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diff --git a/37871-h/37871-h.htm b/37871-h/37871-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..78a16f6 --- /dev/null +++ b/37871-h/37871-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7672 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + +<head> + + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Dandelion Cottage, by Carroll Watson Rankin. + </title> + + <style type="text/css"> + + blockquote { + text-align:justify; + } + + body { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + } + + .booktitle { + letter-spacing:3px; + } + + .centered { + text-align:center; + font-weight:bold; + } + + div.centered { + text-align:center; + } + + div.centered table { + margin-left:auto; + margin-right:auto; + text-align:left; + } + + .figcenter { + padding:1em; + text-align:center; + font-size:0.8em; + border:none; + margin:auto; + text-indent:1em; + } + + .h1 { + font-size:2em; + margin:.67em 0; + } + + .h1, .h2, .h3, .h4, .h5 { + font-weight:bolder; + text-align:center; + text-indent:0; + } + + h1, h2, h3, h4, h5 { + text-align:center; + } + + .h2 { + font-size:1.5em; + margin:.75em 0; + } + + .h3 { + font-size:1.17em; + margin:.83em 0; + } + + .h4 { + margin:1.12em 0 ; + } + + .h5 { + font-size:.83em; + margin:1.5em 0 ; + } + + h5 { + margin-bottom:1%; + margin-top:1%; + } + + hr.chapter { + margin-top:6em; + margin-bottom:4em; + } + + p { + text-align:justify; + margin-top:.75em; + margin-bottom:.75em; + text-indent:0; + } + + p.spacer { + margin-top:2em; + margin-bottom:3em; + } + + .pagenum { +/* visibility:hidden; remove comment out to hide page numbers */ + position:absolute; + right:2%; + font-size:75%; + color:gray; + background-color:inherit; + text-align:right; + text-indent:0; + font-style:normal; + font-weight:normal; + font-variant:normal; + } + + .poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + margin-bottom:1em; + text-align:left; + } + + .poem .stanza { + margin:1em 0em 1em 0em; + } + + .poem p { + margin:0; + padding-left:3em; + text-indent:-3em; + } + + .poem span.i0 { + display:block; + margin-left:0em; + padding-left:3em; + text-indent:-3em; + } + + .poem span.i2 { + display:block; + margin-left:2em; + padding-left:3em; + text-indent:-3em; + } + + .smcap { + font-variant:small-caps; + } + + .tdl { + text-align:left; + } + + .tdr { + text-align:right; + padding-right:1em; + } + + </style> + +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Dandelion Cottage, by Carroll Watson Rankin + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Dandelion Cottage + +Author: Carroll Watson Rankin + +Illustrator: Mary Stevens + +Release Date: October 28, 2011 [EBook #37871] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DANDELION COTTAGE *** + + + + +Produced by Charlene Taylor, Betsie Bush, Matthew Wheaton +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + +<div> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="400" height="597" alt="Cover" />> +</div> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<h1 class="booktitle">Dandelion Cottage</h1> + +<p class="h4">CARROLL WATSON RANKIN</p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i001.jpg" width="400" height="249" alt="" />> +</div> + +<p class="h5"><i>Illustrated by Mary Stevens</i></p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h5">JOHN M. LONGYEAR RESEARCH LIBRARY +<br /> +Marquette, Michigan +<br /> +1977</p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h4"><i>First published in 1904</i><br /> +<br /> +<span class="smcap">The Marquette County Historical Society</span><br /> +213 North Front Street<br /> +Marquette, Michigan 49855</p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h4">FOURTH EDITION<br /> +First Printing, February 1977</p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h5">Printed in the USA by<br /> +<span class="smcap">The Book Concern, Inc.</span><br /> +Hancock, Michigan</p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h4"><i>To</i><br /> +RHODA, FRANCES, AND ELEANOR</p> + +<p class="h5"><i>whose lively interest made the writing +of this little book a joyful task.</i></p> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h4">THE PERSONS OF THE STORY</p> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td class="tdl">Bettie Tucker<br />Jeanie Mapes<br />Mabel Bennett<br />Marjory Vale<br /></td><td class="tdl">}<br />} <i>The Dandelion Cottagers</i><br />}<br />}</td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">The Tucker Family: <i>Mostly boys</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">The Mapes Family: <i>Two parents, two boys</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Dr. and Mrs. Bennett: <i>Merely Parents</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Aunty Jane: <i>A Parental Substitute</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Mrs. Crane: <i>The Pleasantest Neighbor</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Mr. Black: <i>The Senior Warden</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Mr. Downing: <i>The Junior Warden</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Miss Blossom: <i>The Lodger</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Mr. Blossom: <i>The Organ Tuner</i></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="2">Grandma Pike: <i>Another Neighbor</i></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Mr. and Mrs. Milligan<br />Laura Milligan<br />The Milligan Boy and<br /> the Milligan Baby<br />The Milligan Dog<br /></td><td class="tdl">}<br />}<br />} <i>The Unpleasantest Neighbors</i><br />}<br />}</td></tr> +</table> + +<p class="spacer"> </p> + +<p class="h3">Contents</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">1.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_1"><i>Mr. Black's Terms</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">2.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_2"><i>Paying the Rent</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">12</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">3.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_3"><i>The Tenants Take Possession</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">21</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">4.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_4"><i>Furnishing the Cottage</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">33</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">5.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_5"><i>Poverty in the Cottage</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">43</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">6.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_6"><i>A Lodger to the Rescue</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">51</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">7.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_7"><i>The Girls Disclose a Plan</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">64</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">8.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_8"><i>An Unexpected Crop of Dandelions</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">74</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">9.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_9"><i>Changes and Plans</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">83</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">10.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_10"><i>The Milligans</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">97</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">11.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_11"><i>An Embarrassing Visitor</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">111</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">12.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_12"><i>A Lively Afternoon</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">126</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">13.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_13"><i>The Junior Warden</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">142</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">14.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_14"><i>An Unexpected Letter</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">150</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">15.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_15"><i>An Obdurate Landlord</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">158</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">16.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_16"><i>Mabel Plans a Surprise</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">170</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">17.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_17"><i>Several Surprises Take Effect</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">176</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">18.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_18"><i>A Hurried Retreat</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">184</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">19.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_19"><i>The Response to Mabel's Telegram</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">192</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">20.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_20"><i>The Odd Behavior of the Grown-ups</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">205</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdr">21.</td> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_21"><i>The Dinner</i></a></td> + <td class="tdr">214</td> + </tr> +</table></div> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum">[1]</span></p> +<h2>Dandelion Cottage</h2> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i009.jpg" width="400" height="388" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_1">CHAPTER 1</h2> + +<p class="h3">Mr. Black's Terms</p> + +<p>The little square cottage was unoccupied. It had +stood for many years on the parish property, having +indeed been built long before the parish bought the +land for church purposes. It was easy to see how +Dandelion Cottage came by its name at first, for growing +all about it were great, fluffy, golden dandelions; +but afterwards there was another good reason why the<span class="pagenum">[2]</span> +name was appropriate, as you will discover shortly.</p> + +<p>The cottage stood almost directly behind the big +stone church in Lakeville, a thriving Northern Michigan +town, and did not show very plainly from the +street because it was so small by contrast with everything +else near it. This was fortunate, because, after +the Tuckers had moved into the big new rectory, the +smaller house looked decidedly forlorn and deserted.</p> + +<p>"We'll leave it just where it stands," the church +wardens had said, many years previously. "It's precisely +the right size for Doctor and Mrs. Gunn, for they +would rather have a small house than a large one. +When they leave us and we are selecting another +clergyman, we'll try to get one with a small family."</p> + +<p>This plan worked beautifully for a number of years. +It succeeded so well, in fact, that the vestry finally forgot +to be cautious, and when at last it secured the +services of Dr. Tucker, the church had grown so used +to clergymen with small families that the vestrymen +engaged the new minister without remembering to +ask if his family would fit Dandelion Cottage.</p> + +<p>But when Dr. Tucker and Mrs. Tucker and eight +little Tuckers, some on foot and some in baby carriages, +arrived, the vestrymen regretted this oversight. +They could see at a glance that the tiny cottage could +never hold them all.</p> + +<p>"We'll just have to build a rectory on the other lot,"<span class="pagenum">[3]</span> +said Mr. Black, the senior warden. "That's all there is +about it. The cottage is all out of repair, anyway. It +wasn't well built in the first place, and the last three +clergymen have complained bitterly of the inconvenience +of having to hold up umbrellas in the different +rooms every time it rained. Their wives objected to the +wall paper and to being obliged to keep the potatoes +in the bedroom closet. It's really time we had a new +rectory."</p> + +<p>"It certainly is," returned the junior warden, "and +we'll all have to take turns entertaining all the little +Tuckers that there isn't room for in the cottage while +the new house is getting built."</p> + +<p>Seven of the eight little Tuckers were boys. If it +hadn't been for Bettie they would <i>all</i> have been boys, +but Bettie saved the day. She was a slender twelve-year-old +little Bettie, with big brown eyes, a mop of short +brown curls, and such odd clothes. Busy Mrs. Tucker +was so in the habit of making boys' garments that she +could not help giving a boyish cut even to Bettie's +dresses. There were always sailor collars to the waists, +and the skirts were invariably kilted. Besides this, the +little girl wore boys' shoes.</p> + +<p>"You see," explained Bettie, who was a cheerful little +body, "Tommy has to take them next, and of course it +wouldn't pay to buy shoes for just one girl."</p> + +<p>The little Tuckers were not the only children in the<span class="pagenum">[4]</span> +neighborhood. Bettie found a bosom friend in Dr. Bennett's +Mabel, who lived next door to the rectory, another +in Jeanie Mapes, who lived across the street, and +still another in Marjory Vale, whose home was next +door to Dandelion Cottage.</p> + +<p>Jean, as her little friends best liked to call her, was a +sweet-faced, gentle-voiced girl of fourteen. Mothers of +other small girls were always glad to see their own +more scatterbrained daughters tucked under Jean's +loving wing, for thoroughly-nice Jean, without being +in the least priggish, was considered a safe and desirable +companion. It doesn't <i>always</i> follow that children +like the persons it is considered best for them to like, +but in Jean's case both parents and daughters agreed +that Jean was not only safe but delightful—the charming +daughter of a charming mother.</p> + +<p>Marjory, a year younger and nearly a head shorter +than Jean, often seemed older. Outwardly, she was a +sedate small person, slight, blue-eyed, graceful, and +very fair. Her manners at times were very pleasing, +her self-possession almost remarkable; this was the +result of careful training by a conscientious, but at +that time sadly unappreciated, maiden aunt who was +Marjory's sole guardian. There were moments, however, +when Marjory, who was less sedate than she +appeared, forgot to be polite. At such times, her ways +were apt to be less pleasing than those of either Bettie<span class="pagenum">[5]</span> +or Jean, because her wit was nimbler, her tongue +sharper, and her heart a trifle less tender. Her mother +had died when Marjory was only a few weeks old, +her father had lived only two years longer, and the +rather solitary little girl had missed much of the warm +family affection that had fallen to the lot of her three +more fortunate friends. Those who knew her well +found much in her to like, but among her schoolmates +there were girls who said that Marjory was +"stuck-up," affected, and "too smart."</p> + +<p>Mabel, the fourth in this little quartet of friends, +was eleven, large for her age and young for her years, +always an unfortunate combination of circumstances. +She was intensely human and therefore liable to err, +and, it may be said, she very seldom missed an opportunity. +In school she read with a tremendous amount +of expression but mispronounced half the words; when +questions were asked, she waved her hand triumphantly +aloft and gave anything but the right answer; +she had a surprising stock of energy, but most of it +was misdirected. Warm-hearted, generous, heedless, +hot-tempered, and always blundering, she was something +of a trial at home and abroad; yet no one could +help loving her, for everybody realized that she would +grow up some day into a really fine woman, and that +all that was needed in the meantime was considerable +patience. Rearing Mabel was not unlike the task of<span class="pagenum">[6]</span> +bringing up a St. Bernard puppy. Mrs. Bennett was +decidedly glad to note the growing friendship among +the four girls, for she hoped that Mabel would in time +grow dignified and sweet like Jean, thoughtful and +tender like Bettie, graceful and prettily mannered like +Marjory. But this happy result had yet to be achieved.</p> + +<p>The little one-story cottage, too much out of repair +to be rented, stood empty and neglected. To most +persons it was an unattractive spot if not actually an +eyesore. The steps sagged in a dispirited way, some of +the windows were broken, and the fence, in sympathy +perhaps with the house, had shed its pickets and +leaned inward with a discouraged, hopeless air.</p> + +<p>But Bettie looked at the little cottage longingly—she +could gaze right down upon it from the back bedroom +window—a great many times a day. It didn't seem a +bit too big for a playhouse. Indeed, it seemed a great +pity that such a delightful little building should go +unoccupied when Bettie and her homeless dolls were +simply suffering for just such a shelter.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't it be nice," said Bettie, one day in the +early spring, "if we four girls could have Dandelion +Cottage for our very own?"</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't it be sweet," mimicked Marjory, "if we +could have the moon and about twenty stars to play +jacks with?"</p> + +<p>"The cottage isn't <i>quite</i> so far away," said Jean. "It<span class="pagenum">[7]</span> +<i>would</i> be just lovely to have it, for we never have a +place to play in comfortably."</p> + +<p>"We're generally disturbing grown-ups, I notice," +said Marjory, comically imitating her Aunty Jane's +severest manner. "A little less noise, if you please. Is +it really necessary to laugh so much and so often?"</p> + +<p>"Even Mother gets tired of us sometimes," confided +Jean. "There are days when no one seems to want all +of us at once."</p> + +<p>"I know it," said Bettie, pathetically, "but it's worse +for me than it is for the rest of you. You have your +rooms and nobody to meddle with your things. I no +sooner get my dolls nicely settled in one corner than +I have to move them into another, because the babies +poke their eyes out. It's dreadful, too, to have to live +with so many boys. I fixed up the cunningest playhouse +under the clothes-reel last week, but the very +minute it was finished Rob came home with a horrid +porcupine and I had to move out in a hurry."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," suggested Marjory, "we could rent the +cottage."</p> + +<p>"Who'd pay the rent?" demanded Mabel. "My allowance +is five cents a week and I have to pay a fine +of one cent every time I'm late to meals."</p> + +<p>"How much do you have left?" asked Jeanie, +laughing.<span class="pagenum">[8]</span></p> + +<p>"Not a cent. I was seven cents in debt at the end of +last week."</p> + +<p>"I get two cents a hundred for digging dandelions," +said Marjory, "but it takes just forever to dig them, +and ugh! I just hate it."</p> + +<p>"I never have any money at all," sighed Bettie. +"You see there are so many of us."</p> + +<p>"Let's go peek in at the windows," suggested Mabel, +springing up from the grass. "That much won't cost +us anything at any rate."</p> + +<p>Away scampered the four girls, taking a short cut +through Bettie's back yard.</p> + +<p>The cottage had been vacant for more than a year +and had not improved in appearance. Rampant vines +clambered over the windows and nowhere else in +town were there such luxurious weeds as grew in the +cottage yard. Nowhere else were there such mammoth +dandelions or such prickly burrs. The girls waded +fearlessly through them, parted the vines, and, pressing +their noses against the glass, peered into the cottage +parlor.</p> + +<p>"What a nice, square little room!" said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"I don't think the paper is very pretty," said Mabel.</p> + +<p>"We could cover most of the spots with pictures," +suggested practical Marjory.</p> + +<p>"It looks to me sort of spidery," said Mabel, who<span class="pagenum">[9]</span> +was always somewhat pessimistic. "Probably there's +rats, too."</p> + +<p>"I know how to stop up rat holes," said Bettie, who +had not lived with seven brothers without acquiring +a number of useful accomplishments. "I'm not afraid +of spiders—that is, not so <i>very</i> much."</p> + +<p>"What are you doing here?" demanded a gruff +voice so suddenly that everybody jumped.</p> + +<p>The startled girls wheeled about. There stood Bettie's +most devoted friend, the senior warden.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Bettie, "it's only Mr. Black."</p> + +<p>"Were you looking for something?" asked Mr. +Black.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Bettie. "We're looking for a house. +We'd like to rent this one, only we haven't a scrap of +money."</p> + +<p>"And what in the name of common sense would +you do with it?"</p> + +<p>"We want it for our dolls," said Bettie, turning a +pair of big pleading brown eyes upon Mr. Black. +"You see, we haven't any place to play. Marjory's +Aunty Jane won't let her cut papers in the house, so +she can't have any paper dolls, and I can't play any +place because I have so many brothers. They tomahawk +all my dolls when they play Indian, shoot them +with beans when they play soldiers, and drown them +all when they play shipwreck. Don't you think we<span class="pagenum">[10]</span> +might be allowed to use the cottage if we'd promise +to be very careful and not do any damage?"</p> + +<p>"We'd clean it up," offered Marjory, as an inducement.</p> + +<p>"We'd mend the rat holes," offered Jean, looking +hopefully at Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Would you dig the weeds?" demanded Mr. Black.</p> + +<p>There was a deep silence. The girls looked at the +sea of dandelions and then at one another.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Marjory, finally breaking the silence. +"We'd even dig the weeds."</p> + +<p>"Yes," echoed the others. "We'd even dig the weeds—and +there's just millions of 'em."</p> + +<p>"Good!" said Mr. Black. "Now, we'll all sit down +on the steps and I'll tell you what we'll do. It happens +that the Village Improvement Society has just notified +the vestry that the weeds on this lot must be removed +before they go to seed—the neighbors have complained +about them. It would cost the parish several dollars +to hire a man to do the work, and we're short of funds +just now. Now, if you four girls will pull up every +weed in this place before the end of next week you +shall have the use of the cottage for all the rest of the +summer in return for your services. How does that +strike you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Bettie, throwing her arms about Mr.<span class="pagenum">[11]</span> +Black's neck. "Do let me hug you. Oh, I'm glad—glad!"</p> + +<p>"There, there!" cried stout Mr. Black, shaking Bettie +off and dropping her where the dandelions grew +thickest. "I didn't say I was to be strangled as part of +the bargain. You'd better save your muscle for the +dandelions. Remember, you've got to pay your rent +in advance. I shan't hand over the key until the last +weed is dug."</p> + +<p>"We'll begin this minute!" cried enthusiastic Mabel. +"I'm going straight home for a knife."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[12]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i020.jpg" width="400" height="350" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_2">CHAPTER 2</h2> + +<p class="h3">Paying the Rent</p> + +<p>"This is a whopping big yard," said Mabel, looking +disconsolately at two dandelions and one burdock in +the bottom of a bushel basket. "There doesn't seem to +be any place to begin."</p> + +<p>"I'm going to weed out a place big enough to sit +in," announced Bettie. "Then I'll make it bigger and +bigger all around me in every direction until it joins +the clearing next to mine."<span class="pagenum">[13]</span></p> + +<p>"I'm a soldier," said Marjory, brandishing a trowel, +"vanquishing my enemies. You know in books the +hero always battles single-handed with about a million +foes and always kills them all and everybody lives +happy ever after—zip! There goes one!"</p> + +<p>"I'm a pioneer," said Jean, slashing away at a +huge, tough burdock. "I'm chopping down the forest +primeval to make a potato patch. The dandelions are +skulking Indians, and I'm capturing them to put in +my bushel-basket prison."</p> + +<p>"I'm just digging weeds," said prosaic Mabel, "and +I don't like it."</p> + +<p>"Neither does anybody else," said Marjory, "but I +guess having the cottage will be worth it. Just pretend +it's something else and then you won't mind it so +much. Play you're digging for diamonds."</p> + +<p>"I can't," returned Mabel, hopelessly. "I haven't +any imagination. This is just plain dirt and I can't +make myself believe it's anything else."</p> + +<p>By supper time the cottage yard presented a decidedly +disreputable appearance. Before the weeds had +been disturbed they stood upright, presenting an even +surface of green with a light crest of dandelion gold. +But now it was different. Although the number of +weeds was not greatly decreased, the yard looked as +if, indeed, a battle had been fought there. Mr. Black,<span class="pagenum">[14]</span> +passing by on his way to town, began to wonder if he +had been quite wise in turning it over to the girls.</p> + +<p>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.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Jean, disappointedly. "I meant to have +a huge bare field to show you when you came, and +here you are ahead of me. What a lot you've done!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," assented Bettie, happily. "There's room for +me and my basket, too, in my patch. I'll have to go +home after a while to help dress the children."</p> + +<p>Young though she was—she was only twelve—Bettie +was a most helpful young person. It is hard to imagine +what Mrs. Tucker would have done without her +cheerful little daughter. Bettie always spoke of the +boys as "the children," and she helped her mother +darn their stockings, sew on their buttons, and sort +out their collars. The care of the family baby, too, fell +to her lot.</p> + +<p>The boys were good boys, but they were boys. They +were willing to do errands or pile wood or carry out +ashes, but none of them ever thought of doing one of +these things without first being told—sometimes they<span class="pagenum">[15]</span> +had to be told a great many times. It was different +with Bettie. If Tom ate crackers on the front porch, +it was Bettie who ran for the broom to brush up the +crumbs. If the second-baby-but-one needed his face +washed—and it seemed to Bettie that there never was +a time when he <i>didn't</i> need it washed—it was Bettie +who attended to it. If the cat looked hungry, it was +Bettie who gave her a saucer of milk. Dick's rabbits +and Rob's porcupine would have starved if Bettie had +not fed them, and Donald's dog knew that if no one +else remembered his bone kind Bettie would bear it +in mind.