Yes, please Botkins,” Maida answered. And they continued to go -on through more winding, geometrically perfect, beautifully-kept, -gray roads; past armies and armies of trees: high, plumy-tipped, -feathery-trunked aristocratic elms; vigorous, irregular-shaped, -peasant-like oaks; clumps, gracefully-slender, fluttering a veil of -green leaves, of white<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> birch; occasional pine, resinous and shining; -beeches; firs. Suddenly everybody exclaimed at once, “Oh see the pond!”</p> - -<p>“What pond is it?” Harold asked.</p> - -<p>“It’s called by some people Spy Pond,” Maida answered, “but I call it -the Magic Mirror. It’s our pond and I think I ought to be allowed to -call it what I want.”</p> - -<p>“I think so too,” agreed Laura.</p> - -<p>“What do you mean by <i>our</i> pond?” Arthur asked.</p> - -<p>“Just what I say,” Maida replied promptly. “It’s our pond. It belongs -to my father and it’s a part of the grounds of Maida’s Little House. -We can go swimming in it every day. That is if we don’t prefer—” She -broke off in a little embarrassed laugh.</p> - -<p>“Oh Maida you are so full of secrets I could <i>kill</i> you,” Rosie -threatened.</p> - -<p>Maida only laughed.</p> - -<p>They passed the pond which stretched for a considerable distance, long -and crescent-shaped between its tree-hung banks, and now they were in -the real forest. The road was smooth as always and beautifully-kept, -but on both sides, the forest had been left to grow as it pleased. It -was filled with underbrush. The tree trunks were obscured by great -bushes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> Here and there through openings, the children could see -gigantic rocks thrusting great heads and shoulders out of the masses of -rusty-colored leaves.</p> - -<p>“Oh isn’t it lovely!” Rosie said in a perfect ecstasy. “Lovely, lovely, -lovely!” she went on repeating dreamily as though caught in a trance of -delight. She ended with a scream. “Did you see that? What was it Maida?”</p> - -<p>“A woodchuck,” Maida answered smilingly.</p> - -<p>Timmie awakened by Rosie’s scream, asked if there were any lions and -tigers about. Much disappointed at Maida’s <i>no</i>, he fell asleep again.</p> - -<p>And now they seemed to be going up hill, slowly but steadily up. Up, -up, up. The car had begun to speed a little. Ahead was another rounding -curve. Botkins took it with a flash.</p> - -<p>The car came out in front of—</p> - -<p>It was one of the little colonial farmhouses a story-and-a-half in -height; weather-colored, slant-roofed; to which addition after addition -has been added by succeeding generations. It was set in an expanse -of lawn, cut cleanly in two by a path of irregularly-shaped, sunken -stones, dominated, one on either side, by twin<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> elms of enormous girth -and amplitude. The house faced the east.</p> - -<p>The additions, which now merged into one long structure, had gone off -to the right and the north where they joined a big barn. This barn -was the same velvety, gray weather-color as the house but with great -doors painted a strange deep old blue which had faded to an even -stranger, deeper blue. The sun struck into the open door and shot -over the shining sides of half-a-dozen brilliantly colored canoes -lying face-downwards on the floor; glittered in the bright-work of -half-a-dozen bicycles, drawn up in a line.</p> - -<p>The front door of the house opened as the automobile came in sight and -a colored man and woman, young and smiling, came out to meet them. The -automobile seemed to explode children, who started over the lawn of the -house.</p> - -<p>What a house it was!</p> - -<p>The pointed-topped, pillared vestibule entrance was covered with -roses which smothered it in a pink bloom. Hollyhocks, not blooming -yet, marched in files along the front of the house. Lilacs, in heavy -blossom, bunched in hedges at the ends. At one side, a trumpet vine, -with a trunk as thick as iron<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> cable, had crept to the very top spine -of the house, was crawling towards the single ample chimney which -protruded from the middle of the roof. At the other side, a graceful -elm thrust close to the shingles. A syringa bush and a smoke bush grew -in front. But charming as was the house, interesting as was the barn, -the children’s eyes did not linger long on either of them, because -inevitably their gaze fixed on that Annex which made an intermediate -house between them. For in the middle of it—yes <i>in</i> it and <i>through</i> -it—grew an enormous gnarled oak. Its trunk emerged from the roof -and its long level branches spread over it in every direction. More -than that—above that roof—securely caught in those flatly-growing, -widely-spread branches was a little Tree House.</p> - -<p>The colored pair were almost on them now.</p> - -<p>“Good afternoon Floribel,” Maida greeted them, “Good afternoon Zeke. -Let me introduce you to Mrs. Flynn and Mrs. Dore.”</p> - -<p>Then she turned to the rest of the group.</p> - -<p>“Children,” she commanded in a tone of happy pride, “behold Maida’s -Little House.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER IV</span> <span class="smaller">THE LITTLE HOUSE</span></h2> - -<p>“Do you want to see the place now or wait until after supper?” Maida -asked after the last admiring exclamation had died, the last pair of -cramped legs had stretched themselves out.</p> - -<p>“I’m starved,” Rosie answered instantly, “but I must see everything -first.”</p> - -<p>The others echoed Rosie’s decision with a fury of enthusiasm.</p> - -<p>“We can’t see anything of the back of the house from here,” Arthur said -as though that clinched the matter.</p> - -<p>And so while Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore—the little children tagging -them in a daze of fatigue, shot with excitement—were being taken care -of by Floribel and Zeke, Maida led the older children on a voyage of -exploration.</p> - -<p>“Now first,” she said in a practical voice, “let’s go off a little -distance—so that I can show you the whole lay of the land.”</p> - -<p>The six of them returned almost to the spot<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> where they had first -caught sight of the Little House.</p> - -<p>“I’m going to start by telling you a little of the history of the -house,” Maida began importantly. “This is the old Westabrook farmhouse -and my father was born here; and his father and his father. It was -built in 1645 and Westabrooks have lived in it from that day to this.”</p> - -<p>“Oh Maida!” Rosie said in an awed tone, “isn’t that wonderful! Is it -just the same as it was then?”</p> - -<p>“No, indeed,” Maida answered. “Almost every generation of Westabrooks -added something to the original house. The barn was built later and -also all those little additions—we call them the Annex—which connect -the house with the barn, but it was my father who made the sides of -them all windows.”</p> - -<p>“Who put the little house in the tree?” Dicky asked.</p> - -<p>“My grandfather.”</p> - -<p>“Wasn’t it wonderful that they left the tree!” Laura commented.</p> - -<p>“Yes. You see my grandmother loved that big old tree dearly and so they -saved it for her. Now where shall we go first?”</p> - -<p>“Up the tree!” everybody answered. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p> - -<p>“All right. I might have known you would have said that,” Maida -declared, “when I’m just <i>dying</i> to show you the house.”</p> - -<p>The tree grew out of the middle of the Annex. The floor had been fitted -neatly about the tree-trunk. Stairs led up to the roof; and from the -roof, a short flight of steps led to the Tree House. One after another -the children mounted them. It took them into a little square room with -windows looking in all four directions.</p> - -<p>“Oh I can see Spy Pond—I mean the Magic Mirror!” Rosie exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“And from here you can see the Big House,” Laura exclaimed. “Not very -much—just a sort of shining....”</p> - -<p>“Oh—But—Look—See!” Dicky stuttered in his excitement. “From here you -can see the ocean!”</p> - -<p>The children deserted the other windows and rushed to Dicky’s side. In -the west appeared all a-sparkle what looked like a great heaving mass -of melted glass. On and on it stretched, and on, until it cut through -the vapory sky and disappeared forever. A few sail boats like great -gulls were beating their wings on its glittering surface.</p> - -<p>“Isn’t it wonderful?” Rosie said in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> solemn voice. “It makes me feel -almost like not speaking.”</p> - -<p>“Wait until you see it in a nor’easter,” Maida promised, “or a great -thunder storm.”</p> - -<p>“Just think,” Arthur said, “all my life I’ve wanted to learn to sail a -boat—”</p> - -<p>“You will sometime,” Maida interrupted, “but father says we’ve all got -to learn to swim before we can get into a sailboat.”</p> - -<p>“I know how to swim,” Arthur stated in an off-hand voice. “All boys do.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t,” Dicky remonstrated.</p> - -<p>“Well you will in a week,” Maida promised.</p> - -<p>Harold had all this time been keenly examining the ocean, the curving -line of shore.</p> - -<p>“What’s that island off there, Maida?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Everybody else calls it Spectacles Island, because it’s shaped like a -pair of spectacles. But I call it Tom Tiddler’s Ground, because nobody -lives there. I don’t see why I shouldn’t call it what I want. It’s <i>my</i> -island.”</p> - -<p>“Your island,” Rosie repeated. “Oh Maida, you lucky girl.”</p> - -<p>Maida flushed and looked ashamed. “I mean <i>our</i> island,” she corrected -herself. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Well,” Rosie said in a meditative tone, “with a farmhouse in the -country, the ocean with an island in it in front of it; a forest with -deer in back of it; and a pond—Maida can you think of anything else -that we could possibly have?”</p> - -<p>“Well there might be a volcano on the island,” Maida suggested, “a -grotto somewhere like the Blue Grotto of Capri; and then of course we -have no glaciers, geysers, hot springs, deserts or bogs—”</p> - -<p>“Oh you goose!” Rosie interrupted. “You know we couldn’t have any of -those things.”</p> - -<p>“We might have a cave,” Arthur said. “Are there any caves around here, -Maida?”</p> - -<p>“Not that I know of,” Maida answered. “Now let me show you the rest of -the place. You’ve been so busy looking at the ocean that you haven’t -noticed there’s a tennis court and a croquet-ground just below.”</p> - -<p>The five excited faces peered out of the open window down through the -tree branches and there was, indeed, a great cleared velvety lawn -with wickets and stakes at one end and a tennis court marked in white -kalsomine at the other.</p> - -<p>“Now,” Maida said, “come into the house. Oh I forgot to tell you that I -call this tree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> Father Time because it’s the oldest one on the place. -It’s too bad that I named all these things years ago because you could -have had the fun of naming them too.”</p> - -<p>“But I like all your names, Maida,” Dicky declared.</p> - -<p>Climbing down the narrow stairs, Maida conducted them through the two -rooms of the Annex which lay between the Tree Room and the Little -House. The tiny procession marched first into the kitchen which was the -second of these rooms—a big sunny room, the walls painted a deep blue -and hanging against them great pans and platters of brass and copper. -From the kitchen, they entered the dining room; a big room also which -ran the entire width of the house all doors and windows on the western -side. A long, wide table in the center; chairs along the walls; and a -pair of mahogany sideboards facing each other from the ends—these were -its furnishings.</p> - -<p>They passed through a door on the eastern wall.</p> - -<p>“Now,” Maida said, “we are in the original house. This used to be the -old kitchen. Now it’s the living room. Look at the great fireplace with -the oven at one side. This big<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> wooden shovel was used to put the pans -of bread in and to take them out. See how sweet all the old paneling -is! That’s been here from the beginning and the old H hinges and the -old butterfly hinges! And these darling little closets! And those big -old beams with the spatter work on them. Father had this great fender -built around the fireplace so that the little children couldn’t fall -into it when there’s a fire.”</p> - -<p>“Are we going to have fires in that enormous place?” Rosie asked.</p> - -<p>“I wish the temperature would fall to below zero,” Laura declared -recklessly.</p> - -<p>“I should think it would take four-foot logs,” Arthur had been -examining the fireplace. Crouching down he had even walked into it; -stared up into the chimney.</p> - -<p>“It does,” Maida informed him proudly. “Oh, there, Rosie,” she pointed -to a little triangular brass object on the hearth, “is a trivet!”</p> - -<p>Rosie pounced on it. “It looks like a brass cricket! What’s it for?”</p> - -<p>“To put the tea pot on, close to the fire so it will keep hot.”</p> - -<p>Out of the living room through the northern<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> door they came into one of -the two smaller front rooms. The walls were lined with books. And here -was a big table with a reading lamp, a desk, a few comfortable chairs.</p> - -<p>“This is the library,” Maida announced proudly.</p> - -<p>“I’d like to shut myself up here for a month,” Dicky, who was a great -reader, said wistfully. “It looks as if all the books were interesting.”</p> - -<p>“Oh they are!” Maida assured him. “The Lang Fairy Books and Grimm and -Andersen, George McDonald and Louisa M. Alcott and Howard Pyle and -Stevenson and Kipling, and all the nicest books that father and Billy -Potter and Dr. Pierce and I could think of. And lots more that they -selected that I had never heard of.”</p> - -<p>From the library, they went out doors through the little vine-covered -vestibule.</p> - -<p>From upstairs came the voice of Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore putting the -younger children to bed.</p> - -<p>“We three girls,” Maida explained, “have rooms at the front of the -house on the second floor. The nursery is back over the dining room.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Where do we sleep?” Harold asked.</p> - -<p>“You boys,” Maida replied, “are going to sleep in the barn.”</p> - -<p>“Gee <i>whillikins</i>!” Dicky exclaimed. “What fun that’ll be!”</p> - -<p>“I’d rather sleep in a barn than any place I know,” Arthur said.</p> - -<p>“It’s pretty good fun sleeping in a tent,” Harold threw in.</p> - -<p>“I was going to say,” Arthur went on, “except out of doors in the -woods.”</p> - -<p>“Now which shall I show you first,” Maida asked, “the boys’ rooms or -the girls’ rooms?” She did not wait for an answer. “Come on girls,” she -continued in a tone of resignation. “We’ve got to show the boys their -place first. They won’t look at anything until they’ve seen them!”</p> - -<p>The procession moved toward the barn.</p> - -<p>The lower floor—roomy, raftered, sweet-smelling—was empty except -for the canoes; a small run-about; the bicycles; a phonograph; a big -chest; garden tools. Maida led the way to the second floor. The railed -stairway ran close to the side of the barn, brought them through a -square opening in the ceiling, into another big room—the second story. -Here, in each of three corners, were army cots;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> beside each cot, a -tall chiffonier. On top of each chiffonier were toilet articles in a -simple style; beside each chiffonier a chair.</p> - -<p>“That’s your bathroom over there.” Maida pointed to the fourth corner -which was partitioned off. “It has a shower. I don’t expect you’ll use -it much because we’ll be bathing every day in the Magic Mirror. You -hang your clothes on hooks behind these curtains. You see you each have -a closet of your own.”</p> - -<p>The boys were of course opening chiffonier drawers; pulling aside -curtain-draped closets; examining the shower. Their curiosity appeased, -they made for down-stairs—and the canoes.</p> - -<p>“Now while you boys are examining the barn, would you girls like to -explore upstairs in the house?” Maida asked.</p> - -<p>“I’m just dying to see my own room,” Laura declared firmly.</p> - -<p>The two girls pelted across the lawn in the wake of Maida’s eager -footsteps. They ran up the tiny steep flight of stairs, exactly -opposite the little vestibule entrance. It brought them into a small -hall from which opened four small slant-roofed chambers.</p> - -<p>“This is my room,” Maida said, pointing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> to one of the south -chambers—the back room on the right of the stairs. “I have always -slept there when we have been in the house. I love it because of the -great tree outside my window. I have always called this tree, Mother -Nature, to go with Father Time. So you see I have a father tree and a -mother tree! When there’s a storm the boughs make such a sweet sound -rubbing against my walls. And often little twigs tap on my window, and -sometimes it sounds exactly as though the leaves were whispering to me.”</p> - -<p>“Oh Maida!” Rosie exclaimed, “I never saw anything so lovely in all my -life. How I love that bed and that sweet little cricket.”</p> - -<p>The room was simple—it held but a big, double, old-fashioned canopied -bed; an old-fashioned maple bureau; and an old-fashioned maple desk; -a little straight slat-backed chair in front of the desk and a little -slat-backed rocker by one of the windows—but it was quaint. In front -of the rocker was a cricket as though just ready for little feet.</p> - -<p>The flowered wall-paper matched the chintz curtains and the chintz -ruffles on the little cricket. Under the window, in a little -old-fashioned child’s chair, sat a great rag doll, and beside her was a -little hair-cloth trunk. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Yes, it <i>is</i> perfectly lovely,” Laura agreed, “but oh Maida, do show -me my room.”</p> - -<p>“What a selfish goop I am!” Maida exclaimed in contrition. “Your room, -Rosie, is in front of mine, and Laura’s across the hall.”</p> - -<p>The three little girls tumbled pell-mell into the front room. It did -not differ much from Maida’s or from Laura’s across the way—except -where the key-note of Maida’s wall-paper and chintzes were yellow, that -of Rosie’s was crimson and Laura’s blue. In each there was a double -canopied bed; a little old-fashioned bureau; a little old-fashioned -cricket; two quaint little old-fashioned chairs. But all these things -differed in detail and although the rooms showed a similarity, they -also showed an individuality. Rosie and Laura went wild with excitement.</p> - -<p>“Oh look at my sweet, <i>sweet</i> closet!” Laura called from her room. -“What a queer shape with the roof slanting like that. And a baby window -in it!”</p> - -<p>“And the windows,” Rosie took it up from her room, “four, eight, -twelve, sixteen, <i>twenty-four panes</i>! And such queer glass; all full of -bubbles and crinkles and wiggle-waggles!”</p> - -<p>And the beaming Maida, running <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>frantically from the one room to the -other and from the other to the one, was saying, “Yes, aren’t they -lovely little closets—running under the eaves like that? I am so glad -you like them. I was afraid you would think they were queer. Yes, -that’s old old glass. All the window glass in the house is old and some -of it is such a lovely color.”</p> - -<p>After a while, the frantic shutting and opening of desk drawers, bureau -drawers, and closet drawers, ceased. The <i>oh’s</i> and <i>ah’s</i> died down -from lack of breath. Maida led the way into the south room at the -left. “This is the guest chamber. And now,” she added, heading the -file through a door at the back of the small hall which led into a big -long room, “we’re out of the main house and in the Annex. This is the -Nursery. It is over the dining room.”</p> - -<p>The Nursery was a big room with a little bed in each corner; miniature -tables and chiffoniers all painted white.</p> - -<p>“Molly, Timmie, Dorothy, Mabel,” Maida pointed to the four beds. “Delia -will sleep in that room at the left with her mother and Betsy in this -room at the right with Granny Flynn. You see both these rooms open into -the Nursery and Granny Flynn and Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> Dore can keep an eye on what’s -going on here.”</p> - -<p>“They’ll have to keep two eyes on it—if Betsy’s here,” Rosie -prophesied.</p> - -<p>“Now, except for the laundry and some empty rooms in the Annex, I think -you’ve seen everything. Everything, that is, except Floribel’s and -Zeke’s room. I don’t suppose you want to see them. And besides I’d have -to ask their permission.”</p> - -<p>“If I see another thing this day,” Rosie declared desperately, “I shall -die of happiness <i>this minute</i>.”</p> - -<p>Fortunately however, she was not called upon to gaze on any object -which would have resulted in so speedy a demise. For just at that -moment the cow-bell rang.</p> - -<p>“That’s supper,” Maida explained.</p> - -<p>Reinforcing the cow-bell’s call, came Mrs. Dore’s voice: “You must come -down now, children. Your supper is on the table, all nice and hot.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER V</span> <span class="smaller">MORNING</span></h2> - -<p>The sun poured through the windows onto Maida’s bed. She stirred. -Was it a bird calling her? No. It was the phonograph. She peeped out -the window. Arthur had brought the phonograph to the opening of the -barn door. It was playing, “Bugle Calls of the American Army.” It was -reveille that she was listening to.</p> - -<p>The door to her bed-chamber flew open and Rosie, her heavy curls -flying, her black eyes sparkling, precipitated herself across the room. -“Oh Maida!” she exclaimed. “Isn’t it wonderful? I am not <i>dreaming</i> am -I? Ow!” as Maida pinched her. “I have been awake for I don’t know how -long, listening to the birds and everything. I have been waiting ever -so long for you to wake up. I thought you would never stir.”</p> - -<p>“Well now that I’m awake, I’ll dress as soon as possible,” Maida -promised. “We’ve got a long day before us. Let’s go in and get Laura -up.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p> - -<p>Laura was still deep in slumber. Indeed she showed a marked -disinclination to awaken. Rosie charitably assisted her efforts by the -application to her face of a very wet—and a very cold—sponge. For -some reason, this action precipitated a pillow fight. In the midst -of it, the breakfast bell sounded but they paid no attention to it. -Finally Granny Flynn had to call: “Stop that running about, children, -and get dressed. Breakfast’ll be on the table in a minute.”</p> - -<p>When the second bell rang, the boys came in from the barn and the -twelve children, Granny Flynn at one end of the table and Mrs. Dore at -the other, sat down to a breakfast of fruit, oatmeal, eggs, and all the -milk they wanted.</p> - -<p>After breakfast, Maida said, “Now, first, I want to show the six little -children where’s the nicest place for them to play. Do the rest of you -want to come?”</p> - -<p>The rest <i>did</i> want to come. Perhaps Laura voiced their sentiments -when she said, “That’s a great idea, Maida. Get the little children -interested, so they won’t be forever tagging us.”</p> - -<p>Maida led the way to the side of the house—the north. They crossed an -expanse of lawn,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> came to an opening in the stone wall. Beyond looked -like unbroken forest. But from the break in the wall, threading its way -through the trees, appeared a well-worn path. They followed it for a -few rods. It ended flush against a big sloping rock.</p> - -<p>“This,” Maida said triumphantly, “is House Rock.”</p> - -<p>The children swarmed over it.</p> - -<p>“Isn’t it a beauty!” Rosie exclaimed.</p> - -<p>It was a beauty—and especially for play purposes. It was big, cut up -by stratification into all levels—but low. At its highest end, it was -not three feet from the ground. Trees shaded it; bushes hedged it; -mosses padded it. No wonder it had been named House Rock; for it was a -perfect setting for those housekeeping games in which little children -so delight.</p> - -<p>“Now, listen to me, little six,” Maida began.</p> - -<p>But Arthur interrupted, “Why that’s a great name for them—the Little -Six. And we,” he added triumphantly, “are the Big Six.”</p> - -<p>“Molly and Mabel and Dorothy and Betsy and Delia and Timmie,” Maida -started again, “all of you, listen! You are the Little Six. This is -your playground. There are some toys<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> in the house; dolls and doll’s -dishes and doll’s furniture, which you can bring here to play house -with. But you are not to go far from the Rock. And when you hear the -cow-bell, you must always return to the Little House.”</p> - -<p>“Is that all,” Laura asked eagerly, “and now can we leave the Little -Six and go exploring?”</p> - -<p>The Little Six waited, dancing with excitement, impatient for the first -time in their lives to have the big children go.</p> - -<p>“Not yet,” Maida responded, “just one more thing for the Little Six.”</p> - -<p>She led the way around House Rock to its high end. From there another -well-worn path started off. The children followed her down its curving -way. Not far from House Rock, it came into a big circular enclosure; -grassy and surrounded by trees.</p> - -<p>“What’s this, Maida?” Arthur asked.</p> - -<p>“It’s a Fairy Ring,” Maida answered solemnly.</p> - -<p>“A Fairy Ring,” Dicky repeated in an awed tone. “Is it really a Fairy -Ring?”</p> - -<p>“That’s what I’ve always called it,” Maida replied. “I don’t know what -it is, if it isn’t a Fairy Ring. I have never seen anything<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> like -it—except in England and there they always call them Fairy Rings, and -besides nobody knows what it was used for.”</p> - -<p>Arthur strolled around the entire circumference of the Ring keenly -examining the ground and the surrounding trees.</p> - -<p>“It looks like a wood clearing to me,” he said in a low tone to Maida -when he rejoined the group.</p> - -<p>Betsy, silenced for the first time in her five years of experience, -suddenly exploded. “Oh goody! goody! goody!” she exclaimed. “Now the -fairies will come and play with us. I’ve always wanted to see a fairy. -Now I’m going to see one!”</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe they’s any such things as fairies,” Timmie declared -sturdily.</p> - -<p>“Oh Timmie,” Dorothy Clark remonstrated, “I should think you’d be -ashamed of yourself. Of course they’s fairies.”</p> - -<p>“Well, anyway,” Timmie still sturdily stood his ground, “if they are, I -don’t believe they’ll come and play with us.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I believe they will,” Mabel Clark reinforced her sister.</p> - -<p>But Betsy was capering up and down the length and breadth of the Fairy -Ring. “I know the fairies will come!” she sang aloud.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> “I know the -fairies will come! I know the fairies will come!”</p> - -<p>When the older children left the Fairy Ring, all six of the little -children were capering too. The last thing they heard was Delia’s -mimicking words: “I know the fairz tum! I know the fairz tum! I know -the fairz tum!”</p> - -<p>“That’s over,” Maida said. “I told Granny Flynn,” she explained, “that -I’d show the little children a nice place to play. Now let’s go into -the living room and talk. There are a whole lot of things that I’ve got -to tell you that I haven’t had time to tell you yet.”</p> - -<p>Although it was a June day—and as warm and sunny as June knows how -to be—they gathered about the big fireplace where already logs were -piled and ready to burn. The boys sat on the fender; the girls drew up -chairs. After they were all comfortable Maida began.</p> - -<p>“Father says that this first week we can all rest. It’s to be our -vacation, but after that, we’ve got to work. Father says that there are -some things that every girl ought to know how to do and some things -every boy ought to know. And we’re going to learn those things living -in the Little House.”</p> - -<p>Rosie’s eyes danced. “Hurry!” she urged Maida. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p> - -<p>Maida drew a long breath. “There’s so much of it. You see there’s -a good deal of work about the house, although it seems so small. -Floribel—she’s the colored maid—is going to do the cooking and Zeke, -her husband, will attend to most of the outside work. Of course Granny -Flynn and Mrs. Dore will run everything. But we girls are to take care -of our own rooms and the flower garden.”</p> - -<p>“Oh goody, goody!” Rosie exclaimed, “I love flowers!”</p> - -<p>“We are to keep the house decorated with flowers. And once every week, -we are to do the housekeeping for the entire day—that’s Floribel’s and -Zeke’s day off. That day, we have to plan the meals; do the marketing; -cook the food; wash and wipe the dishes.”</p> - -<p>“Gee, I’m glad I’m not a girl,” Harold said jubilantly.</p> - -<p>“Oh your turn comes now,” Maida declared. “You boys have got to weed -and water the vegetable garden; gather vegetables whenever they are -needed; run errands; take care of the tennis court.”</p> - -<p>“For my part,” Laura declared, “I wish we did <i>all</i> the cooking. I love -it.”</p> - -<p>“You wouldn’t love it if you did it for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> sixteen people,” Maida -commented in a scandalized tone.</p> - -<p>“It’s just as though we were all alone by ourselves,” Rosie declared -jubilantly.</p> - -<p>“We are,” Maida stated. “We’re three miles from the Big House. We -shan’t see any of father’s company. Father has closed one of the -roads that leads to the Little House and the other is a secret one -that nobody but he and Botkins and I know. Your parents are invited -to visit you whenever they wish. Of course father will come to see us -occasionally. And let me tell you he will come when we least expect -it. And if everything isn’t in apple-pie-order—Of course there’s the -telephone if we should need help—or anything happened—But otherwise -we’re almost all alone in the world.”</p> - -<p>“It’s like a story book,” Dicky commented.</p> - -<p>“Maida!” Rosie said, “you speak of a flower garden and a vegetable -garden but I don’t remember that you showed them to us last night.”</p> - -<p>“No, I didn’t,” Maida explained. “We were all getting so tired. But -I’ll show them to you now. Come!”</p> - -<p>She led the way through the living room;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> through the dining room to -the back door of the house. Then she turned north. “This room is the -laundry,” she said. “And here,” pointing to an enclosure, set off by a -high vine-grown lattice, “is the drying yard.” They were now walking on -a path which ran between the house and a file of cypresses, standing -trim and tall and so close that they made a hedge. Maida led the way -to the corner where there was an opening. There a great rectangle -surrounded by cypresses was a garden—all roses. The bushes were -already in rich bloom, great creamy white ones and great pinky white -ones. Others were deep pink, golden yellow, a rich dark crimson.</p> - -<p>“This is the rose garden,” Maida explained. “Beyond,” she led the -way into still another cypress-guarded square, “is the old-fashioned -garden. There are nasturtiums here and phlox and pansies and peonies -and lots of other things I can’t remember, and in the fall there’ll be -dahlias and asters.”</p> - -<p>Rosie shook herself with joy. “I shall love working in this garden,” -she declared. “This afternoon let’s fill all the vases in the house -with roses.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” Maida agreed absently. “Now I’m going to show you the -vegetable garden.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I know where that is,” Arthur boasted. “I got up early and explored.”</p> - -<p>Maida led the way past the croquet ground, past the tennis court to -another cypress-bordered square. Here, in parallel lines, were rows -of green sprouts. The earth must have been turned over in the spring, -indeed it might have been turned over in the previous fall, rich loam -and cultivator added. It looked like freshly-grated chocolate.</p> - -<p>“Gracious, I think I could make fudge of that earth,” Rosie exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“How tidy it looks,” Laura commented.