Cricket at the Seashore Part 25

"'Tell it,' urged Phoebe, good-naturedly.

"'Well, then,' I began, desperately,--but I could not say it. I hesitated, and then added, quickly:

"'I said I wondered how Phoebe Dawson always managed to keep herself looking so nice!'

"A little surprised look, then a laugh, went around the cla.s.s. Every one knew that I was not speaking the truth, and I dare say Miss Abbie knew it herself. She cast a very sharp glance at me, but, nevertheless, dismissed the cla.s.s. Every one surrounded me in the cloak-room, laughing, and teasing me about what I had said. But I only waited till Miss Sarah was at liberty, and then I went to her and told her the story. I was very angry, and in a state of great indignation against Miss Abbie, and finally I burst out with, 'She made me tell that lie, herself!'

"'Hush! my dear!' Miss Sarah said, gravely. 'If you think, you will see that the trouble was that your sense of politeness was stronger than your sense of truth. Again, if you hadn't broken the rule about whispering in cla.s.s in the first place, nothing would have happened. So I think we won't blame Miss Abbie. I will tell her about it myself, and nothing more will be said about it to you.'

"I thought Miss Sarah was very good and kind, but my conscience troubled me very much. Phoebe Dawson, too, made me feel thoroughly ashamed of myself. When she came to school the next day she brought me this lovely string of beads, which she said her uncle had brought her home from India.

"'You had all that trouble on my account yesterday,' she said, in her good-natured way, 'so I brought you these to make up. My uncle brings me quant.i.ties of things, so you must take these, to please me,' for, of course, I protested against taking them.

"'You needn't have minded about telling what you really did say,' she went on. 'I know I'm dreadfully untidy, but if I had a mother, or a sister, or any one to look out for me, I'd be different, perhaps,' and her eyes filled with tears.

"Well, I grew very fond of Phoebe Dawson after that, and soon I went to see her. She had a lovely home, full of beautiful things, but everything was as untidy and uncared for as she was herself. Phoebe's mother had died when she was a baby, and her father was a great scholar, who was always buried in his books, and the two servants managed things as they liked. But Phoebe improved very much as she grew older, and we remained friends always."

"Is she living now?" asked Cricket, turning over the beads with interest.

"No, she died several years ago, and she was the grandmother of your little friend, Emily Drayton."

"_Was_ she? How funny! And what was the lesson you learned, grandma?"

"You may guess that for yourself," said grandma, smiling. "Will you choose again?"

CHAPTER XVI.

TWO LITTLE RUNAWAYS.

Cricket dived into the box again.

"What's in this paper?" she asked.

Grandma took the folded sheet, and carefully opened it. There were two soft curls of bright gold hair, fastened to the middle of it by sealing wax.

"These are two little curls I cut from the children's heads when they were small. _My_ children, I mean. Your mamma's and Auntie Jean's. It was the first time their hair was ever cut, and how badly I felt, to have to have it done!"

"But why did you do it?" asked Cricket.

"Naughty little things! I had to."

"Oh, _do_ tell me about that. I just love hearing about mamma when she was naughty!" begged Cricket, turning over the soft gold curls. "It's just exactly like Kenneth's and Helen's, isn't it? And mamma's hair isn't very much darker, now, is it? What a shame you had to cut it!"

"Indeed it was. I was so proud of their lovely hair, and they were such lovely children, everybody said. They were little things. Auntie Jean was nearly five, and your mamma was three. I was visiting my sister in Philadelphia with them both. It was in May, but it was very warm. The children were still in the habit of taking an afternoon nap. One day they were put to bed, as usual, about two o'clock, and my sister and myself went down-town for some shopping. I had a new nursemaid, whom I left in charge, of course. But she was careless, I suppose, and probably went down-stairs to gossip with the other servants.