</p> + +<p>The boys' legs were round and sturdy, but Bettie's +were very much like pipe stems.</p> + +<p>"I don't have time to get fat," Bettie would say. +"But you don't need to worry about me. I think I'm +the healthiest person in the house. At least I'm the +only one that hasn't had to have breakfast in bed this +week."</p> + +<p>Neither Marjory nor Mabel appeared during the +morning to dig their share of the weeds, but when +school was out that afternoon they were all on hand +with their baskets.</p> + +<p>"I had to stay," said Mabel, who was the last to +arrive. "I missed two words in spelling."</p> + +<p>"What were they?" asked Marjory.</p> + +<p>"'Parachute' and 'dandelion.' I hate dandelions,<span class="pagenum">[16]</span> +anyway. I don't know what parachutes are, but if +they're any sort of weeds I hate them, too."</p> + +<p>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 quartet, being only eleven.</p> + +<p>"There doesn't seem to be much grass left after the +weeds are out," said Bettie, surveying the bare, sandy +patch she had made.</p> + +<p>"This has <i>always</i> been a weedy old place," replied +Jean. "I think the whole neighborhood will feel +obliged to us if we ever get the lot cleared. Perhaps +our landlord will plant grass seed. It would be fine +to have a lawn."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," said Marjory, "he'll let us have some +flower beds. Wouldn't it be lovely to have nasturtiums +running right up the sides of the house?"</p> + +<p>"They'd be lovely among the vines," agreed Bettie. +"I've some poppy seeds that we might plant in a long +narrow bed by the fence."</p> + +<p>"There are hundreds of little pansy plants coming +up all over our yard," said Jean. "We might make a +little round bed of them right here where I'm sitting.<span class="pagenum">[17]</span> +What are you going to plant in <i>your</i> bed, Mabel?"</p> + +<p>"Butter-beans," said that practical young person, +promptly.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Bettie, with a long sigh, "we'll have +to work faster than this or summer will be over before +we have a chance to plant <i>anything</i>. This is the +biggest <i>little</i> yard I ever did see."</p> + +<p>For a time there was silence. Marjory, the soldier, +fell upon her foes with renewed vigor, and soon had +an entire regiment in durance vile. Jean, the pioneer, +fell upon the forest with so much energy that its +speedy extermination was threatened. Mabel seized +upon the biggest and toughest burdock she could find +and pulled with both hands and all her might, until, +with a sharp crack, the root suddenly parted and +Mabel, very much to her own surprise, turned a back +somersault and landed in Bettie's basket.</p> + +<p>"Hi there!" cried a voice from the road. "How are +you youngsters getting along?"</p> + +<p>The girls jumped to their feet—all but Mabel, who +was still wedged tightly in Bettie's basket. There was +Mr. Black, with his elbows on the fence, and with +him was the president of the Village Improvement +Society; both were smiling broadly.</p> + +<p>"Sick of your bargain?" asked Mr. Black.</p> + +<p>The four girls shook their heads emphatically.</p> + +<p>"Hard work?"<span class="pagenum">[18]</span></p> + +<p>Four heads bobbed up and down.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Black, encouragingly, "you've +made considerable headway today."</p> + +<p>"Where are you putting the weeds?" asked the +president of the Village Improvement Society.</p> + +<p>"On the back porch in a piano box," said Bettie. +"We had a big pile of them last night, but they shrank +like everything before morning. If they do that <i>every</i> +time, it won't be necessary for Mabel to jump on them +to press them down."</p> + +<p>"Let me know when you have a wagon load," said +Mr. Black. "I'll have them hauled away for you."</p> + +<p>For the rest of the week the girls worked early and +late. They began almost at daylight, and the mosquitoes +found them still digging at dusk.</p> + +<p>By Thursday night, only scattered patches of weeds +remained. The little diggers could hardly tear themselves +away when they could no longer find the weeds +because of the gathering darkness. Now that the task +was so nearly completed it seemed such a waste of +time to eat and sleep.</p> + +<p>Bettie was up earlier than ever the next morning, +and with one of the boys' spades had loosened the soil +around some of the very worst patches before any of +the other girls appeared.</p> + +<p>By five o'clock that night the last weed was dug. +Conscientious Bettie went around the yard a dozen<span class="pagenum">[19]</span> +times, but however hard she might search, not a single +remaining weed could she discover.</p> + +<p>"Good work," said Jean, balancing her empty basket +on her head.</p> + +<p>"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."</p> + +<p>"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."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" gasped Marjory. "Wouldn't it be perfectly +dreadful if he had!"</p> + +<p>It seemed to the little girls, torn between doubt and +expectation, that Mr. Black was strangely indifferent +to the calls of hunger that night. Was he never going +home to dinner? Was he <i>never</i> coming?</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," suggested Jean, "he has gone out of +town."</p> + +<p>"Or forgotten us," said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"Or died," said Mabel, dolefully.</p> + +<p>"No—no," cried Bettie. "There he is; he's coming +around the corner now—I can see him. Let's run to +meet him."</p> + +<p>The girls scampered down the street. Bettie seized +one hand, Mabel the other, Marjory and Jean danced +along ahead of him, and everybody talked at once.<span class="pagenum">[20]</span> +Thus escorted, Mr. Black approached the cottage lot.</p> + +<p>"Well, I declare," said Mr. Black. "You haven't left +so much as a blade of grass. Do you think you could +sow some grass seed if I have the ground made ready +for it?"</p> + +<p>The girls thought they could. Bettie timidly suggested +nasturtiums.</p> + +<p>"Flower beds too? Why, of course," said Mr. Black. +"Vegetables as well if you like. You can have a regular +farm and grow fairy beanstalks and Cinderella pumpkins +if you want to. And now, since the rent seems +to be paid, I suppose there is nothing left for me to +do but to hand over the key. Here it is, Mistress Bettie, +and I'm sure I couldn't have a nicer lot of tenants."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[21]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i029.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_3">CHAPTER 3</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Tenants Take Possession</p> + +<p>"Our own house—think of it!" cried Bettie, turning +the key. "Push, somebody; the door sticks. There! It's +open."</p> + +<p>"Ugh!" said Mabel, drawing back hastily. "It's +awfully dark and stuffy in there. I guess I won't go +in just yet—it smells so dead-ratty."</p> + +<p>"It's been shut up so long," explained Jean. "Wait.<span class="pagenum">[22]</span> +I'll pull some of the vines back from this window. +There! Can you see better?"</p> + +<p>"Lots," said Bettie. "This is the parlor, girls—but, +oh, what raggedy paper. We'll need lots of pictures +to cover all the holes and spots."</p> + +<p>"We'd better clean it all first," advised sensible +Jean. "The windows are covered with dust and the +floor is just black."</p> + +<p>"This," said Marjory, opening a door, "must be the +dining-room. Oh! What a cunning little corner cupboard—just +the place for our dishes."</p> + +<p>"You mean it would be if we had any," said Mabel. +"Mine are all smashed."</p> + +<p>"Pooh!" said Jean. "We don't mean doll things—we +want real, grown-up ones. Why, what a cunning +little bedroom!"</p> + +<p>"There's one off the parlor, too," said Marjory, "and +it's even cunninger than this."</p> + +<p>"My! what a horrid place!" exclaimed Mabel, poking +an inquisitive nose into another unexplored room, +and as hastily withdrawing that offended feature. +"Mercy, I'm all over spider webs."</p> + +<p>"That's the kitchen," explained Bettie. "Most of the +plaster has fallen down and it's rained in a good deal. +But here's a good stovepipe hole, and such a cunning +cupboard built into the wall. What have <i>you</i> found, +Jean?"<span class="pagenum">[23]</span></p> + +<p>"Just a pantry," said Jean, holding up a pair of +black hands, "and lots of dust. There isn't a clean +spot in the house."</p> + +<p>"So much the better," said Bettie, whose clouds +always had a silver lining. "We'll have just that much +more fun cleaning up. I'll tell you what let's do—and +we've all day tomorrow to do it in. We'll just regularly +clean house—I've <i>always</i> wanted to clean house."</p> + +<p>"Me too," cried Mabel, enthusiastically. "We'll bring +just oceans of water—"</p> + +<p>"There's water here," interrupted Jean, turning a +faucet. "Water and a pretty good sink. The water +runs out all right."</p> + +<p>"That's good," said Bettie. "We must each bring a +broom, and soap—"</p> + +<p>"And rags," suggested Jean.</p> + +<p>"And papers for the shelves," added Marjory.</p> + +<p>"And wear our oldest clothes," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Oo-ow, wow!" squealed Mabel.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter?" asked the girls, rushing into +the pantry.</p> + +<p>"Spiders and mice," said Mabel. "I just poked my +head into the cupboard and a mouse jumped out. I'm +all spider-webby again, too."</p> + +<p>"Well, there won't be any spiders by tomorrow +night," said Bettie, consolingly, "or any mice either,<span class="pagenum">[24]</span> +if somebody will bring a cat. Now let's go home to +supper—I'm hungry as a bear."</p> + +<p>"Everybody remember to wear her oldest clothes," +admonished Jean, "and to bring a broom."</p> + +<p>"I'll tie the key to a string and wear it around my +neck night and day," said Bettie, locking the door +carefully when the girls were outside. "Aren't we +going to have a perfectly glorious summer?"</p> + +<p>When Mr. Black, on the way to his office the next +morning, met his four little friends, he did not recognize +them. Jean, who was fourteen, and tall for her +age, wore one of her mother's calico wrappers tied in +at the waist by the strings of the cook's biggest apron. +Marjory, in the much shrunken gown of a previous +summer, had her golden curls tucked away under the +housemaid's sweeping cap. Bettie appeared in her very +oldest skirt surmounted by an exceedingly ragged +jacket and cap discarded by one of her brothers; while +Mabel, with her usual enthusiasm, looked like a veritable +rag-bag. When Bettie had unlocked the door—she +had slept all night with the key in her hand to +make certain that it would not escape—the girls +filed in.</p> + +<p>"I know how to handle a broom as well as anybody," +said Mabel, giving a mighty sweep and raising +such a cloud of dust that the four housecleaners were +obliged to flee out of doors to keep from strangling.<span class="pagenum">[25]</span></p> + +<p>"Phew!" said Jean, when she had stopped coughing. +"I guess we'll have to take it out with a shovel. The +dust must be an inch thick."</p> + +<p>"Wait," cried Marjory, darting off, "I'll get Aunty's +sprinkling can; then the stuff won't fly so."</p> + +<p>After that the sweeping certainly went better. Then +came the dusting.</p> + +<p>"It really looks very well," said Bettie, surveying the +result with her head on one side and an air of housewifely +wisdom that would have been more impressive +if her nose hadn't been perfectly black with soot. "It +certainly does look better, but I'm afraid you girls +have most of the dust on your faces. I don't see how +you managed to do it. Just look at Mabel."</p> + +<p>"Just look at yourself!" retorted Mabel, indignantly. +"You've got the dirtiest face I <i>ever</i> saw."</p> + +<p>"Never mind," said Jean, gently. "I guess we're all +about alike. I've wiped all the dust off the walls of +this parlor. Now I'm going to wash the windows and +the woodwork, and after that I'm going to scrub the +floor."</p> + +<p>"Do you know how to scrub?" asked Marjory.</p> + +<p>"No, but I guess I can learn. There! Doesn't that +pane look as if a really-truly housemaid had washed +it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mabel! Do look out!" cried Marjory.</p> + +<p>But the warning came too late. Mabel stepped on<span class="pagenum">[26]</span> +the slippery bar of soap and sat down hard in a pan +of water, splashing it in every direction. For a moment +Mabel looked decidedly cross, but when she got +up and looked at the tin basin, she began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"That's a funny way to empty a basin, isn't it?" she +said. "There isn't a drop of water left in it."</p> + +<p>"Well, don't try it again," said Jean. "That's Mrs. +Tucker's basin and you've smashed it flat. You should +learn to sit down less suddenly."</p> + +<p>"And," said Marjory, "to be more careful in your +choice of seats—we'll have to take up a collection and +buy Mrs. Tucker a new basin, or she'll be afraid to +lend us anything more."</p> + +<p>The girls ran home at noon for a hasty luncheon. +Rested and refreshed, they all returned promptly to +their housecleaning.</p> + +<p>Nobody wanted to brush out the kitchen cupboard. +It was not only dusty, but full of spider webs, and +worst of all, the spiders themselves seemed very much +at home. The girls left the back door open, hoping +that the spiders would run out of their own accord. +Apparently, however, the spiders felt no need of fresh +air. Bettie, without a word to anyone, ran home, returning +a moment later with her brother Bob's old +tame crow blinking solemnly from her shoulder. She +placed the great, black bird on the cupboard shelf and<span class="pagenum">[27]</span> +in a very few moments every spider had vanished +down his greedy throat.</p> + +<p>"He just loves them," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"How funny!" said Mabel. "Who ever heard of +getting a crow to help clean house? I wish he could +scrub floors as well as he clears out cupboards."</p> + +<p>The scrubbing, indeed, looked anything but an inviting +task. Jean succeeded fairly well with the parlor +floor, though she declared when that was finished +that her wrists were so tired that she couldn't hold the +scrubbing-brush another moment. Marjory and Bettie +together scrubbed the floor of the tiny dining-room. +Mabel made a brilliant success of one of the little +bedrooms, but only, the other girls said, by accidentally +tipping over a pail of clean water upon it, thereby +rinsing off a thick layer of soap. Then Jean, having +rested for a little while, finished the remaining bedroom +and Marjory scoured the pantry shelves.</p> + +<p>The kitchen floor was rough and very dirty. Nobody +wanted the task of scrubbing it. The tired girls +leaned against the wall and looked at the floor and +then at one another.</p> + +<p>"Let's leave it until Monday," said Mabel, who +looked very much as if the others had scrubbed the +floor with her. "I've had all the housecleaning I want +for <i>one</i> day."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," pleaded Bettie. "Everything else is done.<span class="pagenum">[28]</span> +Just think how lovely it would be to go home tonight +with all the disagreeable part finished! We could begin +to move in Monday if we only had the house all +clean."</p> + +<p>"Couldn't we cover the dirtiest places with pieces of +old carpet?" demanded Mabel.</p> + +<p>"Oh, what dreadful housekeeping that would be!" +said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Jean, "we must have every bit of it nice. +Perhaps if we sit on the doorstep and rest for a few +moments we'll feel more like scrubbing."</p> + +<p>The tired girls sat in a row on the edge of the low +porch. They were all rather glad that the next day +would be Sunday, for between the dandelions and +the dust they had had a very busy week.</p> + +<p>"Why!" said Bettie, suddenly brightening. "We're +going to have a visitor, I do believe."</p> + +<p>"Hi there!" said Mr. Black, turning in at the gate. +"I smell soap. Housecleaning all done?"</p> + +<p>"All," said Bettie, wearily, "except the kitchen floor, +and, oh! we're <i>so</i> tired. I'm afraid we'll have to leave +it until Monday, but we just hate to."</p> + +<p>"Too tired to eat peanuts?" asked Mr. Black, handing +Bettie a huge paper bag. "Stay right here on the +doorstep, all of you, and eat every one of these nuts. +<span class="pagenum">[29]</span>I'll look around and see what you've been doing—I'm +sure there <i>can't</i> be much dirt left inside when +there's so much on your faces."</p> + +<p>It seemed a pity that Mr. Black, who liked little +girls so well, should have no children of his own. A +great many years before Bettie's people had moved +to Lakeville, he had had one sister; and at another +almost equally remote period he had possessed one +little daughter, a slender, narrow-chested little maid, +with great, pathetic brown eyes, so like Bettie's that +Mr. Black was startled when Dr. Tucker's little +daughter had first smiled at him from the Tucker +doorway, for the senior warden's little girl had lived +to be only six years old. This, of course, was the secret +of Mr. Black's affection for Bettie.</p> + +<p>Mr. Black, who was a moderately stout, gray-haired +man of fifty-five, with kind, dark eyes and a strong, +rugged, smooth-shaven countenance, had a great deal +of money, a beautiful home perched on the brow of +a green hill overlooking the lake, and a silk hat. This +last made a great impression on the children, for silk +hats were seldom worn in Lakeville. Mr. Black looked +very nice indeed in his, when he wore it to church +Sunday morning, but Bettie felt more at home with +him when he sat bareheaded on the rectory porch, +with his short, crisp, thick gray hair tossed by the +south wind.</p> + +<p>Besides these possessions, Mr. Black owned a garden<span class="pagenum">[30]</span> +on the sheltered hillside where wonderful roses grew +as they would grow nowhere else in Lakeville. This +was fortunate because Mr. Black loved roses, and spent +much time poking about among them with trowel +and pruning shears. Then, there were shelves upon +shelves of books in the big, dingy library, which was +the one room that the owner of the large house really +lived in. A public-spirited man, Mr. Black had a wide +circle of acquaintances and a few warm friends; but +with all his possessions, and in spite of a jovial, cheerful +manner in company, his dark, rather stern face, +as Bettie had very quickly discovered, was sad when +he sat alone in his pew in church. He had really nothing +in the world to love but his books and his roses. +It was evident, to anyone who had time to think +about it, that kind Mr. Black, whose wife had died so +many years before that only the oldest townspeople +could remember that he had had a wife, was, in spite +of his comfortable circumstances, a very lonely man, +and that, as he grew older, he felt his loneliness more +keenly. There were others besides Bettie who realized +this, but it was not an easy matter to offer sympathy +to Mr. Black—there was a dignity about him that repelled +anything that looked like pity. Bettie was the +one person who succeeded, without giving offense, in +doing this difficult thing, but Bettie did it unconsciously, +without in the least knowing that she <i>had</i><span class="pagenum">[31]</span> +accomplished it, and this, of course, was another +reason for the strong friendship between Mr. Black +and her.</p> + +<p>The girls found the peanuts decidedly refreshing; +their unusual exercise had given them astonishing appetites.</p> + +<p>"I wonder," said Bettie, some ten minutes later, +when the paper bag was almost empty, "what Mr. +Black is doing in there."</p> + +<p>"I think, from the swishing, swushing sounds I +hear," said Jean, "that Mr. Black must be scrubbing +the kitchen."</p> + +<p>"What!" gasped the girls.</p> + +<p>"Come and see," said Jean, stealing in on tiptoe.</p> + +<p>There, sure enough, was stout Mr. Black dipping a +broom every now and then into a pail of soapy water +and vigorously sweeping the floor with it.</p> + +<p>"I <i>think</i>," whispered Mabel, ruefully, "that that's +Mother's best broom."</p> + +<p>"Never mind," consoled Jean. "You can take mine +home if you think she'll care. It's really mine because +I bought it when we had that broom drill in the sixth +grade. It's been hanging on my wall ever since."</p> + +<p>"Hi there!" exclaimed Mr. Black, who, looking up +suddenly, had discovered the smiling girls in the +doorway. "You didn't know I could scrub, did you?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Black, quite regardless of his spotless cuffs and<span class="pagenum">[32]</span> +his polished shoes, drew a bucket of fresh water and +dashed it over the floor, sweeping the flood out of +doors and down the back steps.</p> + +<p>"There," said Mr. Black, standing the broom in the +corner, "if there's a cleaner house in town than this, +I don't know where you'll find it. In return for scrubbing +this kitchen, of course, I shall expect you to invite +me to dinner when you get to housekeeping."</p> + +<p>"We will! We do!" shouted the girls. "And we'll +cook every single thing ourselves."</p> + +<p>"I don't know that I'll insist on <i>that</i>," returned Mr. +Black, teasingly, "but I shan't let you forget about the +dinner."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[33]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i040.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_4">CHAPTER 4</h2> + +<p class="h3">Furnishing the Cottage</p> + +<p>After tea that Saturday night four tired but spotlessly +clean little girls sat on Jean's doorstep, making +plans for the coming week.</p> + +<p>"What are you going to do for a stove?" asked Mrs. +Mapes.</p> + +<p>"I have a toy one," replied Mabel, "but it has only +one leg and it always smokes. Besides, I can't find it."</p> + +<p>"I have a little box stove that the boys used to have<span class="pagenum">[34]</span> +in their camp," said Mrs. Mapes. "It has three good +legs and it doesn't smoke at all. If you want it, and if +you'll promise to be very careful about your fire, I'll +have one of the boys set it up for you."</p> + +<p>"That would be lovely," said Bettie, gratefully. +"Mamma has given me four saucers and a syrup jug, +and I have a few pieces left of quite a large-sized +doll's tea set."</p> + +<p>"We have an old rug," said Marjory, "that I'm +almost sure I can have for the parlor floor, and I have +two small rocking chairs of my own."</p> + +<p>"There's a lot of old things in our garret," said +Mabel; "three-legged tables, and chairs with the seats +worn out. I know Mother'll let us take them."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Bettie, "take everything you have to +the cottage Monday afternoon after school. Bring all +the pictures you can to cover the walls, and—"</p> + +<p>"Hark!" said Mrs. Mapes. "I think somebody is +calling Bettie."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my!" said Bettie, springing to her feet. "This +is bath night and I promised to bathe the twins. I +must go this minute."</p> + +<p>"I think Bettie is sweet," said Jean. "Mr. Black +would never have given us the cottage if he hadn't +been so fond of Bettie; but she doesn't put on any airs +at all. She makes us feel as if it belonged to all of us."</p> + +<p>"Bettie <i>is</i> a sweet little girl," said Mrs. Mapes, "but<span class="pagenum">[35]</span> +she's far too energetic for such a little body. You +mustn't let her do <i>all</i> the work."</p> + +<p>"Oh, we don't!" exclaimed Mabel, grandly. "Why, +what are you laughing at, Marjory?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing," said Marjory. "I just happened to +remember how you scrubbed that bedroom floor."</p> + +<p>From four to six on Monday afternoon, the little +housekeepers, heavily burdened each time with their +goods and chattels, made many small journeys between +their homes and Dandelion Cottage. The parlor +was soon piled high with furniture that was all more +or less battered.</p> + +<p>"Dear me," said Jean, pausing at the door with an +armful of carpet. "How am I ever to get in? Hadn't +we better straighten out what we have before we +bring anything more?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Bettie. "I wouldn't be surprised if we +had almost enough for two houses. I'm sure I've seen +six clocks."</p> + +<p>"That's only one for each room," said Mabel. "Besides, +none of the four that <i>I</i> brought will go."</p> + +<p>"Neither will my two," said Marjory, giggling.</p> + +<p>"We might call this 'The House of the Tickless +Clocks,'" suggested Jean.</p> + +<p>"Or of the grindless coffee-mill," giggled Marjory.</p> + +<p>"Or of the talkless telephone," added Mabel. "I<span class="pagenum">[36]</span> +brought over an old telephone box so we could pretend +we had a telephone."</p> + +<p>There were still several things lacking when the +children had found places for all their crippled belongings. +They had no couch for the sofa pillows +Mabel had brought, but Bettie converted two wooden +boxes and a long board into an admirable cozy corner. +She even upholstered this sadly misnamed piece of +furniture with the burlaps and excelsior that had been +packed about her father's new desk, but it still needed +a cover. The windows lacked curtains, the girls had +only one fork, and their cupboard was so distressingly +empty that it rivaled Mother Hubbard's.</p> + +<p>They had planned to eat and even sleep at the cottage +during vacation, which was still some weeks distant; +but, as they had no beds and no provisions, and +as their parents said quite emphatically that they could +<i>not</i> stay away from home at night, part of this plan +had to be given up.</p> + +<p>Most of the grown-ups, however, were greatly +pleased with the cottage plan. Marjory's Aunty Jane, +who was nervous and disliked having children running +in and out of her spotlessly neat house, was glad +to have Marjory happy with her little friends, provided +they were all perfectly safe—and out of earshot. +Overworked Mrs. Tucker found it a great relief to +have careful Bettie take two or three of the smallest<span class="pagenum">[37]</span> +children entirely off her hands for several hours each +day. When these infants, divided as equally as possible +among the four girls, were not needed indoors +to serve as playthings, they rolled about contentedly +inside the cottage fence. Mabel's mother did not hesitate +to say that she, for one, was thankful enough that +Mr. Black had given the girls a place to play in. With +Mabel engaged elsewhere, it was possible, Mrs. Bennett +said, to keep her own house quite respectably +neat. Mrs. Mapes, indeed, missed quiet, orderly Jean; +but she would not mention it for fear of spoiling her +tender-hearted little daughter's pleasure, and it did +not occur to modest Jean that she was of sufficient +consequence to be missed by her mother or anyone +else.