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida agreed. “That’s because the gardener has put it in perfect -condition for you boys. But after this, you’ve got to take care of it -yourselves. And weeds grow like—like—” She paused for a comparison.</p> - -<p>“Like sixty!” Arthur finished it for her. “I know; I’ve weeded my -aunt’s garden in Maine. Believe me it’s hot work. The thing to do is to -work a little every day—that’s the only way you can keep ahead of the -weeds.”</p> - -<p>“Sure, early in the morning!” Dicky remarked.</p> - -<p>“How did you know that, Dicky?” Maida asked curiously. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I just happened to read it in a book,” Dicky explained.</p> - -<p>“Now, when I tell you,” Maida went on, as one suddenly remembering the -rest of her instructions, “that we shall have to go to bed at nine -and get up at seven, I have told you all I have to tell you. Father’s -very strict about our sleep. He says we must have ten hours. There’s -one exception. Saturday night, when we can sit up until ten and Sunday -morning when we can sleep until eight. Now, how would you like to go to -the Magic Mirror?”</p> - -<p>“Oh I’ve been on pins and needles every moment since we got up wanting -to go to that Pond,” Rosie declared, “but then I want to see everything -at once.”</p> - -<p>“Arthur, do you know how to row a canoe?” Dicky asked.</p> - -<p>“No, I don’t,” Arthur admitted.</p> - -<p>“I do,” said Harold with a slight accent of superiority, “but you don’t -<i>row</i> a canoe. You row a <i>boat</i> and you <i>paddle</i> a canoe.”</p> - -<p>“Does it take long to learn?” Dicky asked with great interest.</p> - -<p>“No, and it’s as easy as pie when you get the hang of it, but you fall -overboard a hundred times before you do that.”</p> - -<p>“I can’t swim,” Dicky said disconsolately. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Never mind, Dicky,” Maida comforted him, “you’ll soon learn. Can you -swim Rosie?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. I’ll teach you Dicky. You begin first with water wings and then—”</p> - -<p>In the meantime, following Maida’s lead, they were moving north.</p> - -<p>“Hi!” Arthur remonstrated. “The way to the Pond—I mean the Magic -Mirror—is over in that direction.”</p> - -<p>“This is another way to it,” Maida explained. “Once you’ve taken it, -you’ll never take any other.”</p> - -<p>A little path disengaged itself from the trees which fringed the lawn, -began to wind away, almost hidden, among the trees. The children -followed Maida in Indian file. For a few moments they could hear Granny -Flynn calling to the younger children; then the voices gradually died -away; bird voices took their places; the calm and the hush of the deep -forest fell upon them.</p> - -<p>“Oh isn’t it wonderful!” Rosie said in an awed tone. “It makes me feel -like—It makes me feel like—Well, it’s like being in church.”</p> - -<p>On both sides the fresh green of the trees made an intricate screen -through which the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> sunlight poured and splashed. The birds kept up -their calls; and many insects called too. A bee buzzed through a tiny -interval of silence; then a crow cawed. The road turned, dipped, sank.</p> - -<p>“Isn’t this pretty?” Maida exclaimed as they descended into a hollow -with high, thick, blossoming wild-rose bushes on both sides.</p> - -<p>Involuntarily, the Big Six stopped and looked about them. They stood -in a little dimple in the earth—bushes growing thick and high on its -sides.</p> - -<p>“How hot it is down here,” Laura commented, “and how sweet it smells.”</p> - -<p>“I call it the Bosky Dingle,” Maida explained.</p> - -<p>“What does Bosky Dingle mean?” Dicky enquired.</p> - -<p>“It’s a poetry phrase,” Maida told him. “It means a kind of woody -hollow.”</p> - -<p>“There’s the Pond!” called the practical Harold.</p> - -<p>The children broke into a run.</p> - -<p>They came out on a cleared space with a boat-house and a long jetty, -leading from a newly-shingled shed into the water. “This is for the -canoes,” Maida explained. She <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>unlocked the door and showed a single -wide empty room.</p> - -<p>“Oh let’s go home and get the canoes and bring them down here,” Arthur -explained. “I’m wild to try them.”</p> - -<p>“It will take two to carry each canoe,” Harold explained, “and we need -bathing suits.”</p> - -<p>“There are bathing suits at home for all of us,” Maida explained. -“Shall we turn back?” She asked this question politely, but she said it -a little reluctantly.</p> - -<p>Rosie seemed to see her reluctance.</p> - -<p>“Did you have another plan, Maida?” Rosie demanded.</p> - -<p>“Well you see,” Maida answered slowly, “there’s a gypsy camp half way -round the Magic Mirror and I thought you might like to visit it.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER VI</span> <span class="smaller">AFTERNOON</span></h2> - -<p>“A gypsy camp!” Arthur repeated. “Sure I’d love to go.”</p> - -<p>“Gypsies!” Laura shrank a little. “I think I’d be scared of gypsies.”</p> - -<p>“You wouldn’t be scared of these gypsies,” Maida promised. “I’ve known -them ever since I was a little girl. I am very fond of them.”</p> - -<p>“Well let’s go,” Arthur said, shifting from one foot to another in -impatient excitement.</p> - -<p>The procession started again.</p> - -<p>“Tell us more about the gypsies, Maida,” Arthur demanded at once.</p> - -<p>“There isn’t very much to tell, except that they’ve come here every -summer ever since I can remember and, indeed, long before I was born. -Father has always permitted them to camp on this ground, rent free. I -don’t seem to remember much about them when I was very little, except -that I used to go and buy baskets with Granny Flynn and they always -told Granny’s fortune. ‘Cross my palm with <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>silver,’ they say. That -means, ‘Put some money in my hand!’”</p> - -<p>“How many are there?” Dicky enquired.</p> - -<p>“Not many. Perhaps a dozen. Let me see there’s Aunt Save and Uncle Save -the father and mother, and Aunt Vashti, the old, old grandmother. She -would frighten even you, Rosie—She looks like a witch. But she’s very -kind and I’m very fond of her. And there’s Esther and Miriam, their -daughters and Hector and Tom, their husbands; and their children. And -then there are always three or four relatives—different ones every -year—who come up from the South with them.”</p> - -<p>“They go South then every winter?” Arthur continued.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida answered. She continued to give them her memories of the -gypsies through the rest of the long, shaded, greenly-winding walk, and -the children asked many questions. Presently the trail expanded ahead -into a clearing.</p> - -<p>“There they are!” Arthur called.</p> - -<p>The clearing was surrounded by pines. Against this background, a group -of tents pointed their weather-stained pyramids up from the brown -pine-needles. In the middle,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> a fire was burning. A black pot, hanging -from a triangle of stout sticks, emitted a cloud of steam and a busy -bubbling. A wagon stood off among the trees and tethered by a long -rope two horses were feeding. A trio of hounds, two old and one young, -rose as the children approached; made slowly in their direction. An -old woman, so wrinkled that her face looked as though it could never -have been smooth, with great hoops of gold in her ears, a red kerchief -on her head and a black one around her neck, stood watching the pot. A -little distance off, a younger woman, buxom and brown, mended. Three -men, one middle-aged, two younger, sat smoking.</p> - -<p>“Those dogs won’t bite us Maida,” Laura said in a panic, “will they?”</p> - -<p>“Oh no,” Maida said, “they know me. Hi Lize! Hi Tige!” she called. -The hounds burst into a run; came bounding to her side; leaped up -and licked her face. Maida staggered under the onslaught, but Arthur -expertly seized their collars, held them.</p> - -<p>The excitement in the gypsy camp was immediate. “It’s Maida!” ran a -murmur from mouth to mouth. The young woman leaped to her feet. The old -woman, less alert but still nimble, sprang from the grass also. They<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> -all, even the men, came forward, smiling eagerly. Maida shook hands -with them and introduced her friends.</p> - -<p>“When did you get here?” Maida asked. “I’ve had Zeke come down here -every day for a week looking for you—every day until yesterday, when -in the excitement of our arrival, he neglected to come.”</p> - -<p>“We came yesterday,” they explained. They were most of them, dark, with -longish hair and flashing dark eyes but their look was very friendly. -They asked Maida a multitude of questions about her father and Granny -Flynn, her trip abroad. Finally Maida asked them if they had any -baskets ready for sale.</p> - -<p>“A few,” Mrs. Savory said looking pleased. “Oh Silva, bring the baskets -out! Maida you have never seen Silva and Tyma, have you? They’re my -sister’s children. My sister died last summer and now they’re living -with us.”</p> - -<p>A voice answered, “In a moment.” It was a child’s voice and yet it -had a curious grown-up accent as of an unusual decision of character. -The doors of one of the tents parted and a girl’s head appeared in -the opening. The children stared at her. For an instant nobody spoke. -The head disappeared. When the girl emerged, her hands were full<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> of -baskets. Behind her came a lad very like her but older.</p> - -<p>Silva Burle was a slender brown girl. She did not look any older than -Rosie; but she was much taller—and she was as tawny as Rosie was dark. -Her hair, a strange amber color, hung straight to her shoulders where -the ends turned upwards, not in a curl, but in a big soft wave. Her -eyes were not big but they were long; they were like bits of shining -amber set under her thin straight brows. Her skin was a tanned amber -too. She wore a much-patched rusty dark skirt with a white middy -blouse, a tattered, yellow-ribbon tie.</p> - -<p>Tyma, her brother, was slim too but strong-looking, active. He had a -dark skin and hair so black that there was a purple steeliness about -it. In all this swarthy coloring, his eyes, a clear blue, seemed -strange and unexpected. His brows were thick and they lowered as the -eyes under them contemplated the group of children. Silva’s lips curled -disdainfully upwards.</p> - -<p>Silva nodded briefly when her aunt performed the simple introduction, -“This is Maida and her friends, Silva,” but Tyma merely stared. Then -turning his back, he strolled away to where the horses were feeding; -untethered one of them. With a single<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> leap of his athletic body, he -was on its back. In another instant, the green leaves of the forest -closed around him as he disappeared riding bare-back into it.</p> - -<p>“What beautiful baskets you have Silva!” Maida said politely.</p> - -<p>Silva did not deign to answer. She spread her handiwork out on -the table which stood not far from the fire and then, leaving her -prospective customers to their choice, went over to the fire; sat down -before it, her back to the children.</p> - -<p>Aunt Save seemed to feel dimly that something was wrong. She moved over -to the table and began displaying the baskets.</p> - -<p>Maida made an effort to relieve her embarrassment. “Oh Aunt Save,” she -said, “what do you suppose is the first thing I am going to do when I -get time?” Without waiting for an answer, she went swiftly on. “I’m -going to wash and iron all Lucy’s clothes and pack them nicely away in -a little old hair-cloth trunk which I found in the attic. Lucy,” she -explained to her friends, “is a great big rag-baby doll that Aunt Save -made for me when I was little. It’s as big as a baby two years old. I -was fonder of it than any doll I have ever had, and so Granny Flynn -made it a whole outfit of clothes—all the things a baby should have.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> -I am going to pack them away and keep them for my daughter.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, do you mean that rag-baby doll that’s sitting in the little chair -in your room?” Rosie asked. “And that little queer brown trunk under -the window where the tree is?”</p> - -<p>This slant of the conversation seemed to interest Silva for she turned -a little; listened intently to what followed.</p> - -<p>“Yes, that’s Lucy,” Maida answered. “All her clothes are in that trunk.”</p> - -<p>“When I made that doll for you,” Aunt Save said, “I didn’t think you’d -play with it long. None of us thought you were going to live.”</p> - -<p>“That was before my illness,” Maida explained to the other children, -“when I was so lame.”</p> - -<p>“I told your father,” Aunt Save went on, “that there was only one thing -that could save you. And that was to go South and live with us in the -piny woods and be a little Romany for a year. But he couldn’t seem to -let you go for so long.”</p> - -<p>“Oh Aunt Save!” Maida exclaimed. “How I would have loved that! However -it all came out right because father gave me my Little Shop and I made -all these new friends.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER VII</span> <span class="smaller">TWILIGHT</span></h2> - -<p>“I think that Silva Burle was just horrid!” Rosie burst out suddenly. -“Just horrid!” she repeated with an enraged accent. “I never took such -a dislike to a girl in my life. I just simply despise her!”</p> - -<p>The three little girls were in the rose garden. It was just after -luncheon and Granny Flynn had said they must do something in the way of -quiet exercise, before they went to swim in the Magic Mirror. They had -decided to decorate the house with flowers.</p> - -<p>“She was rather horrid, wasn’t she?” Maida agreed absently. “So was her -brother.”</p> - -<p>“You expect boys to have bad manners,” Laura commented scathingly, “but -a girl ought to behave herself better than that. She made me so mad I -wanted to stick my tongue out at her.”</p> - -<p>“I wanted to box her ears,” announced Rosie fiercely.</p> - -<p>“She seemed to take such a dislike to us—just <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>on sight!” Maida went -on. “I don’t understand it. We didn’t do anything to her. We—”</p> - -<p>“Why we’d never even seen her before,” Rosie interrupted in a crescendo -of irritation.</p> - -<p>“She acted as though,” Maida went straight on, “she was afraid of us -for some reason, as though she thought we were going to do—” She -paused—“well I don’t know what,” she concluded.</p> - -<p>“I hope we never see the disagreeable thing again,” Laura said.</p> - -<p>“We probably will,” Maida declared. “We’ll be going to the gypsy camp -all the time, but of course she won’t come to the Little House.”</p> - -<p>“If she does,” Rosie threatened, “I’ll tell her to go home.”</p> - -<p>Rosie looked cross and she was cross. Ever since the return from the -gypsy camp her tempestuous brows had not smoothed out their knots. Her -eyes alternately burned and flashed and her cheeks were like red roses -on fire.</p> - -<p>Characteristically—because she wore red whenever she could—Rosie had -gathered only the crimson roses. She held a great bunch of them now, -and she stood stripping them of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> their thorns. Laura’s roses were pink; -Maida’s yellow.</p> - -<p>“I should think this would be enough,” Maida suggested in a moment. -“Let’s put them in the vases.”</p> - -<p>“Shall we mix them all together?” Rosie asked. “One color to each room -is really prettier. Just think how lovely the living room will be with -these great red roses everywhere.”</p> - -<p>“Rosie, you shall decide where the flowers go to-day, and the next time -Laura, and the next time me. That’s the only fair way,” Maida declared.</p> - -<p>Indoors, Maida took them to the long closet lined with shelves, lighted -by one window and furnished with a small sink, a table and three -chairs, which she called the Flower Closet. On the shelves were vases -and bowls of all colors and sizes; some high and slender; some squatty -and low; of glass and china. For a few minutes conversation languished. -The three little girls were all busy making their selection from -these receptacles; cutting away too long stems and too heavy foliage; -removing thorns.</p> - -<p>Rosie as usual—her movements were always as swift as -lightning—finished her work<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> first. She came into the living room -where Maida and Laura—the result of Laura’s idea—were trying bunches -of yellow roses in low jars against bunches of pink ones in high ones.</p> - -<p>“I wish I could get that Silva Burle out of my mind,” Rosie burst out -with a sudden return of her irritation. “I keep thinking of her and I -get so mad I’d just like to—”</p> - -<p>“Granny says we can go down to the Pond now,” Arthur called suddenly, -popping in the door. “We boys have been lugging the three canoes down -to the Magic Mirror and believe me it’s some hot work. Granny says that -we must put on our bathing suits here to-day.”</p> - -<p>Boys and girls raced to their rooms. In a surprisingly brief time they -were back again in bathing suits and bathing shoes; the girls with -rubber caps in brilliant colors.</p> - -<p>“Granny says, as Dicky’s the only one that can’t swim, we must all -promise to look after him,” Arthur added warningly on their way to the -Pond.</p> - -<p>“I can look after myself,” Dicky remarked huffily.</p> - -<p>“I’m only telling you what Granny said,” Arthur stated. Apparently -Granny had put<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> other responsibilities on him because he went on. “I -know you swim in deep water, Rosie, because I’ve seen you, and you too -Harold. But how about you Laura?”</p> - -<p>“Well—I’ll show you,” Laura promised caustically.</p> - -<p>“You’ll have to,” Arthur told her, “before I’ll let you go over your -head.” He turned to Maida. “How about you?”</p> - -<p>“I’m not a fast swimmer nor a strong one,” Maida declared, “but I am -quite accustomed to deep water. I used to go over the side of the yacht -with father every morning in the Mediterranean, and I can swim forever -without getting tired out.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” Arthur said. And then, “All in that’s going in!” he -shouted suddenly as the jetty came in sight. He burst into a run and -the file of children raced after him. Over into the water they went in -five tempestuous dives. Only Dicky remained watching them. They came -up almost simultaneously. Arthur and Harold, as a matter of natatorial -compliment, threw into each other’s faces the mud and weeds they had -brought up in their hands. Then they all struck for the middle of the -Pond. They swam with varying degrees of speed—Arthur first as became -his superior<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> size and strength, his superior skill at all things. -Curiously enough Laura, who cut through the water like a thrown knife, -kept a close second to him. The others struggled behind, Maida always -in the rear.</p> - -<p>They turned over and stared into the shining sky.</p> - -<p>“Now tell us a story Maida!” Rosie said.</p> - -<p>Maida began obediently. “Once upon a time,” she said to the -accompaniment of five pairs of hands beating the water, “there lived -a little girl by the name of Rosie. She was probably the naughtiest -little girl in the world—”</p> - -<p>“How about Silva Burle?” Rosie interrupted quickly. “You forget her.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you what you <i>do</i> forget,” Laura took it up, “poor Dicky -standing there all alone on the pier.”</p> - -<p>“Gee,” was all Arthur said, but he turned and swam back, the rest -following him.</p> - -<p>“I’m going to give you your first swimming lesson now,” Arthur called -to the disconsolate figure watching them. Arthur swam in shore. He -commanded Dicky to wade into the pond up to his waist.</p> - -<p>“Now,” he said, putting one hand under Dicky’s chin, “drop down slowly -until you’re<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> lying flat on the water. I’ll hold you by the chin and by -your bathing suit in the back. Now listen! You’re to do exactly what I -tell you. You’ll think I’m going to drop you but I cross my throat I -won’t. But you see that you follow my directions.”</p> - -<p>In a few minutes Dicky was paddling frantically, his eyes almost -bulging out of his head, his lips pursed together; his waving arms and -kicking feet beating the water almost to a lather. “Breathe the way -you always do!” Arthur was shouting. “You poor fish, open your mouth. -Suppose you do swallow some water. It won’t hurt you. Haven’t you ever -drunk any water in your life? Don’t kick up and down. Make your legs go -the way a frog’s does. Don’t go so <i>fast</i>. Now I’ll count for you. One! -Two! Three! Four! Breathe, you poor prune! How do you expect you’re -going to swim without any breath in your body?”</p> - -<p>The others paddled about, adding their jeers or suggestions; but at -times they frequently deserted for a longer swim. Laura displayed a -number of water tricks—she was as graceful in her swimming as in her -dancing and for a short dash she could go fast. She dove forward, -sideways, and backwards. She sat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> upright in the water. She turned over -and over in a somersault. Her strength was nothing to that of Rosie’s -however, who seemed never to tire of any physical exercise.</p> - -<p>“That will be enough for to-day, Dicky,” Arthur decided finally. “Now -put on these water wings and practice the way I’ve been telling you. -Breathe the way you always do and don’t go too fast. Don’t go into deep -water yet. If the wings should fall off or bust—”</p> - -<p>“Burst!” corrected Rosie promptly.</p> - -<p>“Collapse,” Arthur substituted with unexpected elegance, “you’ll sink -like a stone.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll stay near the shore,” Dicky promised docilely. “You bet,” he -added, “I don’t want to make a hole in the water.”</p> - -<p>Shaking off his pedagogical duties, Arthur set off alone for the -middle of the Pond, swimming with the long powerful strokes which -characterized him, his head almost under water.</p> - -<p>“What a stroke he has!” Maida commented admiringly. “I’d give anything -if I could cut through the water like that. Why—why who’s that?”</p> - -<p>Two heads appeared bobbing on the water at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> the other side of the -lake. No one of the children had seen anybody emerge from the woods. -The strangers must have come around the curve. The heads came forward -straight towards the middle of the lake. Arthur had reached his goal; -was floating placidly, his arms folded at the back of his neck. -Involuntarily, the other children stood silent and watched. Nearer the -two heads came to Arthur—nearer and nearer. One of them had thick -tossed black hair; the other lighter hair, satiny as the inside of a -nut where the sun caught it on the top of the head; wet and dark as -strings of seaweed in the neck.</p> - -<p>“It’s Silva and Tyma Burle,” Rosie exclaimed suddenly. “Oh how they can -swim!”</p> - -<p>The two young gypsies had drawn near enough to Arthur for the children -to measure their progress.</p> - -<p>“I never saw a girl swim like that,” Laura said with a touch of envy. -“She swims just like a boy.”</p> - -<p>Arthur, his ears sunk below the level of the water, had apparently -heard nothing. But now suddenly he threw himself on his side and -paddling just enough to keep afloat, watched the approaching pair in -amazement. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> - -<p>On the Burles came, their eyes fixed on Arthur, their expressions quite -non-committal. Arthur waited.</p> - -<p>Suddenly a terrible thing happened! Silva threw up her hands and -screamed. Tyma, a little in advance, turned and swam to her rescue, but -once he had reached his sister’s side she caught him about the neck. It -was all over in a second. The two sank together. The children on the -jetty shrieked. Maida burst into tears. Harold started out at once for -the fatal spot. Rosie made as though to follow him.</p> - -<p>“Don’t Rosie,” Laura said with sudden coolness. “You’ll only be in the -way.”</p> - -<p>In the meantime, Arthur swam instantly for the spot where brother and -sister had disappeared. He dived at once; staying under the water for -what, to the frightened group on shore, seemed an incredible time. But -he came up; filled his lungs with air; dived again. For the third time -he appeared on the surface. For the third time he dived.</p> - -<p>Suddenly many rods away on the top of the water appeared two -heads—Silva’s and Tyma’s. Simultaneously Arthur came up gasping -for air. The Burles managed to wave a hand; broke into high jeering -laughter;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> then swam rapidly towards the other shore. By this time, -Harold had reached Arthur’s side. Together they started after the -practical jokers but both the boys were spent with their first long -swim of the year. After a while, they turned and rejoined their friends -on the shore.</p> - -<p>“Can you beat that?” Arthur demanded. His face had taken on the black -look that rage, with him, always developed. Rosie’s eyes darted -lightnings. Maida had stopped crying and her eyes had changed too. Not -glowering like Rosie’s, they had grown suddenly dark. Laura looked -stupefied. Dicky had turned white. Great shadows jumped out under his -eyes.</p> - -<p>“That was the most dreadful thing I ever saw in my life,” Maida -asserted in a voice, almost a whisper. “You might have drowned, Arthur.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll get even with them for that,” Arthur said in a quiet voice. “You -wait.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t blame you,” Rosie declared. “I’m so mad I don’t know what I -wouldn’t do.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe they’re worth taking any notice of,” Laura decided -contemptuously, “gypsies like that. Why don’t you tell their aunt, -Maida?” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I’d like to,” Maida answered, “but I guess I won’t. I like Aunt Save -too much.”</p> - -<p>“Anyway,” Harold pointed out, “it isn’t anything that concerns them. -It’s all between us children.”</p> - -<p>“No, I wouldn’t want any grown people to get mixed up in this at all,” -Arthur said. “I wouldn’t say anything about it to Granny Flynn or Mrs. -Dore. It’ll only worry them and nobody’s the worse for it. We didn’t do -anything to be ashamed of anyway.”</p> - -<p>“Ashamed of!” Rosie echoed stormily. “You were only trying to save -their lives.”</p> - -<p>“No,” Maida agreed, “I won’t say anything about it. I think you’re -right Arthur.”</p> - -<p>The Burles had reached the opposite shore by this time. Before they -disappeared into the woods, they raised their voices in a long derisive -shout.</p> - -<p>As Arthur listened his face grew blacker and blacker. “Do all the -yelling you want!” he called, “I’ll get even with you, my fine young -gypsies!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER VIII</span> <span class="smaller">NIGHT</span></h2> - -<p>The women were too busy to take any notice of the children when they -returned except to ask them if they had a good swim.</p> - -<p>“I feel like reading,” Maida said with a determined air. She marched -into the library. “There’s a book here I haven’t read for a long time, -<i>At the Back of the North Wind</i>.” She went on as though talking to -herself. “It’s one of the loveliest stories I ever read. I don’t know -but what it’s my favorite of all. I feel like reading it now. It’s so -cool ... there’s a great beautiful woman in it ... the North Wind....” -Her voice melted into silence, as her hand seized a worn brown book. -She dropped into one of the big chairs; seemed to forget entirely about -her companions.</p> - -<p>The others—partly because there seemed nothing else to do—followed -her example.</p> - -<p>“Oh, here’s <i>A Journey to the Centre of the Earth</i>!” Dicky announced -joyously. “I haven’t seen it since Maida took it to Europe.” He -absorbed himself in the big thick volume. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> - -<p>Rosie and Laura contented themselves respectively with <i>Little Men</i> -and <i>Little Women</i>, and Harold began for the third time <i>Kidnapped</i>. -But Arthur found a newly published book describing the exploration of -Africa in a flying machine. He pored over it; gradually became absorbed.</p> - -<p>It had been late afternoon when they returned. Nearly an hour drifted -by. That coolness, which announces the approach of dusk, set in.</p> - -<p>“Well,” Maida said at last, breathing a long relieved sigh, “I’ve got -rid of my temper. If I hadn’t taken a book when I did, I’m sure I’d -have burst into pieces. If everybody has read all he wants to, let’s -try the tennis court.”</p> - -<p>They tried the tennis court (although only Maida and the two Lathrops -played tennis) but to such good effect and with so great a fascination -that they returned to it after supper. Arthur, as was to be expected -with his coolness and game sense, progressed rapidly under Harold’s -instructions. The others found it the most difficult thing they had -ever attempted. They were hot and tired when finally approaching dark -made it impossible for them to see the balls. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p> - -<p>They adjourned to the Tree Room where, in hammock and chairs, they -talked and talked.</p> - -<p>Gradually the talk grew desultory; sank to an occasional silence.</p> - -<p>“I was rummaging about in the barn early this morning,” Arthur said -out of the reflective quiet in which he had long been immersed, “and -I found all kinds of things in a big chest—base-balls and bats; -foot-ball stuff and boxing gloves. Do you know how to box, Harold?”</p> - -<p>“No,” Harold replied, “never tried it.”</p> - -<p>“Want to learn?” Arthur inquired. “I’ll teach you. I’d like the -practice.”</p> - -<p>“Sure,” Harold said. “When will we begin?”</p> - -<p>“To-morrow,” Arthur responded.</p> - -<p>“What do you want to practice boxing for, Arthur?” Rosie asked -curiously.</p> - -<p>“Oh I thought I might need it sometime,” Arthur answered evasively. He -smiled into the dark.</p> - -<p>“Say!” Rosie burst out suddenly, “did anybody besides me get sun-burned -to-day?”</p> - -<p>“Well, I didn’t mention it,” Laura answered sleepily, “but I feel as if -my face were on fire.”</p> - -<p>“Oh! Oh!” Maida exclaimed contritely.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> “I forgot to warn you to be sure -to wear hats this first day or two. Are you burnt, Arthur?”</p> - -<p>“To a cinder,” Arthur declared, “but I’ve been burnt before. I don’t -mind it so very much.”</p> - -<p>“And you Dicky?” Maida went on.</p> - -<p>Dicky’s answer was a grimace.</p> - -<p>“And Harold?” Maida continued in a despairing voice.</p> - -<p>“I shall be one big blister to-morrow,” Harold prophesied grimly.</p> - -<p>“Oh my goodness!” wailed Maida futilely. “It’s all my fault. Well it’s -half-past eight,” she added after a pause. “According to rules we can -sit up until nine, but I’m going to bed now. I never was so tired in -all my life.”</p> - -<p>“I’m falling asleep where I am,” Rosie admitted, “and as for Laura, she -<i>is</i> asleep.”</p> - -<p>This was the first day at the Little House.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER IX</span> <span class="smaller">PLANS</span></h2> - -<p>“Now,” Maida announced at breakfast a week later, “we’ve had all -the vacation we’re going to get—at least all that the Big Six get. -To-morrow begins our work. Father said we could plan it ourselves how -it was to be done and unless our plans were bad ones, we could keep -right on with them. Now I propose that, right after breakfast, you -boys go to the barn and make a program of your work. We girls will -stay here and make a program for ourselves. You remember what it is -you’re expected to do?” Notwithstanding protests that they remembered -everything, she recited briefly again to the boys the list of their -duties.</p> - -<p>After breakfast, as directed, the Big Six divided. The boys proceeded -to the barn. The girls settled themselves in the big, comfortable -living-room, began to discuss the work that they were to do. Rosie, in -some inexplicable way, soon took control; was handling the situation in -the practical, efficient way that was typical of her. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Do you know how to make a bed, Maida?” she asked.</p> - -<p>“No,” Maida answered dolefully, “I never made one in my life. It looks -easy though.”</p> - -<p>“It’s easy to make a bed <i>badly</i>,” Rosie said with emphasis. “How about -you Laura?”</p> - -<p>“Well,” Laura replied slowly, “I <i>have</i> made one.”