A Christmas Child Part 13

He stooped down and untied the knots of the large checked handkerchief in which the unfortunate pie had been enveloped. The dish was all in pieces, the gravy fast disappearing. Jamie gathered together, using the largest bit of the broken stoneware as a plate, some of the pieces of meat which might still be eaten, and Ted, stooping down too, helped him to the best of his ability. But it was very little that could be saved from the shipwreck. And then the two boys turned in the direction of Jamie's home, Jamie sobbing all the way, and Ted himself too appalled to know what to say to comfort him.

Jamie's mother was a busy, hard-working woman. She was kind to her children, but that is not to say that they never had a sharp word from her. And there were so many of them--more than enough to try the patience of a mother less worried by other cares. So poor Jamie had some reason to cry, and he did not attempt to prevent Ted's going home with him--alone he would hardly have dared to face the expected scolding.

She was at the door, or just inside it, as the boys made their appearance, with a big tub before her in which she was washing up some odds and ends, without which her numerous family could not have made their usual tidy appearance at church and Sunday school the next day.

For it was Sat.u.r.day, often a rather trying day to heads of households in every cla.s.s. But Jim's mother was in pretty good spirits. She had got on with her work, Sunday's pie had been made early and sent on to granny's, and Jamie, who was a very careful messenger, would be back with it immediately, all ready to be eaten cold with hot potatoes the next day. So Sunday's dinner was off the good woman's mind, when suddenly a startling vision met her gaze. There was Jamie, red-eyed and tearful, coming down the road, and beside him the little Master from the Lawn House. What could be the matter? Jamie had not hurt _himself_, thus much was evident, but what was the small and shapeless bundle he was carrying in the handkerchief she had given him to cover the pie, and what had come over the nice clean handkerchief itself? The poor woman's heart gave a great throb of vexation.

"What ever have ye done with the pie, Jamie?" she exclaimed first in her anxiety, though she then turned in haste to bid the little master "good morning."

"O mother," Jamie began, his sobs bursting out afresh, but Ted put him gently aside.

"Let me tell," he said. "I came on purpose. If--if you please," he went on eagerly, though his fair face flushed a little, "it was all my fault.

I gave Jim a little poke with my stick, quite in fun, and somehow it made him drop the pie. But it isn't his fault. You won't scold _him_, please, will you?"

Vexed as she was, Jamie's mother could not but feel softened. Ted's friendly ways were well known to his poorer neighbours, who with one voice p.r.o.nounced him "a perfect little gentleman wherever he goes."

"It's not much use scolding," she said gently enough, but still with real distress in her tone which went to Ted's heart. "No use crying over spilt milk, as my master says. But still I do think Jamie might have been more careful. However, it can't be helped, but they'll have to do without a pie for dinner to-morrow. And thank you, Master Ted, for coming along of Jim for to tell me."

"But it wasn't Jim's fault. It was _all_ mine," repeated Ted sadly. And then he bade the poor woman good-bye, and nodding to Jim, who was still wiping his eyes, though looking a good deal less frightened, the boy set off towards home again.

But how different everything looked--the sun was as bright, the air as pleasant as ten minutes before, but Ted's heart was heavy, and when at the garden gate he met his mother, who greeted him with her kind smile and asked him if he had settled with Newton about the seat, it was all poor Ted could do not to burst into tears. He was running past his mother into the house, with a hasty "Yes, thank you, mother, I'll tell you about it afterwards," for he had not yet made up his mind what he should say or do; it was his own fault, and he must suffer for it, that was his first idea, but his mother stopped him. The momentary glance at his face had been sufficient to show her that something was the matter.

"What is it, Ted, dear?" she said kindly and anxiously.

Ted's answer was a question, and a very queer question.

"Mother," he said, "how much do pies cost?"

"Pies," repeated his mother, "what kind of pies do you mean? Big ones, little ones, meat ones, or what?"

"Big ones, mother, at least _a_ big one, and all made of meat, with crust at the top. And oh!" he exclaimed, "there was the dish! I daresay that cost a good deal," and his face grew sadder and sadder.