</p> + +<p>The neighbors, finding that the long-deserted cottage +was again occupied, began to be curious about +the occupants. One day Mrs. Bartholomew Crane, who +lived almost directly opposite the cottage, found herself +so devoured by kindly curiosity that she could +stand it no longer. Intending to be neighborly, for +Mrs. Crane was always neighborly in the best sense +of the word, she put on her one good dress and +started across the street to call on the newcomers.</p> + +<p>It was really a great undertaking for Mrs. Crane to +pay visits, for she was a stout, slow-moving person, +and, owing to the antiquity and consequent tenderness<span class="pagenum">[38]</span> +of her best garments, it was an even greater +undertaking for the good woman to make a visiting +costume. Her best black silk, for instance, had to be +neatly mended with court-plaster when all other remedies +had failed, and her old, thread-lace collars had +been darned until their original floral patterns had +given place to a mosaic of spider webs. Mrs. Crane's +motives, however, were far better than her clothes. +Years before, when she was newly married, she had +lived for months a stranger in a strange town, where +it was no unusual occurrence to live for years in ignorance +of one's next-door neighbor's very name. During +those unhappy months poor Mrs. Crane, sociable by +nature yet sadly afflicted with shyness, had suffered +keenly from loneliness and homesickness. She had +vowed then that no other stranger should suffer as +she had suffered, if it were in her power to prevent +it; so, in spite of increasing difficulties, kind Mrs. +Crane conscientiously called on each newcomer. In +many cases, hers was the first welcome to be extended +to persons settling in Lakeville, and although these +visits were prompted by single-minded generosity, it +was natural that she should, at the same time, make +many friends. These, however, were seldom lasting +ones, for many persons, whose business kept them in +Lakeville for perhaps only a few months, afterwards<span class="pagenum">[39]</span> +moved away and drifted quietly out of Mrs. Crane's +life.</p> + +<p>That afternoon the four girls realized for the first +time that Dandelion Cottage was provided with a +doorbell. In response to its lively jingling, Mabel +dropped the potato she was peeling with neatness but +hardly with dispatch, and hurried to the door.</p> + +<p>"Is your moth—Is the lady of the house at home?" +asked Mrs. Crane.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, all of us are—there's four," stammered +Mabel, who wasn't quite sure of her ability to entertain +a grown-up caller. "Please walk in. Oh! don't sit +down in that one, please! There's only two legs on +that chair, and it always goes down flat."</p> + +<p>"Dear me," said Mrs. Crane, moving toward the +cozy corner, "I shouldn't have suspected it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you can't sit <i>there</i>, either," exclaimed Mabel. +"You see, that's the Tucker baby taking his nap."</p> + +<p>"My land!" said stout Mrs. Crane. "I thought it was +one of those new-fashioned roll pillows."</p> + +<p>"<i>This</i> chair," said Mabel, dragging one in from the +dining room, "is the safest one we have in the house, +but you must be careful to sit right down square in +the middle of it because it slides out from under you +if you sit too hard on the front edge. If you'll excuse +me just a minute I'll go call the others—they're making +a vegetable garden in the back yard."<span class="pagenum">[40]</span></p> + +<p>"Well, I declare!" said Mrs. Crane, when she had +recognized the four young housekeepers and had +heard all about the housekeeping. "It seems as if I +ought to be able to find something in the way of furniture +for you. I have a single iron bedstead I'm +willing to lend you, and maybe I can find you some +other things."</p> + +<p>"Thank you very much," said Bettie, politely.</p> + +<p>"I hope," said Mrs. Crane, pleasantly, "that you'll +be very neighborly and come over to see me whenever +you feel like it, for I'm always alone."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Jean, speaking for the household. +"We'd just love to."</p> + +<p>"Haven't you <i>any</i> children?" asked Bettie, sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"Not one," replied Mrs. Crane. "I've never had any +but I've always loved children."</p> + +<p>"But I'm <i>sure</i> you have a lot of grandchildren," said +Mabel, consolingly. "You look so nice and grandmothery."</p> + +<p>"No," said Mrs. Crane, not appearing so sorrowful +as Mabel had supposed an utterly grandchildless person +<i>would</i> look, "I've never possessed any grandchildren +either."</p> + +<p>"But," queried Mabel, who was sometimes almost +too inquisitive, "haven't you any relatives, husbands, +or <i>anybody</i>, in all the world?"<span class="pagenum">[41]</span></p> + +<p>Many months afterward the girls were suddenly +reminded of Mrs. Crane's odd, contradictory reply:</p> + +<p>"No—Yes—that is, no. None to speak of, I mean. +Do you girls sleep here, too?"</p> + +<p>"No" said Jean. "We want to, awfully, but our +mothers won't let us. You see, we sleep so soundly +that they're all afraid we might get the house afire, +burn up, and never know a thing about it."</p> + +<p>"They're quite right," said Mrs. Crane. "I suppose +they like to have you at home once in a while."</p> + +<p>"Oh, they do have us," replied Bettie. "We eat and +sleep at home and they have us all day Sundays. When +they want any of us other times, all they have to do +is to open a back window and call—Dear me, Mrs. +Crane, I'll have to ask you to excuse me this very +minute—There's somebody calling me now."</p> + +<p>Other visitors, including the girls' parents, called at +the cottage and seemed to enjoy it very much indeed. +The visitors were always greatly interested and everybody +wanted to help. One brought a little table that +really stood up very well if kept against the wall, +another found curtains for all the windows—a little +ragged, to be sure, but still curtains. Grandma Pike, +who had a wonderful garden, was so delighted with +everything that she gave the girls a crimson petunia +growing in a red tomato can, and a great many neat +little homemade packets of flower seeds. Rob said they<span class="pagenum">[42]</span> +might have even his porcupine if they could get it out +from under the rectory porch.</p> + +<p>By the end of the week the cottage presented quite +a lived-in appearance. Bright pictures covered the +dingy paper, and, thanks to numerous donations, the +rooms looked very well furnished. No one would have +suspected that the chairs were untrustworthy, the tables +crippled, and the clocks devoid of works. The cottage +seemed cozy and pleasant, and the girls kept it +in apple-pie order.</p> + +<p>Out of doors, the grass was beginning to show and +little green specks dotted the flower beds. Other green +specks in crooked rows staggered across the vegetable +garden.</p> + +<p>The four mothers, satisfied that their little daughters +were safe in Dandelion Cottage, left them in undisturbed +possession.</p> + +<p>"I declare," said Mrs. Mapes one day, "the only +time I see Jean, nowadays, is when she's asleep. All +the rest of the time she's in school or at the cottage."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mrs. Bennett, "when I miss my scissors +or any of my dishes or anything else, I always have +to go to the cottage and get out a search warrant. +Mabel has carried off a wagonload of things, but I +don't know <i>when</i> our own house has been so peaceful."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[43]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i051.jpg" width="400" height="337" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_5">CHAPTER 5</h2> + +<p class="h3">Poverty in the Cottage</p> + +<p>"There's no use talking," said Jean, one day, as the +girls sat at their dining-room table eating very smoky +toast and drinking the weakest of cocoa, "we'll have +to get some provisions of our own before long if we're +going to invite Mr. Black to dinner as we promised. +The cupboard's perfectly empty and Bridget says I +can't take another scrap of bread or one more potato +out of the house this week."<span class="pagenum">[44]</span></p> + +<p>"Aunty Jane says there'll be trouble," said Marjory, +"if I don't keep out of her ice box, so I guess I can't +bring any more milk. When she says there'll be +trouble, there usually is, if I'm not pretty careful. But +dear me, it <i>is</i> such fun to cook our own meals on that +dear little box-stove, even if most of the things do +taste pretty awful."</p> + +<p>"I wish," said Mabel, mournfully, "that somebody +would give us a hen, so we could make omelets."</p> + +<p>"Who ever made omelets out of a hen?" asked +Jean, laughing.</p> + +<p>"I meant out of the eggs, of course," said Mabel, +with dignity. "Hens lay eggs, don't they? If we count +on five or six eggs a day—"</p> + +<p>"The goose that laid the golden egg laid only one +a day," said Marjory. "It seems to me that six is a +good many."</p> + +<p>"I wasn't talking about geese," said Mabel, "but +about just plain everyday hens."</p> + +<p>"Six-every-day hens, you mean, don't you?" asked +Marjory, teasingly. "You'd better wish for a cow, too, +while you're about it."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Bettie, "we certainly need one, for I'm +not to ask for butter more than twice a week. Mother +says she'll be in the poorhouse before summer's over +if she has to provide butter for <i>two</i> families."</p> + +<p>"I just tell you what it is, girls," said Jean, nibbling<span class="pagenum">[45]</span> +her cindery crust, "we'll just have to earn some money +if we're to give Mr. Black any kind of a dinner."</p> + +<p>Mabel, who always accepted new ideas with enthusiasm, +slipped quietly into the kitchen, took a solitary +lemon from the cupboard, cut it in half, and squeezed +the juice into a broken-nosed pitcher. This done, she +added a little sugar and a great deal of water to the +lemon juice, slipped quietly out of the back door, ran +around the house and in at the front door, taking a +small table from the front room. This she carried out +of doors to the corner of the lot facing the street, +where she established her lemonade stand.</p> + +<p>She was almost immediately successful, for the day +was warm, and Mrs. Bartholomew Crane, who was +entertaining two visitors on her front porch, was glad +of an opportunity to offer her guests something in the +way of refreshment. The cottage boasted only one +glass that did not leak, but Mabel cheerfully made +three trips across the street with it—it did not occur +to any of them until too late it would have been easier +to carry the pitcher across in the first place. The lemonade +was decidedly weak, but the visitors were too +polite to say so. On her return, a thirsty small boy +offered Mabel a nickel for all that was left in the +pitcher, and Mabel, after a moment's hesitation, accepted +the offer.</p> + +<p>"You're getting a bargain," said Mabel. "There's as<span class="pagenum">[46]</span> +much as a glass and three quarters there, besides all +the lemon."</p> + +<p>"Did you get a whole pitcherful out of one lemon?" +asked the boy. "You'd be able to make circus lemonade +all right."</p> + +<p>Before the other girls had had time to discover what +had become of her, the proprietor of the lemonade +stand marched into the cottage and proudly displayed +four shining nickels and the empty pitcher.</p> + +<p>"Why, where in the world did you get all that?" +cried Marjory. "Surely you never earned it by being +on time for meals—you've been late three times a day +ever since we got the cottage."</p> + +<p>"Sold lemonade," said Mabel. "Our troubles are +over, girls. I'm going to buy <i>two</i> lemons tomorrow +and sell twice as much."</p> + +<p>"Good!" cried Bettie, "I'll help. The boys have +promised to bring me a lot of arbutus tonight—they +went to the woods this morning. I'll tie it in bunches +and perhaps we can sell that, too."</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't it be splendid if we could have Mr. +Black here to dinner next Saturday?" said Jean. "I'll +never be satisfied until we've kept that promise, but +I don't suppose we could possibly get enough things +together by that time."</p> + +<p>"I have a sample can of baking powder," offered<span class="pagenum">[47]</span> +Marjory, hopefully. "I'll bring it over next time I +come."</p> + +<p>"What's the good?" asked matter-of-fact Mabel. +"We can't feed Mr. Black on just plain baking powder, +and we haven't any biscuits to raise with it."</p> + +<p>"Dear me," said Jean, "I wish we hadn't been so +extravagant at first. If we hadn't had so many tea +parties last week, we might get enough flour and +things at home. Mother says it's too expensive having +all her groceries carried off."</p> + +<p>"Never mind," consoled Mabel, confidently. "We'll +be buying our own groceries by this time tomorrow +with the money we make selling lemonade. A boy +said my lemonade was quite as good as you can buy +at the circus."</p> + +<p>Unfortunately, however, it rained the next day and +the next, so lemonade was out of the question. By the +time it cleared, Bettie's neat little bunches of arbutus +were no longer fresh, and careless Mabel had forgotten +where she had put the money. She mentioned +no fewer than twenty-two places where the four precious +nickels might be, but none of them happened to +be the right one.</p> + +<p>"Mercy me," said Bettie, "it's dreadful to be so poor! +I'm afraid we'll have to invite Mr. Black to one of our +bread-and-sugar tea-parties, after all."</p> + +<p>"No," said Jean, firmly. "We've just got to give him<span class="pagenum">[48]</span> +a regular seven-course dinner—he has 'em every day +at home. We'll have to put it off until we can do it +in style."</p> + +<p>"By and by," said Mabel, "we'll have beans and +radishes and things in our own garden, and we can +go to the woods for berries."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," said Bettie, hopefully, "one of the boys +might catch a fish—Rob <i>almost</i> did, once."</p> + +<p>"I suppose I could ask Aunty Jane for a potato once +in a while," said Marjory, "but I'll have to give her +time to forget about last month's grocery bill—she +says we never before used so many eggs in one month +and I guess Maggie <i>did</i> give me a good many. Potatoes +will keep, you know. We can save 'em until we +have enough for a meal."</p> + +<p>"While we're about it," said Bettie, "I think we'd +better have Mrs. Crane to dinner, too. She's such a +nice old lady and she's been awfully good to us."</p> + +<p>"She's not very well off," agreed Mabel, "and probably +a real, first-class dinner would taste good to her."</p> + +<p>"But," pleaded Bettie, "don't let's ask her until +we're sure of the date. As it is, I can't sleep nights for +thinking of how Mr. Black must feel. He'll think we +don't want him."</p> + +<p>"You'd better explain to him," suggested Jean, +"that it isn't convenient to have him just yet, but +that we're going to just as soon as ever we can. We<span class="pagenum">[49]</span> +mustn't tell him why, because it would be just like +him to send the provisions here himself, and then it +wouldn't really be <i>our</i> party."</p> + +<p>In spite of all the girls' plans, however, by the end +of the week the cottage larder was still distressingly +empty. Marjory had, indeed, industriously collected +potatoes, only to have them carried off by an equally +industrious rat; and Mabel's four nickels still remained +missing. Things in the vegetable garden seemed singularly +backward, possibly because the four eager +gardeners kept digging them up to see if they were +growing. Their parents and Marjory's Aunty Jane +were firmer than ever in their refusal to part with +any more staple groceries.</p> + +<p>Perhaps if the girls had explained why they wanted +the things, their relatives would have been more generous; +but girllike, the four poverty-stricken young +housekeepers made a deep mystery of their dinner +plan. It was their most cherished secret, and when +they met each morning they always said, mysteriously, +"Good morning—remember M. B. D.," which meant, +of course, "Mr. Black's Dinner."</p> + +<p>Mr. Black, indeed, never went by without referring +to the girls' promise.</p> + +<p>"When," he would ask, "is that dinner party coming +off? It's a long time since I've been invited to a +first-class dinner, cooked by four accomplished young<span class="pagenum">[50]</span> +ladies, and I'm getting hungrier every minute. When +I get up in the morning I always say: 'Now I won't +eat much breakfast because I've got to save room for +that dinner'—and then, after all, I don't get invited."</p> + +<p>The situation was growing really embarrassing. The +girls began to feel that keeping house, not to mention +giving dinner parties, with no income whatever, was +anything but a joke.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[51]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i059.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_6">CHAPTER 6</h2> + +<p class="h3">A Lodger to the Rescue</p> + +<p>Grass was beginning to grow on the tiny lawn, all +sorts of thrifty young seedlings were popping up in +the flower beds, and Jean's pansies were actually beginning +to blossom. The girls had trained the rampant +Virginia creeper away from the windows and +had coaxed it to climb the porch pillars. From the +outside, no one would have suspected that Dandelion<span class="pagenum">[52]</span> +Cottage was not occupied by a regular grown-up +family. Book agents and peddlers offered their wares +at the front door, and appeared very much crestfallen +when Bettie, or one of the others, explained that the +neatly kept little cottage was just a playhouse. Handbills +and sample packages of yeast cakes were left on +the doorstep, and once a brand-new postman actually +dropped a letter into the letter-box; Mabel carried it +afterward to Mrs. Bartholomew Crane, to whom it +rightfully belonged.</p> + +<p>One afternoon, when Jean was rearranging the +dining-room pictures—they had to be rearranged very +frequently—and when Mabel and Marjory were busy +putting fresh papers on the pantry shelves, there was +a ring at the doorbell.</p> + +<p>Bettie, who had been dusting the parlor, pushed the +chairs into place, threw her duster into the dining-room +and ran to the door. A lady—Bettie described +her afterwards as a "middle-aged young lady with +the sweetest dimple"—stood on the doorstep.</p> + +<p>"Is your mother at home?" asked the lady, smiling +pleasantly at Bettie, who liked the stranger at once.</p> + +<p>"She—she doesn't live here," said Bettie, taken by +surprise.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you can tell me what I want to know. I'm +a stranger in town and I want to rent a room in this +neighborhood. I am to have my meals at Mrs. Baker's,<span class="pagenum">[53]</span> +but she hasn't any place for me to sleep. I don't want +anything very expensive, but of course I'd be willing +to pay a fair price. Do you know of anybody with +rooms to rent? I'm to be in town for three weeks."</p> + +<p>Bettie shook her head, reflectively. "No, I don't +believe I do, unless—"</p> + +<p>Bettie paused to look inquiringly at Jean, who, +framed by the dining-room doorway, was nodding +her head vigorously.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps Jean does," finished Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Are you <i>very</i> particular," asked Jean, coming forward, +"about what kind of room it is?"</p> + +<p>"Why, not so very," returned the guest. "I'm afraid +I couldn't afford a very grand one."</p> + +<p>"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?"</p> + +<p>"Why, most persons are, I imagine," said the young +woman, whose eyes were twinkling pleasantly. "Are +there a great many mice and burglars in this neighborhood?"</p> + +<p>"Mice," said Jean, "but not burglars. It's a <i>very</i> +honest neighborhood. I think I have an idea, but you +see there are four of us and I'll have to consult the +others about it, too. Sit here, please, in the cozy corner—it's +the safest piece of furniture we have. Now if<span class="pagenum">[54]</span> +you'll excuse us just a minute we'll go to the kitchen +and talk it over."</p> + +<p>"Certainly," murmured the lady, who looked a trifle +embarrassed at encountering the gaze of the forty-two +staring dolls that sat all around the parlor with their +backs against the baseboard. "I hope I haven't interrupted +a party."</p> + +<p>"Not at all," assured Bettie, with her best company +manner.</p> + +<p>"Girls," said Jean, when she and Bettie were in the +kitchen with the door carefully closed behind them, +"would you be willing to rent the front bedroom to +a clean, nice-looking lady if she'd be willing to take +it? She wants to pay for a room, she says, and she +<i>looks</i> very polite and pleasant, doesn't she, Bettie?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," corroborated Bettie, "I like her. She has kind +of twinkling brown eyes and such nice dimples."</p> + +<p>"You see," explained Jean, "the money would pay +for Mr. Black's dinner."</p> + +<p>"Why, so it would," cried Marjory. "Let's do it."</p> + +<p>"Yes," echoed Mabel, "for goodness' sake, let's do +it. It's only three weeks, anyway, and what's three +weeks!"</p> + +<p>"How would it be," asked Marjory, cautiously, "to +take her on approval? Aunty Jane always has hats +and things sent on approval, so she can send them +back if they don't fit."<span class="pagenum">[55]</span></p> + +<p>"Splendid!" cried Mabel. "If she doesn't fit Dandelion +Cottage, she can't stay."</p> + +<p>"Oh," gurgled Marjory, "<i>what</i> a dinner we'll give +Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane! We'll have ice cream +and—"</p> + +<p>"Huh!" said Mabel, "most likely she won't take the +room at all. Anyhow, probably she's got tired of waiting +and has gone."</p> + +<p>"We'll go and see," said Jean. "Come on, everybody."</p> + +<p>The lady, however, still sat on the hard, lumpy cozy +corner, with her toes just touching the ground.</p> + +<p>"Well," said she, smiling at the flock of girls, "how +about the idea?"</p> + +<p>The other three looked expectantly at Jean; Mabel +nudged her elbow and Bettie nodded at her.</p> + +<p>"<i>You</i> talk," said Marjory; "you're the oldest."</p> + +<p>"It's like this," explained Jean. "This house isn't +good enough to rent to grown-ups because it's all out +of repair, so they've lent it to us for the summer for +a playhouse. The back of it leaks dreadfully when it +rains, and the plaster is all down in the kitchen, but +the front bedroom is really very nice—if you don't +mind having four kinds of carpet on the floor. This +is a very safe neighborhood, no tramps or anything +like that, and if you're not an awfully timid person, +perhaps you wouldn't mind staying alone at night."<span class="pagenum">[56]</span></p> + +<p>"If you did," added Bettie, "probably one of us +could sleep in the other room unless it happened to +rain—it rains right down on the bed."</p> + +<p>"Could I go upstairs to look at the room?" asked +the young woman.</p> + +<p>"There isn't any upstairs," said Bettie, pulling back +a curtain; "the room's right here."</p> + +<p>"Why! What a dear little room—all white and +blue!"</p> + +<p>"I hope you don't mind having children around," +said Marjory, somewhat anxiously. "You see, we'd +have to play in the rest of the house."</p> + +<p>"Of course," added Jean, hastily, "if you had company +you could use the parlor—"</p> + +<p>"And the front steps," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"I'm very fond of children," said the young lady, +"and I don't expect to have any company but you +because I don't know anybody here. I shall be away +every day until about five o'clock because I am here +with my father who is tuning church organs, and I +have to help him. I strike the notes while he works +behind the organ. He has a room at Mrs. Baker's, but +she didn't have any place to put me. I think I should +like this little room very much indeed. Now, how +much are you going to charge me for it?"</p> + +<p>Jean looked at Bettie, and Bettie looked at the other +two.<span class="pagenum">[57]</span></p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Jean, at last.</p> + +<p>"Neither do I," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Would—would a dollar a week be too much?" +asked Marjory.</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't be enough," said the young woman, +promptly. "My father pays five for the room <i>he</i> has, +but it's really a larger room than he wanted. I should +be very glad to give you two dollars and a half a +week—I'm sure I couldn't find a furnished room anywhere +for less than that. Can I move in tonight? I've +nothing but a small trunk."</p> + +<p>"Ye-es," said Bettie, looking inquiringly at Jean. +"I <i>think</i> we could get it ready by seven o'clock. It's +all perfectly clean, but you see we'll have to change +things around a little and fix up the washstand."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure," said the visitor, turning to depart, "that +it all looks quite lovely just as it is. You may expect +me at seven."</p> + +<p>"Well," exclaimed Marjory, when the door had +closed behind their pleasant visitor, "isn't this too +grand for words! It's just like finding a bush with +pennies growing on it, or a pot of gold at the end of +the rainbow. Two and a half a week! That's—let me +see. Why! that's seven dollars and a half! We can buy +Mr. Black's dinner and have enough money left to +live on for a long time afterwards."</p> + +<p>"Mercy!" cried Mabel. "We never said a word to<span class="pagenum">[58]</span> +her about taking her on approval. We didn't even +ask her name."</p> + +<p>"Pshaw!" said Jean. "She's all right. She couldn't +be disagreeable if she wanted to with that dimple and +those sparkles in her eyes; but, girls, we've a tremendous +lot to do."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mabel. "If she'd known that the pillows +under those ruffled shams were just flour sacks stuffed +with excelsior, she wouldn't have thought everything +so lovely. Girls, what in the world are we to do for +sheets? We haven't even one."</p> + +<p>"And blankets?" said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"And quilts?" said Bettie. "That old white spread +is every bit of bedclothes we own. I was <i>so</i> afraid +she'd turn the cover down and see that everything +else was just pieces of burlap."</p> + +<p>"It's a good thing the mattress is all right," said +Marjory. "But there isn't any bottom to the water +pitcher, and the basin leaks like anything."