</p> - -<p>Rosie groaned. “I know what it will look like,” she commented. “Now I -<i>can</i> make a bed,” she boasted. “Right after we finish this, I’ll take -you upstairs and show you both. Now, how about cooking?”</p> - -<p>Maida looked aghast. “I never cooked anything in my life.”</p> - -<p>“That’s what I thought,” Rosie remarked grimly. “How about cooking, -Laura?”</p> - -<p>“I can make pop-overs, one-two-three-four cake and cup-custard,” Laura -stated proudly. “And, oh yes, fudge!”</p> - -<p>“Is that all?” Rosie asked scornfully.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Laura admitted.</p> - -<p>“Can either of you make a fire?” Rosie went on.</p> - -<p>Two meek <i>noes</i> were the answer.</p> - -<p>“Well, as far as I can see,” Rosie decided, “we’ve got to begin at the -very beginning. Now I’ve been thinking this matter over and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> it seems -to me there’s only one fair way of doing it and that is for us to weed -the flower garden <i>all together</i> every morning; each one of us to take -care of their own room—”</p> - -<p>“<i>Her</i> own room,” Maida corrected. She added roguishly, “I thought you -were beginning to feel too important, Rosie.”</p> - -<p>“All right, smarty-cat! <i>Her</i> own room. Then when it comes to -Floribel’s day out, we’ll take turns in planning the three meals. But -every Thursday, one of us must have the day in charge. On that day the -other two are only assistants.”</p> - -<p>“Rosie,” Maida exclaimed, “I think you are perfectly wonderful! That -seems to me to be absolutely all right. Don’t you think so, Laura?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Laura answered equally enthusiastic, “I think it’s marvelous.”</p> - -<p>“Well, then,” Rosie began again, “let’s begin to plan meals for this -Thursday.”</p> - -<p>They were deep in this interesting task when the boys returned from the -barn. They compared plans.</p> - -<p>The boys’ plan did not differ so very much from the girls’ except that, -when it came to the work in the vegetable garden they had decided to -weed in rotation. Also in rotation,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> they were to sprinkle garden and -tennis court nightly, to roll the tennis court daily. Each boy was to -make his own bed. There was a typewriter in the library and they spent -the next half-hour typing out these plans and making as many copies as -there were children. Then they pinned them up in their rooms.</p> - -<p>“Say,” Arthur declared suddenly, “you girls have got to show us how to -make a bed. I suppose I could make one, after a fashion, but I never -have. I don’t know how to begin.”</p> - -<p>“I do,” said Harold unexpectedly. “I learned how to make beds last -summer at camp. I’ll show you.”</p> - -<p>“Show us now,” Arthur demanded.</p> - -<p>The three boys started in the direction of the barn.</p> - -<p>“Let’s go too,” Rosie whispered. “Isn’t it a joke to think of boys -trying to make beds? I’d like to see the bed after Harold has finished -with it.”</p> - -<p>The girls tagged the boys; followed them upstairs into the barn.</p> - -<p>At once Harold began in the most business-like way to strip the bed. It -was apparent that on arising he had pulled the covers back to air. Then -with swift, efficient movements, he began to re-make it. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Goodness!” Rosie exclaimed humbly in a moment, “I can’t make a bed as -well as that. I’m going to learn too.”</p> - -<p>Indeed, the bed looked like a mathematical problem which had just been -solved, and as Harold proceeded to clean up the room in the way he -had learned at camp, the others followed him with respectful glances. -Harold tidied the three chiffoniers and the three closets. When he -finished, the room had a look of military perfection.</p> - -<p>“Now,” he commanded, “Arthur you make your bed and Dicky you make -yours; I’ll supervise the job.”</p> - -<p>“I’m going right back to my room and re-make my bed, Harold,” Maida -declared. “It looks as though somebody had driven an automobile over -it.”</p> - -<p>“I will too,” admitted the humbled Rosie. “Think of having a boy teach -you how to make a bed!”</p> - -<p>The boys rejoined the girls after a while and again they went over -their plans. In the midst of it all, Granny Flynn came in to see what -was keeping them so quiet. They showed her the typewritten schedules -and she approved them highly. “They ought to work like a charm,” she -averred. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> - -<p>And indeed, it seemed as though her prophecy were a true one. About -the same hour the next morning, twin alarm-clocks rang out; one in the -barn, another in Maida’s room. Very soon after, a sleepy boy—Arthur -had volunteered for the first day in the garden—emerged from the barn; -three sleepy girls from the house. They weeded busily for half an hour. -In the meantime, another sleepy boy was rolling the tennis court which -had been hosed the night before. Then came breakfast. Immediately after -breakfast, rooms were made speckless.</p> - -<p>With the girls, this continued to be a kind of game. They not only -prided themselves on keeping their chambers clean, but they actually -tried to match the flowers they placed there to the chintzes and -wallpapers.</p> - -<p>“It’s fun to take care of these darling rooms,” Rosie declared again -and again. “They’re so little I feel as though we ought to buy a doll’s -broom and a doll’s carpet-sweeper and a doll’s dust-pan and brush. I -never saw such sweet furniture in all my life, and how I love the roof -slanting down like that!”</p> - -<p>“I feel that way too—exactly as though I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> were putting a doll’s house -in order,” Laura coincided happily.</p> - -<p>As for the boys—they bothered with no flowers. Indeed a military -plainness prevailed in the barn. This of course meant also a military -neatness to which no one of them was accustomed but Harold. Harold -constituted himself critic-in-chief. And he proved a stern critic -indeed. He would not permit the sheets on the bed to deviate one hair’s -breadth from perfect horizontality or absolute verticality. A bit of -paper on the floor elicited an immediate rebuke. He even stipulated the -exact spots on the chiffonier-tops where brush, comb and mirror were to -be kept and he saw that the other boys kept them there. The victims of -his passion for military order had to roll their pajamas in a certain -way and put them in a certain place. A similar neatness characterized -the closets. Coats and trousers had to be hung on special hangers; ties -on special hooks. As for bureau drawers—Harold maintained that there -was a place for everything and woe to Dicky or Arthur when everything -was not in its place.</p> - -<p>Immediately after the rooms were done in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> the morning came errands. The -first morning, Granny let the Big Six do all the marketing, even what -could have been done over the telephone; so that they could get to know -where the shops were. They proceeded on their bicycles, with Maida for -a guide, to Satuit Center. Maida took them to the Post Office; to the -butcher; the grocer; the coalman; the wood-man; the hardware shop; the -ice cream establishment—even to the little dry-goods shops and to the -cobbler. She introduced them to all these village authorities.</p> - -<p>“After to-day,” Maida explained, “we’ll have to do only part of -Granny’s marketing for her. And only one of us need attend to it.”</p> - -<p>“Oh let’s do it every day—and all together,” Dicky burst out -impulsively.</p> - -<p>“You think you’ll enjoy that because it’s new to you,” Maida laughed, -“but you’ll soon get tired of it. No, we’d better take turns.”</p> - -<p>Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday went by. More and more certainly Granny -Flynn’s prophecy seemed on the way to be proved true. The twin sets of -plans worked perfectly. It looked as though the summer were going by -without a hitch. Then came Thursday—Floribel’s and Zeke’s day out.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER X</span> <span class="smaller">RESPONSIBILITY</span></h2> - -<p>Really, as Rosie pointed out, the work for Floribel’s and Zeke’s day -out began the morning before. You had to make sure then that there was -enough raw material in the house for the three meals of the next day. -Therefore, early Wednesday morning before they went to market, the -three girls sat down at the typewriter and worked out the program of -their three meals.</p> - -<p>“Rosie, you take charge of this first day,” Maida urged, “you’ve had -so much more experience than Laura or me. Don’t you think she ought, -Laura?”</p> - -<p>“I certainly do,” Laura agreed with conviction. “Thank goodness, -breakfast is always easy. It’s fruit, and breakfast food and eggs. -Thank goodness too, that fruit grows already made. Just think how much -work it would be if we had to cook oranges and peaches, or if we had -to shell berries. And what a blessing milk is! How nice of the cow to -deliver it all cooked.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Well, then,” Rosie began, taking the situation in hand at once, “let’s -start with fruit. Let’s have oranges—”</p> - -<p>“Oh let’s!” interrupted Maida excitedly, “I know a perfectly beautiful -way to prepare oranges. You cut the skins into quarters and then into -eighths while they’re still on the orange. You don’t pull them off, but -you turn them back, so that the orange stands in the midst of petals of -its own peel—just like a gold pond-lily.”</p> - -<p>“All except Delia’s orange,” Laura put in.</p> - -<p>“I notice that Mrs. Dore gives her orange juice. And after she has -squeezed it, she strains it very carefully.”</p> - -<p>“All right, Laura,” Rosie agreed again, at once, “you can attend to the -oranges.”</p> - -<p>“I think we’d better have prepared breakfast-food this first -breakfast,” Maida suggested. “We are bound to make a lot of mistakes in -cooking; but we can’t hurt anything that just comes out of a box.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, you’re right, Maida,” Rosie agreed. “Now, shall we have an -omelette? I know how to cook omelettes. No, I guess we’d better have -boiled eggs. They’re the easiest, and I don’t want to make any mistakes -the first day if possible.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Well that settles breakfast,” Maida declared with satisfaction. “Now -what are we going to have for dinner?”</p> - -<p>“I’d like to have a fish chowder,” Rosie suggested. “We haven’t had one -this summer. Most everybody likes chowder. And then,” she added with a -smile, “it’s the only thing I know how to cook.”</p> - -<p>“Then we’ll have it, Rosie,” Maida decided.</p> - -<p>“I’ll teach you to how to make chowder if you like,” Rosie offered.</p> - -<p>“Oh will you, Rosie?” Maida asked ecstatically. “I love fish chowder. -I’ve never in all my life had enough. How I would enjoy making it.”</p> - -<p>“And then,” Rosie continued, “for dessert, we’ll have a bread pudding. -It’s the only pudding I know how to make.”</p> - -<p>Laura drew a long breath, “What’ll we eat next Thursday?” she asked in -a serious tone. “I don’t know how to cook anything but popovers and -custards and cake. Maida doesn’t know how to cook anything at all. And -you are cooking, this first Thursday, everything you know.”</p> - -<p>Rosie sighed too. “Well we’ll consider next Thursday when it comes,” -she decided wisely, “and besides Granny and Mrs. Dore<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> or Floribel will -teach us how to cook anything—they said they would. And now we come to -supper.”</p> - -<p>However supper was not so easy for Laura as for the other two, -because Rosie immediately decided that Laura should make some of her -one-two-three-four cake. The rest of the meal was to be bread and -butter, some of the preserves left over from the year before, with -which the house was richly provided; and great pitchers of milk.</p> - -<p>“We’ve got to do the cooking for this whole day ourselves,” Maida -sighed. “There isn’t a thing in which the boys can help us.”</p> - -<p>“No,” Rosie admitted regretfully, “and I wanted to make them work too. -Next week,” she added, “they’ll be busy enough because we’ll have ice -cream and they’ll have to turn the freezer.”</p> - -<p>The girls pinned up their schedule of meals on the kitchen wall; set -the alarm clock for an incredibly early hour; went to bed at eight, -instead of nine, very serene in their minds.</p> - -<p class="space-above">The record of their first day was probably as good and as bad as that -of most amateur cooks. In the early morning, the little girls moved so -noiselessly about the big kitchen and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> talked in such low tones that -Mrs. Dore said she had not heard a sound until the breakfast bell rang. -The first two courses of breakfast went off beautifully. Then they -discovered they had boiled the eggs twelve minutes. Granny declared -that they must eat them because eggs were expensive. Perhaps it was -to take away the sting from this mistake that Mrs. Dore remarked that -she had never seen oranges look so beautiful as these—in their curled -golden calyxes.</p> - -<p>When it came to luncheon, there were mistakes again; but not such -serious ones. Rosie’s chowder was hot and perfectly delicious; only -there wasn’t enough of it. Rosie herself nobly went without; but the -children clamored for more. On the other hand, she had made enough -bread pudding for a family twice their size. Here the boys eagerly came -to the rescue and demanded three helpings each.</p> - -<p>Supper was very successful. Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore congratulated -Rosie warmly upon it.</p> - -<p>“Well I didn’t make any mistakes for this meal,” Rosie said dryly, -“because there wasn’t anything that I cooked.”</p> - -<p>However Granny continued to praise the three tired little girls. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It’s foine little cooks you’ll make,” she prophesied.</p> - -<p>In the glow that this praise developed, they washed and wiped the -dishes, chattering like magpies. And then, following the impulse which -emerged from that happy glow, they cleaned up Floribel’s kitchen; -re-arranged and re-decorated it.</p> - -<p>They re-arranged and re-decorated to such good purpose that, the next -day, Floribel said privately to Mrs. Dore. “It sho do look beautiful. -Ah’se never seen a kitchen lak it, but Ah can’t find a <i>single thing</i>.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XI</span> <span class="smaller">VISITORS</span></h2> - -<p>After the second Thursday, which was Floribel’s and Zeke’s day out, -came the second Saturday of the children’s stay in the Little House, -and on that Saturday all the parents came to Satuit from Charlestown -to see how their children were getting on: Mr. and Mrs. Brine, Mr. and -Mrs. Lathrop, Mr. and Mrs. Clark, Mr. and Mrs. Doyle, Mr. and Mrs. -Hale. Arthur had no mother but Mr. Duncan appeared with the rest. Mr. -Westabrook appeared at odd moments and helped entertain the guests. -The children of these parents were so excited that Maida and Dicky -lamented loudly that they had no relatives to show the Little House. -This was before the train which brought all these guests arrived. -Afterwards, they had no time to regret anything. The hospitality of -the Little House was stretched to its furthest expansion. The boys, -bunking in tents, hastily erected on the lawn, gave up their beds to -their fathers. The girls, sleeping on extra cots in the nursery, gave -up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> their beds to their mothers. This did not take care of the entire -company. All the rooms in the Annex were filled.</p> - -<p>It was a two days, equally busy for hosts and guests. The children -were determined to show their parents everything and the parents were -equally determined to see everything. One instant Mr. and Mrs. Doyle -could be seen being dragged off by Molly and Timmie to view House Rock; -the next, Mr. and Mrs. Clark, herded by the twins, were being pulled in -the direction of the Fairy Ring. Laura and Rosie displayed every detail -of house and barn to their parents. Arthur took his father on two long -explorations through the woods. Betsy celebrated the arrival of Mr. and -Mrs. Hale by her first attempt to run house and the Magic Mirror, and -brought back away. She was caught half way between them in triumph, her -big eyes sparkling with the mischief which always filled them when she -was successful in accomplishing her purpose.</p> - -<p>Perhaps though, Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore enjoyed more than anybody -this break in their country life; for a happy smile never left Granny’s -wrinkled face, and Mrs. Dore talked to the visitors all day long.</p> - -<p>The company left on a late Sunday <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>afternoon train with an invitation -to come every future week-end; and it looked as though life in the -Little House would go on as usual.</p> - -<p>However, Monday proved to be an equally exciting day as the two which -had preceded it. For when the children—Big Six and Little Six—came -back from their swim in the afternoon, they saw, lying placidly on the -lawn, the figure of a strange man—asleep or awake they could not at -first make out.</p> - -<p>The figure decided that for them by leaping to its feet in what seemed -one athletic jerk.</p> - -<p>“It’s Billy Potter!” shrieked Maida.</p> - -<p>“Billy!” “Billy!” “Billy!” the others made chorus. And they raced over -to his side; threw themselves in one scrambled heap upon him. Being of -athletic build, Billy Potter sustained that shock splendidly.</p> - -<p>Billy Potter was one of the oldest friends the Little Shop had had. He -was a reporter on a Boston paper, a great favorite with Mr. Westabrook, -whom he had many times interviewed; and a devoted friend of Maida’s -whom he called Petronilla. It was the first time the children had seen -him since Maida left for Europe.</p> - -<p>He was rather short—Billy Potter—blue-eyed and golden-haired; the -eyes very blue<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> and very observant; his hair closely woven into a thick -curly thatch.</p> - -<p>The children alternately hugged and thumped him.</p> - -<p>“Why haven’t you been here before, Billy?” Maida said, “I’ve been at -home two weeks now.”</p> - -<p>“Only because I wasn’t in Boston,” Billy declared. “I’ve been away on -my vacation. I had to take it early this year. I couldn’t have come -over here at this moment, but that I’m on a story.”</p> - -<p>When Billy Potter spoke of a “story,” he meant the account which he -wrote of events for his paper. “I’m on a kidnapping case,” he explained -over their heads to Mr. Westabrook. “I may be here in Satuit on and off -for a few days. And if invited, I might become a guest of this noble -establishment.”</p> - -<p>“Oh do come, oh do, oh do!” the children entreated.</p> - -<p>“All right,” Billy agreed, “I’m only waiting for an invitation, -Petronilla.”</p> - -<p>“Well here it is,” said Maida.</p> - -<p>“I accept,” Billy Potter laughed.</p> - -<p>The children had to take him the rounds too. He wondered at and -exclaimed over the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>vegetable garden. He exclaimed over and wondered at -the flower garden. He went in swimming in the Magic Mirror, and showed -them many new water tricks. He inspected House Rock with the Little -Six. He climbed to the Tree Room with the Big Six. He declared that the -Tree Room was where he must sleep. And he did sleep there, although it -took all the ingenuity that he possessed, plus the assistance of the -three boys, to pull a cot up into it.</p> - -<p>And while Billy Potter was still a guest, as though, as Maida said, -<i>wonders would never cease</i>, Dr. Pierce suddenly appeared on the scene.</p> - -<p>Dr. Pierce was the Westabrook family physician. He had known Maida all -her life and called her Pinkwink. He too had often visited the Little -Shop; had been one of its advisors.</p> - -<p>The children deserted Billy for a moment and threw themselves pell-mell -on the old physician. He stood braced for the shock which made every -one of the tight gray curls on his head quiver and brought the -twinkliest of twinkles to his happy old eyes.</p> - -<p>“Well, <i>Pinkwink</i>!” he exclaimed, “is this the little girl who used to -have cheeks as white as paper and eyes like a burnt hole in a <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>blanket? -And are these those pale, washed-out, colorless, slim-jim-looking city -children I used to know?”</p> - -<p>He hugged all the girls impartially, shook hands with the boys; then he -too made the rounds of the place.</p> - -<p>He played all his old games on them; drawing Betsy out to tell her -exploits; listening with great enjoyment to Molly and Timmie; and never -ceasing to pretend that Dorothy and Mabel were one girl with a magic -power of being in two places at once.</p> - -<p>“You must come oftener, Dr. Pierce,” Maida said when at last they found -themselves seated in the living room.</p> - -<p>“Oh I’m coming often enough,” Dr. Pierce said. “You’ll get good and -tired of me before I have finished with you. I’m coming at regular -intervals to see that you don’t drown yourselves or get ivy-poison, or -sun-stroke or lockjaw or any of those things that children are so fond -of. I shall make regular inspections. In fact I am going to make one -this visit. Now that I speak of it, this strikes me as a good time. -Line up over there against the wall, all of you, and stick out your -tongues.”</p> - -<p>Life fell into regular habits after a while.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> For work—two hours every -morning, except on Thursdays, took care of that. On Thursdays, however, -it was a matter of several hours. For play—it seemed as though the -rest of the long golden days was all play.</p> - -<p>After the household tasks came bathing which had become a habit as -regular as eating. Bathing was almost the best fun they had—especially -for Dicky.</p> - -<p>Dicky soon rejected the water wings. He was swimming now—not of course -as fast or as well as the others—but swimming with that fresh joy -which only the amateur knows. The others were perfecting strokes of -various kinds and practising fancy diving of various sorts. Arthur was -of course the best and strongest performer among them. Maida would -never be more than a fair swimmer nor Harold; but Rosie had soon -out-distanced Laura, was beginning to work into Arthur’s class. However -Laura was still, would probably always be, the most graceful of them -all.</p> - -<p>The afternoons were spent in walking and playing tennis; the evenings -were given up to reading and games.</p> - -<p>It looked at first as if their program would never vary. The beautiful -weather kept up and the beautiful country seemed full of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>diversion. -Occasionally came a dark day and then the boys devoted themselves to -boxing in the barn; their shouts and laughter would reach even to the -Little House. On those occasions Mrs. Dore and Granny would gather the -girls about them; set the older ones to mending or to teaching Molly -and the Clark twins how to sew.</p> - -<p>The Big Six kept running into the Burles although the appearance of any -of the Little House children on the path leading to the gypsy camp was -a signal for Silva and Tyma to disappear instantly into the bushes. -The children frequently came across the young gypsies peddling their -baskets in the village—at the pleasant Wampum Arms which was the -Satuit hotel; or at the quiet farmhouses along the road. In the long -walks that they occasionally took in the woods, Maida and her friends -were likely to happen upon the outlaw pair. If the Burles saw the girls -coming, they quickly looked and walked the other way. The two gypsies -were not however much bothered with attentions from the Little House -children, for since the experience at the Magic Mirror, the latter -never voluntarily glanced in their direction.</p> - -<p>Once Rosie came home almost breathless with rage. “What do you think -has just<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> happened, Maida?” she asked indignantly. “I was coming along -the path when I saw a little opening in the bushes. It looked so pretty -that I thought I’d cut into it. Just then I saw Silva Burle running—oh -running like <i>sixty</i>—although she had a bottle of milk under her arm. -She heard me coming and suddenly she disappeared through the bushes. -But before she got away she made—oh the horridest face at me. I was so -mad—”</p> - -<p>“She certainly is a strange girl,” Maida remarked in a perplexed tone. -“I don’t understand why she acts so. We’ve never done anything to her. -Why should she treat us like this?”</p> - -<p>Arthur also reported that once, early in the morning, he caught -sight of Silva Burle flying along the path ahead of him, a bundle -of—he could not tell what—under her arms. At the sound of his -footsteps—Arthur said it was exactly as though she were afraid of -something he might do—though, he added, what she expected him to do, -he couldn’t guess, she flew to cover like a rabbit; actually vanished -from his sight.</p> - -<p>But the most disagreeable of all was Laura’s experience. Rosie -pointed out to her the little opening among the trees which had so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> -interested her. The next day, passing it alone, it occurred to Laura -that she would find out where it led. Like Rosie she walked through -the underbrush—but she got farther than Rosie did. Suddenly she came -against a trailing tree branch; she started to climb over it. One -foot had planted itself. She lifted the other and—splash! A pail of -water, hung on an over-hanging branch, fell on her, drenching her from -head to foot. It spoiled the gloss of her freshly-ironed muslin frock -of course, but it spoiled her temper more. Maida pondered all this -evidence, utterly perplexed. Why the Burles should have taken such a -dislike to them all she could not guess. She did not speak of it to -her father because she was afraid he might complain to Aunt Save. And -Maida did not want to make trouble for her friend. But under promise -of secrecy, she discussed the situation with Billy Potter. For once, -that astute young gentleman had no explanation of a curious social -phenomenon.</p> - -<p>Billy Potter was coming to see them regularly now; so was Mr. -Westabrook. They both had long talks with the children, collectively -and separately.</p> - -<p>One afternoon as they were sitting in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> living room a curious -revelation occurred. Arthur was talking about the forest. It was plain -to be seen that it fascinated him beyond measure. Often he would wake -early in the morning; slip down to the Magic Mirror; canoe himself -across its dawn-swept, glossy surface to the other side; wander for an -hour or more in the woods.</p> - -<p>“I guess I’ll have to make a forester out of you,” Mr. Westabrook said -that afternoon. “I hope you don’t stay up late at night.” His remark -was not a question, only a comment.</p> - -<p>Arthur flushed, remained silent. Mr. Westabrook continued to look at -him. And now his look was a question.</p> - -<p>“Twice—” Arthur faltered finally—“when the moon was full. I wanted to -see if I could come up to some of your deer.”</p> - -<p>“Well, did you manage?” Mr. Westabrook asked.</p> - -<p>“Only once,” Arthur answered. “If they get the smell of you—good -night! But I read in a book here in the library how to work around so’s -the wind wouldn’t carry it—and one night, I watched a group feeding -and tossing their horns nearly five minutes.”</p> - -<p>“It’s a pretty sight,” Mr. Westabrook remarked. “I guess if I were a -boy I couldn’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> resist that myself. But I want you to promise me that -you’ll make these explorations only the three nights that the moon is -full.”</p> - -<p>Arthur promised readily.</p> - -<p>“Oh father,” Maida begged, “couldn’t I do it too?”</p> - -<p>Her father shook his head. “No I guess you little girls must stay in -your beds. Yes you too Dicky,” as Dicky’s lips opened automatically, -“and you Harold. Sometime perhaps but not now. Arthur is older and -bigger. He can take care of himself. Now,” he concluded quickly as if -determined to give envy no time to develop, “come out into the barn. I -hear there’s some good boxing going on here. Besides I want you to show -me how your tennis is improving.”</p> - -<p class="space-above">The Little Six continued to play near or in the house directly under -Granny Flynn’s or Mrs. Dore’s watchful eye. Occasionally they were -permitted to wade in the lake, but only when one of the grown-ups -accompanied them. For the most of their time, they were contented to -frequent Home Rock.</p> - -<p>Maida had told the Little Six that there were toys awaiting them in -the Little House. These included dolls of all sizes; doll <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>furniture; -little sets of dishes, china and pewter. Granny eked these out with the -store of saucerless cups and cupless saucers, the cracked bowls and -plates which linger on the outskirts of all respectable china closets. -The children were permitted to carry pails of water over to House Rock -and there, in its shade, miniature housekeeping began.</p> - -<p>From every level, glassy-eyed dolls, sitting placidly in little chairs, -or lying placidly in little beds, surveyed the landscape. Every morning -the small mothers burst into an orgy of house-cleaning, sweeping rock -rooms, dusting doll furniture, washing doll dishes. Every afternoon, -there broke out a fury of baking. Hundreds of delicious mud pies were -mixed, baked and then abandoned to that limbo, to which all mud pies -are sooner or later consigned. When this play gave out, the ingenious -Mrs. Dore set them to cutting out paper dolls; and to making, in -scrap-books hastily improvised from brown paper, innumerable rooms, -furnished with advertisement furniture, cut from magazines. This -involved endless hours of cutting in which scissors disappeared as -though by witchcraft and reappeared as though by magic; endless hours -of pasting from which the small interior <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>decorators returned splashed -with flour paste from head to foot.</p> - -<p>When in turn this game lost its savor, the resourceful Mrs. Dore -designed paper houses, these architectural wonders, made from the -endless piles of rejected paper boxes which the under-the-eaves closets -of the Little House contained. The Little Six were as much delighted -with the Little House and its neighborhood as the Big Six. But unlike -the Big Six—with the exception of Betsy—they were content with -near-by joys. But Betsy had never recovered from her tendency to run -away.</p> - -<p>Once or twice she slipped off the House Rock and started to make -through the green forests in any direction that occurred to her. But -she was always caught. Caught—because after her first straying, Mrs. -Dore put on the efficient little Molly the burden of keeping a watch -upon her. And Molly watched Betsy—watched her with the same quiet, -supervising care which she had always brought to her guardianship of -the self-willed, stubborn Timmie. After a while, astute Betsy came to -realize that a guard was always near and, for the time being ceased to -stray.</p> - -<p>“She’ll do it sometime,” Dicky prophesied<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> again and again. “She always -has and she always will.”</p> - -<p>The children recovered from their first attack of sunburn; but they -succumbed to another and another. The second attack was not so painful -and the third was scarcely noticed. The red in their faces deepened to -a brown which was like the protection of armor against the sun. The -blue-eyed and fair-haired ones—Maida and the two Lathrops—freckled; -but Rosie turned a deeper rose-bronze every day; Dicky was fast -changing to the color of a coffee bean and Arthur threatened to become -pitch-black. As for the Little Six, Maida said they were “just colonies -of freckles”; and colonies in which layer had grown on layer.</p> - -<p>“I can’t believe you are the same children I saw in the city a little -over two weeks ago,” Buffalo Westabrook remarked on his second visit. -“First I was afraid you were working too hard. When Maida sent me -the program of your work, it looked to me as if you were undertaking -altogether too much, but you certainly thrive on it.”</p> - -<p>“Well we play more than we work,” Rosie explained.</p> - -<p>“I never was so hungry in all my life,”<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> Laura declared, “and I fall -asleep the moment my head touches the pillow.”