Carroll Watson Rankin

“ Barney followed. Together they picked their way along the crumbling wharf. Something brown—a warm brown that caught the glow from the afternoon sun—was curled on Captain Blossom's doorstep. When you've traveled for two nights and spent a long day outdoors on a breezy wharf, exploring all the haunts of your childhood, sleep comes easily. There was Jeanne, her head on her elbow, sound asleep.
Barney took one good look at the small, brunette face; and then, as if all the bad dreams he had ever had, had gotten after him at once, fled up the steep bank behind Old Captain's car and was gone. ”

“ Peter and Sarah used to dream a beautiful dream of living together always, and of going down, hand in hand to a peaceful, plentiful old age. You see, they had no other relative but one very cross grandmother, who scolded them both even oftener than they deserved—which was probably quite often enough—so I suspect that those abused, black-eyed, half-starved children loved each other more than most brothers and sisters do."
"Yes," agreed Mrs. Crane, nodding her head and smiling mistily, "they certainly did. The poor young things had no one else to love." ”

“ The girls laughed. Mabel always looked on the gloomiest side of things and always grumbled. She seemed to thrive on it, however, for she was built very much like a barrel and her cheeks were like a pair of round red apples. She was always honest, if a little too frank in expressing her opinions, and the girls liked her in spite of her blunt ways. She was the youngest of the quartette, being only eleven.
"There doesn't seem to be much grass left after the weeds are out," said Bettie, surveying the bare, sandy patch she had made.
"This has always been a weedy old place," replied Jean. ”

“ I'd like to live here."
"So would I," agreed Jean.
"Wouldn't it be nice," asked Marjory, "if we could come here to camp?"
"We're here now," returned matter-of-fact Mabel. "Let's pretend we really are camping."
"Look at the lake!" exclaimed Jean, suddenly. "It isn't blue any more—it's all gray and silver."
"And all the ripples are gone," observed Henrietta. "See how flat and smooth it is and how lazy it is along the edges. And the sand is turning pink!"
[35]
"Hush!" warned quick-eared Marjory. "I think Mr. Black's calling us—yes, he's waving the tablecloth!" ”

“ Mabel comes next, then Jean, then Bettie; I'm the darkest, because Bettie's eyes are like brown velvet, but mine are black, like bits of hard coal. Where does Rosa Marie come in?"
"I think," said Marjory, with an air of pondering deeply, "that Rosa Marie is almost, if not quite, as dark as you; even darker, perhaps. But her hair isn't as curly."
"Dear little soul," breathed Henrietta, tenderly. "I've a tremendous liking for babies, but they're pretty scarce at our house. ”

“ Dark as a gipsy, with glowing crimson cheeks, bright black eyes with curling lashes, soft black hair that grew naturally in pleasing curls neatly tied back with a broad black ribbon; a shapely, graceful figure possessing to an unusual degree an atmosphere of style. The girls were all well dressed, mostly in blue serge, but this fifth young person, Henrietta Bedford, wore her clothes with a different air. One realized that the serge in her smartly cut frock was a degree finer than that in Mabel’s rumpled middy or in Marjory’s very brief skirt. ”

“ Directly back of the Payson lot stood a huge ice-house, painted dark red and relieved by only one solitary aperture, which might as well have been left out, since it was always closely shuttered by a rough door, also painted red. The sheltered garden, however, was now just exactly the place for tender young seedlings and for Selma, who was never so happy, apparently, as when, her indoor work done, she was down on her knees transplanting infant pansies and youthful lettuces. ”

“ Mabel hated to be laughed at.
"I can rhyme," cried Mabel, springing to her feet and giving vent to all her grievances at once. "My table manners are good. I'm not fat. I've got just as much waist as you have."
"You've got more," shrieked delighted Laura.
Faithless Marjory, struck by this indubitable truth, laughed outright.
"You—you can't make Indian-bead chains," sputtered Mabel, trying hard to find something crushing to say. "You can't make pan-cakes. You can't drive nails." ”

“ A tiny bit of beach had formed below the sloping bank of fine cinders and never were young trees more useful than those in the two clumps of shrubbery that screened this little patch of sandy beach. The shallow water was pleasantly warm.
"Me first! Me first!" shrieked Annie, who had wriggled out of her solitary garment, and was already wading recklessly in.
"Ladies first, always," said Jeannette. "Mike, you and Sammy go behind that bush and undress. Then you can paddle about until I'm ready to soap you. Here, Patsy! Keep out of the water until I get your clothes off. ”