</p> + +<p>"We'll just have to go home," said Jean, "and tell +our mothers all about it. We'll have to borrow what +we need. We must get a lamp too, and some oil, because +there isn't any other way of lighting the house."</p> + +<p>The four girls ran first of all to Bettie's house with +their surprising news.</p> + +<p>"But, Bettie," said Mrs. Tucker, when her little<span class="pagenum">[59]</span> +daughter, helped by the other three, had explained the +situation, "are you <i>sure</i> she's nice? I'm afraid you've +been a little rash."</p> + +<p>"Just as nice as can be," assured Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Dr. Tucker, "I guess it's all right. I +know the organ tuner—I used to see him twice a year +when we lived in Ohio. His name is Blossom and +he's a very fine old fellow. I met his daughter this +afternoon when they were examining the church +organ, and she seemed a pleasant, well-educated young +woman—I believe he said she teaches a kindergarten +during the winter. The girls haven't made any mistake +this time."</p> + +<p>"Then we must make her comfortable," said Mrs. +Tucker. "You may take sheets and pillow-cases from +the linen closet, Bettie, and you must see that she has +everything she needs."</p> + +<p>Excited Bettie danced off to the linen closet and the +others ran home to tell the good news.</p> + +<p>"I've filled a lamp for you, Bettie," said Mrs. Tucker, +meeting Bettie, with her arms full of sheets at the +bottom of the stairs. "Here's a box of matches, too."</p> + +<p>When Bettie was returning with her spoils to Dandelion +Cottage she almost bumped into Mabel, whom +she met at the gate with a pillow under each arm, a +folded patchwork quilt balanced unsteadily on her<span class="pagenum">[60]</span> +head, and her chubby hands clasped about a big brass +lamp.</p> + +<p>"The pillows are off my own bed," said Mabel. +"Mother wasn't home, but she wouldn't care, anyway."</p> + +<p>"But can you sleep without them?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I'll take home one of the excelsior ones," said +Mabel. "I can sleep on anything."</p> + +<p>Jean came in a moment later with a pile of blankets +and quilts. She, too, had a lamp, packed carefully in +a big basket that hung from her arm. Marjory followed +almost at her heels with more bedding, towels, +a fourth lamp, and two candlesticks.</p> + +<p>"Well," laughed Bettie, when all the lamps and +candles were placed in a row on the dining-room table, +"I guess Miss Blossom will have almost light enough. +Here are four big lamps and two candles—"</p> + +<p>"I've six more candles in my blouse," said Mabel, +laughing and fishing them out one at a time. "I +thought they'd do for the blue candlesticks Mrs. Crane +gave us for the bedroom."</p> + +<p>"Isn't it fortunate," said Jean, who was thumping +the mattress vigorously, "that we put the best bed in +this room? Beds are such hard things to move."</p> + +<p>"Ye-es," said Bettie, rather doubtfully, "but I think +we'd better tell Miss Blossom not to be surprised if +the slats fall out once in a while during the night. You<span class="pagenum">[61]</span> +know they always do if you happen to turn over too +suddenly."</p> + +<p>"We must warn her about the chairs, too," said +Marjory. "They're none of them really very safe."</p> + +<p>"I guess," said Jean, "I'd better bring over the rocking +chair from my own room, but I'm afraid she'll +just have to grin and bear the slats, because they <i>will</i> +fall out in spite of anything I can do."</p> + +<p>By seven o'clock the room was invitingly comfortable. +The washstand, which was really only a wooden +box thinly disguised by a muslin curtain gathered +across the front and sides, was supplied with a sound +basin, a whole pitcher, numerous towels, and four +kinds of soap—the girls had all thought of soap. They +were unable to decide which kind the lodger would +like best, so they laid Bettie's clear amber cake of +glycerine soap, Jean's scentless white castile, Marjory's +square of green cucumber soap, and Mabel's highly +perfumed oval pink cake, in a rainbow row on the +washstand.</p> + +<p>The bed, bountifully supplied with coverings—had +Dandelion Cottage been suddenly transported to +Alaska the lodger would still have had blankets to +spare, so generously had her enthusiastic landladies +provided—looked very comfortable indeed. At half-past +seven when the lodger arrived with apologies for<span class="pagenum">[62]</span> +being late because the drayman who was to move her +trunk had been slow, the cottage, for the first time +since the girls had occupied it, was brilliantly lighted.</p> + +<p>"We thought," explained Bettie, "that you might +feel less frightened in a strange place if you had plenty +of light, though we didn't really mean to have so +many lamps—we each supposed we were bringing the +only one. Anyway, we don't know which one burns +best."</p> + +<p>"If they should <i>all</i> go out," said Mabel, earnestly, +"there are candles and matches on the little shelf above +the bed."</p> + +<p>When the lodger had been warned about the loose +slats and the untrustworthiness of the chairs, the girls +said good-night.</p> + +<p>"You needn't go on <i>my</i> account," said Miss Blossom. +"It's pleasant to have you here—still, I'm not +afraid to stay alone. You must always do just as you +like about staying, you know; I shouldn't like to think +that I was driving you out of this dear little house, +for it was nice of you to let me come. I think I was +very fortunate in finding a room so near Mrs. Baker's."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Jean, "but we always have to be +home before dark unless we have permission to stay +any place."</p> + +<p>"I <i>have</i> to go," confided Mabel, "because I was so +excited that I forgot to eat my supper."<span class="pagenum">[63]</span></p> + +<p>"So did I," said Marjory, frankly, "and I'm just as +hungry as a bear."</p> + +<p>"Everybody come home with me," said Jean. "We +always have dinner later than you do and the things +can't be <i>very</i> cold."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[64]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i072.jpg" width="400" height="359" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_7">CHAPTER 7</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Girls Disclose a Plan</p> + +<p>"Did you sleep well, Miss Blossom?" asked Bettie, +shyly waylaying the lodger who was on her way to +breakfast.</p> + +<p>"Ye-es," said Miss Blossom, smiling brightly, +"though in spite of your warning and all my care, +the bottom dropped out of my bed and landed the +mattress on the floor. But no harm was done. As soon<span class="pagenum">[65]</span> +as I discovered that I was not falling down an elevator +shaft, I went to sleep again. I think if I had a +few nails and some little blocks of wood I could fix +those slats so they'd stay in better; you see they're not +quite long enough for the bed."</p> + +<p>"I'll find some for you," said Bettie. "You'll find +them on the parlor table when you get back."</p> + +<p>Before the week was over, the girls had discovered +that their new friend was in every way a most delightful +person. She proved surprisingly skillful with +hammer and nails, and besides mending the bed she +soon had several of the chairs quite firm on their legs.</p> + +<p>"Why," cried Bettie one day as she delightedly inspected +an old black walnut rocker that had always +collapsed at the slightest touch, "this old chair is +almost strong enough to <i>walk</i>! I'm so glad you've +made so many of them safe, because, when Mrs. Bartholomew +Crane comes to see us, she's always afraid +to sit down. She's such a nice neighbor that we'd like +to make her comfortable."</p> + +<p>"We do have the loveliest friends," said Jean, with +a contented sigh. "It's hard to tell which is the nicest +one."</p> + +<p>"But the dearest <i>two</i>," exclaimed Marjory, discriminating +nicely, "are Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane—except +you, of course, Miss Blossom."</p> + +<p>"Somehow," added Bettie, "we always think of<span class="pagenum">[66]</span> +those two in one breath, like Dombey and Son, or +Jack and Jill."</p> + +<p>"But they couldn't be farther apart <i>really</i>," declared +Jean. "They're both nice, both are kind of old, both +are dark and rather stout, but except for that they're +altogether different. Mr. Black has everything in the +world that anybody could want, and Mrs. Crane hasn't +much of anything. Mr. Black is invited to banquets +and things and rides in carriages and—"</p> + +<p>"Has a silk hat," Mabel broke in.</p> + +<p>"And Mrs. Crane," continued Jean, paying no attention +to the interruption, "can't even afford to ride +in the street car—I've heard her say so."</p> + +<p>"I wish," groaned generous Mabel, with deep contrition, +"that I'd never taken a cent for that lemonade +I sold her last spring. If I'd dreamed how good and +how poor she was, I wouldn't have. She might have +had <i>four</i> rides with that money."</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> wish," said Jean, "we could do something perfectly +grand and beautiful for Mrs. Crane. She's always +doing the kindest little things for other people."</p> + +<p>"Well," demanded Marjory, "aren't we going to +have her here to dinner, too, when we have Mr. +Black? Please don't tell anybody, Miss Blossom—it's +to be a surprise."</p> + +<p>"Still, just a dinner doesn't seem to be enough," said +Jean, who, with her chin in her hand, seemed to be<span class="pagenum">[67]</span> +thinking deeply. "Of course it helps, but I'd rather +save her life or do something like that."</p> + +<p>"Little things count for a great deal in this world, +sometimes," said Miss Blossom, leaning down to +brush her cheek softly against Jean's. "It's generally +wiser to leave the big things until one is big enough +to handle them."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crane <i>is</i> pretty big," offered matter-of-fact +Mabel.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear," laughed Miss Blossom, "that wasn't at +all what I meant."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Black," said Bettie, dreamily, "has enough +<i>things</i>, but I don't believe he really cares about anything +in the world but his roses. His face is different +when he talks about them, kind of soft all about the +corners and not so—not so—"</p> + +<p>"Daniel Webstery," supplied Jean, understandingly.</p> + +<p>"It must be pretty lonely for him without any +family," agreed Miss Blossom. "I don't know what +would become of Father if he didn't have me to +keep him cheered up—we're wonderful chums, Father +and I."</p> + +<p>"Oh", mourned tender-hearted Bettie, "I <i>wish</i> I +could make Mrs. Crane rich enough so she wouldn't +need to mend all the time, and that I could provide +Mr. Black with some really truly relatives to love him +the way you love your father."<span class="pagenum">[68]</span></p> + +<p>"Oh, Bettie! Bettie!" cried Mabel, suddenly beginning, +in her excitement, to bounce up and down on +the one chair that possessed springs. "I know exactly +how we could help them both. We could beg seven +or eight children from the orphan asylum—they're +<i>glad</i> to give 'em away—and let Mrs. Crane sell 'em to +Mr. Black for—for ten dollars apiece."</p> + +<p>Such a storm of merriment followed this simple +solution of the problem that Mabel for the moment +looked quite crushed. Her chair, incidentally, was +crushed too, for Mabel's final bounce proved too much +for its frail constitution; its four legs spread suddenly +and lowered the surprised Mabel gently to the floor. +Everybody laughed again, Mabel as heartily as anyone, +and, for a time, the sorrows of Mrs. Crane and +Mr. Black were forgotten.</p> + +<p>The dinner party, however, still remained uppermost +in all their plans. Mabel was in favor of giving it +at once, but the other girls were more cautious, so the +little mistresses of Dandelion Cottage finally decided +to postpone the party until after Miss Blossom had +paid her rent in full.</p> + +<p>"You see," explained cautious Marjory, one day +when the girls were alone, "she might get called away +suddenly before the three weeks are up, and if we +spent more money than we <i>have</i> it wouldn't be very<span class="pagenum">[69]</span> +comfortable. Besides, I've never seen seven dollars and +a half all at once, and I'd like to."</p> + +<p>But the dinner plan was no longer the profound +secret that it had been at first, for when the young +housekeepers had told their mothers about their +lodger, they had been obliged to tell them also what +they intended to do with the money. In the excitement +of the moment, they had all neglected to mention +Mrs. Crane, but later, when they made good this +omission, their news was received in a most perplexing +fashion. The girls were greatly puzzled, but they did +not happen to compare notes until after something +that happened at the dinner party had reminded them +of their parents' incomprehensible behavior.</p> + +<p>"Mamma," said Bettie, one evening at supper time, +soon after Miss Blossom's arrival, "I forgot to tell you +that we're going to ask Mrs. Crane, too, when we have +Mr. Black to dinner. It's to be a surprise for both of +them."</p> + +<p>"What!" gasped Mrs. Tucker, dropping her muffin, +and looking not at Bettie, but at Dr. Tucker. "Surely +not Mrs. Crane and Mr. Black, too! You don't mean +both at the same time!"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, Mamma," said Bettie. "It wouldn't cost +any more."</p> + +<p>Then the little girl looked with astonishment first +at her father and then at her mother, for Dr. Tucker,<span class="pagenum">[70]</span> +with a warning finger against his lips, was shaking +his head just as hard as he could at Mrs. Tucker, who +looked the very picture of amazement.</p> + +<p>"Why," asked Bettie, "what's the matter? Don't +you think it's a good plan? Isn't it the right thing +to do?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Dr. Tucker, still looking at Bettie's +mother, who was nodding her approval, "I shouldn't +be surprised if it might prove a <i>very</i> good thing to +do. Your idea of making it a surprise to both of them +is a good one, too. I should keep it the darkest kind +of secret until the very last moment, if I were you."</p> + +<p>"Yes," agreed Mrs. Tucker, "I should certainly keep +it a secret."</p> + +<p>Jean, too, happened to mention the matter at home +and with very much the same result. Mr. Mapes +looked at Mrs. Mapes with something in his eye that +very closely resembled an amused twinkle, and Jean +was almost certain that there was an answering +twinkle in her mother's eye.</p> + +<p>"What's the joke?" asked Jean.</p> + +<p>"I couldn't think of spoiling it by telling," said Mrs. +Mapes. "If there's anything I can do to help you with +your dinner party I shall be delighted to do it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, will you?" cried Jean. "When I told you about +it last week I thought, somehow, that you weren't +very much interested."<span class="pagenum">[71]</span></p> + +<p>"I'm very much interested indeed," returned Mrs. +Mapes. "I hope you'll be able to keep the surprise part +of it a secret to the very last moment. That's always +the best part of a dinner party, you know."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mr. Mapes, "if you know who the other +guests are to be, it always takes away part of the +pleasure."</p> + +<p>When Marjory told the news, her Aunty Jane, who +seldom smiled and who usually appeared to care very +little about the doings in Dandelion Cottage, greatly +surprised her niece by suddenly displaying as many as +seven upper teeth; she showed, too, such flattering +interest in the coming event that Marjory plucked up +courage to ask for potatoes and other provisions that +might prove useful.</p> + +<p>"When you've decided what day you're going to +have your party," said Aunty Jane, with astonishing +good nature, "I'll give or lend you anything you want, +provided you don't tell either of your guests who the +other one is to be."</p> + +<p>When Mabel told about the plan, she too was very +much perplexed at the way her news was received. +Her parents, after one speaking glance at each other, +leaned back in their chairs and laughed until the tears +rolled down their cheeks. But they, too, heartily approved +of the dinner party and advised strict secrecy +regarding the guests.<span class="pagenum">[72]</span></p> + +<p>School was out, and, as Bettie said, every day was +Saturday, but the days were slipping away altogether +too rapidly. The lawn, by this time, was covered with +what Mabel called "real grass," great bunches of +Jean's sweetest purple pansies had to be picked every +morning so they wouldn't go to seed, and the long +bed by the fence threatened to burst at any moment +into blossom. Even the much-disturbed vegetable garden +was doing so nicely that it was possible to tell the +lettuce from the radish plants.</p> + +<p>Two of Miss Blossom's three weeks had gone. She +herself was to leave town the following Thursday, +and the dinner party was to take place the day after; +but even the thought of the great event failed to keep +the little cottagers quite cheerful, for they hated to +think of losing their lovely lodger. Whenever this +charming young person was not busy at one or +another of the various churches with her father, she +was playing with the children. "Just exactly," said +Bettie, "as if she were just twelve years old, too." Her +clever fingers made dresses for each of the four biggest +dolls, and such cunning baby bonnets for each of +the four littlest ones.</p> + +<p>Best of all, she taught the girls how to do a great +many things. She showed them how to turn the narrowest +of hems, how to gather a ruffle neatly, and +how to take the tiniest of stitches. Bettie, who had<span class="pagenum">[73]</span> +to help with the weekly darning, and Marjory, who +had to mend her own stockings, actually found it +pleasant work after Miss Blossom had shown them +several different ways of weaving the threads.</p> + +<p>"I just wish," cried Mabel, one day, in a burst of +gratitude, "that you'd fall ill, or something so we +could do something for <i>you</i>. You're just lovely to <i>us</i>."</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Mabel," said Miss Blossom, with eyes +that twinkled delightedly, "I'm sure you'd take beautiful +care of me—I'm almost tempted to try it. Shall +I have measles, or just plain smallpox?"</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[74]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i082.jpg" width="400" height="363" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_8">CHAPTER 8</h2> + +<p class="h3">An Unexpected Crop of Dandelions</p> + +<p>In spite of the prospect of losing her, the last week +of Miss Blossom's stay was a delightful one to the +girls because so many pleasant things happened. The +best of all concerned the cottage dining-room.</p> + +<p>This room had proved the hardest spot in the house +to make attractive, for it seemed to resist all efforts to +make a well-furnished room of it. Most of the faded<span class="pagenum">[75]</span> +paper was loose and much of it had dropped off in +patches during the time that the cottage was vacant, +showing the ugly, dark, painted wall underneath. It +was only too evident that the pictures that the girls +had fastened up carefully with pins had been put up +for purposes of concealment, the ceiling was stained +and dingy, and the rug was far too small to cover +the floor where some industrious former occupant had +daubed paint of various gaudy hues while trying, perhaps, +to find the right shade for the woodwork.</p> + +<p>Moreover, what little furniture there was in the +dining-room showed very plainly that it had not been +intended originally for dining-room use; the buffet, in +particular, proclaimed loudly in big black letters that +it was nothing but a soap box, and Bettie's best efforts +could not make anything else of it. Now that the day +for the long-postponed dinner party was actually set, +the girls' attention was more than ever directed toward +the forlorn appearance of the little dining-room.</p> + +<p>"Dear me," said Bettie, one day when the five +friends, seated around the table, were cutting out pictures +for a wonderful scrap-book for the little lame +boy whom Miss Blossom had discovered living near +one of the churches, "I do wish this dining-room +didn't look so sort of bedroomy."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Jean, "I've tried putting the buffet in<span class="pagenum">[76]</span> +every corner and all around the walls, and it <i>won't</i> +look like anything but a wooden box."</p> + +<p>"I tried covering it with a gathered curtain," said +Mabel, "but that made it look so like a washstand +that I took it off again."</p> + +<p>"Why," exclaimed Miss Blossom, "you've given me +a beautiful idea! I believe we could make a splendid +sideboard out of that piano box that's so in our way +on the back porch. We'd just have to saw the ends +down a little, nail on some boards, paint it some plain, +dark color, and spread a towel over the top, and we'd +have a beautiful Flemish oak sideboard. I'll buy the +can of paint."</p> + +<p>"I'll do the painting," said Jean. "I helped Mother +paint our kitchen floor, so I know a little about it."</p> + +<p>"That would be lovely. I've been thinking, too, that +it would be a good idea to fix a little shelf under this +window to hold your petunia and these two geraniums +that are suffering so for sunshine. I think I could +make it from the boards in that soap box."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you!" cried Bettie. "I don't believe +there's <i>anything</i> you don't know how to do."</p> + +<p>The piano box, transformed by Miss Blossom and +the four girls into a very good imitation of a Flemish +oak sideboard, did indeed make such an imposing +piece of furniture that the rest of the room looked +shabbier than ever by contrast.<span class="pagenum">[77]</span></p> + +<p>"I'm afraid," said Miss Blossom, surveying the effect +with an air of comical dismay, "that the rest of our +dining-room really looks worse than it did before; it's +like trying to wear a new hat with an old gown. But +I'm proud of our handiwork."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Jean, "it's a great deal more like a sideboard +than it is like a piano box."</p> + +<p>"It's the sideboardiest sideboard I ever saw," said +Mabel, "but it's certainly too fine for this room."</p> + +<p>"Never mind," said cheerful Bettie. "We'll let Mr. +Black sit so he can see the sideboard, and we'll have +Mrs. Crane face the geraniums on that cunning shelf. +If their eyes begin to wander around the room we'll +just call their attention to the things we want them +to see. When Mamma entertains the sewing society +she always invites the first one that comes to sit in the +chair over the hole in the sitting-room rug so the +others won't notice it. If we catch Mr. Black looking +at the ceiling we'll say: 'Oh, Mr. Black, did you notice +the flowers on the sideboard?'"</p> + +<p>Everybody laughed at Bettie's comical idea. This +desperate measure, however, was not needed, for one +afternoon, the day after the sideboard was finished, +something happened, something lovelier than the girls +had ever even dreamed <i>could</i> happen.</p> + +<p>It was only three o'clock, yet there was Miss Blossom +coming home two whole hours earlier than usual; her<span class="pagenum">[78]</span> +white-haired father was with her and under his arm +in a long parcel were seven rolls of wall paper.</p> + +<p>"My contribution to the cottage," said Mr. Blossom, +laying the bundle at Bettie's feet and smiling pleasantly +at the row of girls on the doorstep.</p> + +<p>"It's paper for the dining-room," explained Miss +Blossom. "We happened to pass a store, on our way +to work this noon, where they were advertising a sale +of odd rolls of very nice paper at only five cents a roll. +There were two rolls that were just right for the ceiling, +and five rolls for the side wall. It seemed just +exactly the right thing for Dandelion Cottage, so we +couldn't help buying it."</p> + +<p>"It would have been wicked," said Mr. Blossom, +cutting the string about the bundle, "not to buy such +suitable paper at such a ridiculous price."</p> + +<p>"Oh! oh!" cried the delighted girls, as Mr. Blossom +held up a roll for inspection. "It might have been +made for this house!"</p> + +<p>"Dandelion blossoms in yellow, with such lovely +soft green leaves," said Bettie, "and such a lovely, light, +creamy background. Oh! what's that?"</p> + +<p>"That's the border," replied Miss Blossom. "See how +graceful the pattern is, and how saucily those dandelions +hold their heads. Show them the ceiling paper, +Father."<span class="pagenum">[79]</span></p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Mabel, "just picked-off dandelions +scattered all over an ocean of milk—how pretty!"</p> + +<p>"We'll have the Village Improvement Society after +us," laughed Marjory. "They don't allow a dandelion +to show its head."</p> + +<p>"I love dandelions," said Miss Blossom; "real ones, +I mean; they're such gay, cheerful things and such a +beautiful color."</p> + +<p>"I love them, too," said Jean, "because, you know, +they paid our rent for us."</p> + +<p>"But," said Mabel, "I'm thankful we haven't got to +dig all these dandelions."</p> + +<p>"Now," said Miss Blossom, "we must go right to +work. If everybody will help, Father and I will put +it on for you. You needn't be afraid to trust us, because +last spring we papered our two biggest rooms, +and they really looked <i>almost</i> professional except for +one strip that Father got upside-down; but your +dining-room will be in no danger on that score, for +Father never makes the same mistake twice. Jean, +you and Mabel can move all the furniture except the +table and sideboard into the kitchen—we'll have to +stand on the table. Bettie, take down all the pictures. +Father, you can be trimming the ceiling paper here +on the sideboard while Marjory starts a fire in the +kitchen stove so I can have hot water for my paste.<span class="pagenum">[80]</span> +We'll have our wall covered with dandelions in just +no time!"</p> + +<p>"Now," said Mr. Blossom, when the furniture was +out and the pictures were all down, "we must dig the +soil up well or our dandelions won't grow. Everybody +must tear as much as she can of this old paper off the +wall; it's so ragged it comes off very easily."</p> + +<p>"The roof used to leak," said Bettie, "but my +brother Rob unrolled some tin cans and nailed them +over the place where the truly shingles are gone, and +it never leaked a mite the last four times it rained."</p> + +<p>"The plaster seems fairly good," said Mr. Blossom. +"I could mend these holes with a little plaster of Paris +if some obliging young lady would run with this +dime to the drugstore for ten cents' worth."