</p> - -<p>“All right,” Buffalo Westabrook laughed. “You’re doing so well I’ll -leave it all in your hands.”</p> - -<p>He always surveyed both the flower garden and the vegetable garden when -he came—surveyed them with much interest. He always went into the barn -and made an examination of the boys’ quarters.</p> - -<p>And so with work and play, July wore itself away.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XII</span> <span class="smaller">BETSY’S FIND</span></h2> - -<p>The Big Six—as the older children were now called—were returning -from their swim. A shower, early in the morning, had delayed the -bathing hour until afternoon. And their pent-up spirits had exploded in -prolonged skylarking in the water. It was late afternoon when they came -in sight of the Little House. They threw themselves under one of the -twin elms on the front lawn, a little warm from their walk home. And -as the Big Six languidly talked, the Little Six came, in single file, -along the trail which led from House Rock.</p> - -<p>“Where’s Betsy?” the sharp-eyed Rosie called.</p> - -<p>“I sent her back for her dolly,” Molly explained gravely. “She forgot -and left Hildegarde on House Rock. Hildegarde was all dressed up in her -best clothes and I didn’t fink she ought to stay out all night long.”</p> - -<p>“That’s right, Molly,” Maida applauded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> the little girl. “Take just as -good care of your dollies as you do of yourselves. And then when you -grow up, they’ll still be with you—like Lucy.”</p> - -<p>Molly, heading the file turned suddenly and walked soberly over to -Maida’s side. She knelt down on the grass beside her. “Maida,” she -said, “when we first came down here, you said if we were very <i>very</i> -good, we could play with Lucy some rainy day.”</p> - -<p>Maida laughed up into the earnest little face. The key-note of Molly’s -coloring was brown just as Delia’s was red, Betsy’s black, and the -Clark twins pink-and-white. Molly’s serious little face, from which -hung two tight thick little braids, had, even in her wee childhood, a -touch of motherliness; and indeed she brooded like a warm little mother -bird over the entire rest of the group.</p> - -<p>“So I did,” Maida said.</p> - -<p>“But we’ve only had free rainy days,” Molly complained.</p> - -<p>The Big Six laughed. Molly could not pronounce t and her failure in -this respect always entertained the Big Six. They all reached out and -knocked the elm trunk. “Knock wood!” they called to Molly; and Molly, -not at all understanding what it was all about, <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span>obediently tapped the -tree with her dimpled knuckles.</p> - -<p>“And you didn’t let us have Lucy those free days,” Molly stated -reproachfully.</p> - -<p>“But if you wait long enough, Molly,” Maida excused herself, “you are -sure to have a big three-days’ storm. And I promise you you shall have -Lucy all three days.”</p> - -<p>“And the little hair frunk?” Molly questioned eagerly.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida agreed, “the little hair frunk.”</p> - -<p>“Cross you froat!” Molly demanded.</p> - -<p>“Yes, cross my froat,” Maida agreed and crossed it.</p> - -<p>“Oh goody!” Molly skipped away on the wings of ecstasy.</p> - -<p>“Did Betsy come back?” Dicky asked carelessly.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t notice,” Maida answered absently, “I wasn’t looking.”</p> - -<p>But after a while the supper bell rang. The children filed into the -dining room and took their places. One chair was vacant.</p> - -<p>“Where’s Betsy?” Mrs. Dore immediately asked.</p> - -<p>Everybody looked puzzled and nobody answered. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I told her to go and get her dolly,” Molly asserted.</p> - -<p>Nobody paid any attention to her.</p> - -<p>“She’s probably up-stairs in the nursery,” Mrs. Dore decided. “Once or -twice she’s fallen asleep up there—she’s got so tired playing.”</p> - -<p>She left the room and the children heard her running over the stairs. -In a moment or two, they heard her footsteps coming back—at a swifter -pace.</p> - -<p>“She isn’t there,” Mrs. Dore said in a quiet voice. “Nor in any one of -the upstairs rooms. Now before you eat, children, scatter about the -place and see if you can find her.”</p> - -<p>“She’s run away,” Dicky asserted. “I told you she would.”</p> - -<p>“I told her to go back for her dolly,” Molly reiterated gravely.</p> - -<p>As Mrs. Dore had ordered, the children scattered. They searched the -house, the Annex, the barn, the Tree House, the two gardens, and the -adjacent trails. No Betsy! By this time, Floribel and Zeke, looking -very serious, had joined in the search. Granny Flynn, obviously -frightened, was wringing her hands.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> Mrs. Dore’s face had turned -serious too, but she was quite mistress of herself.</p> - -<p>“We’ll wait a few minutes,” she ordered slowly, “and then if we haven’t -found her, we’ll telephone the Big House. In the meantime, Granny, -you see that the children have their supper. The rest of you,” she -addressed the Big Six, “must go without your supper for a while. I want -you to help.”</p> - -<p>The Big Six wanted to help of course. For a moment or two they wandered -about aimlessly—a haphazard group; with Mrs. Dore and Floribel and -Zeke trying to direct all at once. Suddenly Arthur Duncan took command -of the situation. He ran into the house and emerged with his arms full -of things; the cow-bell with which Floribel called the children to -meals and four electric flash-lights. “Laura,” he commanded, handing -her the cow-bell, “I want you to stand here at the door and ring this -bell at regular intervals. I’m going to divide the rest of you into -pairs and send you off in different directions. We’re losing time, -all bunched together like this. Now Mrs. Dore, if you and Dicky will -go to the Magic Mirror and hunt the woods there—and Floribel, you -and Rosie take the House Rock<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> direction. Zeke, you and Harold search -in front, across the road. Maida and I’ll beat the woods back of the -house. Remember, don’t any one of you go out of hearing of the bell. -And if any of you find Betsy, come back and ring the bell hard—without -stopping.”</p> - -<p>The four pairs scattered, north, south, east and west. For a few -moments Maida could hear the others crashing through the woods. She -caught their voices ... getting farther and farther away ... calling -“Betsy!” ... “Betsy!” ... fragments of sentences. Finally as she -and Arthur plunged deeper and deeper into the forest, she got only -broken blurred calls. At length these too died away. The silence of -the immeasurable, immemorial forest closed about her and Arthur. The -oncoming dusk seemed to be pouring like a great, gradual-growing flood -upon them.</p> - -<p>“There isn’t any chance of our losing Betsy forever, Arthur?” Maida -asked once in a hushed voice.</p> - -<p>“Not a chance,” Arthur answered. “If we don’t find her, your father -will. In five minutes he can get enough men together to beat these -woods. And by midnight they can cover every spot of them.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p> - -<p>“They are awfully big woods, Arthur,” Maida commented a little -fearfully.</p> - -<p>“But a gang of men working systematically,” Arthur explained, “could -get through them in no time. Why the year my father and I camped out -in Maine, there was a child lost in a forest a hundred times as big as -this, but the whole village turned out and they found her in an hour.” -Arthur did not add that the child was only three. He went on. “You see, -little children can’t walk very fast. They are likely to go round in -circles any way. And they soon get tired out. We shall probably find -her asleep.”</p> - -<p>“But if she’s fast asleep,” Maida remarked, “she can’t help us by -answering our calls.”</p> - -<p>To this Arthur answered, “Perhaps our calls will wake her.”</p> - -<p>In the meantime, they searched every bit of ground thoroughly. At the -foot of tree trunks, beside rocks, under bushes, Arthur thrust the rays -of his electric flash-light. At intervals, he called to Maida and at -intervals Maida called to him. It grew darker and darker.</p> - -<p>“There, there’s the moon!” Arthur said in a relieved tone. “It’s going -to help a good<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> deal—having a full moon.” Following his pointing -finger, Maida caught a faint, red glow through the trees. They searched -a little longer.</p> - -<p>“Arthur, I can barely hear the bell,” Maida exclaimed suddenly.</p> - -<p>Arthur sighed. “I was just thinking of that,” he said. “I guess we’ll -have to go back to the Little House and telephone the Big House.”</p> - -<p>They turned and walked in the direction of the cow-bell. They were too -preoccupied with the sense of their unhappiness to talk. Once only -Maida said, “She’s one of the darlingest little girls I ever knew. If -anything happened to Betsy—And then how could we tell her mother?”</p> - -<p>When they came out on the lawn of the Little House, they found Floribel -and Rosie sitting there. A minute later, Zeke and Harold appeared from -one direction and, after an interval, Mrs. Dore and Dicky from another. -They all had the same anxious, slightly-terrified look.</p> - -<p>“I’ll call up the Big House now,” Mrs. Dore said quietly. “We can’t -handle this alone any longer.” She started towards the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> door and -automatically the others followed her in a silent, down-cast file.</p> - -<p>And then suddenly, Rosie screamed, “There’s Betsy now!”</p> - -<p>The whole group turned; stood petrified.</p> - -<p>Maida followed Rosie’s scream with “And what is she carrying in her -arms?”</p> - -<p>And then the whole group broke and ran in the direction of House Rock.</p> - -<p>Betsy was coming down the trail toward the Little House. The moon was -fairly high now and it shown full on the erect little figure and the -excited sparkling little face. Her dress was soiled and torn. Her -hair ribbon had gone and her curls hung helter-skelter about her rosy -cheeks. Her great eyes shone like baby moons as her gaze fell on the -group running towards her. A trusting smile parted her red lips; showed -all her little white mice teeth.</p> - -<p>“She’s carrying a fawn!” Arthur exclaimed as he neared her. “Why, it -can’t be a day old!”</p> - -<p>Betsy <i>was</i> carrying a fawn. As they surrounded her, she handed it -trustfully over into Arthur’s extended hands. “I finded it myself,” she -announced proudly. “I ranned and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> I ranned and I ranned. And it runned -and it runned and it runned. But I ranned faster than it runned and -pretty soon it was all tired out and I catched it.”</p> - -<p>This was all of her adventure that they ever got out of Betsy. -Conjecture later filled in these meager outlines; that Betsy had -been coming home with her doll, Hildegarde, when this stray from the -Westabrook preserves crossed her path. Dropping Hildegarde—they found -her a few moments later, not far from House Rock—she chased the poor -little creature over trails, through bushes, across rocks until she ran -him down. Then picking him up in her arms, she found the path by some -lucky accident and came home.</p> - -<p>“Mother of God!” Mrs. Dore said, hugging Betsy again and again, “the -child looked like the young St. John coming down the path.”</p> - -<p>Floribel lifted Betsy in her arms and carried her the rest of the way, -a very excited little girl proudly telling her story again and again.</p> - -<p>“I ranned and I ranned and I ranned,” she kept repeating, “and he -runned and he runned and he runned—”</p> - -<p>The other children tried to help in the process by holding onto -dangling legs and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> arms, by patting the little thickly-curly head and -by reaching up to kiss the round rosy cheeks. All except Arthur, who -carried the exhausted little fawn.</p> - -<p>Once home, Betsy was the center of attention for only a moment. She was -given her supper; a warm soothing bath and put immediately to bed. Then -the fawn took the center of the stage.</p> - -<p>The capable Arthur found a big basket which he filled with soft cloths; -placed the exhausted little creature in it. He <i>was</i> exhausted; for -when Arthur first put him on the floor, his legs gave out under him. He -spraddled, all four legs flat, on the rug in front of the fireplace—as -Rosie said, “exactly like a wet mosquito.” Then Arthur heated some -milk; dipped a corner of a handkerchief into it; gave it to the fawn to -suck. It was a slow process; for the fawn did not seem to understand -this strange method of being fed. At length, Arthur thought of a better -scheme. Procuring an eye-dropper from the medicine-chest, he poured the -warm fluid, drop by drop, into the little creature’s mouth.</p> - -<p>All the time the children knelt around the basket in a circle. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p> - -<p>“How sweet it is,” Rosie who adored animals, kept saying. “Look at its -big eyes and its beautiful head!”</p> - -<p>“I’d love to take it in my arms,” Maida exclaimed, again and again, -“only I know I would frighten it to death. See how it trembles if we -get too near!”</p> - -<p>The little children, who had been allowed one glimpse of the deer, -went up-stairs chattering like little magpies. Betsy, tired with her -long hunting, had fallen asleep the instant she struck the pillow. But -the rest were in such a high state of excitement that it was almost an -hour before the last of them calmed down. It was not easy that night to -drive the Big Six to bed.</p> - -<p>When the denizens of the Little House waked the next morning, their -tiny forest guest was lying in his basket, bright-eyed as usual. For -an hour after his breakfast and theirs, they hovered about him making -all kinds of plans in regard to his future. But these dreams were -rudely shattered when Mrs. Dore informed them that she had told Mr. -Westabrook, over the telephone, the whole episode and that he was -sending a man that day to bring the deer back to the Big House.</p> - -<p>“Oh I don’t see why we have to give him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> up!” Maida declared in -heart-broken accents. “What fun it would be to have a deer all our own -and watch him grow. Just think when his horns came!”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Maida!” Rosie begged, “do call your father up and tease him to let -us keep him. Just think of having a baby fawn running about the house.”</p> - -<p>Both the Sixes, Little and Big, added their entreaties to Rosie’s.</p> - -<p>“I don’t think it would be any use, Maida,” Mrs. Dore quietly -interrupted. “Your father said if by chance any stranger brought a -dog here, he would kill the little fawn the moment he caught him. And -then when the fawn himself grew bigger, and developed horns, he might -even be dangerous. Besides Betsy,” as Betsy burst into loud wails -of, “I finded him myself. I ranned and I ranned and I ranned—” “Mr. -Westabrook said he would send you something nice to take the fawn’s -place.”</p> - -<p>“But the fawn’s alive,” Rosie expostulated in a grieved tone. “And -nothing can be as nice as a live creature.”</p> - -<p>“He said this would be alive too,” Mrs. Dore comforted her.</p> - -<p>“Oh <i>what</i>?” Rosie asked. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Dore’s eyes danced. “It’s a surprise. I’m not to tell it.”</p> - -<p>Only half appeased, the children hung around the house, waiting to see -what the <i>live</i> thing was. In the middle of the morning, a run-about -drew up in front of the Little House and one of Mr. Westabrook’s men -alighted from it. He was wearing a long loose coat, but he had nothing -in his arms. He took the little fawn, basket and all, and placed it in -the run-about. The children tagged his every movement, followed with -their eyes his every motion. After the fawn was safely installed on the -seat beside him, he turned on the engine.</p> - -<p>Betsy burst into tears.</p> - -<p>“Oh that’s the little girl,” the man exclaimed, as though suddenly -remembering something, “who found the fawn, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>Through her sobs Betsy began, “I ranned and I ranned and I—”</p> - -<p>“Well then,” the man said, “I guess I’ve got something for you.” He -reached into one of the pockets of his big coat and brought out a tiny, -nondescript bundle of loose white fur; of helpless waving black paws; -big bulging winking black eyes; a curly queue of tail; an impertinent -sniffing nose—a baby bull dog.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> He handed it to Betsy. Betsy’s tears -dried in a flash. She hugged the puppy close to her warm neck; ran with -him to the house. The children raced after her, and the run-about, -utterly forgotten, disappeared down the road.</p> - -<p>“Let’s call it Fawn,” Rosie said, and Fawn it was.</p> - -<p>Fawn adopted the Little House as her home at once. She was a very -affectionate person and she soon grew to love devotedly every member of -the household. They all loved her devotedly in return; but none loved -her more than Betsy; and Betsy’s dog she always remained.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XIII</span> <span class="smaller">DISCOVERY</span></h2> - -<p>“Do you know I think it would be fine if we went off some day this week -on a picnic,” Laura said unexpectedly one morning. “I just love to go -on picnics. And we haven’t had one yet.”</p> - -<p>“Oh Laura!” Maida agreed ecstatically, “What a wonderful idea! I love -picnics too! I adore picnic food and I never yet have had all the -hard-boiled eggs I want. How did you come to think of it?”</p> - -<p>“I thought of it last night just before I fell asleep.” Laura’s voice -sparkled with pride. “It was all I could do to keep from going in -your rooms and waking you and Rosie up to tell you about it. I was so -excited that I couldn’t fall asleep and so I made a perfectly beautiful -plan. I thought we might put up lunches; then get into our bathing -suits; paddle across the Magic Mirror to the other side and spend the -day there—we have never really explored the other side. I’m sure it’s -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>perfectly lovely there and we’ll have a wonderful time.”</p> - -<p>“Let’s do it to-morrow,” Rosie took up with Laura’s plan immediately. -“We can get up early; cook the eggs and make the sandwiches. There’ll -be enough cake left over. And don’t let’s—oh listen, everybody! -Remember not to forget the salt. People always forget the salt on -picnics.”</p> - -<p>“It’s ice cream day to-morrow,” Harold said sadly. “We’ll miss it if we -are not home to freeze it.”</p> - -<p>“No, if you boys will get up early and make it, we can take it along in -the freezer with us,” Rosie suggested daringly.</p> - -<p>“Sure!” Arthur was highly enthusiastic. “I don’t care how early I have -to get up to make ice cream. I’d rather do that than go without it.”</p> - -<p>All other conversation was banished for the day. They kept thinking of -things they would like to take with them—and stopped only short of the -bicycles.</p> - -<p>“I should think,” Maida said once, “that we were going to Africa for -six months at least. Remember one thing though—<i>don’t forget the -salt</i>!”</p> - -<p>They were so afraid that they wouldn’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> wake in time that they wound -their alarm clocks to the very last notch. They did wake in time -however. In fact they had to put the alarm clocks under the bed clothes -and pile pillows on top of them to keep from waking the rest of the -household. With much whispering and many half-suppressed giggles the -girls managed to get into bathing suits; went down stairs and began -their work in the kitchen. Although the exact number of eggs and -sandwiches had been decided on the day before, they held many low-toned -colloquies on the subject.</p> - -<p>“Remember,” Laura said, “you can always eat twice as much at a picnic -as anywhere else. I don’t know why it is,” she concluded thoughtfully, -“but even things you don’t like taste good. <i>Be sure not to forget the -salt!</i>”</p> - -<p>By the time Floribel appeared to get their breakfasts, they were nearly -famished but nevertheless they ate hurriedly, so great was their -longing to get off. Arthur shouldered the ice cream freezer. Between -them, the girls carried the luncheon. The little children had to be -led to the side of the house, so as not to witness their elaborate -burden-laden departure. As it was acute little Betsy apparently guessed -that something was going on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> which did not include her. As the Big Six -disappeared down the trail they could hear Granny Flynn soothing her -whimperings.</p> - -<p>It was a beautiful day. The sun was not yet high enough in the heavens -for it to be hot. Indeed dew still lay over everything. But there was a -languor in the atmosphere which warned them that it would be hot enough -later. The pond was indeed a Magic Mirror. It was like glass. Not a -ripple roughed its surface and everything on the shore was so perfectly -reflected that it looked painted on the water. The children wasted no -time on the view. They pulled the four canoes out of the boat house -and began loading them. Arthur paddled alone in one with the ice cream -freezer and the lunch. Harold paddled alone in the second with the rugs -and the hammock; the others went, two to a canoe. The little fleet kept -close.</p> - -<p>“Isn’t it a beautiful place?” Rosie asked joyously, trailing her hand -in the water, “It’s like fairy land to-day. How I wish I could see some -fairies or goblins or something strange!”</p> - -<p>“I’d be content to see some white peacocks,” Dicky said soberly.</p> - -<p>“Oh Dicky!” Maida exclaimed, “I’ve never<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> taken you to see the white -peacocks as I promised. I’ll do that just as soon as I can.”</p> - -<p>“I’d rather see some deer.” Harold remarked.</p> - -<p>“Well all I ask,” Laura was very emphatic, “is not to see two -people—Silva and Tyma Burle.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t think we’ll run into them,” Maida declared thoughtfully, “It’s -a long time since any of us have seen them—over two weeks I should -say. Perhaps they’ve gone away.”</p> - -<p>“No,” Arthur called from his canoe, “I saw them in the village -yesterday.”</p> - -<p>The landing was effected with no difficulty, although here of course -there was no pier. They followed the trail through the woods for a long -way, trying to find a place to camp. One spot attracted some; a second -attracted others; but for a long time, no place attracted them all.</p> - -<p>“There are too many stones here,” Rosie would say, “it won’t be -comfortable to sit down.”</p> - -<p>“And it’s too sunny here,” Maida commented. “It’ll melt the ice cream -and the butter—and everything.”</p> - -<p>“That place slants,” Laura made the third objection, “we want a nice -flat spot.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I think I hear water,” Dicky cried suddenly.</p> - -<p>“Water!” Maida repeated, “Water! How can you hear it? There’s no water -here. I never saw any brook around here. I can’t hear any water.”</p> - -<p>Neither could anybody else; yet Dicky persisted that he heard the sound -of running water.</p> - -<p>“You wait here,” he exclaimed suddenly, “let me see if I can find it.” -He disappeared through the trees. He came running back in a few minutes -obviously excited. “I haven’t found it yet,” he explained, “but I -certainly hear it plainer and plainer the farther I go.”</p> - -<p>The others swarmed into the bushes. Dicky led the way like a little -human divining rod.</p> - -<p>“I hear water,” Rosie announced electrically. “Hark!”</p> - -<p>They all stopped and listened. One by one they got the soft tinkle. -Encouraged they kept on, rounding bushes and leaping rocks. The noise -grew louder and louder. A rough trail suddenly appeared. They raced -over it as fast as their burdens would permit. The sound was now a -lovely musical splash. They came out on an open space, surrounded by -pines and thickly carpeted with pine needles.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> At one side a great rock -thrust out of the earth. Close beside it ran a tiny brook and just -beyond the lee of the rock, the brook fell into a waterfall not more -than a foot high. The children went wild with delight.</p> - -<p>“Do you mean to tell me, Maida Westabrook, that you never knew this was -here?” Rosie demanded.</p> - -<p>“I never did,” Maida declared solemnly. “I have never seen it. I have -never heard anybody mention it. Isn’t it a darling? What shall we call -it? We must give it a name.”</p> - -<p>Nobody had any names ready and everybody was too excited to think. In -fact, at once they began wading up and down the little brook. They -explored the neighborhood. Not far off they came upon a curious patch -of country. A cleared circle, surrounded by pine trees and carpeted -with pines, was filled with irregular lines of great rocks that lost -themselves in the bushes on either side.</p> - -<p>“I believe this is a moraine,” Maida exclaimed suddenly. “I’ve seen -moraines in Europe.”</p> - -<p>“What’s a moraine?” the others asked.</p> - -<p>Maida explained how once the earth had been covered with great -icecaps called glaciers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> and how in melting these glaciers had often -left—streaking the earth’s surface—great files and lines of rock. -“We’ll ask father to come here some day,” she ended. “He’ll know all -about it. Billy Potter too—he knows everything.”</p> - -<p>After a while, they came back to the waterfall. They swept aside the -pine needles; spread the tablecloth on the ground; took food from the -baskets; set it about in an inviting pile. The ice cream had not melted -an atom in the freezer. The sandwiches, done up in wet napkins, were -quite fresh. The eggs looked as inviting as hard-boiled eggs are bound -to look. Everything was all right except that—and this produced first -consternation, then laughter—there was no salt.</p> - -<p>“We all reminded everybody else to remember the salt,” Maida said in -disgust, “and so nobody put it in the basket.”</p> - -<p>Everybody but Rosie was busy. And Rosie, as though bewitched, was -wandering about, gazing up this vista and down that one; examining -clumps of bushes.</p> - -<p>“Come, Rosie, lunch is most ready,” Maida called to her. And as Rosie -didn’t answer, “<i>What</i> are you doing?”</p> - -<p>“I’m looking for—” Rosie’s voice was <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>muffled. “I thought I saw -something—Oh come and see what I’ve found!” Now her voice was sharp -and high with excitement.</p> - -<p>The children rushed pell-mell in the direction of the voice. Rosie had -gone farther than they thought. Indeed she had disappeared entirely. -She had to keep calling to guide them. When they came to her at last, -she was standing with her back against a tree, the look on her face -very mystified, holding in her arms—</p> - -<p>“A doll!” Maida exclaimed. “Who <i>could</i> have dropped it? Nobody ever -comes here but us.”</p> - -<p>It was a cheap little doll of the rag-baby order perfectly new, -perfectly clean and dry.</p> - -<p>“How did you come to find it?” Laura enquired.</p> - -<p>“Well it’s the strangest thing,” Rosie answered in a queer quiet -voice. “I was just poking around here, not thinking of anything -particularly.... And then I thought I saw something moving—a white -figure. I started towards it and then.... And then it seemed to me that -something was thrown through the air. Now when I try to remember, I -can’t be sure I really did see anything thrown through the air and yet -I sort of <i>feel</i> that I did. <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span>Anyway I ran to see what it was. When I -got there, this doll was lying in the path.”</p> - -<p>“How curious!” Maida commented. “You must have imagined the figure, -Rosie. See, there’s nobody here.”</p> - -<p>A little awed, the children stared through the trees, this way and -that. But they stood stock still.</p> - -<p>“Yes, I must have imagined it,” Rosie admitted. “Still when I try to -make myself believe I didn’t see anything, something inside tells me I -did.”</p> - -<p>“Let’s look about,” Arthur suggested. They scattered exploring; diving -into bush clumps, and peering behind rocks. Fifteen minutes went by.</p> - -<p>“Well we’ve found nothing.” Arthur ended the search as he had begun it. -“Let’s go back and eat lunch.”</p> - -<p>“Oh let’s!” begged Harold. “I never was so hungry in all my life.”</p> - -<p>“Nor I!” “Nor I!” came from the others. Maida alone remained -thoughtful. She led the file, however, back to the waterfall. And it -was she who suddenly stopped and called, “Look! Look what’s happened—” -She stopped as though her breath had given out.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XIV</span> <span class="smaller">THE TERROR</span></h2> - -<p>In the midst of the clearing, the paper tablecloth still lay on the -ground, a great shining rectangle of white. Scattered about, crumpled, -soiled, or torn were the paper napkins. Everything else, even the ice -cream from the freezer, had disappeared.</p> - -<p>“Why, who took it?” Arthur demanded in a dazed voice. “Who <i>could</i> have -taken it?” he went on in a puzzled one. “Is any one of you playing a -joke?” he asked suddenly of the others.</p> - -<p>Everybody protested his innocence.</p> - -<p>“We haven’t been gone more than fifteen minutes,” Arthur went on. -“Let’s look about. It doesn’t seem to me anybody could have carried all -that stuff far and we not get a glimpse of it. It might be tramps.”</p> - -<p>“One thing is certain,” Maida protested, “tramps didn’t do it. There -are never any tramps in Satuit.”</p> - -<p>The children started their search. They<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> looked behind trees and under -bushes; but they showed a tendency to keep together. They talked the -matter over, but instinctively their voices lowered. They kept glancing -over their shoulders. They found nothing.</p> - -<p>“It’s like Magic,” Maida commented in a still voice. “You were saying, -Rosie, that you wished you could see some fairies or goblins. It looks -to me as though the goblins had stolen our lunch.”</p> - -<p>Arthur alone did not leave the clearing. He stood in the center -pivoting about, watching every vista and gnawing his under lip. His -face was more perplexed that any of them had ever seen it.</p> - -<p>“Well if we don’t find our lunch pretty soon,” he said after a while, -“we’ve got to go back home to get something to eat.”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps somebody’s playing a joke on us,” Rosie suggested, “and if we -wait for a while, they’ll bring the lunch back.”</p> - -<p>There seemed nothing else to do. So, rather sobered by this mysterious -event, the children seated themselves in a group by the brook.</p> - -<p>“I can’t wait very much longer,” Laura admitted dolefully. “I’m nearly -starved. I was so excited about the picnic that I hardly ate any -breakfast.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Just a few minutes more,” Arthur begged. “Maida, please tell us a -story.”</p> - -<p>“Once upon a time,” Maida began obligingly, “six boys and girls were -cast away on a great forest with nothing to eat. It was a forest filled -with gob—Hark!” she interrupted herself, “What’s that?”</p> - -<p>From somewhere—not the forest about them, nor the sky above: it seemed -actually to issue from the earth under them—came a strange moaning -cry. The children jumped to their feet. The boys started apart. The -girls clung together. The cry grew louder and louder. It was joined by -a second voice even more strange; and then a third entered the chorus.</p> - -<p>It was too much.</p> - -<p>The little group, white-faced and trembling, broke and made for the -trail. The girls started first. The boys staid still, irresolute; -but as the uncanny sound grew louder and louder, soared higher and -higher, they became panic-stricken too. They ran. Arthur, ending the -file, walked at first. But finally even his walk grew into a run. The -others leaped forward. They bounded over the trail, gaining in terror -as they went. In some way, they got into the canoes but half a dozen -times their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> trembling and fumbling nearly spilled them out. It was not -until they were well out into the middle of the Magic Mirror that their -composure came back.</p> - -<p>“What do you suppose it was?” Maida asked, white faced.</p> - -<p>“It couldn’t have been a ghost could it?” dropped from Laura’s shaking -lips.</p> - -<p>“No.” Arthur dismissed this theory with complete contempt.