Ellis Parker Butler

“ I was walkin' on the level, but my spirits was climbin' hills and coastin' into valleys. First minute I would be stickin' out my chest and thinkin' how all-fired grand it would be to be a daddy, and the next minute I'd cave in like a frost-bitten squash and wonder how in creation I'd ever drag along as a widow-man. One minute I'd see myself sky-hootin' round with a fine kid on my arm, and the next I'd see myself alone, with Marthy gone. ”

“ Why, that's the kind that makes the world worth livin' in at all.
I don't seem to recollect ever hearin' that Heaven was set aside as a sort of place where married folks could hang about by twos. Them that has had experience knows that that would be a mighty poor kind of heaven—one without children in it. It's the child kind of human nature that sweetens up the world. The “give and take” kind—take your spankin' when it comes, and give back love in return for it. ”

“ If anybody could so much as git him to admit that there was a baby born at my house they would be lucky. Just as a sample of what Doc was like, take the case of Sandy Sam, who fell down the mine shaft and was brought up in the bucket, as dead as Adam. Doc was on the ground as soon as they brought Sandy up, and one of the boys that come late asked Doc what caused the crowd to congregate.
“Well,” says Doc, lookin' off at an angle into the air, “it looks like Sandy Sam, or some other feller, fell down the mine shaft.” ”

“ We got away while the neighbors in our end of town were still at breakfast, and as we passed the Wallace's place we ran up to holler good-by through the window at them, and there was the youngest Wallace foolin' on the floor with her stockings not on yet, and breakfast half over. Marthy stopped long enough to have a good, long look at the child.
“If all the children was like Daisy Wallace,” she says, “they wouldn't be so bad. She is the dearest thing I ever did see. She's got the cutest way of kissin' a person on the eyelids.” ”

“ I sat there probably about a thousand years, if you count by feelin's. I had a wish to go in and see the kid, and then, again, I hated to. I hated for Mrs. Murphy to look at me; I felt I'd blubber, and I was ashamed; but I knew I'd ought to be there to take Marthy's hand when she woke up, and to lie to her about it not bein' so bad as she would think.
That made me pull myself together. I made up my mind that I'd be a man, anyway. I had Marthy to think of, and a man ain't made to be blubberin' around when his women need help. ”

“ Wallace don't rightly appreciate May,” says Marthy, thoughtful-like. “I thinks she makes her study too much. When I was May's age I had plenty of chances to git the fresh air, and you'd never see me takin' up music-lessons in the summer. I spent my time feedin' the chickens and runnin' about the farm, and enjoyin' life. It ain't right, the way girls is forced in their studies nowadays. ”

“ THE CONFESSIONS OF A DADDY
I. OUR NEIGHBORS' BABIES I guess we folks that live up at our end of town think we are about as good as anybody in Colorado, and mebby a little better. We get along together as pleasant as you please, and we are a sort of colony, as you might say, all by ourselves.
Me and Marthy make especial good neighbors. We don't have no fights with the other folks in our end of town, and in them days the neighbors hadn't any reason to fight with us, for we didn't keep a dog and we hadn't no children! ”

“ Marthy laid down her fork, and her lips trembled.
“Cut that out, Ed,” I says. “Marthy has the nerves to-night; the subject ain't popular.”
“I think she's goin' to be good now,” says grand-daddy, who always stuck up for the kid bein' the best that ever lived. “She seems quiet enough. She must have gone off to sleep.”
“I sure do hope so,” says Marthy. “I never had such a day with her.” “Mama, laim!” came the little voice from the bedroom, of a sudden.
“I met Tuomy to-day,” I says, “and he—”
“Mama, laim! Mama, laim!” called Deedee. ”

“ I take notice that it is other folks dogs and children that make most of the bad feelin's between neighbors. Of course we had mosquitos, but Providence gives everybody something to practise up their patience, and when me and Marthy sat out on our porch and heard other people's children frettin' because the mosquitos was bad, we just sat there behind our screened porch and thanked our stars that we did n't have no children to leave our screen doors open. ”