</p> + +<p>"I'll go," said Mabel. "I don't think I like peeling +walls."</p> + +<p>"Mabel," said Miss Blossom, "isn't really fond of +work, though I notice that she usually does her share."</p> + +<p>Everybody helped to mend the cracks, and everybody +watched with breathless interest to see the first +long strip, upheld by Mr. Blossom and guided by +Miss Blossom and the cottage broom, go into place.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't it be awful," whispered Mabel, "if it +shouldn't stick?"</p> + +<p>But it did stick, smooth and flat, and the paper was +even prettier on the wall than it had been in the roll.<span class="pagenum">[81]</span></p> + +<p>"A side strip next, Father, so we can see how it's +going to look," pleaded Miss Blossom. "Remember, +we're just children."</p> + +<p>At five o'clock, when half of the ceiling and one +side of the wall were finished, the front door was +opened abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Hi there!" said Mr. Black, putting his head in at +the dining-room door. "Why don't you listen when I +ring your bell? Is that dinner of mine ready? I'm +losing a pound a day."</p> + +<p>"No," said Bettie, jumping down from her perch +on the sideboard, "but it will be next Friday. We're +getting it ready just as fast as ever we can. We're even +papering the dining-room for the occasion."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Black, "I just stopped in to say +that unless you could give me that dinner this very +minute, I shall have to go hungry for the next five +weeks."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Bettie, in dismay, "why?"</p> + +<p>"Because I'm going to Washington tonight by the +six o'clock train and I shall be gone a whole month—perhaps +longer."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear," cried Bettie, "we just <i>couldn't</i> have you +tonight. We're papering the dining-room, and besides +we haven't a single thing to eat but some stale cake +that Mrs. Pike gave us."</p> + +<p>"I strongly suspect," said Mr. Black, smiling over<span class="pagenum">[82]</span> +Bettie's head at Mr. Blossom, "that you don't really +<i>want</i> me to dinner."</p> + +<p>"Oh, we do, we do," assured Bettie, earnestly, "but +we just <i>can't</i> have company tonight. If you'll just let +us know exactly when you're coming home, you'll +find a beautiful dinner ready for you."</p> + +<p>"All right," said Mr. Black, "I'll telegraph. I'll say: +'My dear Miss Bettykins, of Dandelion Cottage: It will +give me great pleasure to dine with you tomorrow—or +would you rather have me say the day after tomorrow?—evening. +Yours most devotedly and-so-forth.'"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," cried Bettie, "that will be all right, but +you must give us three days to get ready in."</p> + +<p>After all, however, it was Mabel that sent the telegram, +and it was a very different one.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[83]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i090.jpg" width="400" height="359" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_9">CHAPTER 9</h2> + +<p class="h3">Changes and Plans</p> + +<p>When the little dining-room was finished it was +quite the prettiest room in the house, for the friendly +Blossoms had painted the battered woodwork a delicate +green to match the leaves in the paper; and by +mixing what was left of the green paint with the remaining +color left from the sideboard, clever Miss +Blossom obtained a shade that was exactly right for<span class="pagenum">[84]</span> +as much of the floor as the rug did not cover. Of +course all the neighbors and all the girls' relatives had +to come in afterwards to see what Bettie called "the +very dandelioniest room in Dandelion Cottage."</p> + +<p>It seemed to the girls that the time fairly galloped +from Monday to Thursday. They were heartily sorry +when the moment came for them to lose their pleasant +lodger. They went to the train to see the last of her +and to assure her for the thousandth time that they +should never forget her. Mabel sobbed audibly at the +moment of parting, and large tears were rolling down +silent Bettie's cheeks. Even the seven dollars and fifty +cents that the girls had handled with such delight +that morning paled into insignificance beside the fact +that the train was actually whisking their beloved +Miss Blossom away from them. When she had paid +for her lodging she advised her four landladies to +deposit the money in the bank until time for the dinner +party, and the girls did so, but even the importance +of owning a bank account failed to console +them for their loss. The train out of sight, the sober +little procession wended its way to Dandelion Cottage +but the cozy little house seemed strangely silent +and deserted when Bettie unlocked the door. Mabel, +who had wept stormily all the way home, sat down +heavily on the doorstep and wept afresh.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum">[85]</span></p><p>Pinned to a pillow on the parlor couch, Jean discovered +a little folded square of paper addressed to +Bettie, who was drumming a sad little tune on the +window pane.</p> + +<p>"Why, Bettie," cried Jean, "this looks like a note +for you from Miss Blossom! Do read it and tell us +what she says."</p> + +<p>"It says," read Bettie: "'My dearest of Betties: +Thank you for being so nice to me. There's a telephone +message for you.'"</p> + +<p>"I wonder what it means," said Marjory.</p> + +<p>Bettie ran to the talkless telephone, slipped her hand +inside the little door at the top, and found a small +square parcel wrapped in tissue paper, tied with a +pink ribbon, and addressed to Miss Bettie Tucker, +Dandelion Cottage. Bettie hastily undid the wrappings +and squealed with delight when she saw the +lovely little handkerchief, bordered delicately with +lace, that Miss Blossom herself had made for her. +There was a daintily embroidered "B" in the corner +to make it Bettie's very own.</p> + +<p>Marjory happened upon Jean's note peeping out +from under a book on the parlor table. It said: "Dear +Jean: Don't you think it's time for you to look at the +kitchen clock?"</p> + +<p>Of course everybody rushed to the kitchen to see +Jean take from inside the case of the tickless clock a<span class="pagenum">[86]</span> +lovely handkerchief just like Bettie's except that it +was marked with "J."</p> + +<p>Marjory's note, which she presently found growing +on the crimson petunia, sent her flying to the grindless +coffee-mill, where she too found a similar gift.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mabel, who was now fairly cheerful, +"I wonder if she forgot all about <i>me</i>."</p> + +<p>For several anxious moments the girls searched +eagerly in Mabel's behalf but no note was visible.</p> + +<p>"I can't think where it could be," said housewifely +Jean, stooping to pick up a bit of string from the +dining-room rug, and winding it into a little ball. +"I've looked in every room and—Why! what a long +string! I wonder where it's all coming from."</p> + +<p>"Under the rug," said Marjory, making a dive for +the bit of paper that dangled from the end of the +string. "Here's your note, Mabel."</p> + +<p>"I think," Miss Blossom had written, "that there +must be a mouse in the pantry mousetrap by this +time."</p> + +<p>"Yes!" shouted Mabel, a moment later. "A lovely +lace-edged mouse with an 'M' on it—no, it's 'M B'—a +really truly monogram, the very first monogram I +ever had."</p> + +<p>"Why, so it is," said Marjory. "I suppose she did +that so we could tell them apart, because if she'd put<span class="pagenum">[87]</span> +M on both of them we wouldn't have known which +was which."</p> + +<p>"Why," cried Jean, "it's nearly an hour since the +train left. Wasn't it sweet of her to think of keeping +us interested so we shouldn't be quite so lonesome?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Bettie, "it was even nicer than our +lovely presents, but it was just like her."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear," said Mabel, again on the verge of tears, +"I wish she might have stayed forever. What's the +use of getting lovely new friends if you have to go +and lose them the very next minute? She was just +the nicest grown-up little girl there ever was, and +I'll never see—see her any—"</p> + +<p>"Look out, Mabel," warned Marjory, "if you cry on +that handkerchief you'll spoil that monogram. Miss +Blossom didn't intend these for crying-handkerchiefs—one +good-sized tear would soak them."</p> + +<p>Miss Blossom was not the only friend the girls were +fated to lose that week. Grandma Pike, as everybody +called the pleasant little old lady, was their next-door +neighbor on the west side, and the cottagers were +very fond of her. No one dreamed that Mrs. Pike +would ever think of going to another town to live; +but about ten days before Miss Blossom departed, the +cheery old lady had quite taken everybody's breath +away by announcing that she was going west, just as<span class="pagenum">[88]</span> +soon as she could get her things packed, to live with +her married daughter.</p> + +<p>When the girls heard that Grandma Pike was going +away they were very much surprised and not at all +pleased at the idea of losing one of their most delightful +neighbors. At Miss Blossom's suggestion, they +had spent several evenings working on a parting gift +for their elderly friend. The gift, a wonderful linen +traveling case with places in it to carry everything a +traveler would be likely to need, was finished at last—with +so many persons working on it, it was hard to +keep all the pieces together—and the girls carried it +to Grandma Pike, who seemed very much pleased.</p> + +<p>"Well, well," said the delighted old lady, unrolling +the parcel, "if you haven't gone and made me a grand +slipper-bag! I'll think of you, now, every time I put +on my slippers."</p> + +<p>"No, no," protested Jean. "It's a traveling case with +places in it for 'most everything <i>but</i> slippers."</p> + +<p>"We all sewed on it," explained Mabel. "Those +little bits of stitches that you can't see at all are Bettie's. +Jean did all this feather-stitching, and Marjory +hemmed all the binding. Miss Blossom basted it together +so it wouldn't be crooked."</p> + +<p>"What did <i>you</i> do, Mabel?" asked Grandma Pike, +smiling over her spectacles.<span class="pagenum">[89]</span></p> + +<p>"I took out the basting threads and embroidered +these letters on the pockets."</p> + +<p>"What does this 'P' stand for?"</p> + +<p>"Pins," said Mabel. "You see it was sort of an accident. +I started to embroider the word soap on this +little pocket, but when I got the S O A done, there +wasn't any room left for the P, so I just put it on the +<i>next</i> pocket. I knew that if I explained that it was the +end of 'Soap' and the beginning of 'Pins' you'd remember +not to get your pins and soap mixed up."</p> + +<p>During the lonely days immediately following Miss +Blossom's departure, Mrs. Bartholomew Crane proved +a great solace. The girls had somewhat neglected her +during the preceding busy weeks; but with Miss +Blossom gone, the cottagers became conscious of an +aching void that new wall paper and lace handkerchiefs +and a bank account could not quite fill; so +presently they resumed their former habit of trotting +across the street many times a day to visit good-natured +Mrs. Crane.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crane's house was very small and looked rather +gloomy from the outside because the paint had long +ago peeled off and the weatherbeaten boards had +grown black with age; but inside it was cheerfulness +personified. First, there was Mrs. Crane herself, fairly +radiating comfort. Then there was a bright rag carpet +on the floor, a glowing red cloth on the little table,<span class="pagenum">[90]</span> +a lively yellow canary named Dicksy in one window, +and a gorgeous red-and-crimson but very bad-tempered +parrot in the other. There were only three +rooms downstairs and two bed-chambers upstairs. +Mrs. Crane's own room opened off the little parlor, +and visitors could see the high feather bed always as +smooth and rounded on top as one of Mrs. Crane's +big loaves of light bread. The privileged girls were +never tired of examining the good woman's patchwork +quilts, made many years ago of minute, quaint, +old-fashioned scraps of calico.</p> + +<p>Even the garden seemed to differ from other gardens, +for every inch of it except the patch of green +grass under the solitary cherry tree was given over to +flowers, many of them as quaint and old-fashioned as +the bits of calico in the quilts, and to vegetables that +ripened a week earlier for Mrs. Crane than similar +varieties did for anyone else. Yet the garden was so +little, and the variety so great, that Mrs. Crane never +had enough of any one thing to sell. She owned her +little home, but very little else. The two upstairs +rooms were rented to lodgers, and she knitted stockings +and mittens to sell because she could knit without +using her eyes, which, like so many soft, bright, +black eyes, were far from strong; but the little income +so gained was barely enough to keep stout, warm-hearted, +overgenerous Mrs. Crane supplied with food<span class="pagenum">[91]</span> +and fuel. The neighbors often wondered what would +become of the good, lonely woman if she lost her +lodgers, if her eyes failed completely, or if she should +fall ill. Everybody agreed that Mrs. Crane should +have been a wealthy woman instead of a poor one, +because she would undoubtedly have done so much +good with her money. Mabel had heard her father +say that there was a good-sized mortgage on the +place, and Dr. Bennett had instantly added: "Now, +don't you say anything about that, Mabel." But ever +after that, Mabel had kept her eyes open during her +visits to Mrs. Crane, hoping to get a glimpse of the +dreadful large-sized thing that was not to be mentioned.</p> + +<p>On one occasion she thought she saw light. Mrs. +Crane had expressed a fear that a wandering polecat +had made a home under her woodshed.</p> + +<p>"Is mortgage another name for polecat?" Mabel +had asked a little later.</p> + +<p>"No," imaginative Jean had replied. "A mortgage +is more like a great, lean, hungry, gray wolf waiting +just around the corner to eat you up. Don't ever use +the word before Mrs. Crane; she has one."</p> + +<p>"Where does she keep it?" demanded Mabel, agog +with interest.</p> + +<p>"I promised not to talk about it," said Jean, "and +I won't."<span class="pagenum">[92]</span></p> + +<p>Miss Blossom had been gone only two days when +something happened to Mrs. Crane. It was none of +the things that the neighbors had expected to happen, +but for a little while it looked almost as serious. +Bettie, running across the street right after breakfast +one morning, with a bunch of fresh chickweed for +the yellow canary and a cracker for cross Polly, found +Mrs. Crane, usually the most cheerful person imaginable, +sitting in her kitchen with a swollen, crimson +foot in a pail of lukewarm water, and groaning dismally.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mrs. Crane!" cried surprised Bettie. "What in +the world is the matter? Are—are you coming down +with anything?"</p> + +<p>"I've already come," moaned Mrs. Crane, grimly. +"I was out in my back yard in my thin old slippers +early this morning putting hellebore on my currant +bushes, and I stepped down hard on the teeth of the +rake that I'd dropped on the grass. There's two great +holes in my foot. How I'm ever going to do things I +don't know, for 'twas all I could do to crawl into the +house on my hands and knees."</p> + +<p>"Isn't there something I can do for you?" asked +Bettie, sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"Could you get a stick of wood from the shed and +make me a cup of tea? Maybe I'd feel braver if I +wasn't so empty."<span class="pagenum">[93]</span></p> + +<p>"Of course I could," said Bettie, cheerily.</p> + +<p>"I tell you what it is," confided Mrs. Crane. "It's +real nice and independent living all alone as long as +you're strong and well, but just the minute anything +happens, there you are like a Robinson Crusoe, cast +away on a desert isle. I began to think nobody would +<i>ever</i> come."</p> + +<p>"Can't I do something more for you?" asked Bettie, +poking scraps of paper under the kettle to bring it to +a boil. "Don't you want Dr. Bennett to look at your +foot? Hadn't I better get him?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, do," said Mrs. Crane, "and then come back. +I can't bear to think of staying here alone."</p> + +<p>For the next four days there was a deep depression +in the middle of Mrs. Crane's puffy feather bed, for +the injured foot was badly swollen and Mrs. Crane +was far too heavy to go hopping about on the other +one. At first, her usually hopeful countenance wore a +strained, anxious expression, quite pathetic to see.</p> + +<p>"Now don't you worry one bit," said comforting +little Bettie. "We'll take turns staying with you; we'll +feed Polly and Dicksy, and I believe every friend you +have is going to offer to make broth. Mother's making +some this minute."</p> + +<p>"But there's the lodgers," groaned Mrs. Crane, +"both as particular as a pair of old maids in a glass +case. Mr. Barlow wants his bedclothes tucked in all<span class="pagenum">[94]</span> +around so tight that a body'd think he was afraid of +rolling out of bed nights, and Mr. Bailey won't have +his tucked in at all—says he likes 'em 'floating round +loose and airy.' Do you suppose you girls can make +those two beds and not get those two lodgers mixed +up? I declare, I'm so absent-minded myself that I've +had to climb those narrow stairs many a day to make +sure I'd done it right."</p> + +<p>"Don't be afraid," said Jean, who had joined Bettie. +"Marjory's Aunty Jane has taught her to make beds +beautifully, and I have a good memory. Between us +we'll manage splendidly."</p> + +<p>"But there's my garden," mourned the usually busy +woman, who found it hard to lie still with folded +hands in a world that seemed to be constantly needing +her. "Dear me! I don't see how I'm going to +spare myself for a whole week just when everything +is growing so fast."</p> + +<p>"We'll tend to the garden, too," promised Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed we will," echoed Mabel. "We'll water +everything and weed—"</p> + +<p>"No, you won't," said Mrs. Crane, quickly. "You +can do all the watering you like, but if I catch any +of you weeding, there'll be trouble."</p> + +<p>The young cottagers were even better than their +promises, for they took excellent care of Mrs. Crane, +the lodgers, the parrot, the canary, and the garden,<span class="pagenum">[95]</span> +until the injured foot was well again; but while doing +all this they learned something that distressed them +very much, indeed. Of course they had always known +in a general way that their friend was far from being +wealthy, but they had not guessed how touchingly +poor she really was. But now they saw that her cupboard +was very scantily filled, that her clothing was +very much patched and mended, her shoes distressingly +worn out, and that even her dish-towels were +neatly darned.</p> + +<p>"But we won't talk about it to people," said fine-minded +Jean. "Perhaps she wouldn't like to have +everybody know."</p> + +<p>Even Jean, however, did not guess what a comfort +proud Mrs. Crane had found it to have her warm-hearted +little friends stand between her poverty and +the sometimes-too-prying eyes of a grown-up world.</p> + +<p>Unobservant though they had seemed, the girls did +not forget about the Mother-Hubbardlike state of +Mrs. Crane's cupboard. After that one of their finest +castles in Spain always had Mrs. Crane, who would +have made such a delightful mother and who had +never had any children, enthroned as its gracious +mistress. When they had time to think about it at all, +it always grieved them to think of their generous-natured, +no-longer-young friend dreading a poverty-stricken, +loveless, and perhaps homeless old age; for<span class="pagenum">[96]</span> +this, they had discovered, was precisely what Mrs. +Crane was doing.</p> + +<p>"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, <i>why</i> couldn't she have had +just one strong, kind son to take care of her?"</p> + +<p>"When I'm married," offered Mabel, generously, +"I'll take her to live with me. I won't <i>have</i> any husband +if he doesn't promise to take Mrs. Crane, too."</p> + +<p>"You shan't have her," declared Jean. "I want her +myself."</p> + +<p>"She's already promised to me," said Bettie, triumphantly. +"We're going to keep house together +some place, and I'm going to be an old-maid kindergarten +teacher."</p> + +<p>"I don't think that's fair, Bettie Tucker," said Marjory, +earnestly. "I don't see how my children are to +have any grandmother if she doesn't live with <i>me</i>. +Imagine the poor little things with Aunty Jane for a +grandmother!"</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[97]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i105.jpg" width="400" height="370" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_10">CHAPTER 10</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Milligans</p> + +<p>To the moment of Grandma Pike's departure, all +their neighbors had been so pleasant that the girls +were deceived into thinking that neighbors were never +anything <i>but</i> pleasant. Although they felt not the +slightest misgiving as to their future neighbors, they +had hated to lose dear old Grandma Pike, who had +always been as good to them as if she had really been<span class="pagenum">[98]</span> +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. In spite of the lasting pleasure of this +unexpected donation, however, they could not help +feeling that, with Mr. Black away, Miss Blossom gone, +Mrs. Pike living in another town, and only disabled +Mrs. Crane left, they were losing friends with alarming +rapidity. Grief for the departed, however, did not +prevent their taking an active interest in the persons +who were to occupy the house next door, which Mrs. +Pike's departure had left vacant.</p> + +<p>"I wonder," said Marjory, pulling the curtain back +to get a better view of the empty house, "what the +new people will be like. It's exciting, isn't it, to have +something happening in this quiet neighborhood? +What did Grandma Pike say the name was?"</p> + +<p>"Milligan," replied Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Kind of nice name, isn't it?" asked Jean.</p> + +<p>"Yes," agreed Mabel, brightening suddenly. "I +made up a long, long rhyme about it last night before +I went to sleep. Want to hear it?"</p> + +<p>"Of course."</p> + +<p>"This one really rhymes," explained Mabel, importantly. +Her verses sometimes lacked that desirable +quality, so when they did rhyme Mabel always liked +to mention it. "Here it is:<span class="pagenum">[99]</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"As soon as a man named Milligan<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Got well he always fell ill again—ill again—ill—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"Dear me, I can't remember how it went. There was a +lot more, but I've forgotten the rest."</p> + +<p>"It's a great pity," said Marjory, drily, "that you +didn't forget <i>all</i> of it, because if there's really a Mr. +Milligan, and I ever see him, I'll think of that rhyme +and I won't be able to keep my face straight."</p> + +<p>"We must be very polite to the Milligans," said considerate +Bettie, "and call on them as soon as they +come. Mother always calls on new people; she says it +makes folks feel more comfortable to be welcomed +into the neighborhood."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crane does it, too. We're the nearest, perhaps +we ought to be the first."</p> + +<p>"I think," suggested Jean thoughtfully, "we'd better +wait until they're nicely settled; they might not like +visitors too soon. You know <i>we</i> didn't."</p> + +<p>"They're going to move in today," said Mabel. +"Goodness! I wish they'd hurry and come; I'm so +excited that I keep dusting the same shelf over and +over again. I'm just wild to see them!"</p> + +<p>It was sweeping-day at the cottage when the Milligans' +furniture began to arrive, but it looked very +much as if the sweeping would last for at least <i>two</i> +days because the girls were unable to get very far +away from the windows that faced west. These were<span class="pagenum">[100]</span> +the bedroom windows, and, as there were only two +of them, there were usually two heads at each window.</p> + +<p>"There comes the first load," announced Marjory, +at last. "There's a high-chair on the very top, so there +must be a baby."</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad," said Bettie. "I just love a baby."</p> + +<p>Two men unpacked the Milligans' furniture in the +Milligans' front yard, and each load seemed more interesting +than the one before it. It was such fun to +guess what the big, clumsy parcels contained, particularly +when the contents proved to be quite different +from what the girls expected.</p> + +<p>"Somehow, I don't think they're going to be very +nice people," said Mabel. "I b'lieve we're going to be +disappointed in 'em."</p> + +<p>"Why, Mabel," objected Jean, "we don't know a +thing about them yet."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I do too. Their things—look—they don't look +<i>ladylike</i>."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mabel," laughed Marjory, "you're so funny."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," offered Jean, "the Milligans are poor and +the children have spoiled things."</p> + +<p>"No," insisted Mabel. "They've got some of the +newest and shiningest furniture I ever saw, but I +b'lieve it's imitation."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mabel," laughed Jean, "I hope you won't +watch the loads when <i>I</i> move. For a girl that's slept<span class="pagenum">[101]</span> +for three weeks on an imitation pillow, you're pretty +critical."</p> + +<p>Presently the Milligans themselves arrived. Mabel +happened to be counting the buds on the poppy plants +when they came.</p> + +<p>"Girls!" she cried, rushing into the cottage with the +news. "They've come. I saw them all. There's a Mr. +Milligan, a Mrs. Milligan, a girl, a boy, a baby, and +a dog. The girl's the oldest. She's just about my size—I +mean height—and she has straight, light hair. The +baby walks, and none of them are so very good-looking."</p> + +<p>It did not take the newcomers long to discover that +their next-door neighbors were four little girls. Mrs. +Milligan found it out that very afternoon when she +went to the back door to borrow tea. Bettie explained, +very politely, that Dandelion Cottage was only a +playhouse, and that their tea-caddy contained nothing +but glass beads. When Mrs. Milligan returned to her +own house, she told her own family about it.</p> + +<p>"You might as well run over and play with them, +Laura," she said. "Take the baby with you, too. He's +a dreadful nuisance under my feet. That'll be a real +nice place for you both to play all summer."