</p> - -<p>“I should think it was a crazy person,” Harold declared. “Is there a -lunatic asylum around here, Maida?”</p> - -<p>“No,” Maida replied.</p> - -<p>“Is there any crazy person about here?”</p> - -<p>Maida shook her head.</p> - -<p>“I think it was a tramp who first stole our lunch,” Arthur guessed -shrewdly, “and then decided to frighten us away.”</p> - -<p>“I think the wood is haunted.” Rosie shivered.</p> - -<p>“Nonsense!” Maida exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“Well I wish I hadn’t run away,” Arthur burst out impatiently. “I wish -I’d stayed.”</p> - -<p>“So do I, Arthur,” Maida agreed vigorously. “That’s the first time I -ever ran away from anything in my life.”</p> - -<p>“Let’s go back,” Arthur suggested. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> - -<p>Laura burst into tears. “Oh, please don’t,” she begged. “I’m frightened -to death.”</p> - -<p>“We won’t go, Laura dear,” Maida reassured her, “don’t worry.” She -continued after an interval of thought, “And don’t let’s tell Granny -Flynn and Mrs. Dore about that screaming. Let’s say that our lunch was -stolen while we were away. If I tell them all of it, they won’t let us -go on another picnic.”</p> - -<p>“Well, believe me, I don’t want to go on another picnic,” Laura said, -her eyes streaming still.</p> - -<p>However, by the time they had reached the jetty and had tethered the -canoes, they were more composed. When they reached the Little House -even Laura had begun to smile, to admit that the tramp theory was -probably the correct one.</p> - -<p>Granny Flynn and Mrs. Dore looked very much concerned when they heard -the story. They asked many questions. Finally they decided with Arthur -that tramps were the answer to the strange happening. Maida persisted -though that tramps were never permitted in Satuit.</p> - -<p>The next morning Arthur strolled down to the lake alone. In a little -while, he came <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>running back white with rage. “What do you suppose has -happened?” he called while still running up the trail. “We didn’t lock -the canoes in the boathouse last night and somebody has made a great -hole in all four of them.”</p> - -<p>The Big Six rushed down to the Magic Mirror. It was only too true. -Four of their canoes were ruined. The children stood staring at them, -horrified.</p> - -<p>“I don’t think tramps would do this,” Arthur said slowly. “They’d steal -them, but there’d be no sense in destroying them.”</p> - -<p>“No,” Maida said slowly. “This looks as though we had an enemy who is -determined to make us as unhappy as possible.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XV</span> <span class="smaller">ARTHUR’S ADVENTURE</span></h2> - -<p>It was after eleven, a cloudless night and a beautiful one. A great -white moon filled the sky with white light and covered the earth with -a thin film of silver. The barn door opened slowly and noiselessly. -Arthur emerged. Padding the grass as quickly as possible, he moved in -the direction of the trail; turned into it. For a while he proceeded -swiftly. But once out of hearing of the Little House he moved more -slowly and without any efforts to deaden his footsteps. That his -excursion had a purpose was apparent from the way that, without pause -or stay of any kind, he made steadily forward. It was obvious that the -Magic Mirror was his objective.</p> - -<p>He dipped into the Bosky Dingle and there, perhaps because the air was -so densely laden with flower perfumes, he stopped. Only for an instant -however. After sniffing the air like some wild creature he went on. -Presently he came out on the shore of the lake. Taking a key from his -pocket, he opened the little<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> boathouse in which, since the accident, -the canoes were nightly locked; pulled one of them out; shoved it into -the water. He seated himself in it and started to paddle across the -pond.</p> - -<p>Curiously enough, however, he did not strike straight across the Magic -Mirror. He kept close to the edge as though afraid of observation; -slipped whenever he could under overhanging boughs; took advantage -of every bit of low-drooping bush. So stealthy and so silent was his -progress indeed that from the middle of the lake he might not have -been observed at all. This was however a slow method. It was nearly -midnight when he reached the point about opposite the boathouse, which -was apparently his objective. He stopped short of it, however; tied -the canoe to a tree trunk, just where a half-broken bough concealed -it completely; stepped lightly ashore. Apparently he had landed here -before. There developed, under the moonlight, a little side trail which -led in the direction of the main trail. He took it.</p> - -<p>Now his movements were attended by much greater caution. He went -slowly and he put his feet down with the utmost care even in the -cleared portions of the trail. Wherever underbrush intervened, he took -great care to skirt<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> it or, with a long quiet leap or a prolonged -straddle, to surmount it so that no sound came from the process. It -was surprising, in a boy so lumbering and with feet and hands so -large, with what delicacy he picked his way. Indeed, he moved with -extraordinary speed and a surprising quiet.</p> - -<p>A little distance up the trail, he turned again. This time, he took a -path so little worn that nothing but a full moon would have revealed -its existence. Arthur struck into it with the air of one who has been -there before; followed it with a perfect confidence. At times, it -ceased to be a path at all; merged with underbrush and low trees. But -he must, on an earlier excursion, have blazed a pioneer way through -those obstacles because each time he made without hesitation for the -only spot which offered egress; emerged on the other side with the -same quiet and dispatch. He went on and on, proceeding with a greatly -increased swiftness but with no diminution of his caution.</p> - -<p>After a while, he came into ordered country. Obviously he had struck -the cleared land that, for so many acres, surrounded the Big House. Now -he moved like a shadow but at a smart clip. He had the confident air -of one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> familiar with the lay of the land. After a while, he struck a -wide avenue of trees—Mr. Westabrook had taught him its French name, -an <i>allee</i>. This was one of five, all beginning at the Big House and -ending with a fountain or a statue. Arthur proceeded under the shade of -the trees until he came out near the Big House. Then he swung himself -up among the branches of a tree; found a comfortable crotch; seated -himself, his back against the trunk. With a forked stick he parted the -branches; watched.</p> - -<p>The moon was riding high now and, as the night was still cloudless, it -was pouring white fire over the earth. The great lawn in front of the -Big House looked like silvered velvet. Half way down its length, like -a jet of shredded crystal, the fountain still played into its white -marble basin. Out of reach of its splashing flood, as though moored -against its marble sides, four swans, great feathery heaps of snow, -slept with their heads under their wings. As Arthur stared a faint -perturbation stirred the air, as though somewhere at the side of the -house—unseen by him—a motor pulsed to rest. Presently a high, slim -dog—Arthur recognized it to be a Russian boar-hound; white, pointed -nose, long tail—came sauntering across<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> the lawn. He poked his nose -into the basin of the fountain. One of the swans made a strange, low -sleepy cry; moved aimlessly about for an instant, then came to rest -and to sleep, apart from his companions. The hound moved into the -shrubbery; returned to the lawn.</p> - -<p>As though the swan’s call or the dog’s nosing had evoked it, one of the -white peacocks emerged from the woods, spreading his tail with a superb -gesture of pride and triumph. The long white hound considered the -exhibition gravely. The peacock, consciously proud, sauntered over the -velvet surface of the lawn for a while alone. Then a companion joined -him and another. Finally, there were three great snowy sails floating -with a majestic movement across the grass. The display ended as soon -as it began. One of the trio suddenly returned to the treey shade; the -other two immediately followed. The lawn was deserted by all except the -fountain, which kept up untiringly its exquisite plaint. The boar-hound -sped noiselessly towards the house.</p> - -<p>Arthur waited for a moment; then he slipped down from the tree; made -back over the way in which he had come. But he did not pursue the same -trail. He made a detour<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> which would take him further around the lake. -And if he seemed cautious before, now he was caution itself. He moved -so slowly and carefully that no human could have known of his coming, -save that he had eyes, or ears or a nose superhumanly acute. And Arthur -had his reward.</p> - -<p>Suddenly he came to an opening, which gave, past a little covert, on a -glade. And at the end of the glade, a group of deer were feeding in the -moonlight. Arthur did not move after his discovery of them; indeed he -seemed scarcely to breathe. There were nearly a dozen. The bucks and -does were pulling delicately at the brush-foliage; the fawns browsed -on the grass. In spite of Arthur’s caution, instinct told them that -something was wrong. The largest buck got it first. He stopped feeding, -lifted his head, sniffed the air suspiciously. Then one of the does -caught the contagion. She too lifted her head and for what, though -really a brief moment, seemed a long time, tested the atmosphere with -her dilated nostrils. Then the others, one after another, showed signs -of restlessness. Only the little fawns continued to stand, feeding -placidly at their mothers’ sides. But apparently the consensus of -testimony was too strongly in favor of retreat.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> For an instant, the -adults moved anxiously. Then suddenly as though the word of alarm had -been whispered into every velvety ear—dash! Flash! There came a series -of white gleams as all their short tails went up. And then the glade -was as empty as though there were no deer within a hundred miles.</p> - -<p>Arthur went on. And now, as though he hoped for still another reward -of his patience, he moved with even greater care. But for a long time, -nothing happened. In the meantime clouds came up. Occasionally they -covered the moon. Then, the light being gone, the great harbors and the -wide straits between the clouds seemed to fill with stars. The moon -would start to emerge; her light would silver everything. The smaller -stars would retreat leaving only a few big ones to flare on.</p> - -<p>Such an obscuration had come. And while the moon struggled as though -actually trying to pull herself free, a second cloud interposed itself -between her and the earth. The world turned dark—almost black.</p> - -<p>The effect on Arthur was however to make him pick his way with an -even greater care. The trail here was not a blind one. It was the one -that ran presently into the path that led from the gypsy camp to the -Moraine. Ahead,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> Arthur could just make out the point where the trails -crossed.</p> - -<p>Suddenly the moon came out with a great vivid flare. It was as though -an enormous searchlight had been turned on the earth. Something—it -seemed the mere ghost of a sound—arrested Arthur’s footsteps. He -stopped; stood stock still; listened; watched.</p> - -<p>Something or somebody was coming up the trail from the direction of -the gypsy camp. In a moment he would pass the opening. It was human -apparently, for the sound was of human footsteps. They came nearer and -nearer. A straight, light figure with hair that gleamed, as though -burnished, passed into the moonlight.... It was Silva Burle.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XVI</span> <span class="smaller">MYSTERY</span></h2> - -<p>Arthur’s first inclination was to call. But something within him warned -him not to do that. Something just as imperative advised him to another -course of action. He waited a moment or two to let Silva get far enough -ahead, so that she could not possibly hear his footsteps. Then he -followed her.</p> - -<p>She walked with an extraordinary swiftness—so swiftly indeed that -Arthur was put to it to keep up with her. However she had the advantage -over him in that she knew the trail perfectly. Her feet stumbled over -no obstacles; her arms hit no protruding branches; her face brushed -against no scratchy twigs. She moved indeed as though it were day. -Arthur was in a difficult situation. He must walk quickly to keep up -with her; but if he walked too quickly she would certainly hear him.</p> - -<p>Presently she came to the place in the trail where it turned at right -angles on itself. Arthur, anticipating this, stopped in the shadow<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> of -a tree in the far side of the path. Silva turned swiftly. It happened -that she did glance indifferently backwards over the way in which she -had come. But she could not have seen Arthur; for she went on at the -same composed high pace. But Arthur saw that she was carrying under her -arm a bottle of milk.</p> - -<p>Arthur quickened his cautious footsteps; came in his turn to the fork -in the trail. There was Silva ahead, her white skirt fluttering on -both sides of her vigorous walking, much as the white foam of the sea -flutters away from the prow of the ship. She kept straight on and -Arthur kept straight on. The moon dipped behind clouds and dove out of -them; flashed her great blaze on the earth and shadowed it again. On -and on they went, the stalker and the stalked. They were approaching -the Moraine. Big stones began to lift out of the underbrush on either -side. Some were like great tables, flat and smooth; comfortable and -comforting. Others were perturbing—like huge monsters that had thrust -themselves out of the earth, were resting on their front paws or their -haunches even. Layers of rust-colored leaves—the leaves that had -been for many years falling—lay between them. And now and then the -moonlight caught on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> rocks with a black glisten and on the leaves -with a red gleam; for the dew was falling.</p> - -<p>Arthur began to wonder what he should do. He somehow took it for -granted that Silva was going to the Moraine; mainly because there -seemed no other place for her to go; though for what purpose he could -not guess. If for any reason she stopped there, he must soon become -visible to her. Indeed there were only two courses for him to take: -retreat by the path over which he had come or through the wood on -either side. He could not make up his mind to turn back. If he took the -second course, he would undoubtedly get lost. He would have to wait for -daylight to find his way home and that, he recognized at once, would be -stretching inexcusably the generous liberty which Mr. Westabrook had -given him. He might call to Silva. But again something inside seemed -to warn him not to make his presence known. He continued to follow the -vigorous figure ahead.</p> - -<p>As though she were approaching the end of her journey, Silva was -hurrying faster and faster. Arthur hurried too. Silva broke into what -was a half run. It would have been, Arthur felt, a complete run, if she -were not <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>carrying the bottle of milk so carefully. Arthur seethed with -perplexity. Why was she speeding so? What could she possibly have to do -at this spot and at this hour? What could require such urgent haste? -Well, perhaps he would know in another moment.</p> - -<p>And then suddenly strange things happened all at once.</p> - -<p>Silva’s rapid progress had, as it apparently neared its object, become -less careful. At any rate, an overhanging briar caught her hair; pulled -her up sharply. In her first effort to extricate herself, Silva turned -completely about; caught sight of Arthur’s figure a little way down the -trail.</p> - -<p>She started so convulsively that even Arthur could see it. Then with a -swift wrench of her slender hand she tore her hair away; turned and ran -like a deer in the direction of the Moraine.</p> - -<p>Arthur ran too. And as he ran he called, “Don’t be afraid, Silva. It’s -Arthur Duncan from the Little House. Don’t mind me! I won’t hurt you.”</p> - -<p>But Silva only redoubled her speed. Arthur redoubled his. He was -gaining swiftly on her. He entered the Moraine. On the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> other side -Silva was just disappearing from it. “I tell you,” he called, “I’m not -going to hurt you. Stop! I want to speak to you!”</p> - -<p>Silva did not answer. He heard a frenzied floundering among the -underbrush. For the noise Silva made, she might have been an elephant. -And then suddenly came silence—silence utter and complete.</p> - -<p>Had she fainted? What could be the matter? What a silly girl to act -like that! Arthur rushed across the Moraine; penetrated the woods on -the other side.</p> - -<p>Silva had disappeared as completely as though she had vanished into -the air. Arthur stared about him like one waking from a dream. Then he -began to search for her. Around rocks, into clumps of bushes he peered. -Nobody. Nothing.</p> - -<p>“Silva Burle!” he called. “Silva! Silva! Where are you?” And then -because he was genuinely alarmed, “Please answer. Please! I’m afraid -you’re hurt.” Another search over a wider area. He mounted rocks this -time. Remembering how Silva could climb, he stared upwards into trees. -He crawled on hands and knees through every little thicket he found. -And all the time he kept calling. Still nobody. Still nothing. As far -as he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> could see, he was absolutely alone in that part of the wood.</p> - -<p>After half an hour, he gave it up. But he was a little alarmed and very -much humiliated. He walked back over the trail to the Magic Mirror -and all the time his head was bent in the deepest thought. He found -the canoe; absently slid into it; mechanically paddled himself across -the water. And all the time he continued to think hard. “It’s like a -dream,” he thought. “I’d think anybody else was dreaming who told me -this.”</p> - -<p>When he reached the barn, the whole mysterious episode seemed to -float out of his mind in the great wave of drowsiness which suddenly -beat through him. He fell immediately into slumber. But his sleep was -full of dreams, all so strange that when he awoke in the morning, his -experience of the night before threatened for a moment to take its -place among them. “But I didn’t dream the peacocks or the deer,” he -said to himself. “And I know I didn’t dream Silva!”</p> - -<p>He said nothing of his experience to any of the other children, though -he found himself strangely tempted to tell Maida. But a kind of shyness -held him back. At times it occurred to him that Silva might be lying -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>injured somewhere in the woods. But always some instinct made him -believe that this was not true.</p> - -<p>Halfway through the morning Granny Flynn sent him on an errand to the -village. As he came out of the Post Office, he ran into Silva Burle -just about to enter it. He tumbled off the wheel which he had just -mounted.</p> - -<p>“Say,” he said without any other greeting, “where did you disappear to -last night?”</p> - -<p>“Last night!” Silva repeated in a bland tone of mere curiousness. “What -do you mean by <i>last night</i>?”</p> - -<p>“You know very well what I mean,” Arthur persisted. “Last night in the -Moraine—in the woods.”</p> - -<p>“In the Moraine—in the woods,” Silva repeated. “I don’t know what -you’re talking about. I didn’t sleep in the woods last night. I slept -in my tent as usual.”</p> - -<p>Arthur looked at her hard. “Well,” he said after a moment, “either -you’re telling the biggest whopper I ever listened to or you were -walking in your sleep.”</p> - -<p>“Walking in my sleep,” Silva said scornfully, “you’re crazy.” And she -passed on.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XVII</span> <span class="smaller">CRESCENT MOON BEACH</span></h2> - -<p>It was drawing near the middle of August. And now with each sunrise, -the fun at the Little House seemed to double itself.</p> - -<p>“I never saw such a place as this,” Rosie wailed once. “There aren’t -hours enough to do all the things you want to do every day; and not -days enough to do all you want to do every week.”</p> - -<p>There was some justice in Rosie’s complaint. The day’s program of -swimming, tennis, croquet, bicycling, reading and games had been broken -into by the coming of the berry season. Blueberries and blackberries -were thick in the vicinity and the children enjoyed enormously eating -the fruit they had gathered.</p> - -<p>Floribel taught the little girls how to make blueberry cake and -blackberry grunt and on their teacher’s day out, the Little House was -sure to have one of these delicacies for luncheon and another for -dinner. The Big Six tried to do everything of course; and as Laura -complained, they succeeded in doing <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>everything badly and no one thing -very well. One day Maida appeared at the table with a radiant look of -one who has spawned an idea.</p> - -<p>“Granny,” she said, “we haven’t had a picnic on the beach yet. Every -summer we go to the beach once at least. Can’t we go this week on -Floribel’s day out? We girls will cook the luncheon and pack it all up -nicely.”</p> - -<p>“But the beach is pretty far away,” Mrs. Dore said warily. “How far is -it? Could you walk to it?”</p> - -<p>“It’s between four and five miles,” Maida answered hazily. “You see -the little children could go in the motor and the rest of us—the Big -Six—could go on our bicycles.”</p> - -<p>“But I don’t think,” Mrs. Dore said, “that I’d like you children to go -so far away without a grown person with you.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, of course,” Maida said, “you and Granny come too.”</p> - -<p>“But with Zeke and Floribel away,” Mrs. Dore protested, “who would -drive the automobile?”</p> - -<p>Maida’s face fell. “Oh,” she exclaimed, “I never thought of that.”</p> - -<p>All the faces about the table—they had grown bright in anticipation of -this new excursion—grew dark. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span></p> - -<p>Zeke had already taught Arthur and Harold to run the machine, but Mr. -Westabrook’s orders against unlicensed persons driving it, were strict. -For a moment it looked as though the ocean-picnic must be given up.</p> - -<p>“I think,” Maida faltered, “if I ask my father to lend us Botkins and -the big car, he’d do it.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Dore shook her head. “I wouldn’t like to have you do that, Maida,” -she said. “Your father has given us everything that he thinks necessary -for this household.” She added gratefully, “And more than any of us had -ever had in our lives before. I should certainly not like you to ask a -single thing more of him.”</p> - -<p>Again gloom descended on the Big Six. And then hope showed her bright -face again.</p> - -<p>“Ah’ll tell you what Ah’ll do,” Floribel, who was waiting on table, -broke in. “Zeke and Ah’ve wanted fo’ a long time to see the big ocean. -Now eff yo’ll let the lil’ children go on dat pic-a-nic, Mis’ Dore, -Zeke and Ah’ll go with them and tak’ the best of care of them.”</p> - -<p>“Oh <i>would</i> you, Floribel?” Rosie asked.</p> - -<p>“Well, in that case,” Mrs. Dore decided<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> thoughtfully, “I don’t see why -you shouldn’t all go.”</p> - -<p>Madness at once broke out in both Sixes, Little and Big. Laura, Maida -and Rosie leaped to their feet and danced about the room. The little -children beat on the table with their spoons and the three boys -indulged in ear-splitting whistles.</p> - -<p>The next Thursday, Floribel, Zeke, the Little Six and the lunch, packed -somehow into the machine, the Big Six on their bicycles, streaming -ahead like couriers, started off for the beach.</p> - -<p>“Thank goodness we’ve remembered the salt this time,” Rosie said to -Arthur as they mounted their wheels, “I took care of that myself.”</p> - -<p>It was a beautiful day, cool as it was sunny, brisk as it was warm. The -winding road led through South Satuit and then over a long stretch of -scrub-pine country, straight to the beach.</p> - -<p>Just as they emerged from the Westabrook estate into South Satuit, -Maida’s bicycle made a sudden swerve. “Why I just saw Silva Burle!” she -called in a whisper to Rosie. “She was walking along the trail towards -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> Little House. I wonder what she is doing there?”</p> - -<p>“Well you may be very sure she isn’t calling on <i>us</i>,” Rosie declared, -“and if she is I’m delighted to think that Granny will say, ‘Not at -home!’”</p> - -<p>“Still,” Maida said thoughtfully, “that trail leads directly to the -Little House. She must be going there for some reason.”</p> - -<p>“Probably,” Laura remarked scornfully, “she’s hoping she’ll meet some -of us, so’s she can make faces at us.”</p> - -<p>The automobile arrived at the beach first and the cyclists came -straggling in one after another. Crescent Moon Beach was like a deeply -cut silver crescent, furred at each tip of the crescent with a tight -grove of scrub-pines which grew down to the very water’s edge. Beyond -it, except for a single island, stretched unbroken the vast heaving -blue of the Atlantic. Under the lee of the southern tip of the crescent -was a line of half-a-dozen bath houses.</p> - -<p>“What a wonderful, wonderful beach!” Laura commented.</p> - -<p>“And there’s that island,” Dicky said, “that we see from the Tree -House—Spectacles<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> Island, didn’t you say—oh no, I remember, Tom -Tiddler’s Ground. How I wish I could swim out to it. I have never been -on an island in my life. Could you swim as far as that, Arthur?”</p> - -<p>Arthur laughed. “I should say not. Nobody but a professional could do -that—and perhaps he’d find it some pull. It’s much longer than it -looks, Dicky. Distances on the water are very deceiving.”</p> - -<p>“What’s on the Island, Maida?” Dicky went on curiously. “Have you ever -been there?”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes,” Maida answered, “once. I went on father’s yacht but I was -such a little little girl that I have only one impression—of great -trees and enormous rocks and thick underbrush.”</p> - -<p>Dicky sighed. “I wish we could go on a picnic there!”</p> - -<p>“What’s that over there?” Harold demanded, pointing to a spot far out -where a series of poles, connected by webs of fish-net, rose above the -water’s surface.</p> - -<p>“Oh that’s a fish weir,” Maida declared electrically. “I’d forgotten -all about that. You see the tide’s going out. It goes out almost two -miles here. And if we follow it up,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> we can get into the weir and come -back before the tide overtakes us.”</p> - -<p>Maida explained the situation to Floribel. Floribel turned to Zeke for -advice. Zeke corroborated Maida’s story. He had, he said, been in that -weir several times himself. Floribel said she would stay on the beach -with the Little Six while Zeke accompanied the Big Six. When they came -back, she added, lunch would be all spread out on the beach.</p> - -<p>“The last bath house,” Maida informed them, “is ours. Now let’s get -into our bathing suits at once because we have no time to lose.”</p> - -<p>It was only partially low tide when they arrived but it almost seemed -to the children that they could see the water slipping away towards the -horizon. When they emerged from the bath house, a patch of eelgrass, -not far off, made a brilliant green spot in the midst of the golden -sand. As the Big Six started towards the fish weir, the Little Six were -splashing about in the warm shallows near shore.</p> - -<p>“Oh what fun this is!” Rosie said. “I love salt-water bathing more than -fresh water—I don’t know why. But somehow I always feel so much gayer.”</p> - -<p>The salt water seemed to have an effect<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> of gayety on all of them. -They chattered incessantly when they were not laughing or singing. -At times they came to hollows between the sand bars where the water -was waist-high, but in the main, the water came no farther than their -knees; and it continued to recede steadily before them. Sand-bar after -sand-bar bared itself to the light of the sun—stretched before them -in ridges of solid gold. Eelgrass—patch after patch—lifted above -the water; spread around them areas of brilliant green. Above, white -clouds and blue ether wove a radiant sky-ceiling. And between, the -gulls swooped and soared, circled and dashed, emitting their strange, -creaking cries. It seemed an hour at least to the Big Six before they -reached the weir, but in fact it had taken little more than half that -time.</p> - -<p>Zeke found the entrance to the weir and they followed him in. Here the -water was waist-deep. Zeke explained the plan of the weir. It was, he -pointed out, nothing but a deep-sea trap for fish. The fish entered -through the narrow opening into a channel which led into the big -inner maze. Although it was very easy for them to float in, it was a -very difficult matter finding the way out. Caught there, as the tide -retreated, they stayed until the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>fisherman arrived with his cart and -shoveled them ignominiously into it.</p> - -<p>“Oh, oh!” Laura shrieked suddenly. “This place is full of fish. One -just passed me! Oh, there’s another! And another!”</p> - -<p>But by this time both the other girls were jumping and screaming -with their excitement; for fish were darting about them everywhere. -The boys, not at all nervous of course and very much excited, were -trying to drive the fish into corners to find out what they were. Zeke -identified them all easily enough—cod, sculpins, flounders, and perch.</p> - -<p>“What’s that big thing?” Arthur exclaimed suddenly. “Jiminy -<i>crickets</i>!” he called excitedly. “It’s the biggest turtle I ever laid -my eyes on.”</p> - -<p>The girls shrieked and stayed exactly where they were, clinging -together. But the males all ran in Arthur’s direction.</p> - -<p>“Dat’s some turtle, believe muh,” commented Zeke.</p> - -<p>“I’m going to take it home,” Arthur declared, “and put it in the Magic -Mirror.”</p> - -<p>“The Magic Mirror!” Laura echoed. “Why I would never dare go in -swimming if I knew that huge thing was there.”</p> - -<p>“We’ll keep it tied up with a rope,” <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span>Arthur went on excitedly. “It -can’t get where we go in swimming because the rope won’t be long -enough. Come on, fellows, help me get it.”</p> - -<p>“How are you going to catch it?” Harold demanded.</p> - -<p>“Lasso it!” Arthur declared, untying a stout rope which hung from one -end of the weir posts.</p> - -<p>The prospect of catching such big game was too tempting for the males -of the party. And so while the girls dashed madly about, trying to get -out of their reach, screaming with excitement and holding on to each -other for protection, but really enjoying the situation very much—the -boys chased the turtle from corner to corner, until finally Arthur -managed to lasso a leathery paw and tie it captive to a weir post. How -he did this, he himself found it hard to say, because the water was -lashed to a miniature fury by the flounderings of both the turtle and -its captors. It was probably pure accident, he was humble enough to -assert. But having caught the creature, they were not content until -they had brought him ashore, and so the procession started beachwards, -Arthur pulling the turtle at the end of the rope.</p> - -<p>It was a huge turtle at least two feet in <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span>diameter. It had wide -leathery flappers, a wicked looking head—as big, Rosie said, as her -alarm clock. But its shell was beautifully marked.</p> - -<p>As they approached the beach they could see the great square of the -tablecloth laid out on the sand and Floribel busy piling up sandwiches -and hard-boiled eggs; fruit and cake. The Little Six came running to -meet them and then it became a problem to keep them out of the way -of the turtle’s snapping jaws. They had no difficulty however, with -Floribel, who screamed with terror at the sight of the strange creature -and would not allow them to bring it onto the beach. They ended by -mooring it, by means of a large rock, in one of the pools near the -shore.