“ Deedee was gittin' to be a regular person. She could tell what she wanted, and once in a while we could understand what it was. It was full time, everybody said, that her education had ought to begin. If she was goin' to grow up into a fine, sincere woman like Marthy, she must have the right kind of start. Just the night before the day of the Spank, Marthy had begun to teach her her religious education. ”

“ But I guess every man feels like I did when I was walkin' that porch. When they shut the door on him, and turn him out, and tell him they will call him when they want him, he's a widow-man right from that moment and feels so. And when they call him in and say all's doin' as well as could be expected under the circumstances, right then he feels like his wife had rose from the dead, and he becomes a married man again. ”

“ It's a shame. She puts every cent she can dig up on those children of hers, and has hardly a decent thing of her own. I feel right sorry for her.”
“I feel sorry for Hemingway,” says I. “The old boy is workin' himself to death. He never gits home until supper is all over, and he told me just now that he felt it his bounden duty to work to-morrow. I tell you, Marthy, children is an expensive luxury!” ”

“ I says, as we was walkin' up the road. “We 're like Mister and Missus Robinson Crusoe,” and at the very next turn we most fell over Bobby Jones and his everlastin' chum, Rex, which is the most no-account dog on earth.
“Where y' goin'?” he asks.
“Nowheres particular,” says Marthy. “Just walkin' out to git the air.”
“So'm I,” says he, and then he says, sort of bluffin', “I ain't lost.”
“Yes you are, Bobby,” I says, severe as I could, “and if you know what's good for a kid about your size you'd better turn right 'round and scoot for home.” ”

“ Marthy threw herself on the bed and covered up her face with her hands. She was cryin'.
I guess I frowned.
Deedee looked up at me as sweet as a little angel.
“Papa, laim,” she says.
“No!” says I, “No laim, Deedee. You lie down and go to sleep like a good girl. Papa'll fix your pillow nice.”
I pounded up her pillow, and turned it over, and pulled the sheets out straight. Then I took the baby and laid her down gentle. She smiled and cuddled into the pillow.
“Oh, what a nice bed!” I says. “Ain't it a nice bed, Deedee?” ”

“ Somehow, as I look back on it, it seems as if I'd never thought of that kid, at any time, except as Edith L. Curious how folks will try to fool theirselves that way.
When it come to the auspicious occasion we had Doc Wolfert in, because he was the only doc in our end of town. He certainly was a quaint old bone-setter. Some said he took morphine on the sly, and some said it was just his natural manner, but he was the shiftiest-eyed medic you ever saw. No man livin' ever got him to say plain yes or no. ”

“ Well, I went into that bedroom. Deedee left off cryin' when she seen me, and in the dim light I could see her standin' in the crib. I stuck out my hand to take her, and she hung on to it.
“Papa, laim!” she begged.
“Edith,” I says, hoarse in my throat, “you 've been naughty. Papa told you to go to sleep, and mama told you to go to sleep. When we tell you to go to sleep, you've got to go to sleep. Now, this is the last time I'm goin' to tell you. Will you lie down and go to sleep?” ”

“ I remarked, and I was surprised, the way Marthy turned on me.
“Why, Hiram Smith!” she cried; “didn't you ever dawdle over your dressin'? When I was a girl I got lots of fun out of being late to breakfast. What difference does it make, anyway, when she is perfectly lovely all the rest of the time? I simply love that child. I wonder,” she said, sort of wistful, “if they would let us take her with us to-day. She would enjoy it so.”
“Foolishness,” I said. “We don't want to pull a kid along with us all day ”

“ That baby, shocked and surprised, laid on the pillow thinkin', as much as a baby could think. Something cruel and unexpected had happened to her.
Me and Marthy had turned cruel. She didn't have no one to love up to. She had been hurt. Her papa dear had hurt her, because she had cried for “laim.”
“I hope she will,” says Marthy in reply to grand-daddy, and that minute from the bedroom, come Deedee's voice. ”

“ I leaned back and smiled sort of grim. “That shows,” I thinks, “that women ain't got the right kind of tact to handle a kid, or else they 've got catchin' nerves. It shows how easy a man can—”
“Papa, laim!”
Deedee's clear little voice just cut what I was thinkin' into two pieces. I was into that bedroom in about two steps. Deedee was standin' up in her crib. ”