But his mother told him he really must explain, and so he did. "I didn't mean to tell you about it, mother," he said, "for it was my own fault, and telling you seems almost like asking for the money," and here poor Ted's face grew red again. "I thought the only thing to do was to take the _act_ money, the two shillings and sevenpence, you know, mother, and give it to Jamie's mother, and just give up having the seat," and here Ted's repressed feelings were too much for him. He turned away his face and fairly burst into tears. Give up the seat! Think of all that meant to him, poor boy. The pleasure for Cissy as well as his own, the delightful surprise to Percy, the rows of stick-sticks for his uncle. I don't think it was wonderful that Ted burst into tears.

"My poor boy," said his mother, and then she thought it over to herself for a little. She did not begin talking to Ted about how careless he had been, and that it must be a lesson to him, and so on, as many even very kind mothers are sometimes tempted to do, when, as _does_ happen now and then in this rather contrary world, very small wrongdoings have very big results,--she could not feel that Ted had been much to blame, and she was quite sure it _would_ be "a lesson to him," without her saying any more about it. So she just thought it over quietly, and then said,

"No, Ted. I don't quite think that would be right. Your giving up the seat would be punishing others as well as yourself--Cissy particularly--and that would not be right. I will see that Jamie and his brothers and sisters have something for their dinner to-morrow that will please them as much as the pie, and you must tell Newton to go on with the seat, and----"

"But, mother," interrupted Ted, "I won't be happy unless I pay it myself, the dinner I mean. It wouldn't be _fair_, if I didn't--would it, mother?" and he looked up with his honest, anxious blue eyes in his mother's face, so that she felt the same wish to stoop down and kiss him that had made her do so long ago in the street of the little country town near their old home.

"I was going on to speak about that," said his mother. "It will take all your money and a little more to pay Newton, you see, and you haven't any more."

"No, mother, but if I was to give up my library pennies?"--for Ted subscribed a penny a week to a children's library in the town, as he had long ago exhausted the home stores.

"That would take a _very_ long time, and it would be a pity for you to lose your reading," said his mother. "But I'll tell you what--I will count the dinner as owing from you to me, and you will pay it as best you can, little by little. For every summer you get presents from your uncles or cousins when they are with us. I will count it two shillings and sixpence--the sixpence for the dish, and I know you will not forget to pay me."

"No indeed, mother, and thank you _so_ much," said Ted, with a now really lightened heart. "Shall I tell Jamie about the dinner? I could go that way when I go back to Newton's. He will be so pleased. His mother didn't scold him, but yet I couldn't help being _very_ sorry for him.

His face did look so unhappy."

And when, after dinner, Ted ran off again, I think the pleasure of the good news in store for poor Jamie was quite as much in his mind as his own errand to Newton's.

The seat was a great success. Newton came that very evening to measure it exactly, and Ted had the satisfaction of making some suggestions which the carpenter thought very good ones, as to the best way of fastening it firmly. And on Monday evening the work was accomplished.

Never, surely, were two birds in a nest more happy than Ted and Cissy, when, for the first time, they mounted up on to their airy throne. Their mother, busy among her flowers, was surprised by a sound of soft singing over her head, coming from at first she could not tell where. She stood still to listen--she had, for the moment, forgotten about the perch in the tree. But the words and the tune soon told her who it was. It was Ted at his old favourite, "Home, sweet home." Sweetly and softly his boyish voice rang out. The tears came into his mother's eyes, but she moved away silently. She did not want the children to know she was there. It seemed to take away the simplicity of his pretty singing for him to know that _any one_, even his mother, had been listening.

"He is very fond of music," she said to herself, "no doubt he has great taste for it," and the thought gave her pleasure. She pictured to herself happy future days when Ted and Cissy would be able to play and sing together--when as "big people," the brother and sister would continue the tender friendship that she liked so much to see.

Monday evening was too late to begin the important paper for Uncle Ted.