</p> - -<p>Then, forgetting their prey for a while, they sat down to lunch. They -were ready to do full justice to it.</p> - -<p>“Lord<i>ee</i>!” Floribel exclaimed once. “Dey’se salt enough here for an -army—shuah! Who put all dat salt in the basket?”</p> - -<p>The three girls burst into giggles.</p> - -<p>“I was so sure we’d forget the salt,” Maida said, “that I put in a pair -of salt-cellars.”</p> - -<p>“I put in three,” declared Rosie.</p> - -<p>“And I put in four,” confessed Laura. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span></p> - -<p>After lunch, following the orders which Mrs. Dore had given them, they -sat on the beach for an hour before they went in bathing again. This -prolonged itself to much more than an hour because they began making -the inevitable collections of shells and stones to take home. Floribel -said that moon-stones were sometimes found on this beach and there -instantly began a frantic search for the small, translucent white -stones. Of course everybody found several of what he supposed were -invaluable gems. By this time the tide, which had turned just as they -left the fish weir, was now galloping up on the beach in great waves. -They had to pull the turtle farther and farther in shore. At length -they all went in bathing again; the Big Six diving through the waves -and occasionally getting “boiled”—which was the local term for being -whirled about—for their pains. Floribel permitted the Little Six to -play only in the rush of the waves after they broke.</p> - -<p>After five o’clock, blissfully tired, excitedly happy, they piled the -little children into the machine; packed the turtle in the big lunch -hamper, tied the cover securely over him and started home.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Wild with excitement and the news of their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> find, they dashed into the -Little House.</p> - -<p>“Oh Granny you’ll never guess what we’ve brought home with us,” Maida -exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“And oh what a wonderful day we’ve had,” Rosie added.</p> - -<p>“And how tired we are and how hungry,” Laura concluded.</p> - -<p>The little children were all chattering with excitement; the boys were -attending to the turtle in the barn, preparatory to taking it to the -Magic Mirror.</p> - -<p>“I’m glad you’ve had a good time, children,” Granny said gravely. “Your -father is here, Maida, and he wants to see you all in the living room.”</p> - -<p>Something seemed to have gone out of the gayety of the day. What it was -or what made it go or where it went, Maida could not guess. Perhaps -it was a quality in Granny’s air and words. At any rate she said -instantly, “I’m going right in there, Granny, and Rosie will you please -tell the boys to come at once?”</p> - -<p>Rosie too had caught an infection of this seriousness. She sped to the -barn. In three minutes, the Big Six had gathered in the living room. -Mr. Westabrook was sitting on the couch in front of the fire.</p> - -<p>“Good afternoon, children,” he said quietly.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> “I told Granny to ask -you to come here the instant you came home, because I had something -to say to you. It occurred to me to-day that I would come over to the -Little House when you didn’t expect me and make an inspection. Hitherto -I have come regularly every Sunday. This is Thursday. I’m glad I did -because I found that neither the flower garden nor the vegetable -garden had been weeded for the last three days. The barn was in a very -disorderly confusion. I asked Granny how the girls had left their rooms -and although she didn’t want to tell me, she had to say that the beds -were not made and apparently nothing had been done. But the worst thing -of all that I have to say is that I find that the tennis court is all -kicked up as though it had been played on after a shower without having -first been rolled.”</p> - -<p>There was an instant of silence in the room; a silence so great that -everybody could hear quite plainly the ticking of the grandfather’s -clock. Arthur spoke first.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Westabrook,” he said in a low voice, “we ought to be ashamed of -ourselves and I certainly am. After all your kindness to us—I won’t -try to make any excuses because there are no excuses we can make.”</p> - -<p>“It’s all my fault,” Harold admitted, “I’m<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> supposed to run the boys’ -end of the work and I have not held them up to keeping everything -right.”</p> - -<p>“It isn’t your fault,” Dicky declared hotly, “no more than mine or -Arthur’s. We’re all to blame.”</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully ashamed of myself, Mr. Westabrook,” Rosie confessed almost -in a whisper. “I wouldn’t blame you if you <i>never</i> forgave us, but I -hope you will.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know how we got this way,” Laura said in perplexity. “We began -right.”</p> - -<p>“We’ve been having such a good time,” Maida explained in a grave tone, -“that we’ve just let ourselves get careless.”</p> - -<p>“Then,” Mr. Westabrook advised them, rising, “try not to let yourselves -get careless again.” He shook hands all around; and kissed his -daughter. “Fair warning,” he said, “I don’t know when I’m coming again, -but it won’t be when you expect me.”</p> - -<p>It was a very subdued and a very tired little trio of girls who -went up-stairs and attended to their rooms. It was an even more -subdued—though a less tired—trio of boys who put the barn in order -and then trailing the turtle at the end of his rope, walked down to the -Magic Mirror, and tied him to a tree, and deposited him in the water -there for the night.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XVIII</span> <span class="smaller">EXPIATION</span></h2> - -<p>A very quiet group of children gathered at breakfast the next morning. -Conversation was intermittent and devoted mainly to piling offers of -assistance in the housework on Granny and Mrs. Dore.</p> - -<p>“When you have finished your own work, we’ll see,” Mrs. Dore steadily -answered all these suggestions.</p> - -<p>The children finished their work in record time and with the utmost -care. The girls swept and dusted their chambers. They washed the -furniture, the paint and the windows. Everything was taken out of -closets and bureau-drawers, shaken and carefully put back. They shook -rugs. The boys in a frenzy of emulation followed a program equally -detailed. Having accomplished all this, the Big Six again begged for -more work and Granny and Mrs. Dore, taking pity on the penitent little -sinners, thought up all kinds of odd jobs for them to perform.</p> - -<p>At length, Maida said, “Now we’ve done all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> the work we can do, there’s -one other thing I’d like to see attended to. I woke up in the middle -of the night—I don’t know what woke me—but I began at once to think -of that turtle—that poor, horrid turtle. And it suddenly came into my -head that it was a very cruel thing to put a creature in fresh water -who is accustomed to salt water. I suppose it’ll kill him in time, -won’t it?” she appealed to Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Gee <i>whillikins</i>,” Arthur answered, “I never thought of that! Of -course he’ll die. But what are we going to do about it?”</p> - -<p>“I thought,” Maida began very falteringly, “if you would let us, -Granny, we’d ask Zeke to drive us over to the beach and we’d take the -turtle and put him back in the water where he came from. We won’t stay -there but a moment.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t see why you shouldn’t do that,” Mrs. Dore accorded them -thoughtfully.</p> - -<p>“And as for me, I’ll be glad to be well rid of the craythur,” Granny -said shudderingly.</p> - -<p>So it was settled. After luncheon, the three boys went down to the -Magic Mirror, hauled the poor awkward beast out of the water; pulled -it along the trail to the barn. They loaded it into the lunch hamper -again; stowed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> it in the automobile; and then Zeke drove them to the -beach.</p> - -<p>Once there, they lifted the hamper out of the machine, removed the -cover and dumped its living contents onto the sand.</p> - -<p>There was no question as to the turtle’s wishes in this matter. Without -an instant’s hesitation, he turned in the direction of the ocean; -and lumbered toward it over the sand—lumbered awkwardly but with a -surprising swiftness. The waves were piling in, like great ridges of -melted glass, green edged with shining, opalescent filigree. They -shattered themselves on the sand and seemed miraculously to turn into -great fans of green emerald trimmed with pearl-colored, foam lace.</p> - -<p>The turtle struck the broken wave ... swam into it ... dove through -the next wave ... and the next ... and the next.... Suddenly they lost -sight of him.</p> - -<p class="space-above">When they returned, still unnaturally quiet, to the Little House, to -their great surprise Billy Potter came forward to meet them.</p> - -<p>Their subdued spirits took an involuntary jump. Nevertheless they -greeted their guest in an unusually quiet way. Billy’s perceptions, -always keen, apparently leaped<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> in an instant of calculation to the -truth. After a while, in which he devoted himself to the Little Six, -he suggested that the Big Six take a walk with him. They accepted the -invitation with alacrity and plunged into the woods.</p> - -<p>When they were out of sight of the Little House, “Now what’s the -matter?” Billy Potter suddenly demanded.</p> - -<p>They told him; all at once; each interrupting the other, piling -on excuses and explanations; interrupted with confessions and -self-accusals.</p> - -<p>“We feel that we’ve treated Mr. Westabrook rottenly,” Arthur concluded.</p> - -<p>“And we don’t know what to do to show him we’re sorry,” Rosie after a -pause added.</p> - -<p>“That’s pretty bad,” Billy commented. “Now let’s think of some way out -of this.” He himself meditated for an interval, falling into a study so -deep that no one of the children dared interrupt it.</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you,” he burst out after a while, “Why not invite Mr. -Westabrook down for an afternoon—to make another inspection of the -house—and to stay for supper. You probably haven’t shown him for a -long time how well you can cook.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span></p> - -<p>“No, we haven’t,” Maida said. “I think father has eaten only one meal -that we girls cooked.”</p> - -<p>“I think that would be lovely,” Rosie agreed.</p> - -<p>“Let’s do it as quickly as possible,” Arthur suggested. “This is Friday -morning. Why don’t you invite him for Monday night?”</p> - -<p>The children caught the suggestion at once. That night, working -together—for Billy Potter stayed over only one train—they painfully -drafted a formal invitation to Mr. Westabrook to spend Monday afternoon -with them and stay to supper. They posted it the next morning and -almost by return mail, they received a formal acceptance.</p> - -<p>Monday was a day of the most frantic work that the Little House had -ever seen. Everything was swept that could be swept; dusted that -could be dusted; washed that could be washed; polished that could be -polished. Rosie even washed off the stepping stones that led to the -Little House. And Maida not to be outdone, shined the brass knocker -on the door and the knob. Laura was only stopped in time from pinning -flypaper, which she had bought with her own pocket money, on the -outside of the screen door. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span></p> - -<p>“There are no flies in the house,” Mrs. Dore protested, “and we can’t -catch all the flies in the outside world.”</p> - -<p>The boys cleaned the barn, the little cellar to the house, its tiny -garret. They rolled and re-rolled the tennis court. They begged for -other work and Mrs. Dore gave them all the table silver to polish and -some pots, obstinately black, to scrape.</p> - -<p>When Mr. Westabrook came, the place looked, as he said, as though they -had cleaned the outside with manicure tools and the inside with the -aid of a microscope. The supper which, in deference to Mr. Westabrook, -included a single hot dish, consisted of one of Rosie’s delicious -chowders; one of Maida’s delicious blueberry cakes; one of Laura’s -delicious salads; and a freezer full of the boys’ delicious ice-cream.</p> - -<p>Mr. Westabrook said that he had eaten meals all over the United States -and in nearly every country in Europe and he could not recall any one -that he had enjoyed more than this.</p> - -<p>That night the Big Six went to bed with clear consciences.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XIX</span> <span class="smaller">MAIDA’S MOOD</span></h2> - -<p>“What are you so quiet about, Maida?” Dicky asked at breakfast a few -mornings later. “I don’t think you’ve said a word since you’ve got up.”</p> - -<p>“Haven’t I?” Maida replied. But she added nothing.</p> - -<p>At first because of the noise which prevailed at breakfasts in the -Little House, nobody noticed Maida’s continued silence. Then finally -Rosie Brine made comment on it. “Sleepy-head! Sleepy-head!” she teased. -“Wake up and talk. You’re not in bed asleep. You’re sitting at the -table.”</p> - -<p>Maida opened her lips to speak but closed them quickly on something -which it was apparent, she even repented thinking. She shut her lips -firmly and maintained her silence.</p> - -<p>“S’eepy-head! S’eepy-head!” the little mimic, Delia, prattled. “Wate up -and tot. Not in bed as’eep. Sitting at table.”</p> - -<p>Everybody laughed. Everybody always laughed at Delia’s strenuous -efforts to produce<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> as copious a stream of conversation as the -grown-ups. But Maida only bit her lips.</p> - -<p>The talk drifted among the older children to plans for the day.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps you will give us your views, Miss Westabrook,” Laura said -after some discussion, with a touch of purely friendly sarcasm. “That -is if you will condescend to talk with us.”</p> - -<p>“Oh can’t I be quiet once in a while,” Maida exclaimed pettishly, -“without everybody speaking of it!” She rose from the table. “I’m tired -of talking!” She walked quickly out of the dining room and ran upstairs -to her own chamber. The children stared for a moment petrified.</p> - -<p>“Why I never saw Maida cross before,” Rosie said in almost an awed -tone. “I wonder what can be the matter. I hope I didn’t say anything—”</p> - -<p>“No, of course you didn’t,” Arthur answered. “Maida got out of the -wrong side of her bed this morning—that’s all.”</p> - -<p>“Well,” Laura concluded generously, “if anybody’s got a right to be -cross once in a while, it’s Maida. She’s always so sweet.”</p> - -<p>After breakfast, the children separated, as was the custom of the -Little House, to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> early morning tasks. But Rosie and Laura lingered -about, talking in low tones, before one went to the library and the -other into the living room to do her daily stint of dusting. After this -work was finished, they proceeded to the garden and plucked flowers -together.</p> - -<p>It was phlox season and Laura cut great bunches of blossoms that ran -all the shades from white to a deep magenta through pink, vermilion, -lavender and purple-blue. But Rosie chose caligulas—changelessly -orange; zinnias—purple, garnet, crimson; marigolds—yellow and gold.</p> - -<p>“Oh how lovely they look,” Laura exclaimed burying her face in the -delicately-perfumed mass of phlox. She put her harvest on a rock and -helped Rosie with the more difficult work of gathering nasturtiums. The -vines and plants were now full of blossoms. It was impossible to keep -ahead of them. They picked all they could.</p> - -<p>“I hope Maida isn’t sick,” Laura said after a while.</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe she is,” Rosie reassured her.</p> - -<p>“I wonder if we ought not to go up to her room,” Laura mused. “Let’s!”</p> - -<p>Rosie reflected. “No, I think we’d better<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> wait until after we’ve come -back from the errands. Maida wants to be alone so seldom that I guess -we’d better not interrupt her. Besides I heard her slam her door hard -and then lock it. I guess that means she doesn’t want anybody around -for a time.”</p> - -<p>“I guess it does too,” Laura agreed. “It isn’t my turn to go to market, -but I’m going with you this morning, Rosie. It’ll give Maida a chance -to be alone for a while.”</p> - -<p>The little girls trundled their bicycles out of the barn; mounted them -and speeded down the long trail which led to the road.</p> - -<p class="space-above">In the meantime, Maida still remained in her room. She made her bed -with fierce determined motions, as though it were a work of destruction -rather than construction. She dusted her bureau with swift slapping -strokes. Then she sat down by the window. Why was she cross, she didn’t -know; but undoubtedly she <i>was</i> cross. She didn’t want to go anywhere; -she didn’t want to play games; to see anybody; least of all to talk. -Why—when ordinarily she was so sociable, she should have this feeling -she had no idea. Nevertheless it was there.</p> - -<p>From various directions, sound of voices<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> came to her; Rosie’s and -Laura’s from the garden; the boys from the barn; the little children -from House Rock. Rosie and Laura were nearer, but she could not hear -what they were saying. And of course she made no attempt to listen. -Later she heard them go around to the barn—she knew they were off on -the morning marketing. Still Maida continued to sit listlessly looking -out of the window.</p> - -<p>A long time seemed to go by.</p> - -<p>Presently she heard in the distance, the sound of Laura and Rosie -returning. They were evidently in a great state of excitement. She -could hear them chattering about something as they came up the trail to -the house. She did not feel like talking, but she knew it was her duty -to meet them, to apologize for her rudeness, to go on with the usual -games of the day. She caught the rattle with which the two girls put -their bicycles in place; then their swift rush to the kitchen. At the -door she got in Rosie’s high excited tones, “Where’s Maida, Granny?”</p> - -<p>“Still upstairs,” Granny answered. “I haven’t heard her stir.”</p> - -<p>“We’ve got something to tell her,” Rosie went on swiftly.</p> - -<p>“And the most dreadful thing has <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>happened,” Laura put in -simultaneously. Then talking together in phrases that broke one against -the other or overlapped, “A dreadful accident ... Silva Burle ... this -morning ... she was on her bicycle ... man just learning to run an -automobile ... knocked her off ... picked up senseless.... It happened -in front of Fosdick house ... took her in ... there now....”</p> - -<p>“How is the poor choild?” Maida heard Granny ask compassionately.</p> - -<p>“Nothing broken,” Laura answered eagerly, “but it was a long time -before she came to.”</p> - -<p>“She’s not unconscious any longer,” Rosie concluded the story. “She’s -asleep, but she moans and mutters all the time.”</p> - -<p>Maida listened, horrified. She felt that she ought to go downstairs and -talk with the girls. She felt that she ought to get on her bicycle, go -at once to see Silva.</p> - -<p>Apparently Mrs. Dore said something to that effect; for Rosie answered -promptly, “Oh no, nobody’s allowed to see her yet.”</p> - -<p>Somehow if she could not go to Silva, Maida did not feel like talking. -Not yet at any rate. Why not get away from the house until her strange -mood passed?</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XX</span> <span class="smaller">MAIDA’S FIND</span></h2> - -<p>Maida crept slowly out of her room; stole softly down the stairs; ran -quietly to a side entrance; opened the screen door gently; closed it -inaudibly; dashed down the trail to the Magic Mirror. She arrived at -the boathouse panting. But she did not wait to recover her breath. -Quickly she unlocked the door and pulled out one of the canoes, leaped -into it so swiftly that she almost upset it, paddled as rapidly as she -could towards the center of the lake.</p> - -<p>It was an unusually hot day. And paddling was hot work. The water -looked tempting. Maida battled with a temptation, which she had never -known before, to jump overboard just as she was in her fresh clean -dress and take a long swim. But she knew that Granny Flynn would -disapprove of this and she relinquished her project with a tired sigh. -She did not stop paddling until she reached the other side of the lake. -Then she drew the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> canoe in close to the shore, under an overhanging -tree; lay down in it; stared vacantly up at the sky.</p> - -<p>“I know what’s the matter with me,” she thought suddenly. “I’m tired. I -didn’t sleep well last night. I had a dreadful dream—Now what was that -dream? It was a nightmare really and it seemed to last so long. What -was it—Oh <i>what</i> was it?”</p> - -<p>She groped in her memory in the way one does to remember a haunting but -elusive dream. It was like trying, in pitch darkness, to pick out one -rag from scores of others in a rag bag. Then suddenly a ray of light -seemed to pierce that darkness and she put her hand on the right rag.</p> - -<p>Very late, long after midnight indeed, it seemed to her that somebody -came into her room, that she half-waked; spoke. That somebody did not -answer and she fell asleep again. Yes, she remembered now, that that -somebody seemed to come in through the window. She fell asleep and yet -not entirely asleep.... That somebody moved about the room ... looked -at everything.... That somebody stopped near the little hair-cloth -trunk which contained Lucy’s clothes. After a while ... that somebody -went away ... <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>through the window.... But all night long, a sense -of trouble and disturbance kept bringing Maida out of deep sleep to -ruffled wakefulness; then sent her back into a heavy and fatiguing -slumber.</p> - -<p>Thinking this over and staring up at the blue sky, Maida drifted off to -sleep. She woke—it must have been nearly two hours later—perfectly -refreshed. But she did not go back immediately to the Little House. -Instead, the sight of a columbine in the woods made her determine -to land. She knew that Rosie particularly loved the columbines and -pursuing, half absently, the trail which went to the Moraine, she soon -gathered a great armful.</p> - -<p>Maida became so absorbed in this pleasant duty of reparation that she -went further than she intended. In fact, it was with a real sense -of surprise—and a slight tingle of terror—that suddenly she found -herself at the approach to the Moraine itself. She had not been -there since the extraordinary day of the picnic and although she had -not let her mind dwell on the curious experience of that occasion, -she had by no means forgotten it. For a moment, she hesitated about -going further. And then she caught a glimpse, across the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> rust-brown -pine-needle-covered expanse, of a great clump of columbines faintly -nodding their delicate heads. Involuntarily Maida dashed across the -Moraine and picked them. More appeared beyond. She picked all these and -then just beyond, she caught sight of a tiny field of columbines. Maida -moved in their direction, plumped herself down in the midst of their -beautiful living carpet. It was cool there and quiet. The pines held -the sun out, although their needles were all filmed with iridescence; -but they let little glimpses of the sky through their branches. Some -strange wood insect burst into a long strident buzz.</p> - -<p>Suddenly there came, as though from the very ground under her feet, a -long wailing cry.</p> - -<p>Maida turned white. Her heart leaped so high that she felt with another -such impulse it would break through her chest. She jumped to her feet, -still clutching her flowers, raced across the Moraine into the path. -She had not gone very far before something stopped her; not an obstacle -but a thought. She had expected, remembering the day of the picnic, -that the voice would be joined by two others. This did not happen. That -first voice maintained its eerie call. The thought was, “That cry is -not the cry of anything frightening<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> like a goblin or a wild animal, or -a tramp—it is the wail of a baby.”</p> - -<p>Maida stood for a moment just where she had stopped. The cry began -again. Terror surged through Maida. But she clinched her hands and -made herself listen. Yes, that was what it was—the wail of a baby. -Could it be some little baby animal crying for its mother—a fawn -like Betsy’s or—and here Maida’s hair rose on her head again—a baby -bear? Her common sense immediately rejected this theory. There were no -bears in the woods. And if it were a baby deer, she would be ashamed -of being afraid of a baby deer when Betsy showed no fear. For another -interval she stood still fighting her cowardice. Then suddenly she -took her resolution in hand. “I’m going to find out <i>what</i> it is,” she -said aloud. Perhaps she was assisted in this by the cessation of the -mysterious wail. Only for a moment however! Her resolution received -another weakening blow by the sudden resumption of the uncanny noise. -But she did not actually stop, she only faltered. For the farther she -walked across the Moraine, the more it sounded like the crying of—not -a baby animal—but a regular baby. Suddenly all Maida’s fear vanished -forever. “I am not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> afraid any more,” she said to herself. And she -wasn’t.</p> - -<p>The hard thing was to discover where the cry came from. It seemed under -her feet. She plunged here, there, beyond—everywhere, looking up and -down but finding nothing. Then she began a more systematic search. -Starting with the very edge of the Moraine she took every rock as it -came along, searched around and over it, each clump of bushes, parted -them and walked through them. Still the cry kept up. Occasionally she -stopped to listen. “That baby’s sick,” she said once, and later, “I do -believe it’s hungry.”</p> - -<p>Ahead, a big rock thrust out of the earth like an elephant sitting on -its haunches. At one side, two bushes grew at so acute an angle and -with branches so thickly leaved, that the great surface of the rock was -concealed. Maida parted them.</p> - -<p>Underneath there was no rocky surface. The bushes concealed a small low -opening to what looked like a cave. Was it a cave? Where did it lead? -How far? Would—and again Maida’s heart spun with terror—would she -confront an enraged mother bear if she entered it? But these questions -all died in Maida’s mind. For, emerging undisputedly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> from the cave, -came the fretful cry of a baby.</p> - -<p>Without further question, Maida dropped to her hands and knees and -crawled into the opening. Crawled <i>down</i> rather; for the entrance -sloped at first. Then, it began to grow level. The crying grew louder.</p> - -<p>It was a big cave. The end was lost in shadow but in the light from the -entrance, Maida could see something lying, not far off, on a heap of -bed clothes. As she looked, a tiny hand came up and waved in the air. -Maida could not stand upright yet. But she hurried over to that tiny -hand. She was beginning to get the glimmer of a little white face.</p> - -<p>It <i>was</i> a baby.</p> - -<p>The baby put up its hands to her. Maida lifted it from the ground -and made rapidly backwards to the cave opening. It was a lovely -baby—Maida decided that at once—a girl, getting towards a year old, -brown-complexioned with a thick shock of dark hair and big brown eyes. -For a moment, it looked at Maida in surprise and even in baby distrust; -then it began to cry. Its open mouth displayed four little white teeth.</p> - -<p>Maida put the baby down on the soft grass in the shade of some bushes. -She returned to the cave. She found a candle there; some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> matches in an -iron box. She lighted the candle. There was one pile of baby clothes, -unironed though perfectly clean, but in tatters. Beside them was -another pile. Somehow these seemed familiar. Maida looked closely.</p> - -<p>They were Lucy’s clothes.</p> - -<p>Then—lightnings poured through Maida’s mind—It was not a -dream—Somebody had come into her room ... robbed her ... robbed little -Lucy.... But she must not think of that now, with a crying, perhaps a -starving baby on her hands. Further back was a bundle of hay, pressed -down as though somebody older slept there. There was a little alcohol -lamp and the materials for warming milk; milk bottles but no milk.</p> - -<p>Maida returned to the baby, who had resumed its crying; took it into -her lap; rocked it.</p> - -<p>What should she do? The baby must belong to somebody. But where was -that somebody? It was hungry now. She felt sure of that. It seemed to -her that she ought to take the baby home. And yet suppose the parent -should come back? Then she would be in the position of stealing a baby. -What should she do? She could not go off and leave it. Nor could she -stay indefinitely. She had not even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> told them at the Little House -where she was going. They would be worried about her. They would -think that, like Betsy, she was lost. Pretty soon they might send out -searching parties. How she regretted her pettishness of the morning. -And still if it had not been for that, she would not have come here; -would not have found the baby. What <i>should</i> she do?</p> - -<p>She put her hands over her eyes, as though shutting out the sight of -things made it easier to think. Perhaps it did. For suddenly it came to -her that the first thing to consider was the baby. Babies must not be -neglected. Babies must be fed. It was a serious matter for them to go -too long without their milk. Suddenly she pulled her little red morocco -diary from her pocket; tore out a page. With the little pencil that lay -in the loop of the diary she wrote:</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>I have taken your baby to my home—the Little House. It is at -the end of the trail just across the lake. I was afraid you had -deserted her and she would get sick and die. I am sorry if you are -worried, but you can have your baby at once by claiming her.</p></blockquote> - -<p>A phrase slipped from she knew not where into her mind. She concluded -with it: “and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> proving property.” She signed her own name and under it -wrote, “Daughter of Jerome Westabrook, financier.”</p> - -<p>Her mind made up, Maida worked quickly. Holding the baby in her -arms, she walked swiftly down the trail to the canoe. Here a problem -presented itself.</p> - -<p>She could not hold the baby in her arms, nor could she let the hot -sun of that hot August day pour on the little head. After a great -deal of difficulty and some maneuvering, she managed to stand up some -thickly-leaved branches so that they made a shade. She placed the baby -on one of the canoe cushions in its shadow; stepped into the canoe.</p> - -<p>Never had Maida paddled so carefully or so well. On the other side, -she tethered the canoe; lifted the baby out. She had cried all the way -across the lake and was still crying fitfully.</p> - -<p>“Somebody may come and break the canoe,” Maida surmised swiftly, “but I -can’t wait to put it away.” She hurried in the direction of the Little -House. “What a surprise I’ve got for them,” her thoughts ran. She was -toiling along slowly now, for by this time, the baby had grown heavy as -lead. Maida had to stop many times to rest her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> arms. Her back ached as -though it would break. “They’ll all want to keep this baby forever and -I wish we could.”</p> - -<p>But the surprise was not all for the others, nor indeed much as -compared with their surprise for Maida. For as Maida neared the house, -Rosie came flying down the path. Maida saw that her face was white and -that great tears were pouring down her cheeks.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Maida,” she sobbed, “where have you been? We’ve been looking -for you everywhere. A most terrible thing has happened. Poor Mrs. -Dore”—she burst for an instant into uncontrollable sobbing; then -composed herself, “—fell down the cellar stairs and broke her leg. -We’ve had a dreadful time—Where did you get that baby?”