"Presently the children woke up, and as they found there was no one with them, they slipped off the bed by themselves. They were entirely undressed and in their little night-clothes, with bare feet. They ran around up-stairs for a while, and then, finding n.o.body about, they ran down-stairs. The front door stood ajar, so out they slipped, and pattered away down the street. They were always independent children, and not a bit afraid of anything, so when they found they were out all alone by themselves, they decided to go and 'see uncle.' They had been taken to his office down-town several times. My sister lived in what was then a very quiet part of Philadelphia, and near their home were several vacant lots. The children strayed in here to pick some gra.s.ses and weeds, which they thought were flowers.

"Unfortunately, a lot of burdocks grew there, and, of course, the children picked them, and stuck them together, with great delight.

Probably some of them got caught accidentally in the hair of one of them, for, as far as we could make out from their story afterwards, they twisted them in each other's curls, till there was just a mat of burs, all over their heads. Then, of course, when they tried to take them out, they only made matters worse, so they gave it up and trotted on.

Presently they came to a grocery store, where all sorts of things stood outside of the door.

"Strawberries were in the market, so these little wretches instantly plunged both hands into a box of them, and stuffed them into their mouths. Next they sat themselves down in a corner made by some big boxes, and quietly helped themselves to a box of strawberries apiece.

You can imagine the state of their little night-dresses, when they were through with this feast, just a ma.s.s of strawberry stain. They were so small and so quiet, that no one in the store noticed them for some time, and no one chanced to pa.s.s. At last a lady came by, and spied them. Of course she instantly saw they were runaways, and spoke to them.

"'We isn't yunning away,' Jean insisted, 'we is only going to see uncle.'

"'But where is your mamma?' persisted the lady.

"'Her's gone to see uncle, too,' said Jean. The lady knew they had probably run away from some neighbouring house, so she went into the store to ask a clerk to come and see if he knew them. But while she was gone, the children slipped away down the side street. The clerk told us all about this afterwards, for it was a store where my sister often went.

"Then the little ones probably wandered around a good deal, though we never knew where, except that they came to some water in a gutter, somewhere, and took to it like ducks. They must have paddled in it for some time--'washing their feets,' Jean told us afterwards, as an excuse.

"Of course, by this time they had collected a crowd around them, for just imagine what they looked like! Nothing on but white night-dresses--I mean, of course, that were originally white,--but now spattered a foot deep with muddy water, and stained all over with crushed strawberries; and they were barefooted, with their golden curls stuck full of burs, till they looked like little porcupines."

"_Grandma_! how funny! and to think that was mamma," broke in Cricket, in great enjoyment of the picture.

"They must have looked as badly as Zaidee and Helen did when they came in from swimming in the tanks at the cheese factory the other day."

"Worse, if anything, because the strawberry stains made them look as if they had been through the wars, poor little mites. At last a policeman took them in charge."

"Think of mamma being actually arrested! That's worse than anything that's ever happened to me," said Cricket.

"That's your good fortune," laughed grandma. "Your wash-rag isn't getting along very fast, is it? I thought you were going to knit as I talk."

"Oh, I am! I am!" cried Cricket, scrabbling up her wash-rag, which she had entirely forgotten. "Go on, grandma."

"So a policeman took them in charge. He said the children didn't seem a bit frightened, but took everything very coolly, insisting all the time that they were on the way to see uncle.

"'Who is uncle?' asked the policeman, and Jean said: 'He's Uncle Darling, and he lives on Wide Stweet.'

"'But what's his name?' asked the policeman, thinking the children were calling him by their pet name.

"'Uncle Darling,' Jean kept repeating.

"'We'll take them to the station, and report at headquarters,' said the policeman, finally."

"Think of mamma's actually being taken to the lock-up," murmured Cricket.

"But the children were very determined little things, and insisted that they were going to Wide Stweet to see uncle. Presently a gentleman pa.s.sed, and asked the reason of the commotion.

"'Runaways,' somebody answered, whereupon Jean instantly piped up, 'I say I _isn't_ yunning away. I is goin' to Wide Stweet to see Uncle Darling.'

"'Darling?' said the gentleman. 'I know Darling of Broad Street. These little sc.r.a.ps must have slipped away from his house. Call a cab, policeman, and we'll go and see.'

"So a cab was called, and the policeman mounted the box, and the man got inside with the children, and off they went to Broad Street, which Jean called Wide Stweet.