“ When the fortunate but unappreciative traveler who had been sitting directly opposite the young woman arose to leave the train, Emsleigh promptly took possession of the vacated seat.
“Gad! What an all-around pretty girl!” said Emsleigh, gazing stealthily over the top of his paper. “She makes me think of apple-blossoms, new-mown hay and all that sort of thing. There's no reason why I shouldn't spend my vacation in her town, wherever that town may be. I'd like to know that girl—she's as sweet as a garden of roses.” ”

“ Mrs. Mapes, Doctor and Mrs. Tucker, and the Bennetts were delighted with Pete's Patch and went quite wild over the scenery; but it was clear to everybody that Henrietta's decidedly aristocratic little grandmother and Marjory's overwhelmingly neat Aunty Jane had never been intended by nature for camp life. Mrs. Slater, to be sure, enjoyed the fine sky, the wonderful expanse of blue water, the beautiful golden-brown river, and the deep, cool forest. ”

“ Jean, stooping suddenly, kissed the upturned lips.
"Why!" exclaimed Jean, genuinely surprised, "I didn't know I was going to do that."
"She gets around everybody," said Mrs. Slater, "and the worst of it is she's so good and so naughty that you'll never know whether you like her or not."
"Why, Grannie!" exclaimed Henrietta, "don't you know?"
"I know that I like you," said the old lady, smiling fondly at pretty, whimsical Henrietta, "but you know very well that I also regard you with strong disapproval. ”

“ Every one liked Miss Blossom, the pleasant young woman who had spent a summer in Lakeville and had played in Dandelion Cottage with Jean, Bettie, Marjory and Mabel; and had later paid them a visit at Pete’s Patch, where she had met pretty Henrietta.
Never was teacher more popular. Before long, almost every girl in the school was completely in love with the charming young woman. And now, some of the girls who had listened most credulously to Gladys’s unpleasant tales about the Lakeville children, began, little by little, to doubt these tales. ”

“ Half a dozen steps down the grassy dock and Jeanne stood stock-still. The lake! There, all big and clear and blue. And just the same—her lake!
A great big lump in her throat and suddenly the lake became so misty that she couldn't see it.
"What a goose-y thing to do," said surprised Jeanne, wiping away the fog; "when I'm glad all the way to my heels. I didn't believe folks really cried for joy; but I guess they do. I wonder where those children are. They ought to be catching pollywogs, but they aren't. And here are flowers just asking to be picked—Annie must be getting lazy. ”

“ Without doubt, Aunty Jane would be lonely; the Bennetts, in Germany, might miss noisy, affectionate Mabel, Mrs. Mapes might long for helpful Jean and Mrs. Slater would certainly find her big, beautiful home dull with no sparkling Henrietta but it was Bettie, poor little impecunious, uncomplaining Bettie, who would be the very loneliest of all. The others would lose only one girl apiece; Bettie's loss would be fourfold. Lovely Jean, sprightly Marjory, jolly Mabel and attractive Henrietta—how could she spare them all at once! ”

“ After dinner, every one, except Bettie, who was compelled by solicitous Mrs. Crane to curl up with the kitten under a tree for a nap, went exploring.
That was great fun, for exploring is interesting, anyway, even if you haven't anything bigger to explore than your own back yard. But when you have a whole wilderness, with a little of every kind of landscape there is dotted about, here and there; and always so unexpectedly that you don't know what you're coming to next, exploring becomes just the very jolliest pursuit there is. ”

“ TO the moment of Grandma Pike's departure, all their neighbours had been so pleasant that the girls were deceived into thinking that neighbours were never anything but pleasant. Although they felt not the slightest misgiving as to their future neighbours, they had hated to lose dear old Grandma Pike, who had always been as good to them as if she had really been their grandmother, and whose parting gifts, sundry odds and ends of dishes, old magazines and broken parcels of provisions, gave them occupation for many delightful days. ”

“ Am I going to be like that twenty years from now?”
“Of course you’re not,” consoled Jean, “You’re ever so bright in school and you—why, Sallie! It’s all in your own hands. If you learn every blessed thing you can, some day you’ll be smart enough to teach. And then, probably, they’d be glad enough to have you teach right here. And if they wouldn’t, you could go some place else. Don’t ever think that you have to stay here and be a stupid, downtrodden servant like poor old Abbie.” ”