</p> - -<p>“In a cave,” Maida answered faintly. “Will you carry her, Rosie, I’m so -tired. Go on quickly. Tell me all about it—”</p> - -<p>Rosie took the baby into her expert arms; continued. “Well, Arthur -called up the Satuit doctor and he came with an ambulance and they’ve -taken her to the Satuit Center hospital. Granny Flynn had to go with -her—and we’re all alone. We’ll have to run the house ourselves until -Granny can get back. Poor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> Dicky feels dreadful and now we’ve got this -baby on our hands. Everything happens at once, doesn’t it? Gracious, -I’ll have to give this poor little thing something to eat right off. -That’s a hungry cry.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXI</span> <span class="smaller">TRAGEDY</span></h2> - -<p>Indoors was the scene and sound of confusion. Delia, sensing the panic -that lay in the atmosphere, was crying wildly for her mother. The -other children, unchecked, were running about the house in a game that -seemed an improvised combination of tag and hide-and-go-seek. Their -excited cries rang from above. Arthur was at the telephone trying -to get Central. Beside him, a pencil ready to take down anything of -importance, very wan-faced and pale, drooped Dicky. From the dining -room came the clatter of plates as Harold and Laura went practically to -work to set the table.</p> - -<p>Arthur stared at Maida and Rosie as they entered with their strange -bundle; stopped his telephoning to say, “Where did you get that baby?”</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you in a moment,” Maida said wearily, “but now we’ve got to -work fast and I never was so tired in my life. Oh Dicky<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> dear, I’m so -sorry for you! Poor, poor, Mrs. Dore and poor, poor Granny!”</p> - -<p>But it was Rosie who really took the situation in charge, Rosie who so -loved babies, Rosie who having helped so long in the care of her own -little brother, knew exactly what to do.</p> - -<p>“Tell Laura to get some milk from the ice chest, Arthur!” she commanded -crisply, “and warm it up on the stove as quickly as possible. Then -bring it upstairs to us. Maida, you come with me!” Rosie marched up to -the bathroom and Maida meekly followed. On the first floor, “Get Mrs. -Dore’s sewing board!” Rosie ordered and Maida got it. In the bathroom, -Rosie placed the sewing board across the tub, close to the hand bowl; -began to undress the baby.</p> - -<p>There were few things to take off. They were all loose, comparatively -clean, but ragged. Soon the little creature lay on the soft towels that -Rosie had spread on the sewing board, kicking feebly. The removal of -her clothes seemed to ease her. Her cry abated its violence a bit. Only -what was the translation of a baby sob came now and then. Rosie filled -the bowl with warm water, then with the gentlest of soothing strokes -and <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>using the softest sponge she could find, she began to bathe the -baby. Its crying died down completely. It responded to this cooling -treatment with a little soft coo that drew from Maida, “Oh the little -darling. Don’t you love her already, Rosie?”</p> - -<p>“I love all babies,” Rosie said in a business-like tone, sopping the -little girl’s downy head. She dried her carefully—deft little pattings -that seemed merely pettings—with the finest towel she could get.</p> - -<p>“Run to Mrs. Dore’s room and get Delia’s powder!” she commanded briefly -again. When Maida returned, she covered the little glowing form with -the cool powder. The baby’s eyelids began to droop.</p> - -<p>“See how sleepy it is,” Rosie said with a kind of triumph. “Ah there -comes Laura. Oh I wonder if she had the sense to put the milk in one of -Delia’s old bottles?”</p> - -<p>Laura had had the sense to do this, and was obviously proud of her -foresight. Very expertly, Rosie turned a few drops from the bottle onto -the back of her hand; decided it was not too hot; inserted the nipple -in the baby’s mouth. The little girl pulled on it like one famished; -pulled so hard and long and deep that Rosie had, once or twice, to take -the bottle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> away to keep her from choking. The little hands always -reached out for the bottle and after a few instants Rosie gave it to -her again.</p> - -<p>In the meantime, Maida answered the stream of Laura’s questions, and -Laura answered the torrent of Maida’s.</p> - -<p>The baby pulled continuously at the bottle. Rosie had to lift the lower -end higher and higher. After a long while, the baby dropped the nipple -with a little sigh of relaxation. Her eyes, which had been growing -heavier and heavier closed ... opened ... closed....</p> - -<p>Now she was asleep.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know what her feeding hours are,” Rosie said. “I’ll give her -another feeding at four this afternoon. I’m going to fix the alarm -clock so that I’ll wake at ten to-night, then I’ll let her go until -morning. I don’t believe she has more than one night feeding. Even if -she does, she can get along without it, one night. She seems famished -now though. I never saw such a hungry baby.”</p> - -<p>“You wake me up,” Maida said almost jealously. “Remember she’s <i>my</i> -baby.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Rosie agreed, “I’ll wake you.” She knit her satiny brows. “I -wonder whose baby she is? They must be awfully worried about her by -this time.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Oh, I left a note,” Maida protested.</p> - -<p>“Are you sure you left it where they’d see it?”</p> - -<p>Maida nodded. “I put a stone on it to hold it down and I surrounded it -by other pages that I tore out of my diary and put stones on them. You -could not fail to see it.”</p> - -<p>Rosie lifted the baby and carried it to her bed. “I don’t think she -could fall off,” she said. “But to make sure I’ll put chairs up against -her and bank her around with pillows. Now we’d better let her sleep.”</p> - -<p>In the meantime, Arthur had finished his telephoning. Mrs. Dore was as -well as could be expected; was resting quietly. The break was a simple -one. All she needed, in order to recover, was time and rest. The three -boys had managed to stop Delia’s sobs; had captured the five other -children and were keeping them quiet. Now they bombarded Maida with -questions.</p> - -<p>For the third time, Maida told the story of the baby. “Well, Maida, you -certainly were brave,” Laura declared, “to follow that noise until you -found out what it was. I would have run as fast as I could and as far -as I could. That is, if I hadn’t fainted.”</p> - -<p>“No,” Maida protested, “I wasn’t brave<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> I wish I had been. At first I -was as frightened as I could be. But when it flashed on me that it was -a baby crying, it didn’t take any courage to find out where the baby -was.”</p> - -<p>“I wonder whose baby it is,” Harold said.</p> - -<p>Everybody said this at least once, everybody except Arthur, but Arthur -said nothing. He was thinking hard.</p> - -<p>“Something queer happened to me the other night,” he broke out -suddenly. “I didn’t tell you all about it because—because—Well -somehow I couldn’t. I didn’t know what the answer was and I was ashamed -that a girl could beat me like that.”</p> - -<p>“Like what?” Rosie demanded. “What are you talking about? Oh, Arthur, -do tell us!”</p> - -<p>Arthur related in all its detail his experience with Silva Burle. “It -made me wild,” he admitted, “to think that a girl could find a path -that I couldn’t see and get away from me when I could run twice as fast -as she—Well not twice as fast,” he corrected himself honestly, “but a -great deal faster.”</p> - -<p>“Well of course Silva’s a queer girl,” was Rosie’s comment. She added, -“She won’t be running down any paths for some time yet I’m afraid, poor -thing!” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I think Silva had something to do with that baby,” Arthur guessed -shrewdly.</p> - -<p>“What nonsense!” Rosie said briskly. “What would she be doing taking -care of somebody’s baby in the woods?”</p> - -<p>“But she had a bottle of milk under her arm,” Arthur persisted.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Rosie said in an uncertain voice, “and that reminds me that I -have seen her before carrying bottles of milk.”</p> - -<p>“Oh I think somebody’s probably left that baby there for the day,” -Laura said, “some tramp—or somebody.”</p> - -<p>“But it must have been the baby crying that frightened us on the day of -the picnic,” Harold declared.</p> - -<p>“Well then,” Laura explained, “it was the same baby and the same -people, whoever they were, left the baby in the cave that day too.”</p> - -<p>The telephone rang. Arthur answered it. He listened for a moment, then -he said, “Yes, of course. We’ll be all right. Tell her not to worry.” -He turned to the others. “Poor Granny’s so upset that she wants to stay -near the hospital all night, so she can see Mrs. Dore the first thing -to-morrow morning. She asked if we could get along by ourselves until -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>Floribel came to-night and of course I said we could.”</p> - -<p>“Of course we can,” Maida reassured him.</p> - -<p>“Oh I’m so glad Granny can stay. It does seem as though everything came -at once.”</p> - -<p>“Things go by three’s,” Rosie asserted.</p> - -<p>“Well what are our three?” Maida inquired. “There was Mrs. Dore’s -accident, finding the baby and— What’s the third?”</p> - -<p>“You wait,” Rosie prophesied loftily, “It’ll come. But now the thing to -do is to get lunch. Thank goodness for all those cooking lessons we’ve -had. Don’t you remember, Maida, that your father said that we’d never -know when we’d be put in a situation that we’d be very glad we could -cook.”</p> - -<p>“What shall we have for luncheon?” Maida asked and her voice quavered a -little.</p> - -<p>“We’d better look into the ice chest and see what’s there,” suggested -the practical Laura.</p> - -<p>“Oh here’s all this nice stew left over from day before yesterday!” -Rosie’s head was concealed by the ice chest door but her tone was that -of one who has found diamonds. “That’s nice because all we’ve got to do -to that is warm it up. I’ll attend to the stew.”</p> - -<p>“And here’s some delicious tarts,” Laura exclaimed, “that Granny must -have made<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> this morning. We’ll have them for dessert.”</p> - -<p>“Now while I’m warming the stew,” Rosie commanded, “you two cut the -bread; fill the milk pitchers and put the butter on the table.”</p> - -<p>When they summoned the others to lunch, they found the seats all -changed about. This was the work of the practical Rosie. “You must each -of you take care of one of the children,” Rosie explained. “Now all of -you begin buttering the bread while I am dishing out the stew.”</p> - -<p>Laura had Betsy, and Dicky, Delia. Harold had one of the Clark twins -and Laura the other. Maida took care of both Timmie and Molly; so that -Rosie had nothing to do but serve.</p> - -<p>“My goodness, I never realized how much work Granny and Mrs. Dore do,” -Laura said once, “and how patient they are. Delia, that’s your fourth -slice of bread and butter. Now you <i>must</i> drink your milk.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXII</span> <span class="smaller">SILVA’S MESSAGE</span></h2> - -<p>“After the dishes are washed and wiped, let’s set the table for -supper,” Laura suggested. “Floribel will be so tired when she gets -home, and thinks of all the work she’ll have to do alone.”</p> - -<p>So the girls added this to the work they had already done.</p> - -<p>“Shall we go in bathing this afternoon?” Rosie asked when the last -knife and fork was in place.</p> - -<p>“You all go if you want,” Maida answered, “I don’t think I want to -swim. Somehow I feel as though I’d like to stay about the house. So -many things have happened that I’m worried about going away.”</p> - -<p>“So do I, Maida,” Laura agreed emphatically.</p> - -<p>So although the boys went in swimming as usual, the girls stayed at -home.</p> - -<p>“I feel tired, too,” Maida remarked. They took books from the library -and settled quietly in the Tree Room where they read and talked<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> all -the afternoon. They were interrupted twice—once by the boys who, as -though they had a responsibility too, cut their swimming short—and by -the baby.</p> - -<p>When the baby awoke, late in the afternoon, Rosie brought her -downstairs into the air for a while. They all declared that she looked -quite a different child. A tinge of pink had come into her soft brown -cheeks and the warmth and moisture of her nap had curled the brown hair -in her neck.</p> - -<p>“Oh you sweet <i>sweet</i> darling!” Maida kissed the little girl -ecstatically. “Oh how I wish your parents would give you to me! That’s -all we need in the Little House—a baby. Delia’s not quite little -enough.” She caught Delia and kissed her.</p> - -<p>“Delia bid dirl,” Delia protested.</p> - -<p>Even the boys were amused and entertained by their little visitor. -Arthur deigned to make faces for her. They amused her enormously, -and when Harold unloosed an ear-splitting whistle, she turned round, -delighted eyes in his direction. But that she was still tired was -evident; she kept falling into little naps.</p> - -<p>“I don’t think I’ll bathe her again so soon,” Rosie meditated with -knitted brows when they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> had taken her upstairs for the night. -“To-morrow I’ll give her a bath in the morning and another at night. -But now I’ll just wash her face and hands and let her have her bottle. -You do it this time, Maida and to-morrow,” added Rosie, generous -always, “we’ll take turns bathing and feeding her.”</p> - -<p>As they came downstairs Laura said, “I wonder what time it is. Oh half -past five!”</p> - -<p>“Five!” Maida exclaimed. “Why Floribel ought to have been home at five! -What train can she get now?”</p> - -<p>Nobody knew, but Arthur remembered there was a time-table in the -library. They clustered about him. To most of them it was as difficult -as Greek; but to Arthur, who had had some experience in traveling and -to Maida who had had a great deal, it did not seem insolvable.</p> - -<p>They puzzled over it together.</p> - -<p>“There’s a train at six from Boston and another at seven,” they finally -decided. “And that’s all.”</p> - -<p>“She must have lost the three from Boston,” Maida declared. “But the -six from Boston isn’t due here until eight. And in the meantime we’ll -have to get supper.”</p> - -<p>“Say let us boys help,” Arthur suggested.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> “It must be a big job -cooking for twelve. I know how to cook,” he added unexpectedly.</p> - -<p>“Where did you learn, Arthur?” Maida asked with interest.</p> - -<p>“Tramping with my father,” Arthur answered briefly. “We often camped in -the woods for days.”</p> - -<p>“Supper isn’t so hard as dinner,” Rosie said hopefully. “Now I propose -that we have a combination salad with hard-boiled eggs cut up in it. -You see there’s a lot of cold vegetables in the ice chest and we can -make a custard and orange pudding.”</p> - -<p>The whole group, three girls and three boys, bustled into the kitchen. -From a drawer full of aprons, Rosie took out enough for all of them. -The little girls wore the aprons as they should be worn, but in the -boys’ case, Rosie tied them around their necks. “I’ve seen boys cook -before,” she announced scornfully, “and when they get through, they -generally look as though they had fallen into a barrel of something.”</p> - -<p>The boys protested loudly. But to some extent Rosie’s pungent comment -seemed to be justified. Arthur for instance squeezed the orange juice -into his own eye. He yelled so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> loudly at this unexpected deluge that -Harold dropped an egg on his coat.</p> - -<p>“There I told you!” Rosie declared scathingly. “What did you pick out -an egg to drop for, Harold, why didn’t you drop a potato?”</p> - -<p>However pride goeth before destruction and the contemptuous Rosie was -soon caught up with; for clandestinely stealing a long sliver of ice -from the high ice box, she seized it in such a way that it slipped out -of her hand and dropped down her neck.</p> - -<p>“Serves you right,” Arthur declared with delight. With heartless -interest they all watched her wriggles before she was able to secure -and extricate the slippery, rapidly melting sliver.</p> - -<p>“You look as though you had had the hose squirted on you,” said Dicky.</p> - -<p>But their supper was good. The salad—lettuce with cold peas, string -beans, tomatoes and sliced eggs—was so pretty that Maida said she -thought it ought to be used as an ornament for the center of the table. -As for the custard and orange pudding—to which the gifted Laura had -added a delicious meringue—they ate and ate. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I never tasted anything so good in all my life,” Rosie sighed. “I wish -we’d made a bathtubful. Once I had a dream,” she went on pensively, -“where it looked as though I was going to have all the sweet things -to eat I wanted. I dreamed that when I came out in the morning to -go to school, the whole neighborhood was made of pink and white -candy—everything, houses, streets, lamp-posts. I took a big bite right -out of my fence.”</p> - -<p>“And what happened then?” Maida asked breathlessly.</p> - -<p>“I woke up, goose. Wouldn’t you <i>know</i> that that was what would happen -with a whole worldful of candy to be eaten?”</p> - -<p>After talking a while longer, they all filed into the living room; -began to look about for their books. Suddenly the telephone bell rang. -Maida was nearest. “I hope nothing else has happened,” she said as she -took off the receiver.</p> - -<p>“I want to talk with Maida Westabrook,” came a girl’s voice over -the wire to her. Strange it was and yet it had a familiar ring; the -strangeness was its weakness and its breathlessness.</p> - -<p>“I am Maida Westabrook.”</p> - -<p>“Listen! I must talk quick. They will be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> back and stop me. I am Silva -Burle. They think I am asleep. I have tried to tell them. They won’t -listen. They think I am raving. I’m not. I’ve got my senses. My baby -sister, Nesta, is in a cave on the other side of the lake. Tyma is -away. There’s nobody to feed her. She’ll starve—”</p> - -<p>“I found her this afternoon, Silva,” Maida interrupted. “She’s upstairs -in the Little House now—fast asleep.”</p> - -<p>“Oh!” Silva’s voice dropped almost as though she were faint. Then -suspiciously, “Are you saying this to me because you think I’m raving? -Oh tell me the truth. I ask God to be my witness that I am telling -<i>you</i> the truth.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, Silva,” Maida said steadily, “I am telling you the truth. I give -you my word of honor. I went across the lake this morning. I heard the -baby crying. I followed the sound and found her. Don’t worry any more -about her. We’ll keep her here just as long as you’re ill.” She started -to add the news of Mrs. Dore’s accident, of Granny’s and Floribel’s -absence, but a sudden discreet impulse bade her not to go on. Instead -she said, “How did you happen to have the baby in that cave?” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It’s a long story,” answered Silva weakly. “I can’t tell you now. Will -you come to see me to-morrow?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida agreed, “in the morning.”</p> - -<p>“You promise?” Silva’s weak voice entreated; it almost threatened.</p> - -<p>“I cross my throat and my heart!” Unseen by Silva, Maida solemnly -performed these rituals of the pledged word.</p> - -<p>“And you’re sure she’s all right?”</p> - -<p>“Sure,” Maida answered. “You ought to hear her laugh and coo.”</p> - -<p>“Ask her how often they feed her,” came from Rosie’s clear voice from -behind. Maida repeated the question.</p> - -<p>“Four times a day—at nine; at twelve; at three and at six, and then at -night.”</p> - -<p>“That’s what Rosie said,” Maida explained, “four in the day and one at -night.”</p> - -<p>“I can never thank you enough.” Silva’s voice had something in it that -Maida had never heard there before. “But some day— Here they are -coming up the stairs. I must get back to bed.” Silva’s voice cut off -quickly. Maida listened for a while, but there was no sound.</p> - -<p>A babble of questions assailed her when she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> dropped the receiver. She -told them all she knew.</p> - -<p>“Who would have thought that baby would have turned out to be Silva -Burle’s sister!” Rosie remarked thoughtfully.</p> - -<p>“Well now,” Laura prophesied with a faint lilt of triumph, “I guess she -won’t be so pig-headed.”</p> - -<p>“Nesta,” Maida said. “What a sweet name! I’ll go to-morrow morning -at—” And then the telephone rang again. Maida took the message. “It’s -Floribel,” she announced in a serious voice. “They’ve lost the last -train. We’ve got to get breakfast.”</p> - -<p>“If we’re going to get up as early as that,” Laura declared, “I’m going -to bed now. I’m so tired that I’m cross.”</p> - -<p>“I told you things always go by three’s,” Rosie triumphantly reminded -them.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXIII</span> <span class="smaller">SILVA’S STORY</span></h2> - -<p>When Maida woke up the next morning, it was to the sound of a baby’s -crying. It was not however a sick cry; it was a sleepy cry. She glanced -swiftly at the clock; then jumped out of bed. Rosie was standing in the -doorway, Nesta, wearing one of Delia’s nightgowns, in her arms.</p> - -<p>“You never woke me up, Rosie Brine,” Maida accused her friend.</p> - -<p>“I tried to,” Rosie replied. “Honest I did. But you couldn’t seem to -wake up. And when I realized what a day you had yesterday and what a -day might be before you, I thought it would be better to let you sleep. -Laura and I got breakfast. We’ve given the baby her bath and I am now -taking her to bed.”</p> - -<p>Maida kissed the little curly, dusky head. “She looks fine,” she said -approvingly. “I’m so glad I can give Silva such good news.”</p> - -<p>“What time did you say you had to call there?”</p> - -<p>“Ten o’clock.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It’s now half past eight,” Rosie said. “And here comes Laura with your -breakfast.”</p> - -<p>As Rosie disappeared with her sleeping burden, Laura appeared at the -stairs carrying a tray.</p> - -<p>“Hop back into bed, Maida Westabrook,” she said serenely. “You’re going -to have your breakfast in bed this morning—like a princess.”</p> - -<p>Maida meekly hopped back as ordered and Laura placed the tray on the -bed in front of her. On it, the peel so divided that it looked like a -great golden-petaled flower, was an orange; a dish of oatmeal; an egg -in an egg cup; two pieces of toast; a small pitcher of milk; sugar. -Around the plate was wreathed nasturtiums, flowers and leaves.</p> - -<p>“Oh how good it looks!” Maida said; and then after a few moments of -enthusiastic eating, “Oh, how good it <i>tastes</i>! How dainty you’ve made -this tray, Laura! I’m sure you’re going to be the best housekeeper -among us. You like housekeeping, don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“I just love it,” Laura replied.</p> - -<p>“I hate it.” Rosie who now reappeared in the doorway, declared -emphatically. “I wish you could buy blocks of dishes the way you buy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> -blocks of paper; so’s you could tear off a clean set for every meal; -then burn them up. I wish you could buy blocks of clothes just the same -way.”</p> - -<p>“What a queer thing you are, Rosie!” Laura exclaimed. “I just love to -have pretty things, crocheted and knit and embroidered—dainty china -and glass—and keep everything neat and shining.”</p> - -<p>Maida reflectively tapped the top of her egg; meditatively removed -the little bit of broken shell; absently salted and buttered it; -thoughtfully tasted it. “I don’t know what I like,” she declared after -a while, “I like to do anything—if I’m doing it with people I love. -But I just despise to do anything with people I don’t like.”</p> - -<p>An hour later, Maida, one foot on the pedal of her bicycle was -accepting last orders in regard to marketing from Rosie and Laura; -giving equally hurried advice to them.</p> - -<p>“Don’t forget to buy all the different kinds of berries you can find,” -Rosie said. “Berries make such an easy dessert.”</p> - -<p>“And oh, if there are any tomatoes yet, order all you can find, Maida,” -Laura chimed in. “I can make so many things with tomatoes:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> tomato and -macaroni; tomato and crackers; stewed tomatoes and boiled tomatoes.”</p> - -<p>“And don’t let the fire go out,” Maida replied, “and always have some -one near the telephone if anybody calls up. And remember, if the baby -doesn’t seem all right, telephone for the doctor at once. Get the -hospital on the telephone at nine o’clock and ask how Mrs. Dore is this -morning.” Then mounting her machine in a flash, Maida was off like a -bird.</p> - -<p>“Who would ever have thought,” Rosie said looking after her, “that the -Maida Westabrook who first came to Primrose Court—so pale and thin and -lame—would ever grow into such a strong girl? Do you remember, Laura?”</p> - -<p>“Of course I do. My mother didn’t think she was going to live.”</p> - -<p>In the meantime, Maida was proceeding down the dewy trail, the prey to -some worry but with a gradually-growing, comfortable feeling that her -troubles were all over and that now things would go smoothly. She did -all the marketing that had been intrusted to her and was even able, -being the first on the spot, to secure a basket of early tomatoes for -Laura.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> As for berries—they were everywhere. Maida ordered, a little -recklessly, blueberries, blackberries, currants. It was ten o’clock -as she had agreed—Maida was a very prompt little girl, having been -brought up to promptness by a business-like father—ten o’clock to the -dot, when she walked up the Fosdick path and knocked on the door by -means of a big brass knocker.</p> - -<p>A maid servant opened the door; but just behind appeared a white-haired -lady in a black silk and black silk mitts; a three-cornered bit of -black lace on her soft hair.</p> - -<p>“You are Maida Westabrook,” she said smiling, “and you have come to see -our little invalid. She’s awake and waiting for you. If you will follow -me, I will take you to her.”</p> - -<p>Maida followed Mrs. Fosdick up broad carpeted stairs and down a long -sunny hallway. At the very end, the old lady pushed open a door. Silva -was lying on a day couch, placed near a back window which overlooked -the garden. A light gayly-flowered down puff covered her. Silva looked -white but her strange amber-colored eyes seemed to hold a drop of fire.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Silva,” Maida said.</p> - -<p>“Good morning,” Silva answered, but she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> used the words awkwardly, like -one who has not been accustomed to this morning greeting.</p> - -<p>“I’m glad you are better,” Maida went on and then paused in a little -embarrassment. After an instant in which Silva said nothing she added, -“How did it happen?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Fosdick interrupted. “I am going to leave you little girls alone -to talk. I know you’ll have things to tell each other,” her kind old -eyes smiled understandingly, “that you don’t want grown-ups to hear.”</p> - -<p>“Oh no,” Maida said involuntarily but this was only instinctive -politeness on her part. She very much desired to be alone with Silva. -Silva was apparently too honest to say anything. She waited until Mrs. -Fosdick’s footsteps were lost to hearing. Then she pulled herself -upright with a sudden jerk. “How’s Nesta?” she asked breathlessly.</p> - -<p>“She’s all right. She slept all night long without waking once—except -when Rosie fed her at ten—and this morning she looks as sweet and -dainty as a rose-bud. Don’t worry about Nesta, Silva. She’s all right. -It’s you we’re worrying about.”</p> - -<p>But this did not appear to interest Silva. “How did you find her?” she -demanded.</p> - -<p>Maida told the story of her visit to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> Moraine Land, not leaving out -a detail. Silva listened intently, her strange eyes unwinkingly fixed -on Maida’s face. “What time was this?” Silva asked.</p> - -<p>Maida told her.</p> - -<p>“Oh she only missed one feeding then,” Silva said in a tone of acute -relief. “You can just imagine,” she went on, “when I came out of the -faint enough to remember about the baby, how I felt. I tried to tell -them here about Nesta, but nobody would listen to me. They thought I -was raving and I can’t blame them for that of course. I begged them, I -screamed at them; then suddenly I thought of you—why I don’t know. But -somehow I knew I could trust you. I asked them to call you up or let me -call you up. But they wouldn’t. ‘There! There!’ they would say, ‘Lie -down and sleep! You’ll be all right in the morning.’ Oh what I went -through! I thought I was going crazy! And then I heard somebody using -the telephone in the hall. And when they left me to go down to dinner, -I crept out and called you up. Nobody heard me. They don’t know yet -that I telephoned. I told them last night that I knew you’d come this -morning.”</p> - -<p>“It must have made you dizzy to stand up,” Maida said sympathetically. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It did. At first I thought I couldn’t stand it. But I had to do it and -so I did. You are sure Nesta is all right?”</p> - -<p>“<i>Sure!</i>” Maida reiterated, smiling. “But why didn’t you call up Aunt -Save?”</p> - -<p>“She was at the Warneford Fair. They all went. Tyma went too. Aunt -Save’s telling fortunes. Tyma and I have been making baskets for a -month. He thought he could probably sell them all in three days. We -talked it all over. One of us had to go and the other to stay with the -baby and of course I was the one to stay with Nesta. Tyma won’t be back -until to-morrow.”</p> - -<p>“But I don’t understand why Nesta was in the cave,” Maida declared in a -puzzled tone.</p> - -<p>Silva closed her eyes for a moment and she sighed. It was a long sigh -and a weary one to come from a little girl’s lips.</p> - -<p>“We’ve kept her there a month,” she said. “We stole her—Tyma and I.”</p> - -<p>“<i>Stole</i> her!” Maida echoed in a shocked tone. “Stole her! From whom?”</p> - -<p>“From my father,” Silva answered and two big tears formed slowly in her -eyes. They hung on the end of her long lashes but they did not drop. -Maida handed Silva her handkerchief. Silva wiped the tears away. No -more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> came, and she went on with her story in a perfectly composed way.</p> - -<p>“It’s a queer story to tell and—and I’m so ashamed. You see my -mother died last February when Nesta was about three months old. -After mother’s death, we had all the care of her—Tyma and I. It was -very hard because my father—” She stopped for an instant and seemed -to choke on what she was going to say. Then she went on steadily. -“My father began to get drunk—more and more— But that wasn’t the -worst. He began to treat us badly—and I was always worried about -Nesta—sometimes I was afraid he’d hurt her— Sometimes—” She stopped -and looked at Maida imploringly.</p> - -<p>Maida nodded as though she understood.</p> - -<p>“He was worse to Tyma though, and so Tyma ran away. He joined Aunt Save -and she told him to stay with them. One day he was exploring the woods -and he discovered that cave. Well things got worse and worse at home— -And— And— And then father told me he was going to be married again. I -didn’t like the—the one he was going to marry. I knew she didn’t mind -his drinking. She—used to drink too. She didn’t like me—nor Tyma—nor -Nesta. I could see that she didn’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> want the care of Nesta. Tyma and I -could take care of ourselves, but I knew she would be cruel to Nesta.”</p> - -<p>Silva paused; for this time it was Maida’s eyes that filled. Silva held -out Maida’s handkerchief and Maida took it; and wiped her tears away.</p> - -<p>“Go on,” Maida said.</p> - -<p>“Tyma came back one night very late. Father never knew he was there. -He threw pebbles against my window and I came out and talked to him. -He told me a plan. It was for us to run away and take Nesta with us -and keep her hidden in the cave. He said he’d take the baby first. -Then after a few days, I was to go to live with Aunt Save. You see if -I was to run away with the baby, father would know. But if the baby -was stolen while I was with him and when he thought Tyma was with Aunt -Save, he could not blame it onto either of us.”