</p> + +<p>The girls received their visitors pleasantly; almost, +indeed, with enthusiasm; but after a very few moments, +they began to eye the baby with apprehension.<span class="pagenum">[102]</span> +He refused to make friends with them but wandered +about rather lawlessly and handled their treasures +roughly. Laura paid no attention to him but talked to +the girls. She seemed a bright girl and not at all bashful, +and she used a great many slang phrases that +sounded new and, it must be confessed, rather attractive +to the girls.</p> + +<p>"Oh, land, yes," she said, "we came here from Chicago +where we had all kinds of money, and clothes +to burn—we lived in a beautiful flat. Pa just came +here to oblige Mr. Williams—he's going to clerk in +Williams's store. Come over and see me—we'll be +real friendly and have lots of good times together—I +can put you up to lots of dodges. Say, this is a dandy +place to play in—I'm coming over often."</p> + +<p>Jean looked in silence at Bettie, Bettie at Mabel, and +Mabel at Marjory. Surely such an outburst of cordiality +deserved a fitting response, but no one seemed to +be able to make it.</p> + +<p>"Do," said Jean, finally, but rather feebly, "we'd be +pleased to have you."</p> + +<p>Except for a few lively but good-natured squabbles +between Marjory, who was something of a tease, and +Mabel, who was Marjory's favorite victim, the little +mistresses of Dandelion Cottage had always played +together in perfect harmony; but with the coming of +the Milligans everything was changed.<span class="pagenum">[103]</span></p> + +<p>To start with, between the Milligan baby and the +Milligan dog, the girls knew no peace. Mrs. Milligan +was right when she said that the baby was a nuisance, +for it would have been hard to find a more troublesome +three-year-old. He pulled down everything he +could reach, broke the girls' best dishes, wiped their +precious petunia and the geraniums completely out of +existence, and roared with a deep bass voice if anyone +attempted to interfere with him. The dog carried +mud into the neat little cottage, scratched up the +garden, and growled if the girls tried to drive him out.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mabel, disconsolately, in one of the +rare moments when the girls were alone, "I <i>could</i> +stand the baby and the dog. But I <i>can't</i> stand Laura!"</p> + +<p>"Laura certainly likes to boss," said Bettie, who +looked pale and worried. "I don't just see what we're +going to do about it. I try to be nice to her, but I +<i>can't</i> like her. Mother says we must be polite to her, +but I don't believe Mother knows just what a queer +girl she is—you see she's always as quiet as can be +when there are grown people around."</p> + +<p>"Yes," agreed Mabel, "her company manners are so +much properer than mine that Mother says she wishes +I were more like her."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Marjory, uncompromisingly, "I'm +mighty glad you're not. Your manners aren't particularly +good, but you haven't two sets. I think<span class="pagenum">[104]</span> +Laura's the most disagreeable girl I ever knew. Just as +she fools you into almost liking her, she turns around +and scratches you."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," said Jean, "if her people were nicer—By +the way, Mother says that after this we must keep the +windows shut while Mr. Milligan is splitting wood in +his back yard so we can't hear the awful things he +says, and that if we hear Mr. and Mrs. Milligan quarreling +again we mustn't listen."</p> + +<p>"Listen!" exclaimed Mabel. "We don't <i>need</i> to +listen. Their voices keep getting louder and louder +until it seems as if they were right in this house."</p> + +<p>"Of course," said Marjory, "it can't be pleasant for +Laura at home, but, dear me, it isn't pleasant for <i>us</i> +with her over here."</p> + +<p>Badly-brought-up Laura was certainly not a pleasant +playmate. She wanted to lead in everything and was +amiable only when she was having her own way. She +was not satisfied with the way the cottage was arranged +but rearranged it to suit herself. She told the +girls that their garments were countrified, and laughed +scornfully at Bettie's boyish frocks and heavy shoes. +She ridiculed rotund Mabel for being fat, and said +that Marjory's nose turned up and that Jean's rather +large mouth was a good opening for a young dentist. +Before the first week was fairly over, the four girls—who +had lived so happily before her arrival—were<span class="pagenum">[105]</span> +grieved, indignant, or downright angry three-fourths +of the time.</p> + +<p>Laura had one habit that annoyed the girls excessively, +although at first they had found it rather amusing. +Later, however, owing perhaps to a certain rasping +quality in Laura's voice, it grew very tiresome. +She transposed the initials of their names. For instance, +Bettie Tucker became Tettie Bucker, Jeanie Mapes +became Meanie Japes, while Mabel became Babel +Mennett. It was particularly distressing to have Laura +speak familiarly in her sharp, half-scornful tones, of +their dear, departed Miss Blossom, whose name was +Gertrude, as Bertie Glossom. Mr. Peter Black, of +course, became Beter Plack, and Mrs. Bartholomew +Crane was Mrs. Cartholomew Brane, to lawless young +Laura.</p> + +<p>"I don't think it's exactly respectful to do that to +grown-up people's names," protested Bettie, one day.</p> + +<p>"Pooh!" said Laura. "Mrs. Cartholomew Brane looks +just like an old washtub, she's so fat—who'd be respectful +to a washtub? There goes Toctor Ducker, +Tettie Bucker. Huh! I'd hate to be a parson's daughter—they're +always as poor as church mice. What did +you say your mother's first name is?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't say and I'm not going to," returned Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Well, anyhow, her bonnet went out of style four<span class="pagenum">[106]</span> +years ago. I should think the parish'd take up a subscription +and get her a new one."</p> + +<p>"I wish, Laura," said exasperated Jean, another +day, "that you wouldn't meddle with our things. This +bedroom is mine and Bettie's, and the other one is +Mabel's and Marjory's. We wouldn't <i>think</i> of looking +into each other's private treasure boxes. I've seen you +open mine half a dozen times this week. The things +are all keepsakes and I'd rather not have them +handled."</p> + +<p>"Huh! I guess I'll handle 'em if I want to. My +mother can't keep me out of her bureau drawers, and +I don't think you're so very much smarter."</p> + +<p>A day or two later, the girls of Dandelion Cottage +were invited to a party in another portion of the town. +The invitations were left at their own cottage door +and the delighted girls began at once to make plans +for the party.</p> + +<p>"Let's carry our new handkerchiefs," suggested Jean, +going to her treasure box. "I believe I'll take mine +home with me—I dreamed last night that the cottage +was on fire and that mine got burned. Besides, I'll +have to get dressed at home for the party and it would +be handier to have it there."</p> + +<p>"Guess I will, too," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Great idea," said Marjory, taking her own box +from its shelf. "I never should have thought of anything<span class="pagenum">[107]</span> +so bright. Let's all write to Miss Blossom and +tell her that we carried our—Why! mine isn't in my +box!"</p> + +<p>"Neither is mine," cried Mabel, who had turned +quite pale at the discovery. "It was there this morning. +Girls, did any of you touch our handkerchiefs?"</p> + +<p>"Of course we didn't," said Jean. "See, here's mine +with 'J' on it, and there are no others in my box."</p> + +<p>"Of course not," echoed Laura.</p> + +<p>"Mine's here, all right," said Bettie, who had been +struggling with her box, which opened hard. "Are you +sure you left them in your boxes?"</p> + +<p>"Certain sure," replied Mabel. "I saw it this morning."</p> + +<p>"So did I see mine," asserted Marjory. "After I'd +shown it to Aunty Jane I brought it back to put in +my treasure box."</p> + +<p>"Laura," asked Jean, "was Marjory's handkerchief +in her box when you looked in it this morning? I +heard the cover make that funny little clicking noise +that it always makes, and just a minute afterward you +came out of her room."</p> + +<p>"I—I don't know," stammered Laura. "I didn't see +it—I never touched her old box. If you say I did, I'll +go right home and tell my mother you called me a +thief. I'm going now, anyway."</p> + +<p>The girls were in the dining-room just outside of<span class="pagenum">[108]</span> +the back bedroom door. As Laura was brushing past +Jean, the opening of the new girl's blouse caught in +such a fashion on the corner of the sideboard that the +garment, which fastened in front, came unbuttoned +from top to bottom. From its bulging front dropped +Bettie's bead chain, various articles of doll's clothing, +and the two missing handkerchiefs.</p> + +<p>"They're mine!" cried Laura, making a dive for +the things.</p> + +<p>"They're not any such thing!" cried indignant +Jean. "I made that doll's dress myself, and I know +the lace on those handkerchiefs."</p> + +<p>"They're my mother's," protested Laura. "I took +'em out of her drawer."</p> + +<p>"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."</p> + +<p>"It's no such thing," lied Laura, stoutly. "It stands +for Bertha Milligan and that's my mother's name."</p> + +<p>"Give me that other handkerchief this instant," demanded +Jean, giving Laura a slight shake. "If you +don't, we'll take it away from you."</p> + +<p>"Take the old rag," said Laura. "My mother gives +away better handkerchiefs than these to beggars. I just +took 'em anyway to scare Varjory Male and Babel +Mennett, the silly babies."<span class="pagenum">[109]</span></p> + +<p>After this enlightening experience, the girls never +for a moment left their unwelcome visitor alone in +any of the rooms of Dandelion Cottage. They stood +her for almost a week longer, principally because +there seemed to be no way of getting rid of her. +Mabel, indeed, had several lively quarrels with her +during that time, because quick-tempered Mabel, always +strictly truthful herself, could not tolerate deceit +in anyone else, and she had, of course, lost all faith +in Laura.</p> + +<p>The end came suddenly one Friday afternoon. Miss +Blossom had sent to the girls, by mail, a photograph +of her own charming self, and nothing that the cottage +contained was more precious. After one of the +usual tiffs with Mabel, high-handed Laura spitefully +scratched a disfiguring mustache right across the +beautiful face, ruining the priceless treasure beyond +repair.</p> + +<p>Even Laura looked slightly dismayed at the result +of her spiteful work. The others for a moment were +too horror-stricken for words. Then Mabel, with +blazing eyes, sprang to her feet and flung the cottage +door wide open.</p> + +<p>"You go home, Laura Milligan!" she cried. "Don't +you ever dare to come inside this house again!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, go," cried mild Bettie, for once thoroughly +roused. "We've tried to be nice to you and there<span class="pagenum">[110]</span> +hasn't been a single day that you haven't been rude +and horrid. Go home this minute. We're done with +you."</p> + +<p>"I won't go until I'm good and ready," retorted +Laura, tearing the disfigured photograph in two and +scornfully tossing the pieces into a corner. "Such a fuss +about a skinny old maid's picture."</p> + +<p>"You shan't stay one instant longer!" cried indignant +Jean, stepping determinedly behind Laura, placing +her hands on the girl's shoulders, and making a +sudden run for the door. "There! You're out. Don't +you ever attempt to come in again."</p> + +<p>Bettie, grasping the situation and the Milligan baby +at the same time, promptly set the boy outside. She +had handled him with the utmost gentleness, but he +always roared if anyone touched him, and he roared +now.</p> + +<p>"Yah!" yelled Laura, "I'll tell my mother you +pinched him—slapped him, too."</p> + +<p>"Sapped him, too," wailed the baby.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Jean, turning the key in the lock, +"we'll have to keep the door locked after this. Mercy! +I never behaved so dreadfully to anybody before and +I hope I'll never have to again."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[111]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i119.jpg" width="400" height="316" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_11">CHAPTER 11</h2> + +<p class="h3">An Embarrassing Visitor</p> + +<p>Up to the time of the unpleasantness with Laura, the +girls had unlocked the cottage in the morning and had +left it unlocked until they were ready to go home at +night, for the girls spent all their waking hours at +Dandelion Cottage. Bettie, indeed, had the care of the +youngest two Tucker babies, but they were good little +creatures and when the girls played with their dolls +they were glad to include the two placid babies, just +as if they too were dolls. The littlest baby, in particular,<span class="pagenum">[112]</span> +made a remarkably comfortable plaything, for +it was all one to him whether he slept in Jean's biggest +doll's cradle, or in the middle of the dining-room +table, as long as he was permitted to sleep sixteen +hours out of the twenty-four. When he wasn't asleep, +he sucked his thumb contentedly, crowed happily on +one of the cottage beds, or rolled cheerfully about on +the cottage floor. The older baby, too, obligingly +stayed wherever the girls happened to put him. After +this experience with the Tucker infants, the Milligan +baby had proved a great disappointment to the girls, +for they had hoped to use him, too, as an animated +doll; but he had refused steadfastly to make friends +even with Bettie, whose way with babies was something +beautiful to see.</p> + +<p>The girls were all required to do their own mending, +but they found it no hardship to do their darning +on their own doorstep on sunny days, or around the +dining-room table if the north wind happened to be +blowing, for they always had so many interesting +things to talk about.</p> + +<p>During the daytime, the cottage was never left entirely +alone. It was occupied even at mealtimes because +the four families dined and supped at different +hours; for instance, Marjory's Aunty Jane always liked +her tea at half-past five, but Jean's people did not dine +until seven. Owing to the impossibility of capturing<span class="pagenum">[113]</span> +all the boys at one time, supper at the Tucker house +was a movable feast, so Bettie usually ate whenever +she found it most convenient. As for Mabel, it is +doubtful if she knew the exact hours for meals at the +Bennett house because she was invariably late. After +the handkerchief episode, the girls planned that one +or another of them should always be in the cottage +from the time that it was opened in the morning until +it was again locked for the night. The morning after +the later quarrel, however, the girls met by previous +arrangement on Mabel's doorstep, went in a body to +the cottage, and, after they were all inside, carefully +locked the door.</p> + +<p>"We'll be on the safe side, anyway," said Jean. +"Though I shouldn't think that Laura would ever +want to come near the place again."</p> + +<p>"Oh, she'll come fast enough," said Mabel. "She's +cheeky enough for anything. Do you s'pose she told +her mother about it? She said she was going to."</p> + +<p>"Pshaw!" said Marjory. "She was always threatening +to tell her mother, but nothing ever came of it. If +she'd told her mother half the things she <i>said</i> she was +going to, she wouldn't have had time to eat or sleep."</p> + +<p>It was hopeless, the girls had decided, to attempt to +mend the ruined photograph, so, at Bettie's suggestion, +they had sorrowfully cut it into four pieces of +equal size, which they divided between them. They<span class="pagenum">[114]</span> +had just laid the precious fragments tenderly away in +their treasure boxes when the doorbell rang with +such a loud, prolonged, jangling peal that everybody +jumped.</p> + +<p>"Laura!" exclaimed the four girls.</p> + +<p>"No," said Jean, cautiously drawing back the curtain +of the front window and peeping out. "It's Mrs. +Milligan!"</p> + +<p>"Goodness!" whispered Marjory, "there's no knowing +what Laura told her—she never <i>did</i> tell anything +straight."</p> + +<p>"Let's keep still," said Mabel. "Perhaps she'll think +there's nobody home."</p> + +<p>"No hope of that," said Jean. "She saw us come in. +But, pshaw! she can't hurt us anyway."</p> + +<p>"No," said Marjory. "What's the use of being +afraid? <i>We</i> didn't do anything to be ashamed of. +Aunty Jane says we should have turned Laura out the +day she took the handkerchiefs."</p> + +<p>"I'm not exactly afraid," said Bettie, "but I don't +like Mrs. Milligan. Still, we'll have to let her in, I +suppose."</p> + +<p>A second vigorous peal at the bell warned them that +their visitor was getting impatient.</p> + +<p>"You're the biggest and the most dignified," said +Marjory, giving Jean a shove. "<i>You</i> go."</p> + +<p>"Don't ask her in if you can help it," warned Bettie,<span class="pagenum">[115]</span> +in a pleading whisper. "The doorbell sounds as if she +didn't like us very well."</p> + +<p>But the visitor did not wait to be asked to come in. +The moment Jean turned the key the door was flung +open and Mrs. Milligan brushed past the astonished +quartet and sailed into the parlor, where she seated +herself bolt upright on the cozy corner.</p> + +<p>"I'd like to know," demanded Mrs. Milligan, in a +hard, cold tone that fell unpleasantly on the cottagers' +ears, "if you consider it ladylike for four great overgrown +girls to pitch into one poor innocent little child +and a helpless baby? Your conduct yesterday was +simply <i>outrageous</i>. You might have injured those children +for life, or even broken the baby's back."</p> + +<p>"Broken the baby's back!" gasped Bettie, in honest +amazement. "Why, I simply lifted him with my two +hands and set him just outside the door. I never was +rough with <i>any</i> baby in all my life!"</p> + +<p>"I happen to know, on excellent authority," said +Mrs. Milligan, "that you slapped both of those helpless +children and threw them down the front steps. +Laura was so excited about it that she couldn't sleep, +and the poor baby cried half the night—we fear that +he's injured internally."</p> + +<p>"Nobody <i>here</i> injured him," said Mabel. "He always +cries all the time, anyhow."</p> + +<p>"We <i>did</i> put them out and for a very good reason,"<span class="pagenum">[116]</span> +said Jean, speaking as respectfully as she could, "but +we certainly didn't hurt either of them. I'm sorry if +the baby isn't well, but I know it isn't our fault."</p> + +<p>"Laura walked down the steps," said Bettie, "and +the baby turned over and slid down on his stomach +the way he always does."</p> + +<p>"I should think that a <i>minister's</i> daughter," said +Mrs. Milligan, with a withering glance at poor shrinking +Bettie, "would scorn to tell such lies."</p> + +<p>Bettie, who had never before been accused of untruthfulness, +looked the picture of conscious guilt; a +tide of crimson flooded her cheeks and she fingered +the buttons on her blouse nervously. She was too +dumbfounded to speak a word in her own defense. +Mabel, however, was only too ready.</p> + +<p>"Bettie never told a lie in her life," cried the indignant +little girl. "It was your own Laura that told +stories if anybody did—and I guess somebody did, all +right. Laura <i>never</i> tells the truth; she doesn't know +how to."</p> + +<p>"I have implicit confidence in Laura," returned +Mrs. Milligan, frowning at Mabel. "I believe every +word she says."</p> + +<p>"Well," retorted dauntless Mabel, "that's more than +the rest of us do. We kept count one day and she told +seventy-two fibs that we <i>know</i> of."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mabel, do hush," pleaded scandalized Bettie.<span class="pagenum">[117]</span></p> + +<p>"Hush nothing," said Mabel, not to be deterred. +"I'm only telling the truth. Laura took our handkerchiefs +and then fibbed about it, and we've missed a +dozen things since that she probably carried off and—"</p> + +<p>"Mabel, Mabel!" warned Jean, pressing her hand +over Mabel's too reckless lips. "Don't you know that +we decided not to say a word about those other +things? They didn't amount to anything, and we'd +rather have peace than to make a fuss about them."</p> + +<p>"I can see very plainly," said Mrs. Milligan, with +cold disapproval, "that you're not at all the proper +sort of children for my little Laura to play with. I +forbid you to speak to her again; I don't care to have +her associate with you. I can believe all she says about +you, for I've never been treated so rudely in my life."</p> + +<p>"Apologize, Mabel," whispered Jean, whose arm +was still about the younger girl's neck.</p> + +<p>"If I was rude," said candid Mabel, "I beg your +pardon. I didn't <i>mean</i> to be impolite, but every word +I said about Laura was true."</p> + +<p>"I shall not accept your apology," said Mrs. Milligan, +rising to depart, "until you've sent a written +apology to Laura and have retracted everything you've +said about her, besides."</p> + +<p>"It'll never be accepted then," said quick-tempered +Mabel, "for we haven't done anything to apologize +for."<span class="pagenum">[118]</span></p> + +<p>"No, Mrs. Milligan," said Jean, in her even, pleasant +voice. "No apology to Laura can ever come from us. +We stood her just as long as we could, and then we +turned her out just as kindly as anyone could have +done it. I told Mother all about it last night and she +agreed that there wasn't anything else we <i>could</i> have +done."</p> + +<p>"So did Mamma," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"So did Aunty Jane."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mrs. Milligan, pausing on the porch, +"I'd thank you young gossips to keep your tongues +and your hands off my children in the future."</p> + +<p>Jean closed the door and the four girls looked at +one another in silence. None of their own relatives +were at all like Mrs. Milligan and they didn't know +just what to make of their unpleasant experience. At +last, Marjory gave a long sigh.</p> + +<p>"Well," said she, "I came awfully near telling her +when she forbade our playing with Laura that my +Aunty Jane has forbidden <i>me</i> to even speak to her +poor abused Laura."</p> + +<p>"As for me," said Mabel, with lofty scorn, "I don't +<i>need</i> to be forbidden."</p> + +<p>"Come, girls," said Jean, "I'm sorry it had to +happen, but I'm glad the matter's ended. Let's not +talk about it any more. Let's have one of our own<span class="pagenum">[119]</span> +good old happy days—the kind we had before Laura +came."</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you what we'll do," said Bettie. "We'll +each write out a bill of fare for Mr. Black's dinner +party, and we'll see how many different things we can +think of. In that way, we'll be sure not to forget anything."</p> + +<p>"But the Milligans," breathed Marjory, promptly +seeing through Bettie's tactful scheme.</p> + +<p>The Milligan matter, however, was not by any means +ended. It was true that the girls paid no further attention +to Laura, but this did not deter that rather vindictive +young person from annoying the little cottagers +in every way that she possibly could, although she was +afraid to work openly.</p> + +<p>As Laura knew, the girls took great pride in their +little garden. Bettie's good-natured big brother Rob +had offered to take care of their tiny lawn, and he +kept it smooth and even. The round pansy bed daily +yielded handfuls of great purple, white, or golden +blossoms; the thrifty nasturtiums were beginning to +bloom with creditable freedom; and many of the different, +prettily foliaged little plants in the long bed +near the Milligans' fence were opening their first +curious, many-colored flowers.</p> + +<p>Some of the vegetables were positively getting radishes +and carrots on their roots, as Bettie put it. The<span class="pagenum">[120]</span> +pride of the vegetable garden, however, was a huge, +rampant vine that threatened to take possession of the +entire yard. There was just the one plant; no one knew +where the seed came from or how it had managed to +get itself planted, but there it was, close beside the +back fence. For want of a better name, the girls called +it "The Accident," and they expected wonderful +things from it when the great yellow trumpet-shaped +flowers should give place to fruit, although they didn't +know in the least what kind of crop to look for. But +this made it all the more delightful.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it'll be pumpkins," said Jean. "I guess I'd +better hunt up a recipe for pumpkin pie, so's to be +ready when the time comes."</p> + +<p>"Or those funny, pale green squashes that are scalloped +all around the edge like a dish," said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"Or cucumbers," said Bettie. "I took Mrs. Crane a +leaf, one day, and she said it <i>might</i> be cucumbers."</p> + +<p>"Or watermelons," said Mabel. "Um-m! wouldn't it +be grand if it should happen to be watermelons?"</p> + +<p>"What I'm wondering is," said Jean, "whether +there's any danger of the vine's going around the +house and taking possession of the front yard, too. I +could almost believe that this was a seedling of Jack's +beanstalk except that it runs on the ground instead +of up."</p> + +<p>"If it tries to go around the corner," laughed Bettie,<span class="pagenum">[121]</span> +"we'll train it up the back of the house. Wouldn't it +be fun to have pumpkins, or squashes, or cucumbers, +or melons, or maybe all of them at once, growing on +our roof?"</p> + +<p>The day after Mrs. Milligan's visit, Laura, who was +not invited to the party, and who found time heavy +on her hands, watched the girls, after stopping for +Marjory, set out in their pretty summer dresses to +spend the afternoon at a young friend's house. Laura +gazed after them enviously. There was no reason why +she should have been invited, for she had never met +the little girl who was giving the party, but she didn't +think of that. Instead, she foolishly laid the unintentional +slight at the little cottagers' door.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Milligan was sewing on the doorstep and had +given Laura a dish-towel to hem. Saying something +about hunting for a thimble, Laura went to the +kitchen, took the bread-knife from the table drawer, +stole quietly out of the back door, and slipped between +the bars of the back fence. Reaching the splendid vine +that the girls loved so dearly, she parted the huge, +rough leaves until she found the spot where the vine +started from the ground. First looking about cautiously +to make certain that no one was in sight, +spiteful Laura drew the knife back and forth across +the thick stem until, with a sudden, sharp crack, the +sturdy vine parted from its root.