“ In a very few seconds, the hasty Janitor had opened the lower door of the chute and, with the firemen standing by, was calmly hauling her out by her feet—Oh! She could never tell that part of it.
And then, as if that were not bad enough, that inconsiderate Janitor seized her by the elbow and hurried her right into the coal bin, forced her to march over eighty tons of black, dusty, sliding coal and finally compelled her to crawl—yes, crawl—out of a small basement window on the safest side of the building. ”

“ Jean and Bettie cried silently but bitterly. Marjory wept audibly, with long, shuddering sobs; but Mabel simply bawled. Mabel always did her crying on the excellent principle that, if a thing were worth doing at all, it was worth doing well. She was doing it so well on this occasion that Jean, who seldom cried and whose puffed, scarlet eyelids contrasted oddly and rather pathetically with her colorless cheeks, presently sat up to remonstrate. ”

“ Notwithstanding many unusual kindnesses from her Lakeville friends—even always-hungry Mabel begged her to eat part of her favorite dessert—puzzled Marjory felt that the sky was dark above her and the world a terrible place for little girls just her size. And then, quite suddenly, Laura was whisked away by her mother, and Doctor Rhodes, chalk in hand and frowning prodigiously, was approaching the fateful bulletin board. ”

“ Why is it, Daddy?"
"Well," returned Mr. Duval, carefully shaved and very neat and tidy in his shabby clothes, "they are Mollie Shannon's children. You are the daughter of Elizabeth Huntington. Your full name is Jeannette Huntington Duval. I want you to live up to that name."
"Do you mean," asked Jeanne, who was perched on the old trunk, "that Mollie's children have to be like Mollie?"
"Something like that," admitted Mr. Duval.
"That's a pity," said Jeanne. "I like those children. They're sweet when they're clean. And Michael's almost always good to the others." ”

“ Crane wrapped her patient in a warm blanket.
When she returned with the broth, intending to force it by spoonfuls into the lad's mouth, she realised that a great change had taken place in her patient. The fever flush was gone from his cheeks, leaving him pale and clammy; but now, for the first time since his arrival in Pete's Patch his eyes were open. They were big and very, very blue.
"Well," greeted Mrs. Crane, "this is something like! Awake, are you? Don't be frightened, poor lamb—you're as safe here as if you were in your own bed. Open your mouth, there's a good boy. ”

“ From its bulging front, dropped Bettie's bead chain, various articles of doll's clothing, and the two missing handkerchiefs.
"They're mine," cried Laura, making a dive for the things.
"They're not any such thing," cried indignant Jean. "I made that doll's dress myself and I know the lace on those handkerchiefs."
"They're my mother's," protested Laura. "I took 'em out of her drawer."
"They're not," contradicted Mabel, prying Laura's fingers apart and forcing her to drop one of the crumpled handkerchiefs. "Look at that monogram—'M B' for Mabel Bennett." ”

“ Just about everybody liked Jane.
“Are you related to those grand Chicago Pools?” asked Gladys Evelyn one day, as she peeled a fresh stick of gum.
“Mercy, no,” returned Jane, who had listened for a weary half hour to Laura’s tales about her own wonderful people. “There’s nothing grand about us—we’re just plain Pools—little common Pools like mud puddles. No limousines, no diamonds, no ancestors. Just three meals a day and a bed at night. We’re just folks—the commonest kind.” ”

“ Crane was certain that they were all bewitched.
On the last forenoon of the useful young man's visit, Mabel, pursuing a startled brown rabbit, happened to stumble into the very heart of Fairyland. The rabbit led her out of Pete's Patch, through thicket and marsh, to an unsuspected bayou—a little bay that had once been part of the lively river but was now merely a quiet pond. Mabel found herself on the very muddy edge of a wide circular basin that was bigger than it looked. ”

“ A Crowded Day MABEL rose very early indeed on Christmas morning to explore her bulging stocking and to open her packages; but Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane were even earlier, and they were delighted to find that the weather had remained mild. Putting on their outside wraps and warm overshoes, the worthy couple went with good-natured Martin and Maggie, the nimble nursery maid, to the garden as soon as it was light. They strung the tall tree from top to bottom with tinsel and glittering Christmas-tree ornaments, the finest that money could buy. ”

“ When you are going home in three years, eleven months, and fourteen days, you are so afraid that you won't have enough money for your ticket when the time comes that you save! Jeanne had saved her money whenever she could, and, with the thrift that she had perhaps inherited from some remote French ancestor, had hidden it in the fat pincushion of the work-box that Mrs. Huntington had given her for Christmas. ”