</p> - -<p>“Oh Silva!” Maida gasped. “What a terrible thing to do— I mean—” She -thought an instant. “What a terrible thing to <i>have</i> to do! How could -you do it? I couldn’t.”</p> - -<p>“You can do anything,” Silva said in a voice strangely stern in one so -young, “if you have to do it. So we planned it all very carefully.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> -Tyma went back to Aunt Save and then he returned a few nights later. -While I was in the field with father, he took the baby and went back -with her to Satuit; put her in the cave. He went by night and almost -always through the woods. Nobody saw him. When Aunt Save woke up the -next morning, Tyma was in his tent.”</p> - -<p>“What did your father say?”</p> - -<p>“He was wild. He thought at once it was Tyma and he went over to see -Aunt Save. Tyma was there, but of course there was no baby about. Aunt -Save said that Tyma had no baby with him and father knew that Aunt Save -wouldn’t lie to him. She asked father if he didn’t want me to come and -live with her as long as he was going to get married. Father said yes -and when he came back, he told me to go to Aunt Save. He gave me my car -fare and I went.”</p> - -<p>“Didn’t he do anything more to find the baby?” Maida asked in a -horrified tone.</p> - -<p>“Oh yes—he hunted everywhere—he talked about her all the time. And -then after ten days or so he told the police and there were articles in -the newspapers with his picture and Nesta’s—it didn’t look anything -like her. Reporters came to see him. But after a while<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> nobody cared. -People don’t care what happens to gypsies.” Silva’s voice was bitter. -“Then he got married and as his wife didn’t want Nesta, he stopped -bothering about her.”</p> - -<p>“And do you mean to tell me,” Maida said in an awed voice, “that you -kept the baby in the cave nearly two months?”</p> - -<p>“Ever since just after you children came to the Little House. We were -planning to steal Nesta when we saw you first. That’s why we had to -be so hateful to you— We had to do everything we could to keep you -away from the cave. That’s why we acted so terribly that first day -when you were swimming in the lake and that’s why we broke your canoes -and that’s why we stole all your lunch the day of the picnic. That -day, Tyma was in the cave with the baby and I was bringing a bottle -of milk and a little doll for her. She was too little to play with a -doll, but I wanted her to have one. Rosie Brine caught sight of me. I -dodged around the bushes and got into the cave. I think she would have -thought she imagined me if I hadn’t dropped the doll. Tyma and I sat -there trembling.... And then we realized that you were going to eat -your lunches right near.... The baby was asleep; but we were frightened -to death for fear she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> would wake up and cry ... and then the idea -came to us to steal your lunches ... and ruin everything so you would -think tramps had been there.... And then the baby <i>did</i> cry.... Oh how -frightened we were! Tyma and I clung to each other and the same idea -came to us both at once. I began to moan very loud. And so did Tyma. -And then you couldn’t trace the sound and it frightened you and you all -ran away. Tyma said you would never come back and you didn’t. That is, -except one night, when I saw Arthur Duncan.”</p> - -<p>“I never heard or read anything like this,” Maida declared solemnly. -“How did you manage to take care of the baby—and bathe her and feed -her?”</p> - -<p>“It was very hard,” Silva said simply. “Tyma and I took turns in -spending the night in the cave. Aunt Save never knew; for we waited -until everybody was asleep before we left the camp. I used to go once -in the morning to heat water and bathe her and once in the afternoon to -take her out in the sunlight. We made baskets all the time so that we -could buy milk. Getting the milk to her though without being seen—Oh -how we had to plan! I bought a little lamp and heated her milk over it. -And then I was so worried! I knew<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> it was going to be very troublesome -in a little while because it was only a question of time before Nesta -would creep. Fortunately she was backward about everything—especially -walking. We planned to barricade the front of the cave. But what we -should do when winter came, we could not guess. And then we were so -bothered about clothes—” Silva stopped and cast her eyes downward. -“This is so hard to tell you!”</p> - -<p>“Go on!” Maida urged.</p> - -<p>“I broke into your house night before last, and stole some doll -clothes. That first day you came to visit Aunt Save, I heard you -talking with her about a doll you had as big as a baby, and how you -kept her clothes in a little hair-cloth trunk under your window in your -room. I watched the house until I found out which room was yours. There -was a great tree in front of it. And that night, when everybody had -gone to sleep, I climbed in your window and took all the doll clothes. -You see some nights were rainy and I was afraid she wouldn’t be warm -enough. Please excuse me if you can. I will give them all back.”</p> - -<p>Maida was silent for an instant struggling with the situation too -complicated for her young mind. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Of course,” she said at last in a tremulous voice, “stealing is always -wrong. I would have given you Lucy’s clothes if you had asked me for -them.”</p> - -<p>“I didn’t know that you would,” Silva faltered. “And I didn’t dare tell -you about Nesta.”</p> - -<p>“Of course I saw Lucy’s clothes in the cave,” Maida went on. Her eyes -were downcast. “Let’s not speak of it again. Very likely, I would have -done the same thing if I had been in your place— Only I suppose I -wouldn’t have stolen the baby in the beginning.” She paused and then -added honestly, “But perhaps that’s only because I wouldn’t have had -the courage. What are you going to do now— I mean when you get well?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know—” Silva answered drearily. “I’ll have to wait until -Tyma comes back. Everybody’ll know then. Aunt Save will make me write -to father that I have Nesta. He’ll take Nesta away from me and that -dreadful woman will have the care of her—”</p> - -<p>And now Silva put her head in the hollow of her elbow and sobbed. But -they were not the sobs of a child. They were hard and tearless. They -shook Silva’s whole body. Maida rushed to her side. She put her arms -about<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> Silva; kissed her again and again. “Don’t think of it any more, -Silva dear,” she begged. “I know it isn’t as bad as you fancy. Will you -let me tell my father about it? My father is a wonderful man. It is -almost as though he had magic power—like a genie. He’ll find some way -out for you, I’m sure. Will you let me tell him?”</p> - -<p>It was some moments before Silva’s whispered “Yes” came from between -her racking sobs. But very soon thereafter she sat up. “Here comes -somebody,” she whispered. “Please don’t say anything about Nesta.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXIV</span> <span class="smaller">GUESTS</span></h2> - -<p>When Maida turned the bend in the path just before it came out on the -Little House, she found Rosie, Laura, Arthur, Harold and Dicky drawn up -in a straight soldier-like line.</p> - -<p>“We have to report that—” they all chanted in a solemn voice.</p> - -<p>“Mother is very comfortable and will return to us in a week,” announced -the radiant Dicky.</p> - -<p>“Granny Flynn has come back,” announced the beaming Laura.</p> - -<p>“Floribel is in the kitchen,” announced the smiling Harold.</p> - -<p>“Zeke is in the garden,” announced the triumphant Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Your father is in the living room waiting for you,” announced the -sparkling Rosie.</p> - -<p>“My father!” Maida exclaimed in a happy voice. “My father! Oh what a -blessing that is!” She dropped her bicycle. “Oh Rosie, will you put my -wheel away for me? I want to see my father so much.” She didn’t wait<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> -for Rosie’s hearty, “Yes, of course, goose!” but raced across the grass.</p> - -<p>In a few minutes an unprecedented activity broke out in the Little -House. Down stairs in the living room, Mr. Westabrook, who had been -most of the time glued to the telephone, was still telephoning. -Up-stairs in the Little House, Floribel was getting the spare room -ready for one guest. Up-stairs in the barn, Zeke was putting up a cot -for another. In the kitchen, Rosie was frantically making popovers. -Between the flower garden and the spare room, Laura and Maida were -swinging like a pair of active pendulums, decorating with flowers. -Outside on lawn and in vegetable garden, the boys were working -frantically putting everything in what Rosie called “apple pie order.” -Everywhere the smaller children, to whom for the moment nobody was -paying any attention, were getting in everybody’s way.</p> - -<p>About noon the big gray limousine appeared at the end of the trail. -Zeke hurried down to it. He and Botkins lifted out the slight figure -lying in the back, bore it up the path to the house and over the stairs -to the guest chamber. An excited queue of children—all the young -inhabitants of the Little House in fact—followed. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span></p> - -<p>“All right, Silva?” Maida was enquiring and to Silva’s faint “Yes,” -Rosie was saying, “We’re all awfully glad you’re going to be here -with us,” and “Just as soon as you are well enough, you’ve got to -teach us how to make those beautiful baskets,” Laura was contributing. -The boys didn’t seem to be able to do anything but they were making -attempts—highly unsuccessful ones to be sure—to assist the two men.</p> - -<p>Up-stairs, they left Silva alone with the girls. Maida immediately took -off the long rusty coat that Silva was wearing, her worn and stained -middy blouse; her ragged skirt; undressed her; put on first one of her -own simple white nightgowns and over it her favorite dressing gown -of organdie muslin with pink ribbon. Laura brought a pair of pink -bed shoes; slipped them on Silva’s slender feet. Rosie contributed a -boudoir cap of white lace with pink ribbons which she had managed to -fashion in the hour they had waited for Silva. And then in answer to -the beseeching look in Silva’s eyes, Rosie brought the cooing little -Nesta and put her in her sister’s arms.</p> - -<p>“My father is going to send for your father, Silva,” Maida explained. -“He is going to ask him to let you and Tyma and the baby stay<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> with -us. Your father will say yes, Silva—people always say yes to my -father—and then if you like us, we want you to live with us as long as -we stay here.”</p> - -<p>“Only a few weeks longer,” Rosie added in a wailing voice, “then school -begins.”</p> - -<p>Silva, only half hearing, was kissing her little sister with violent -flurries of kisses. And her eyes were filling with tears. She made no -effort to check them because that would have been impossible. Finally -she put her head down on the arm of her chair and cried. The others -kept a frightened silence. Rosie, recovering first, noiselessly removed -Nesta. Silva made no attempt to keep her. Maida slipped into the -bathroom and came back with a wet face cloth and a towel; proceeded -to bathe Silva’s face. Silva submitted meekly. Laura disappeared and -returned with a bottle of toilet water with which she sprinkled Silva.</p> - -<p>“Oh you are so good to me,” Silva said when she could control her -voice. “And when I think of how I treated you— I didn’t want to -though. I—I had to. But when I’m well, I’ll gladly show you how to -make baskets. And I know where the berries grow thickest and biggest -... I’ll take you to all my secret places ... I do thank you! I do! I -do! With all my heart!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXV</span> <span class="smaller">THE END OF SUMMER</span></h2> - -<p>Outside all was wind, rain, confusion and destruction. Occasionally a -bough came crashing down to earth and always the branches of the great -tree beside Maida’s window, rubbed against the house. The wind veered -and whirled. One moment the rain was coming, like a shower of bullets, -against the window of one side; the next it was lashing, like a bundle -of twigs, against the glass of another.</p> - -<p>Inside was warmth, light, laughter and conversation. The older children -sat about the big fireplace in the living room. Rosie was on her knees -there, busily wielding a corn popper. Beside her sat Laura toasting -macaroons on the end of a long fork. Silva and Maida were bringing in -great pans of molasses candy which simply refused to cool. The boys -were fanning it in an effort to bring it to the tasting point. The -little children were running about, looking at books, or playing games, -according to their tastes, perfectly confident, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> ever, that the -relentless hour of eight o’clock could be put off this one evening. -Mrs. Dore, quite herself again, was rocking Delia who had given way to -premature fatigue. In the midst of all this excitement Granny Flynn -read tranquilly from her <i>Lives of the Saints</i>.</p> - -<p>“I can’t believe the summer is over,” Rosie exclaimed suddenly. “I -<i>won’t</i> believe it! Oh why can’t things like this go on for ever?”</p> - -<p>“I couldn’t believe it either,” Laura declared, “until this storm came. -The weather has been so warm up to now that I wouldn’t believe autumn -had come. But to-day and yesterday have been fallish.”</p> - -<p>“Autumn’s here,” Silva said, “when the goldenrod and asters come.”</p> - -<p>“I know it,” Maida agreed mournfully. “How glad I am when flowers -come and how sorry I am when they go! It makes you know that summer -is flying just to watch them disappear. If the flowers only stayed -after they came, you wouldn’t notice it so much. But they don’t. They -go—first the dandelions and then the violets; and then the daisies and -buttercups and wild roses and iris; then the elderberry and sumach; and -then the goldenrod and asters. But as soon as each one of these stops -blooming, you realize that <i>that</i><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> part of the summer is gone. And as -soon as you see the red rose hips—” she twisted her hand through the -long necklace of crimson berries that she was wearing, “—then you know -that the fall has begun.”</p> - -<p>“I never thought of that before,” Laura exclaimed. “Wouldn’t it be -perfectly beautiful if they stayed until the end of the summer, even -the dandelions? Perhaps there wouldn’t be room for them all though.”</p> - -<p>“This storm makes me think of fall all right,” Arthur said.</p> - -<p>“Yes, and this fire,” Dicky chimed in.</p> - -<p>“It makes me think of <i>school</i>,” Harold declared.</p> - -<p>Everybody groaned.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps it’s the popcorn,” Rosie said, “and the apples. But somehow -I feel to-night just as though it were Halloween night. Oh, do you -remember the beautiful party we had at Laura’s last Halloween?”</p> - -<p>“Do I?” Maida answered. “I should say I did. It was the first Halloween -party I ever went to. I shall remember it as long as I live. I remember -sitting in the window of the Little Shop and watching all the pumpkin -lanterns come bobbing along Primrose Court. Oh how lovely it was!” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It doesn’t seem possible,” Rosie reiterated dreamily, although she -was vigorously shaking the popper, “that next Sunday night means -Charlestown again, and Monday morning, horrid school once more. -How shall we ever get used to being kept indoors? I shall stifle. -I shall miss everything—oh dreadfully. But the thing I shall miss -most is my lovely little room, out-of-doors. Oh no, it isn’t that,” -she contradicted herself, “the thing I shall miss most is the cave. -Everything that happens to us is like a story book; but the cave is -most like a story book of all. Oh how sorry I was when we came to the -end of it! I did so hope it would be a Mammoth Cave with a great big -river in it and fish without eyes and chambers with stalactites and -stalagmites.”</p> - -<p>“If it had been,” Tyma Burle said shrewdly, “people would have been -coming all the time to look at it and it wouldn’t be our cave any -longer. I have enjoyed tennis most of anything,” Tyma went on. “I think -it is the greatest game in the world.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t wonder you like tennis,” Laura exclaimed, “when you can beat -everybody at it. Oh, how mad it still makes me to think that when I’ve -been playing tennis for two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> years that Tyma has to give himself a -handicap when he plays with me.”</p> - -<p>Everybody laughed. They were always amused by the spectacle on the -tennis court of Laura’s rages when Tyma beat her so easily.</p> - -<p>“I have enjoyed the deer most,” Arthur declared.</p> - -<p>This specification of enjoyment had developed to a game now. Arthur -went on. “Having those deer about is the most like Robin Hood of -anything I’ve ever known. It’s like stories you read in Kipling -and Stevenson. When I come across a group of them in the woods, I -feel—well I give it up—I don’t know how I feel.”</p> - -<p>“I know what Dicky enjoys most,” Maida said.</p> - -<p>“What?” Dicky demanded.</p> - -<p>“The white peacocks.”</p> - -<p>Dicky admitted it. “But the swimming and the canoeing and the tennis, -too,” he added as though a little jealous for these new sports of his. -“But of course the white peacocks most— Well, if Arthur thinks the -deer are like adventure stories I think the peacocks are like all the -fairy stories in the world come true. What do you enjoy most, Maida?” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span></p> - -<p>Maida thought carefully. “Everything! Having all of you here.”</p> - -<p>“Oh but what special thing, Maida?” Rosie pleaded. “There’s always one -thing you like better than others.”</p> - -<p>“Betsy’s badness, then,” Maida admitted. “I’ve never laughed so much in -all my life as at the things Betsy does. You see when I was a little -girl, I was so sick that I never did anything really naughty but -Betsy—Oh she’s such fun!”</p> - -<p>“I’ve enjoyed the keeping house part most,” Laura stated with -enthusiasm. “I never had the chance before to cook all the things I -wanted in a real kitchen—and dust rooms—and arrange things—and put -the flowers about. I just love setting the table for Sunday night -supper.”</p> - -<p>“I hate it,” burst out Rosie. “I hate every single thing you like, -Laura. But I’m glad you like it because then I don’t have to do it.” -Rosie poured the popper-full of white corn into a big brown bowl. “Now -don’t all grab at once!” She commanded, as a half-a-dozen eager hands -reached towards the table. “Wait until I pour melted butter on it. That -makes it perfectly <i>scrumptious</i>! There you are!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> Now each one of you -take a plate, and spoon the corn out on it.”</p> - -<p>The bowl passed rapidly from hand to hand. Rosie embedded her sharp -little teeth into the shining coral of a Baldwin apple. “Oh what a good -apple!” she said.</p> - -<p>“What did you enjoy most, Silva?” Maida asked curiously, her mouth full -of popcorn.</p> - -<p>“Oh, living in a house!” Silva answered instantly. “You don’t know -what fun that is to me. All my life I have lived either in a tent or a -wagon. All my life I have longed to live in a house with lace curtains -in the windows. How I love that little room of mine I can’t tell you! -And yet at first—Do you know—I was afraid I couldn’t stand it? It -seemed as though the walls were pressing in on me and I couldn’t get -enough air. Many and many a night, I got up and went downstairs in the -middle of the night and slept in the hammock. Sometimes I felt like a -bird in a cage—as if I was beating my wings the way I’ve seen birds -do.”</p> - -<p>“I’ve never got quite used to it,” Tyma confessed. “Sometimes, even now -I have to get up in the middle of the night and go out and sleep on the -grass.”</p> - -<p>“My!” Rosie exclaimed. “I should think<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> that would be a hard bed. What -have you enjoyed most, Harold?”</p> - -<p>“Oh going all over the country on my bicycle,” Harold explained. “You -see always before we have gone to Marblehead Neck and you always have -to go so far before you come to any new country. But here you start out -in any direction and you are somewhere else before you know it.”</p> - -<p>The little children who, as the popcorn approached the eating point, -had been lured out of the room, now came in to say good night. As usual -they were rebellious about going to bed; but were comforted by the -promise of a long train-ride next Sunday. As Arthur tactfully concealed -the popcorn under his chair and Tyma mimicking him, shoved the apples -under the couch, the good nights were effected without tragedy.</p> - -<p>“How well they all look!” Maida said proudly. “They are as freckled and -sun-burned as they can be and fat as little butterballs!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span>CHAPTER XXVI</span> <span class="smaller">PROMISE</span></h2> - -<p>“What are you going to do in the winter, Maida?” Rosie asked.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know,” Maida answered. “Father hasn’t made up his mind yet and -it all depends of course upon what he is going to do.”</p> - -<p>“Then if he went to Europe, you’d go too?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Maida admitted. “But I don’t think we’ll go to Europe. At -least,” she added conscientiously, “he hasn’t said we would. I don’t -know what we’ll do.”</p> - -<p>“But if you don’t go to Europe, will you go to school?” Silva asked.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know,” Maida responded. “Perhaps I’ll have a governess.”</p> - -<p>“What would you rather do, Maida?” persisted Rosie.</p> - -<p>“I think I’d rather go to school,” Maida answered honestly.</p> - -<p>“And what kind of a school?” Rosie kept it up.</p> - -<p>“Oh the school you all go to—in Charlestown. I’d love that.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Oh how I wish your father would let you,” Rosie declared fervently. -“Wouldn’t it be fun? But then you know all they could teach you there. -You know geography and history and literature.”</p> - -<p>“Oh but my arithmetic is dreadful,” Maida declared, “and my spelling, -and father says he is perfectly ashamed of my writing.”</p> - -<p>“But you speak French,” Laura said enviously, “and Italian!”</p> - -<p>“A very little Italian,” Maida confessed.</p> - -<p>“But you can read fairy tales in French,” Dicky said. “Oh what a lucky -girl!”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I <i>do</i> think I’m lucky in that,” Maida agreed with him.</p> - -<p>“And if you aren’t very good in arithmetic, you know all about English -and French and Italian money,” Harold asserted. “I think that’s great!”</p> - -<p>“It’s very easy to learn that,” Maida said deprecatingly. “How I wish I -knew fractions and percentage and square root—like you, Rosie.”</p> - -<p>“Rosie was the smartest girl in the room in arithmetic,” Dicky -declared. “She could beat any one of us, and as for mental -arithmetic—whew! And she always won in the spelling matches.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I never was in a spelling match in my life,” Maida said in a grieved -tone. “How I should enjoy it—except of course that I’d fail in the -first word they gave me.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” Dicky informed her, “they always give you something like -<i>receive</i> and <i>believe</i> or <i>Mississippi</i> or <i>separate</i>! I shall never -learn how to spell <i>separate</i> as long as I live.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you how to remember it,” Harold offered. “You know there’s a -city in South America called Para. Well, I always remember that there’s -a Para right in the middle of separate.”</p> - -<p>“Gee that makes it easy!” Dicky’s voice was grateful. “I won’t forget -that.” After an instant he added, “I hate school!”</p> - -<p>“So do I,” said Rosie.</p> - -<p>“So do I,” said Laura.</p> - -<p>“So do I,” said Arthur.</p> - -<p>“So do I,” said Harold.</p> - -<p>“I never went to school,” Maida said sadly.</p> - -<p>“Nor I,” admitted Silva.</p> - -<p>“Nor I,” admitted Tyma.</p> - -<p>“You’d want to go to school if you’d never had the chance,” Maida -announced to the quartette of discontented ones. “Isn’t that true?” She -appealed to Silva and Tyma.</p> - -<p>They both nodded. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Everybody wants what he doesn’t have,” Rosie said eagerly. “Now I -should like to travel like Maida.”</p> - -<p>“Who wouldn’t!” exclaimed Laura and Arthur together.</p> - -<p>“And I’d like to have a tutor,” Dicky declared. “Somebody to read to -you and answer all your questions. I should think that would be great.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe you would like school long, Maida,” Rosie went on. “At -least if you went to the same kind of school we go to. Isn’t that so, -Arthur?”</p> - -<p>Arthur nodded. “They’re no fun.”</p> - -<p>“When the teacher puts the arithmetic problems on the blackboard,” -Rosie said, “I always get them done in five minutes. I’m good in -arithmetic and they’re almost always correct. Then there’s nothing for -me to do until the rest of the children have finished but read in my -Reader that I’ve read through a million times; or my Geography that I -have read just as often; or in the Supplementary Reading that I know -just as well.”</p> - -<p>“That’s stupid,” Maida decided reflectively.</p> - -<p>“And then, when we have to write compositions, I nearly die,” Rosie -went on in the same discontented vein. “I hate <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span>compositions. I never -can think of anything to say. I always have to stay after school—”</p> - -<p>“Why Rosie, you write the most <i>wonderful</i> letters,” Maida protested. -“Oh how I enjoyed getting them abroad! You told me all the things I -wanted to know and how I used to laugh at them too.”</p> - -<p>“Oh well, letters aren’t writing!” Rosie said scornfully. “Anybody can -write letters.”</p> - -<p>“I can’t,” Arthur declared, “I hate writing letters.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t think it’s easy to write letters,” Laura interrupted, -“although Maida and Rosie do it so easily. I think they’re just as hard -as a composition. If you can write a letter, you ought to be able to -write a composition, and if you can write a composition, you ought to -be able to write a letter.”</p> - -<p>“And then,” Arthur went on with the argument, “geography is so dull in -school. You never learn about the places you’d like to know about—like -Gibraltar and the Desert of Sahara and the North Pole and the jungles -of Africa and the Great Wall of China, and the Mammoth Cave and the -Grand Cañon. Or history. Now I’d like to study about Richard Cœur de -Lion and Robert Bruce and William Tell and Thermopylæ and the Alamo and -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> Battle of Hastings and Waterloo and Gettysburg. But you never get -anything about them.”</p> - -<p>“Gracious!” Rosie commented, “I don’t even know what those are.”</p> - -<p>“Sometimes I like school,” Dicky said hesitatingly.</p> - -<p>“That’s because you have only gone to school one year,” Laura declared -scornfully.</p> - -<p>“Well I’d rather be with you in a school that wasn’t very interesting,” -Maida persisted, “than not be with you at all. Now next summer in the -Little House—”</p> - -<p>“Next summer!” Rosie interrupted. “<i>Oh Maida, is there going to be a -next summer?</i>”</p> - -<p>“Is there going to be a next summer?” Maida repeated. She stared about -the circle of faces; all very intent; all waiting almost with hushed -breath, for her reply. “Of course there’s going to be a next summer. -What made you think there wasn’t?”</p> - -<p>“You never said once there was going to be a next summer,” Dicky -accused her out of the hubbub which succeeded this statement. “Oh I -could jump up and down!”</p> - -<p>“I <i>shall</i> jump up and down,” Rosie announced—and did until the glass -pendants to the candelabra tinkled. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p> - -<p>Maida could only repeat feebly, “But of course there’s going to be a -next summer. It never occurred to me to tell you so. I thought you -understood.”</p> - -<p>“Not only a next summer, but next summers,” a voice said back of them.</p> - -<p>They all started and then jumped to their feet. Mr. Westabrook, coming -in very quietly, had apparently caught much of their discussion.</p> - -<p>“A whole line of summers, all in a row,” he added as he took the easy -chair which Arthur pushed into the middle of the circle for him. He -helped himself to popcorn from the plate which Rosie filled and placed -in his lap; took one of the apples which Laura offered him; a piece of -the molasses candy which Tyma pressed upon him. “You’ve got a permanent -engagement with us every summer.”</p> - -<p>Again Rosie did what Dicky had threatened to do—she jumped up and -down. Laura danced the whole length of the room, turning out one after -another a series of the most beautiful pirouettes. Silva did not move -except to lean forward and stare intently at Mr. Westabrook. The boys -drew their chairs in a circle closer about him.</p> - -<p>“So you don’t think schools are very <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>interesting?” Buffalo Westabrook -went on, bending his eagle glance on Arthur.</p> - -<p>“Not any I have ever been to,” Arthur answered promptly.</p> - -<p>“Do you think they could be made interesting?” Mr. Westabrook went on.</p> - -<p>“I’m not sure they could,” Arthur answered.</p> - -<p>But Rosie broke in with an impulsive, “Of course they could.”</p> - -<p>“How?” Mr. Westabrook asked with his disturbing brevity.</p> - -<p>“By letting you study the things you want, in the way you want to study -them,” Rosie answered immediately.</p> - -<p>“I guess that’s as good an answer as I could get,” Mr. Westabrook -admitted. “What would you say,” he went on very slowly after a pause, -“if we tried to have such a school as that <i>here</i>?” He continued -apparently unconscious of the excitement which was developing in his -hearers. “A school where, as Rosie says, you could study the things -you want to study, in the way you want to study them. A school with -plenty of books to read and dictionaries and encyclopedias and books -of reference to consult. A book with all the newest maps and globes. A -school with plenty of travel and discovery and exploration. A<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> school -with gardens to grow. A school with a magic lantern, an aquarium, and—”</p> - -<p>Maida could contain herself no longer. “Father,” she burst out, “you’re -going to have such a school for us!”</p> - -<p>“I’ve got it,” Buffalo announced. “And you’re all going to that school -this winter.”</p> - -<p>“Oh my goodness,” Rosie said in a quiet awed voice, “if anything else -happens I shall die of happiness.”</p> - -<p>“Do our fathers and mothers know?” Laura asked.</p> - -<p>“Know,” Mr. Westabrook repeated, though very tranquilly, “they helped -to decide what you should study there.”</p> - -<p>“And we won’t be separated after all,” Dicky declared in a voice shaken -with happiness.</p> - -<p>“No.”</p> - -<p>“What’s the name of the school?” Harold asked.</p> - -<p>“It hasn’t any name yet,” Mr. Westabrook answered.</p> - -<p>“I know what to call it,” Arthur said, his face lighting up. “We’ve -had <i>Maida’s Little Shop</i> and <i>Maida’s Little House</i>. Why not call it -<i>Maida’s Little School</i>?”</p> - -<p class="center">THE END</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/ad1.jpg" alt="Three Stories of Fun and Friendship" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/ad2.jpg" alt="The MARY and JERRY MYSTERY STORIES" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/ad3.jpg" alt="THE MARY JANE SERIES" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/ad4.jpg" alt="BOOKS FOR GIRLS" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div lang='en' xml:lang='en'> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK <span lang='' xml:lang=''>MAIDA'S LITTLE HOUSE</span> ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law 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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