<span class="pagenum">[122]</span></p> + +<p>Two minutes later, Laura, looking the picture of +propriety, sat on the Milligans' doorstep hemming her +dish-towel.</p> + +<p>Of course, when the girls made their next daily +excursion about their garden they were almost broken-hearted +at finding their beloved vine flat on the +ground, all withered and dead.</p> + +<p>"Oh," mourned Marjory, "now we'll never know +<i>what</i> 'The Accident' was going to bear, pumpkins or +squashes or—"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mabel, who was blinking hard to keep +the tears back, "that's the hardest part of it, it was cut +off in its p-prime—Oh, dear, I guess I'm g-going to +cry."</p> + +<p>"What <i>could</i> have done it?" asked Bettie, who was +not far from following Mabel's example. "Has anyone +stepped on it?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps a potato bug ate it off," suggested Jean.</p> + +<p>"A two-legged potato bug, I guess," said Marjory, +who had been examining the ground carefully. "See, +here are small sharp heel prints close to the root."</p> + +<p>"Whose handkerchief is this?" asked Mabel, picking +up a small tightly crumpled ball and unrolling it +gingerly. "There's a name on it but my eyes are so +teary I can't make it out."</p> + +<p>"It looks like Milligan," said Bettie, turning it over, +"but we can't tell how long it's been here."<span class="pagenum">[123]</span></p> + +<p>"Horrid as she is," said charitable Jean, "it doesn't +seem as if even Laura would do such a mean thing. +I can't believe it of her."</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> can," said Mabel. "If <i>she</i> had a squash vine, or +a pumpkin vine, I'd go straight over and spoil it this +minute."</p> + +<p>"No, no," said Jean, "we mustn't be horrid just because +other folks are. We won't pay any attention to +her—we'll just be patient."</p> + +<p>The girls found four small, green, egglike objects +growing on the withered vine; they cut them off and +these, too, were laid tenderly away in their treasure +boxes.</p> + +<p>"When we get old," said Mabel, tearfully, "we'll +take 'em out and tell our grandchildren all about 'The +Accident.'"</p> + +<p>But even this prospect did not quite console the +girls for the loss of their treasure.</p> + +<p>For the next few days, Laura remained contented +with doing on the sly whatever she could to annoy +the girls. One evening, when the girls had gone +home for the night and while her mother was away +from home, Laura threw a brick at one of the +cottage windows, breaking a pane of glass. Reaching +in through the hole, she scattered handfuls of sand on +the clean floor that the girls had scrubbed that morning.<span class="pagenum">[124]</span> +Another night she emptied a basketful of potato +parings on their neat front porch and daubed molasses +on their doorknob—mean little tricks prompted by a +mean little nature.</p> + +<p>It wasn't much fun, however, to annoy persons who +refused to show any sign of being annoyed, and Laura +presently changed her tactics. Taking a large bone +from the pantry one day, when the girls were sitting +on their doorstep, she first showed it to Towser, the +Milligan dog, and then threw it over the fence into +the very middle of the pansy bed. Of course, the big +clumsy dog bounded over the low fence after the +bone, crushing many of the delicate pansy plants. +After that at regular intervals, Laura threw sticks and +other bones into the other beds with very much the +same result.</p> + +<p>The next time Rob cut the grass he noticed the untidy +appearance of the beds and asked the reason. The +girls explained.</p> + +<p>"I'll shoot that dog if you say so," offered Rob, with +honest indignation.</p> + +<p>"No, no," said Bettie, "it isn't the <i>dog's</i> fault."</p> + +<p>"No," said Jean, "we're not sure that the dog isn't +the least objectionable member of the Milligan family."</p> + +<p>"How would it do if I licked the boy?" asked Rob.</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't do at all," replied Bettie. "He works<span class="pagenum">[125]</span> +somewhere in the daytime and never even looks in +this direction when he's home. He's afraid of girls."</p> + +<p>"Then I guess you'll have to grin and bear it," said +Rob, moving off with the lawn-mower, "since neither +of my remedies seems to fit the case."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[126]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i134.jpg" width="400" height="346" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_12">CHAPTER 12</h2> + +<p class="h3">A Lively Afternoon</p> + +<p>It happened one day that Mrs. Milligan was obliged +to spend a long afternoon at the dentist's, leaving +Laura in charge of the house. Unfortunately it happened, +too, that this was the day when the sewing +society met, and Mrs. Tucker had asked Bettie to +stay home for the afternoon because the next-to-the-youngest +baby was ill with a croupy cold and could +not go out of doors to the cottage. Devoted Jean offered<span class="pagenum">[127]</span> +to stay with her beloved Bettie, who gladly accepted +the offer. Before going to Bettie's, however, +Jean ran over to Dandelion Cottage to tell the other +girls about it.</p> + +<p>"Mabel," asked Jean, a little doubtfully, "are you +quite sure you'll be able to turn a deaf ear if Laura +should happen to bother you? I'm half afraid to leave +you two girls here alone."</p> + +<p>"You needn't be," said Mabel. "I wouldn't associate +with Laura if I were paid for it. She isn't my kind."</p> + +<p>"No," said Marjory, "you needn't worry a mite. +We're going to sit on the doorstep and read a perfectly +lovely book that Aunty Jane found at the +library—it's one that she liked when <i>she</i> was a little +girl. We're going to take turns reading it aloud."</p> + +<p>"Well, that certainly ought to keep you out of mischief. +You'll be safe enough if you stick to your book. +If anything <i>should</i> happen, just remember that I'm +at Bettie's."</p> + +<p>"Yes, Grandma," said Marjory, with a comical +grimace.</p> + +<p>Jean laughed, ran around the house, and squeezed +through the hole in the back fence.</p> + +<p>Half an hour later, lonely Laura, discovering the +girls on their doorstep, amused herself by sicking the +dog at them. Towser, however, merely growled lazily +for a few moments and then went to sleep in the sunshine—he,<span class="pagenum">[128]</span> +at least, cherished no particular grudge +against the girls and probably by that time he recognized +them as neighbors.</p> + +<p>Then Laura perched herself on one of the square +posts of the dividing fence and began to sing—in her +high, rasping, exasperating voice—a song that was +almost too personal to be pleasant. It had taken Laura +almost two hours to compose it, some days before, and +fully another hour to commit it to memory, but she +sang it now in an offhand, haphazard way that led +the girls to suppose that she was making it up as she +went along. It ran thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's a lanky girl named Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who's altogether too lean.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her mouth is too big,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she wears a wig,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And her eyes are bright sea-green.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Of course it was quite impossible to read even a +thrillingly interesting book with rude Laura making +such a disturbance. If the girls had been wise, they +would have gone into the house and closed the door, +leaving Laura without an audience; but they were <i>not</i> +wise and they <i>were</i> curious. They couldn't help waiting +to hear what Laura was going to sing about the +rest of them, and they did not need to wait long; +Laura promptly obliged them with the second verse:<span class="pagenum">[129]</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's another named Marjory Vale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who's about the size of a snail.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her teeth are light blue—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She hasn't but two—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And her hair is much too pale.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Laura had, in several instances, sacrificed truth for +the sake of rhyme, but enough remained to injure the +vanity of the subjects of her song very sharply. Marjory +breathed quickly for a moment and flushed pink +but gave no audible sign that she had heard. Laura, +somewhat disappointed, proceeded:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's a silly young lass called Bet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thinks she's ev'rybody's sweet pet.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She slapped my brother,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fibbed to my mother—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know what <i>she's</i> going to get.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Mabel snorted indignantly over this injustice to +her beloved Bettie and started to rise, but Marjory +promptly seized her skirt and dragged her down. +Laura, however, saw the movement and was correspondingly +elated. It showed in her voice:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But the worst of the lot is Mabel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She eats all the pie she's able.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She's round as a ball,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has no waist at all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And her manners are bad at the table.<br /></span> +<span class="pagenum">[130]</span></div></div> + +<p>Marjory giggled. She had no thought of being disloyal, +but this verse was certainly a close fit.</p> + +<p>"You just let me go," muttered Mabel, crimson +with resentment and struggling to break away from +Marjory's restraining hand. "I'll push her off that +post."</p> + +<p>"Hush!" said diplomatic Marjory, "perhaps there's +more to the song."</p> + +<p>But there wasn't. Laura began at the beginning and +sang all the verses again, giving particular emphasis +to the ones concerning Mabel and Marjory. This, of +course, grew decidedly monotonous; the girls got tired +of the constant repetition of the silly song long before +Laura did. There was something about the song, too, +that caught and held their attention. Irresistibly attracted, +held by an exasperating fascination, neither +girl could help waiting for her own special verse. +But while this was going on, Mabel, with a finger in +the ear nearest Laura, was industriously scribbling +something on a scrap of paper.</p> + +<p>As everybody knows, the poetic muse doesn't always +work when it is most needed, and Mabel was sadly +handicapped at that moment. She was not satisfied +with her hasty scrawl but, in the circumstances, +it was the best she could do. Suddenly, before Marjory +realized what was about to happen, Mabel was shouting<span class="pagenum">[131]</span> +back, to an air quite as objectionable as the one +Laura was singing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There's a very rude girl named Laura,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose ways fill all with horror.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She's all the things she says <i>we</i> are;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All know this to their sorrow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"Yah! yah!" retorted quick-witted Laura. "There +isn't a rhyme in your old song. If I couldn't rhyme +better 'n that, I'd learn how. Come over and I'll teach +you!"</p> + +<p>For an instant, Mabel looked decidedly crushed—<i>no</i> +poet likes his rhymes disparaged. Laura, noting Mabel's +crestfallen attitude, went into gales of mocking +laughter and when Mabel looked at Marjory for sympathy +Marjory's face was wreathed in smiles. It was +too much; Mabel hated to be laughed at.</p> + +<p>"I <i>can</i> rhyme," cried Mabel, springing to her feet +and giving vent to all her grievances at once. "My +table manners <i>are</i> good. I'm <i>not</i> fat. I've got just as +much waist as <i>you</i> have."</p> + +<p>"You've got more," shrieked delighted Laura.</p> + +<p>Faithless Marjory, struck by this indubitable truth, +laughed outright.</p> + +<p>"You—you can't make Indian-bead chains," sputtered +Mabel, trying hard to find something crushing +to say. "You can't make pancakes. You can't drive +nails."<span class="pagenum">[132]</span></p> + +<p>"Yah," retorted Laura, who was right in her element, +"you can't throw straight."</p> + +<p>"Neither can you."</p> + +<p>"I can! If I could find anything to throw I'd +prove it."</p> + +<p>Just at this unfortunate moment, a grocery-man +arrived at the Milligan house with a basketful of +beautiful scarlet tomatoes. In another second, Laura, +anxious to prove her ability, had jumped from the +fence, seized the basket and, with unerring aim, was +delightedly pelting her astonished enemy with the +gorgeous fruit. Mabel caught one full in the chest, +and as she turned to flee, another landed square in +the middle of her light-blue gingham back; Marjory's +shoulder stopped a third before the girls retreated to +the house, leaving Laura, a picturesque figure on the +high post, shouting derisively:</p> + +<p>"Proved it, didn't I? Ki! I proved it."</p> + +<p>Marjory, pleading that discretion was the better part +of valor, begged Mabel to stay indoors; but Mabel, +who had received, and undoubtedly deserved, the +worst of the encounter, was for instant revenge. Rushing +to the kitchen she seized the pan of hard little +green apples that Grandma Pike had bequeathed the +girls and flew with them to the porch.</p> + +<p>Mabel's first shot took Laura by surprise and landed +squarely between her shoulders. Mabel was surprised,<span class="pagenum">[133]</span> +too, because throwing straight was not one of her accomplishments. +She hadn't hoped to do more than +frighten her exasperating little neighbor.</p> + +<p>Elated by this success, Mabel threw her second +apple, which, alas, flew wide of its mark and caught +poor unprepared Mr. Milligan, who was coming in +at his own gate, just under the jaw, striking in such +a fashion that it made the astonished man suddenly +bite his tongue.</p> + +<p>Nobody likes to bite his tongue. Naturally Mr. Milligan +was indignant; indeed, he had every reason to +be, for Mabel's conduct was disgraceful and the little +apple was very hard. Entirely overlooking the fact +that Laura, who had failed to notice her father's untimely +arrival, was still vigorously pelting Mabel, who +stood as if petrified on the cottage steps and was making +no effort to dodge the flying scarlet fruit, Mr. Milligan +shouted:</p> + +<p>"Look here, you young imps, I'll see that you're +turned out of that cottage for this outrage. We've +stood just about enough abuse from you. I don't intend +to put up with any more of it."</p> + +<p>Then, suddenly discovering what Laura, who had +turned around in dismay at the sound of her father's +voice, was doing, angry Mr. Milligan dragged his suddenly +crestfallen daughter from the fence, boxed her +ears soundly, and carried what was left of the tomatoes<span class="pagenum">[134]</span> +into the house; for that particular basket of fruit +had been sent from very far south and express charges +had swelled the price of the unseasonable dainty to a +very considerable sum.</p> + +<p>Marjory, in the cottage kitchen, was alternately +scolding and laughing at woebegone Mabel when +Jean and Bettie, released from their charge, ran back +to Dandelion Cottage. Mabel, crying with indignation, +sat on the kitchen stove rubbing her eyes with a pair +of grimy fists—Mabel's hands always gathered dust.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mabel! how <i>could</i> you!" groaned Jean, when +Marjory had told the afternoon's story. "I'll never dare +to leave you here again without some sensible person +to look after you. Don't you <i>see</i> you've been almost—yes, +quite—as bad as Laura?"</p> + +<p>"I don't care," sobbed unrepentant Mabel. "If you'd +heard those verses—and—and Marjory <i>laughed</i> at +me."</p> + +<p>"Couldn't help it," giggled Marjory, who was +perched on the corner of the kitchen table.</p> + +<p>"But surely," reproached gentle-mannered Jean, "it +wasn't necessary to throw things."</p> + +<p>"I guess," said Mabel, suddenly sitting up very +straight and disclosing a puffy, tear-stained countenance +that moved Marjory to fresh giggles, "if you'd +felt those icy cold tomatoes go plump in your eye and +every place on your very newest dress, <i>you'd</i> have<span class="pagenum">[135]</span> +been pretty mad, too. Look at me! I was too surprised +to move after I'd hit Mr. Milligan—I never saw him +coming at all—and I guess every tomato Laura threw +hit me some place."</p> + +<p>"Yes," confirmed Marjory, "I'll say that much for +Laura. She can certainly throw straighter than any girl +I ever knew—she throws just like a boy."</p> + +<p>Jean, still worried and disapproving, could not help +laughing, for Laura's plump target showed only too +good evidence of Laura's skill. Mabel's new light-blue +gingham showed a round scarlet spot where each +juicy missile had landed; and besides this, there were +wide muddy circles where her tears had left highwater +marks about each eye.</p> + +<p>"But, dear me," said Jean, growing sober again, +"think how low-down and horrid it will sound when +we tell about it at home. Suppose it should get into +the papers! Apples and tomatoes! If boys had done it +it would have sounded bad enough, but for <i>girls</i> to do +such a thing! Oh, dear, I <i>do</i> wish I'd been here to +stop it!"</p> + +<p>"To stop the tomatoes, you mean," said Mabel. +"You couldn't have stopped anything else, for I just +<i>had</i> to do something or burst. I've felt all the week +just like something sizzling in a bottle and waiting +to have the cork pulled! I'll <i>never</i> be able to do my<span class="pagenum">[136]</span> +suffering in silence the way you and Bettie do. Oh, +girls, I feel just loads better."</p> + +<p>"Well, you may <i>feel</i> better," said irrepressible Marjory, +"but you certainly look a lot worse. With those +muddy rings on your face you look just like a little +owl that isn't very wise."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear," mourned Bettie, "if Miss Blossom had +only stayed we wouldn't have had all this trouble with +those people."</p> + +<p>"No," said Marjory, shrewdly, "Miss Blossom would +probably have made Laura over into a very good imitation +of an honest citizen. I don't think, though, that +even Miss Blossom could make Laura anything more +than an imitation, because—well, because she's Laura. +It's different with Mabel—"</p> + +<p>Mabel looked up expectantly, and Marjory, who was +in a teasing mood, continued.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said she, encouragingly, "Miss Blossom <i>might</i> +have succeeded in making a nice, polite girl out of +Mabel if she'd only had time—"</p> + +<p>"How much time?" demanded Mabel, with sudden +suspicion.</p> + +<p>"Oh, about a thousand years," replied Marjory, skipping +prudently behind tall Jean.</p> + +<p>"Never mind, Mabel," said Bettie, who always sided +with the oppressed, slipping a thin arm about Mabel's<span class="pagenum">[137]</span> +plump shoulders. "We like you pretty well, anyway, +and you've certainly had an awful time."</p> + +<p>"Do you think," asked Mabel, with sudden concern, +"that Mr. Milligan <i>could</i> get us turned out of +the cottage? You know he threatened to."</p> + +<p>"No," said Bettie. "The cottage is church property +and no one could do anything about it with Mr. Black +away because he's the senior warden. Father said only +this morning that there was all sorts of church business +waiting for him."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mabel, with a sigh of relief, "Mr. +Black wouldn't turn us out, so we're perfectly safe. +Guess I'll go out on the porch and sing my Milligan +song again."</p> + +<p>"I guess you won't," said Jean. "There's a very +good tub in the Bennett house and I'd advise you to +go home and take a bath in it—you look as if you +needed <i>two</i> baths and a shampoo. Besides, it's almost +supper time."</p> + +<p>Laura's version of the story, unfortunately, differed +materially from the truth. There was no gainsaying +the tomatoes—Mr. Milligan had seen those with his +own eyes; but Laura claimed that she had been compelled +to use those expensive vegetables as a means of +self-defense. According to Laura, whose imagination +was as well trained as her arm, she had been the innocent +victim of all sorts of persecution at the hands of<span class="pagenum">[138]</span> +the four girls. They had called her a thief and had +insulted not only her but all the other Milligans. +Mabel, she declared, had opened hostilities that afternoon +by throwing stones, and poor, abused Laura had +only used the tomatoes as a last resort. The apple that +struck Mr. Milligan was, she maintained, the very last +of about four dozen.</p> + +<p>Had the Milligans not been prejudiced, they might +easily have learned how far from the truth this assertion +was, for the porch of Dandelion Cottage was still +bespattered with tomatoes, whereas in the Milligan +yard there were no traces of the recent encounter. +This, to be sure, was no particular credit to Mabel for +there <i>might</i> have been had Mr. Milligan delayed his +coming by a very few minutes, since Mabel's pan still +contained seven hard little apples and Mabel still +longed to use them.</p> + +<p>The Milligans, however, <i>were</i> prejudiced. Although +Laura was often rude and disagreeable at home, she +was the only little girl the Milligans had; in any +quarrel with outsiders they naturally sided with their +own flesh and blood, and, in spite of the tomatoes, +they did so now. In her mother Laura found a staunch +champion.</p> + +<p>"I won't have those stuck-up little imps there another +week," said Mrs. Milligan. "If you don't see +that they're turned out, James, I will."<span class="pagenum">[139]</span></p> + +<p>"They stick out their tongues at me every time they +see me," fibbed Laura, whose own tongue was the +only one that had been used for sticking-out purposes. +"They said Ma was no lady, and—"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to complain of them this very night," +said Mrs. Milligan, with quick resentment. "I'll show +'em whether I'm a lady or not."</p> + +<p>"Who'll you complain to?" asked Laura, hopefully.</p> + +<p>"The church warden, of course. These cottages both +belong to the church."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Black is the girls' best friend," said Laura. "He +wouldn't believe anything against them—besides, he's +away."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Downing isn't," said Mr. Milligan. "I paid +him the rent last week. We'll threaten to leave if he +doesn't turn them out. He's a sharp businessman and +he wouldn't lose the rent of this house for the sake of +letting a lot of children use that cottage. I'll see him +tomorrow."</p> + +<p>"No," said Mrs. Milligan, "just leave the matter to +me. <i>I'll</i> talk to Mr. Downing."</p> + +<p>"Suit yourself," said Mr. Milligan, glad perhaps to +shirk a disagreeable task.</p> + +<p>After supper that evening, Mrs. Milligan put on her +best hat and went to Mr. Downing's house, which was +only about three blocks from her own. The evening +was warm and she found Mr. and Mrs. Downing<span class="pagenum">[140]</span> +seated on their front porch. Mrs. Milligan accepted +their invitation to take a chair and began at once to +explain the reason for her visit.</p> + +<p>The angry woman's tale lost nothing in the telling; +indeed, it was not hard to discover how Laura came +by her habit of exaggerating. When Mrs. Milligan +went home half an hour later, Mr. Downing was +convinced that the church property was in dangerous +hands. He couldn't see what Mr. Black had been +thinking of to allow careless, impudent children who +played with matches, drove nails in the cottage +plaster, and insulted innocent neighbors, to occupy +Dandelion Cottage.</p> + +<p>"Somehow," said Mrs. Downing, when the visitor +had departed, "I don't like that woman. She isn't quite +a lady."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, my dear," said Mr. Downing. "If only +<i>half</i> the things she hints at are true, there would be +reason enough for closing the cottage. The place itself +doesn't amount to much, I've been told, but a fire +started there would damage thousands of dollars' +worth of property. Besides, there's the rent from the +house those people are in—we don't want to lose that, +you know."</p> + +<p>"Still, there are always tenants—"</p> + +<p>"Not at this time of the year. I'll look into the +matter as soon as I can find time."<span class="pagenum">[141]</span></p> + +<p>"Remember," said Mrs. Downing, thinking of Mrs. +Milligan's rasping tones, "that there are two sides to +every story."</p> + +<p>"My dear," said Mr. Downing, complacently, "I +shall listen with the strictest impartiality to both +sides."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[142]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i150.jpg" width="400" height="357" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_13">CHAPTER 13</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Junior Warden</p> + +<p>By nine o'clock the next morning, the girls were all +at the cottage as usual. Mrs. Mapes had given them +materials for a simple cake and Jean and Bettie were +in the kitchen making it. Marjory, singing as she +worked, was running her Aunty Jane's carpet-sweeper +noisily over the parlor rug, while Mabel, whistling an +accompaniment to Marjory's song, was dusting the<span class="pagenum">[143]</span> +sideboard; at all times the cottage furniture received +so much unnecessary dusting that it would not have +been at all surprising if it had worn thin in spots.</p> + +<p>When the doorbell rang suddenly and sharply, Marjory's +tune stopped short, high in air, and Mabel ran +to the window.</p> + +<p>"It's a man," announced Mabel.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Milligan?" asked Marjory, anxiously.</p> + +<p>"He's moved so I can't tell."</p> + +<p>"Try the other window," urged Marjory, impatiently.</p> + +<p>"It doesn't look like Mr. Milligan's legs—I can't see +the rest of him. They look neat and—and expensive."</p> + +<p>"Probably it's just an agent; they're kind of thick +lately. You go to the door and tell him we're just pretend +people, while I'm putting the sweeper out of +sight."</p> + +<p>"Good morning," said Mr. Downing. "Are you—Why! +this is a very cozy little place. I had no idea that +it was so comfortable. May I come in?"