“ Black, placing his forefinger against his own broad chest, "is going to ask this one (he pointed to Mrs. Crane) to come and live with him in his own great big empty house, so he'll have a sister again to sew on his buttons, listen to his old stories and make a home for him. What do you say, Sarah?"
"I say yes," said Mrs. Crane; "yes, with all my heart."
"And here," said Mr. Black, smiling into four pairs of sympathetic eyes, "are four young people who will have to pretend that they truly belong to us once in awhile, because we'd both like to have our house full of happy little girls. ”

“ When there are visitors he seems so oily and so smooth; and it seems to me that he is extra polite to those Miller girls—all the world uses their father’s soap, you know—but when he asks Sallie to do errands he doesn’t even say please. And Mrs. Rhodes is always gliding about like the ghost of Hamlet’s Father. She looks as if she were listening with all her features. But she never says a thing to us, even when she catches us slipping around through the corridors after lights are out.”
“I’m glad she doesn’t,” said Marjory. “She looks all the things she doesn’t say.” ”

“ Crane. The campers, never very early risers, grew lazier every day—and fatter! Mabel, always exceedingly plump, was now so rotund that Mrs. Crane was obliged to tie loops of twine in all her buttonholes. Bettie's cheeks and the calves of her legs were certainly rounding into new and pleasing curves. Tall Jean was casting a wider shadow, shapely Henrietta had punched two new holes in her tight leather belt; and it was now possible to pinch the hitherto unpinchable Marjory. ”

“ Crane, noticing that the girls were dressed for mild weather, detained them while she hunted up a silk handkerchief to wrap about Marjory's throat, a veil to tie over Bettie's ears and some warmer gloves for Jean. Henrietta and Mabel refused to be bundled up.
The outside air was many degrees colder than it had been two hours earlier, and was full of flying snow. The wind came in gusts, yet there was something bracing and stimulating about the stirring atmosphere, particularly to Henrietta.
"Oh!" cried she, "this is fine! Why can't we take a long walk? It's a shame to hurry home. ”

“ On Christmas eve we'll open just the bundles we find under the tree. That'll make our Christmas last twice as long. Oh, I'm so excited! Jeanne, you aren't half as young as I am. Roger, you stolid boy, you sedate old gentleman, why don't you get up more enthusiasm?"
"I always get all the things I want and then some," said Roger, lazily, "so why worry?"
"You're a spoiled child," laughed Jeanne.
Mr. Fairchild, however, seemed to wear an air of pleased expectancy, quite different from Roger's calmness.
"Having a daughter to liven things up," said Mr. Fairchild, "is a new experience for us. ”

“ No tall, dark man wandered about the yard. No neighbor came from the tumbling houses across the street to explain the woman's puzzling absence.
It proved a most tiresome day. Mabel was not only mentally weary from trying to solve the mystery, but physically tired also from dragging Rosa Marie up and down the hill between Dandelion Cottage and the child's deserted home. The girls went with her once, but, having satisfied their curiosity as to Rosa Marie's abiding-place, turned their attention to pleasanter tasks. Walking with Rosa Marie was too much like traveling with a snail. ”

“ Although the number of weeds was not greatly decreased, the yard looked as if, indeed, a battle had been fought there. Mr. Black, passing by on his way to town, began to wonder if he had been quite wise in turning it over to the girls.
At four o'clock the following morning, sleepy Bettie tumbled out of bed and into her clothes. Then she slipped quietly downstairs, out of doors, through the convenient hole in the back fence and into the cottage yard. She had been digging for more than an hour when Jean, rubbing a pair of sleepy eyes, put in her appearance. ”

“ She hated her music lessons from a cross old professor. It was bad enough to hear Pearl and Clara practice, without doing it herself. Her thoughts, when she practiced, were always gloomy ones. Once, downstairs, Maggie had sung a song beginning: "I am always saddest when I sing."
"And I," said Jeanne, in the big, lonely drawing-room, whose corners were always dark enough to conceal most any lurking horror, "am always saddest when I practice. I'd much rather make things—that's the kind of fingers mine are." ”