But on Tuesday the children were up with the lark, armed with a long ruled sheet, divided by lines across the other way, into what Ted called several "compartments," a pencil or two, for though Cissy could not make figures, she could make little strokes, each of which stood for a one _something_. The words at the head of the "compartments" comprised everything which, with the slightest probability, _could_ be expected to journey along the highroad. Men, women, boys, girls, babies in perambulators, babies in nurses' arms; old women with baskets were considered a separate genus, and had a row to themselves; carts with one horse, waggons with two, donkeys, dogs, pigs, cats, wheelbarrows. And at one side Ted carefully marked the hour at which began and ended the "observations." For, alas! the children could not be _all_ day at their post, though they did gravely purpose that they should take it in turn to go in to dinner, so that no pa.s.sers-by should be unrecorded. But that mother could not agree to. Dinner must be eaten, and with as much deliberation and propriety as usual, or else what was an interest and a pleasure would have to be discouraged. And after all it was rather nice to have the paper exhibited and commented upon as they all sat round the luncheon-table, though Cissy looked as if she were not _quite_ sure that she should not take offence for Ted, when one of the big people inquired why there wasn't a row for elephants and another for dancing-bears.

The long summer afternoon was spent in the same way. Never surely had such a delightful occupation for two small people br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with life and energy, been discovered. Two birds busied with arranging their nest could not have been more completely content.

"If this goes on," said the children's mother, laughing, when they did condescend to come in to tea, "I think we had better send a mattress and a pillow up to your seat, and let you stay there all night."

Ted and Cissy smiled, and in their hearts I rather think they were of opinion that what their mother proposed would be very nice. But, eager as they were, they were both very hungry, and it was evident that living in a tree did not destroy their appet.i.te, for the quant.i.ty of slices of bread and b.u.t.ter which disappeared would have alarmed any one unaccustomed to the feats of little people in that way.

And tea over, off they set again. It was almost as if they were away on a visit somewhere, the house seemed so quiet, and the garden, so often at that time of day the scene of tremendous romps in which even nurse herself was coaxed to join, quite deserted. _Unless_--that is to say--you had pa.s.sed under a certain tree and stood still to listen to the clatter going on overhead, though, thanks to the leafy branches, there was nothing to be _seen_.

"Can there be magpies up in that tree?" would, I think, have been your first idea. And then, listening a little more attentively, you would have come to think that whether human or feathered they were very funny magpies indeed.

"Fifteen, _sixteen_, that makes. Hurrah, sixteen dogs since ten o'clock this morning. And, let's see, seven old women with baskets, and----"

"Them wasn't all _old_," corrects the small voice of magpie number two; "Jessie wif the eggs isn't old."

"Never mind; if they've got baskets they _should_ be old," replies Ted. "An old woman with a basket _sounds_ right. Then there's five p'rambulators, oh, it _is_ a long word to spell--it goes right out of its place into the other rows. I wish I'd just put 'babies in p'rams.'

And then there's three pigs and horses, oh dear I can't count how many.

It's getting too dark to see the strokes on the paper. I say, Cissy, just you get down and run in and ask for two or three dips. We can stick them up on the wall and have a beautiful lighting up, and then we can see everybody that pa.s.ses."

Down clambered obedient Cissy--she was growing very alert by this time at making her way up and down--off she set to the house with her message.

"Dips, dips," she repeated to herself. "Ted says I'm to ask for two or three dips. I wonder what dips is."

She had not the slightest idea, but it never occurred to her to do otherwise than exactly what her brother had said. It was a funny little figure that presented itself to the children's mother, in the twilight, just as she was putting away her work and thinking it was really time for Ted and Cissy to come in, a shawl wrapped round and tied behind over her white pinafore, of which the part that could be seen was by no means as clean as it might have been, any more than the eager flushed little face, with its bright dark eyes and wavy hair tumbling over the forehead.

"My dear Cissy, what a _very_ dirty little girl you are," said her mother, laughing. "You really look more like a gipsy than anything else."

"Does dipsies live up trees?" inquired Cissy gravely. "Trees _is_ rather dirty. But oh, mother, Ted wants me to ask you for two or three dips.

_P'ease_ give me zem."

"_Dips_," repeated her mother, "what in the world does he want dips for?"

"Cissy doesn't know," replied the little girl. "Cissy doesn't know what dips is. Cissy finks Ted said he would 'tick zem up on ze wall, to make it look pitty."

Her mother was very much amused.

"Dips are candles," she said. "I suppose Ted wants to light up the tree."

Her words made a light break over Cissy's face in the first place.

"Oh ses," said the little maiden, "it is getting so dark. Oh _do_ give Ted some dips, _dear_ mother--do, _do_."