“ You and Jean have always been as thick as thieves. Don't you let this pretty Henrietta steal your Jean away from you."
Bettie, dear little unselfish soul, had hitherto been conscious of no such fear, but now her big brown eyes were troubled. This new possibility was alarming.
"We'd like to see Rosa Marie," said Marjory. "Is she well?"
"She has a bad cold," returned Mrs. Crane, shaking her head, sorrowfully. "I've just been looking through my books, and in the very first one I found more than twenty-five fatal diseases that begin with a bad cold."
"Didn't you find any that folks ever get over?" ”

“ To be saved by a girl! And all those staring people watching him drip! It was too much.
Without a word of thanks, and with all the dignity that he could muster, plump young Roger marched past the assembled multitude—it seemed like that to him—straight along the dock toward the shore, leaving behind him a wet, shining trail.
With much difficulty, because of his soggy shoes, he climbed the rough path up the bank to Lake Street, crossed that thoroughfare to clamber up the exceedingly long flight of stairs—four long flights to be exact—that led to the street above. ”

“ The Odd Behaviour Of The Grown-ups
EVEN with all its ingenious but inexpensive improvements, the renovated cottage would probably have failed to satisfy a genuine rent-paying family, but to the contented girls, it seemed absolutely perfect.
It looked, at last, to everybody as if the long deferred dinner party were actually to take place. There, in readiness, were the girls, the money, the cottage and Mr. Black, and nothing had happened to Mrs. Bartholomew Crane, who might easily, as Mabel suggested harrowingly, have moved away or died at any moment during the summer. ”

“ Conscientious Bettie went around the yard a dozen times, but however hard she might search, not a single remaining weed could she discover.
"Good work," said Jean, balancing her empty basket on her head.
"It seems too good to be true," said Bettie, "but think of it, girls, the rent is paid! It's most time for Mr. Black to go by. Let's watch for him from the doorstep—our own precious doorstep."
"It needs scrubbing," said Mabel. "Besides, it isn't ours, yet. Perhaps Mr. Black has changed his mind. Some grown-up folks have awfully changeable minds." ”

“ We must thank that girl."
"I hate girls," said Roger, who had finally escaped from his persistent mother. "And small ones—Yah!"
The girl that he thought he hated most was eleven years of age, and small at that. Yet, because of her carefree, outdoor life, she was wiry and strong; as active, too, as a squirrel. Also, she did a great deal of thinking.
Little Jeanne Duval loved the old wharf because it was all so beautiful. She liked the soft blackness of the cindery soil that covered the most sheltered portions of the worn-out dock. ”

“ Yet, there were days when she teased them almost to the limit of their endurance, times when they could not quite approve her and moments when she fairly roused them to anger; but, in spite of her faults, they could not help loving her, because, with all her impishness and her distressing lack of repose, she was warm-hearted, loyal and thoroughly true. And, although she possessed dozens of advantages that the other girls lacked, although she was beautifully gowned, splendidly housed and bountifully supplied with spending money, never did she show, in any way, the faintest scrap of false pride. ”

“ Crane was doing.
"If she were a little, thin, active old lady, with bobbing white curls like Grandma Pike," said Jean, "lots of people would have a corner for her; but poor Mrs. Crane takes up so much room and is so heavy and slow that she's going to be hard to take care of when she gets old. Oh why couldn't she have had just one strong, kind son to take care of her?"
"When I'm married," offered Mabel, generously, "I'll take her to live with me. I won't have any husband if he doesn't promise to take Mrs. Crane, too." ”

“ She saw only the babyish roundness of Rosa Marie's body, the cunning dimples in her elbows and the affectionate gleam that sometimes showed in the small black eyes. But then, it was always Mabel who found beauty in the stray dogs and cats that no one else would have on the premises. During these trying days the Cottagers almost quarreled.
"That child is all cheeks," complained Marjory, petulantly. "They positively hang down. Do you suppose we're giving her too much milk? She's disgustingly fat, and she hasn't any figure."
"She has altogether too much figure," declared Jean, almost crossly. ”

“ Bettie paused to look inquiringly at Jean, who, framed by the dining room doorway, was nodding her head vigorously.
"Perhaps Jean does," finished Bettie.
"Are you very particular," asked Jean, coming forward, "about what kind of a room it is?"
"Why, not so very," returned the guest. "I'm afraid I couldn't afford a very grand one."
"Are you very timid?" asked Bettie, who had suddenly guessed what Jean had in mind. "I mean are you afraid of burglars and mice and things like that?"
"Why, most persons are, I imagine," said the young woman, whose eyes were twinkling pleasantly. ”