</p> + +<p>"Ye-es," returned Mabel, eyeing him doubtfully, +"but I think you're probably making a mistake. You +see, we're not really-truly people."</p> + +<p>"Indeed!" said Mr. Downing, with an amused +glance at plump Mabel. "Is it possible you're a ghost?"</p> + +<p>"I mean," explained Mabel, "we're just children and +this is only a playhouse, not a real one. If you have<span class="pagenum">[144]</span> +anything to sell, or are looking for a boarding place, +or want to take our census—"</p> + +<p>"No," said Mr. Downing, "I don't want either your +dollars or your senses. My name is Downing and I'm +not selling anything. I called on business. Who is the +head of this—this ghostly corporation?"</p> + +<p>"It has four," said Mabel. "I'll get the rest."</p> + +<p>Bettie and Jean, with grown-up gingham aprons +tied about their necks, followed Mabel to the parlor. +Mr. Downing had seated himself in one of the chairs +and the girls sat facing him in a bright-eyed row on +the couch. Their countenances were so eager and +expectant that Mr. Downing found it hard to begin.</p> + +<p>"I've come in," he said, "to talk over a little matter +of business with you. I understand that you've been +having trouble with your neighbors—exchanging compliments—"</p> + +<p>"No," said honest Mabel, turning crimson, "it was +apples and tomatoes. The Milligans are the most troublesome +neighbors we've ever had."</p> + +<p>"So-o?" said the visitor, raising his eyebrows in +genuine surprise. "Why, I understood that it was quite +the other way round. I'd like to hear your version of +the difficulty."</p> + +<p>Jean and Bettie, with occasional assistance from +Marjory and much prompting from Mabel, told him +all about it. During the recital Mr. Downing's attention<span class="pagenum">[145]</span> +seemed to wander, for his eyes took in every detail +of the neat sitting-room, strayed to the prettily +papered dining-room, and even rested lingeringly upon +the one visible corner of the dainty blue bedroom. +Bettie had neglected to close the door between the +kitchen and the dining-room, which proved unfortunate, +because the tiny scrap of butter that Jean had +left melting in a very small pan on the kitchen stove, +got too hot and with threatening, hissing noises began +to give forth clouds of thick, disagreeable smoke. +Jean, the first of the girls to notice it, flew to the +kitchen, snatched a lid from the stove, and, with a +newspaper for a holder, swept the burning butter, +pan and all, into the fire. Then the paper in Jean's +hand caught fire, and for the instant before she stuffed +it into the stove and clapped the lid into place, fierce +red flames leaped high.</p> + +<p>To the visitor, prepared by Mrs. Milligan for just +such doings, it looked for a moment as if all the rear +end of the cottage were in flames; but Jean returned +to her place on the couch with an air of what looked +to Mr. Downing very much like almost criminal unconcern. +How was Mr. Downing, who did no cooking, +to know that paper placed on a cake-baking fire +<i>always</i> flares up in an alarming fashion without doing +any real harm? He didn't know, and the incident decided +the matter he was turning over in his mind.<span class="pagenum">[146]</span> +The girls had found it a little hard to tell their story, +for it was plain that their visitor was using his eyes +rather than his ears; moreover, they were not at all +certain that he had any right to demand the facts in +the case. When the story was finished, Mr. Downing +looked at the row of interested faces and cleared his +throat; but, for some reason, the words he had meant +to speak refused to come. He hadn't supposed that the +evicting of unsatisfactory tenants would prove such +an unpleasant task. The tenants, all at once, seemed +part of the house, and the man realized suddenly that +the losing of the cottage was likely to prove a severe +blow to the four little housekeepers. Perhaps it was +disconcerting to see the expression of puzzled anxiety +that had crept into Bettie's great brown eyes, into +Jean's hazel ones, into Marjory's gray and Mabel's +blue ones. At any rate, Mr. Downing decided to be +well out of the way when the blow should fall; he +realized that it would prove a trying ordeal to face all +those young eyes filled with indignation and probably +with tears.</p> + +<p>"Ah-hum," said Mr. Downing, rising to take his +leave. "I'm much obliged to you young ladies. Hum—the +number of this house is what, if you please?"</p> + +<p>"Number 224," said Bettie, whose mind worked +quickly.</p> + +<p>"Hum," said Mr. Downing, writing it on the envelope<span class="pagenum">[147]</span> +he had taken from his pocket, and moving +rather abruptly toward the door, as if desirous to +escape as speedily as possible with the knowledge he +had gleaned. "Thank you very much. I bid you all +good morning."</p> + +<p>"Now what in the world did that man want?" demanded +Mabel, before the front door had fairly closed. +"Do you s'pose he's some kind of a lawyer, or—" and +Mabel turned pale at the thought—"a policeman disguised +as a—a human being? Do you suppose the +Milligans are going to get us arrested for just two +apples—and—and a little poetry?"</p> + +<p>"More probably," suggested Jean, "he's a burglar. +Didn't you notice the way he looked around at everything? +I could see that he sort of lost interest after +while—as if he had concluded that we hadn't anything +worth stealing."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" said Bettie. "I don't know what he +does for a living, but he can't be a burglar. He hasn't +lived here very long, but he goes to our church and +comes to our house to vestry meetings. Sometimes on +warm Sundays when there's nobody else to do it, he +passes the plate."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mabel, "I hope he isn't a policeman +weekdays."</p> + +<p>"It's more likely," said Marjory, "that he does reporting +for the papers. The time Aunty Jane was in<span class="pagenum">[148]</span> +that railroad accident, a reporter came to our house +to interview her, and he asked questions just as that +Mr. Downing—was that his name?—did. He took +the number of the house, too."</p> + +<p>"Oh, mercy!" gasped Mabel, turning suddenly from +white to a deep crimson. "If those green apples get +into the paper, I'll be too ashamed to live! Oh, <i>girls</i>! +Couldn't we stop him—couldn't we—couldn't we pay +him something <i>not</i> to?"</p> + +<p>"It's probably in by now," said Marjory, teasingly. +"They do it by telegraph, you know."</p> + +<p>"He <i>couldn't</i> have been a reporter," protested Mabel. +"Reporters are always young and very active so they +can catch lots of scoons—no, scoots."</p> + +<p>"Scoops," corrected Jean.</p> + +<p>"Well, scoops. He was kind of slow and a little bit +bald-headed on top—I noticed it when he stooped for +his hat."</p> + +<p>"Well, anyway," comforted Jean, "let's not worry +about it. Let's rebuild our fire—of course it's out by +now—and finish our cake."</p> + +<p>In spite of the cake's turning out much better than +anyone could have expected, with so many agitated +cooks taking turns stirring it, there was something +wrong with the day. The girls were filled with uneasy +forebodings and could settle down to nothing. Marjory +felt no desire to sing, and even the cake seemed<span class="pagenum">[149]</span> +to have lost something of its flavor. Moreover, when +they had stood for a moment on their doorstep to see +the new steam road-roller go puffing by, Laura had +tossed her head triumphantly and shouted tauntingly: +"<i>I</i> know something <i>I</i> shan't tell!" After that, the girls +could not help wondering if Laura really did know +something—some dreadful thing that concerned them +vitally and was likely to burst upon them at any +moment.</p> + +<p>For the first time in the history of their housekeeping, +they could find nothing that they really wanted +to do. During the afternoon they had several little disagreements +with each other. Mild Jean spoke sharply +to Marjory, and even sweet-tempered Bettie was +drawn into a lively dispute with Mabel. Moreover, all +three of the older girls were inclined to blame Mabel +for her fracas with the Milligans; and the culprit, +ashamed one moment and defiant the next, was in a +most unhappy frame of mind. Altogether, the day was +a failure and the four friends parted coldly at least an +hour before the usual time.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[150]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i158.jpg" width="400" height="290" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_14">CHAPTER 14</h2> + +<p class="h3">An Unexpected Letter</p> + +<p>The next morning, Jean, with three large bananas as +a peace offering, was the first to arrive at Dandelion +Cottage. Jean, a wise young person for her years, had +decided that a little hard work would clear the atmosphere, +so, finding no one else in the house, she made +a fire in the stove, put on the kettle, put up the leaf +of the kitchen table, and began to take all the dishes +from the pantry shelves. Dishwashing in the cottage +was always far more enjoyable than this despised occupation +usually is elsewhere, owing to the astonishing<span class="pagenum">[151]</span> +assortment of crockery the girls had accumulated. No +two of the dishes—with the exception of a pair of +plates bearing life-sized portraits of "The frog that +would a-wooing go, whether his mother would let +him or no"—bore the same pattern. There was a bewildering +diversity, too, in the sizes and shapes of the +cups and saucers, and an alarming variety in the matter +of color. But, as the girls had declared gleefully a +dozen times or more, it would be possible to set the +table for seven courses when the time should come for +Mr. Black's and Mrs. Crane's dinner party, because so +many of the things almost matched if they didn't +quite. Jean was thinking of this as she lifted the dishes +from the shelf to the table, and lovingly arranged +them in pairs, the pink sugar bowl beside the blue +cream-pitcher, the yellow coffee cup beside the dull +red Japanese tea cup, and the "Love-the-Giver" mug +beside the "For my Little Friend" oatmeal bowl. She +had just taken down the big, dusty, cracked pitcher +that matched nothing else—which perhaps was the +reason that it had remained high on the shelf since +the day Mabel had used it for her lemonade—when +the doorbell rang.</p> + +<p>Hastily wiping her dusty hands, Jean ran to the +door. No one was there, but the postman was climbing +the steps of the next house, so Jean slipped her +fingers expectantly into the little, rusty iron letter-box.<span class="pagenum">[152]</span> +Perhaps there was something from Miss Blossom, who +sometimes showed that she had not forgotten her little +landladies.</p> + +<p>Sure enough, there was a large white letter, not +from Miss Blossom to be sure, but from somebody. +To the young cottagers, letters were always joyous +happenings; they had no debts, consequently they +were unacquainted with bills. With this auspicious +beginning, for of course the coming of a totally unexpected +letter was an auspicious beginning, it was +surely going to be a cheerful, perhaps even a delightful, +day. Jean hummed happily as she laid the unopened +letter on the dining-room table, for of course +a letter somewhat oddly addressed to "The Four +Young Ladies at 224 Fremont Street, City," could be +opened only when all four were present. When Marjory +and Bettie came in, they fell upon the letter and +examined every portion of the envelope, but neither +girl could imagine who had sent it. It was impossible +to wait for Mabel, who was always late, so Bettie +obligingly ran to get her. Even so there was still a +considerable wait while Mabel laced her shoes; but +presently Bettie returned, with Mabel, still nibbling +very-much-buttered toast, at her heels.</p> + +<p>"You open it, Jean," panted Bettie. "You can read +writing better than we can."</p> + +<p>"Hurry," urged Mabel, who could keep other persons<span class="pagenum">[153]</span> +waiting much more easily than she herself could +wait.</p> + +<p>"Here's a fork to open it with," said Marjory. "I +can't find the scissors. Hurry up; maybe it's a party +and we'll have to R. S. V. P. right away."</p> + +<p>"Oh, goody! If it is," squealed Mabel, "I can wear +my new tan Oxfords."</p> + +<p>"It's from Yours respectably—no, Yours regretfully, +John W. Downing," announced Jean. "The man that +was here yesterday, you know."</p> + +<p>"Read it, read it," pleaded the others, crowding so +close that Jean had to lift the letter above their heads +in order to see it at all. "Do hurry up, we're crazy to +hear it."</p> + +<blockquote><p>"My Dear Young Ladies," read Jean in a voice that +started bravely but grew fainter with every line. "It +is with sincere regret that I write to inform you that +it no longer suits the convenience of the vestrymen +to have you occupy the church cottage on Fremont +Street. It is to be rented as soon as a few necessary +repairs can be made, and in the meantime you will +oblige us greatly by moving out at once. Please deliver +the key at your earliest convenience to me at either +my house or this office.</p> + +<p>"Yours regretfully,</p> + +<p>"<span class="smcap">John W. Downing</span>."</p></blockquote><p><span class="pagenum">[154]</span></p> + +<p>For as much as two minutes no one said a word. +Jean had laid the open letter on the table. Marjory +and Bettie with their arms tightly locked, as if both +felt the need of support, reread the closely written +page in silence. When they reached the end, they +pushed it toward Mabel.</p> + +<p>"What does it mean in plain English?" asked +Mabel, hoping that both her eyes and her ears had +deceived her.</p> + +<p>"That somebody else is to have the cottage," said +Jean, "and that in the meantime we're to move."</p> + +<p>"In the meantime!" blurted Mabel, with swift +wrath. "I should say it <i>was</i> the meantime—the very +meanest time anybody ever heard of. I'd just like to +know what right 'Yours-respectably-John-W.-Downing' +has to turn us out of our own house. I guess we paid +our rent—I guess there's blisters on me yet—I guess +I dug dandelions—I guess I—"</p> + +<p>But here Mabel's indignation turned to grief, and +with one of her very best howls and a torrent of tears +she buried her face in Jean's apron.</p> + +<p>"Bettie," asked Jean with her arms about Mabel, +"do you think it would do any good to ask your +father about it? He's the minister, you know, and he +might explain to Mr. Downing that we were promised +the cottage for all summer."</p> + +<p>"Papa went away this morning and won't be home<span class="pagenum">[155]</span> +for ten days. He has exchanged with somebody for +the next two Sundays."</p> + +<p>"My pa-pa-papa's away, too," sobbed Mabel, "or +he'd tell that vile Mr. Downing that it was all the +Mill-ill-igans' fault. <i>They're</i> the folks that ought to +be turned out, and I just wuh-wuh-wish they—they +had been."</p> + +<p>"Why wouldn't it be a good idea," suggested Marjory, +"for us all to go down to Mr. Downing's office +and tell him all about it? You see, he hasn't lived here +very long and perhaps he doesn't understand that we +have paid our rent for all summer."</p> + +<p>"Yes," assented Jean, "that would probably be the +best thing to do. He won't mind having us go to the +office because he told us to take the key there. But +where <i>is</i> his office?"</p> + +<p>"I know," said Bettie. "Here's the address on the +letter, and the dentist I go to is right near there, so I +can find it easily."</p> + +<p>"Then let's start right away," cried eager Mabel, +uncovering a disheveled head and a tear-stained countenance. +"Don't let's lose a minute."</p> + +<p>"Mercy, no," said Jean, taking Mabel by the shoulders +and pushing her before her to the blue-room +mirror. "Do you think you can go <i>any</i> place looking +like that? Do you think you <i>look</i> like a desirable +tenant? We've all got to be just as clean and neat as<span class="pagenum">[156]</span> +we can be. We've got to impress him with our—our +ladylikeness."</p> + +<p>"I'll braid Mabel's hair," offered Bettie, "if Marjory +will run around the block and get all our hats. I'm +wearing Dick's straw one with the blue ribbon just +now, Marjory. You'll find it some place in our front +hall if Tommy hasn't got it on."</p> + +<p>"Bring mine, too," said Jean; "it's in my room."</p> + +<p>"I don't know <i>where</i> mine is," said Mabel, "but if +you can't find it you'd better wear your Sunday one +and lend me your everyday one."</p> + +<p>"I don't see myself lending you any more hats," said Marjory, +who had, like the other girls, brightened at the +prospect of going to Mr. Downing's. "I haven't forgotten +how you left the last one outdoors all night in +the rain, and how it looked afterwards, when Aunty +Jane made me wear it to punish me for <i>my</i> carelessness. +You'll go in your own hat or none."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mabel, meekly, "I guess you'll probably +find it in my room under the bed, if it isn't in the +parlor behind the sofa."</p> + +<p>"Now, remember," said Jean, who was retying the +bow on Bettie's hair, "we're all to be polite, whatever +happens, for we mustn't let Mr. Downing think we're +anything like the Milligans. If he won't let us have +the cottage when he knows about the rent's being +<span class="pagenum">[157]</span>paid—though I'm almost sure he <i>will</i> let us keep it—why, +we'll just have to give it up and not let him see +that we care."</p> + +<p>"I'll be good," promised Bettie.</p> + +<p>"You needn't be afraid of <i>me</i>," said Mabel. "I +wouldn't humble myself to <i>speak</i> to such a despisable +man."</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[158]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i166.jpg" width="400" height="385" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_15">CHAPTER 15</h2> + +<p class="h3">An Obdurate Landlord</p> + +<p>Twenty minutes later when Mr. Downing roared +"<i>Come in</i>" in the terrifying voice he usually reserved +for agents and other unexpected or unwelcome visitors, +he was plainly very much surprised to see four pale +girls with shocked, reproachful eyes file in and come to +an embarrassed standstill just inside the office door, +which closed of its own accord and left them imprisoned<span class="pagenum">[159]</span> +with the enemy. They waited quietly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, good morning," said he, in a much milder +tone, as he swung about in his revolving chair. "What +can I do for you? Have you brought the key so +soon?"</p> + +<p>"We came," said Jean, propelled suddenly forward +by a vigorous push from the rear, "to see you about +Dandelion Cottage. We think you've made a mistake."</p> + +<p>"Indeed!" said Mr. Downing, who did not at any +time like to be considered mistaken. "Suppose you +explain."</p> + +<p>So sweet-voiced Jean explained all about digging +the dandelions to pay the rent, about Mr. Black's giving +them the key at the end of the week, and about +all the lovely times they had had and were still hoping +to have in their precious cottage before giving it +up for the winter.</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing, personally, did not like Mr. Black. +He had a poor opinion of the older man's business +ability, and perhaps a somewhat exalted opinion of +his own. He considered Mr. Black old-fashioned and +far too easy-going. He felt that parish affairs were +more likely to flourish in the hands of a younger, +shrewder, and more modern person, and he had an +idea that he was that person. At any rate, now that +Mr. Black was out of town, Mr. Downing was glad +of an opportunity to display his own superior shrewdness.<span class="pagenum">[160]</span> +He would show the vestry a thing or two, and +incidentally increase the parish income, which as +everybody knew stood greatly in need of increasing. +He had no patience with slipshod methods. He was +truly sorry when business matters compelled him to +appear hard-hearted; but to him it seemed little short +of absurd for a man of Mr. Black's years to waste on +four small girls a cottage that might be bringing in a +comfortable sum every month in the year.</p> + +<p>"Now that's a very pretty little story," said Mr. +Downing, when Jean had finished. "But, you see, +you've already had the cottage more than long enough +to pay you for pulling those few weeds."</p> + +<p>"<i>Few!</i>" exclaimed Mabel, in indignant protest and +forgetting her promise of silence. "<i>Few!</i> Why, there +were <i>billions</i> of 'em. If we'd been paid two cents a +hundred for them, we'd all be <i>rich</i>. Mr. Black promised +us we could have that cottage for all summer and +our rent hasn't half perspired yet."</p> + +<p>"She means <i>ex</i>pired," explained Marjory, "but she's +right for once. Mr. Black did say we could stay there +all summer, and it isn't quite August yet, you know."</p> + +<p>"Hum," said Mr. Downing. "Nobody said anything +to <i>me</i> about any such arrangement, and I'm keeping +the books. I don't know what Mr. Black could have +been thinking of if he made any such foolish promise +as that. Of course it's not binding. Why, that cottage<span class="pagenum">[161]</span> +ought to be renting for ten or twelve dollars a month!"</p> + +<p>"But the plaster's very bad," pleaded Bettie, eagerly, +"and the roof leaks in every room in the house but +one, and something's the matter underneath so it's +too cold for folks to live in during the winter. It was +vacant for a long time before <i>we</i> had it."</p> + +<p>"It looked very comfortable to <i>me</i>," said Mr. Downing, +who had lived in the town for only a few months +and neither knew nor suspected the real condition of +the house. "I'm afraid your arrangement with Mr. +Black doesn't hold good. Mr. Morgan and I think it +best to have the house vacated at once. You see, we're +in danger of losing the rent from the next house, because +the Milligans have threatened to move out if +you don't."</p> + +<p>"If—if seven dollars and a half would do you any +good," said Mabel, "and if you're mean enough to take +all the money we've got in this world—"</p> + +<p>"I'm not," said Mr. Downing. "I'm only reasonable, +and I want you to be reasonable too. You must look +at this thing from a business standpoint. You see, the +rent from those two houses should bring in twenty-five +dollars a month, which isn't more than a sufficient +return for the money invested. The taxes—"</p> + +<p>"A note for you, Mr. Downing," said a boy, who +had quietly opened the office door.</p> + +<p>"Why," said Mr. Downing, when he had read the<span class="pagenum">[162]</span> +note, "this is really quite a remarkable coincidence. +This communication is from Mr. Milligan, who has +found a desirable tenant for the cottage he is now in, +and wishes, himself, to occupy the cottage you are +going to vacate. Very clever idea on Mr. Milligan's +part. This will save him five dollars a month and is +a most convenient arrangement all around. He wishes +to move in at once."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Milligan!" gasped three of the astonished +girls.</p> + +<p>"Those Milligans in <i>our</i> house!" cried Mabel. "Well, +<i>isn't</i> that the worst!"</p> + +<p>"You see," said Mr. Downing, "it is really necessary +for you to move at once. I think you had better begin +without further loss of time. Good morning, good +morning, all of you, and please believe me, I'm sorry +about this, but it can't be helped."</p> + +<p>"I hope," said Mabel, summoning all her dignity +for a parting shot, "that you'll never live long enough +to regret this—this outrage. There are seven rolls of +paper on the walls of that cottage that belong to us, +and we expect to be paid for every one of them."</p> + +<p>"How much?" asked Mr. Downing, suppressing a +smile, for Mabel was never more amusing than when +she was very angry.</p> + +<p>"Five cents a roll—thirty-five cents altogether."</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing gravely reached into his trousers<span class="pagenum">[163]</span> +pocket, fished up a handful of loose change, scrupulously +counted out three dimes and a nickel, and +handed them to Mabel, who, with averted eyes and +chin held unnecessarily high, accepted the price of +the Blossom wall paper haughtily, and, following the +others, stalked from the office.</p> + +<p>The unhappy girls could not trust themselves to +talk as they hastened homeward. They held hands +tightly, walking four abreast along the quiet street, +and barely managed to keep the tears back and the +rapidly swelling lumps in their little throats successfully +swallowed until Jean's trembling fingers had +unlocked the cottage door.</p> + +<p>Then, with one accord, they rushed pell-mell for the +blue-room bed, hurled themselves upon its excelsior +pillows, and burst into tears. 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.</p> + +<p>"Mabel!" she said, slipping an arm about the chief +mourner, "do you want the Milligans to hear you? +We're on their side of the house, you know."<span class="pagenum">[164]</span></p> + +<p>Jean couldn't have used a better argument. Mabel +stopped short in the middle of one of her very best +howls, sat up, and shook her head vigorously.</p> + +<p>"Well, I just guess I don't," said she. "I'd die first!"</p> + +<p>"I thought so," said Jean, with just a faint glimmer +of a smile. "We mustn't let those people guess how +awfully we care. Go bathe your eyes, Mabel—there +must be a little warm water in the tea kettle."</p> + +<p>Then the comforter turned to Bettie, and made the +appeal that was most likely to reach that always-ready-to-help +young person.</p> + +<p>"Come, Bettie dear, you've cried long enough. We +must get to work, for we've a tremendous lot to do. +Don't you suppose that, if we had all the things +packed in baskets or bundles, we could get a few of +your brothers to help us move out after dark? I just +<i>can't</i> let those Milligans gloat over us while we go +back and forth with things."</p> + +<p>Bettie's only response was a sob.</p> + +<p>"Where in the world can we put the things?" asked +Marjory, sitting up suddenly and displaying a blotched +and swollen countenance very unlike her usual fair, +rose-tinted face. "Of course we can each take our dolls +and books home, but our furniture—"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to ask Mother if we can't store it upstairs +in our barn. I'm sure she'll let us."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I <i>wish</i> Mr. Black were here. It doesn't seem<span class="pagenum">[165]</span> +possible we've really got to move. There <i>must</i> be some +way out of it. Oh, Bettie, <i>couldn't</i> we write to Mr. +Black?"</p> + +<p>"It would take too-oo-oo long," sobbed Bettie, sitting +up and mopping her eyes with the muslin window +curtain, which she could easily reach from the +foot of the bed. "He's way off in Washington. Oh, +dear—oh, dear—oh, dear!"</p> + +<p>"Why couldn't we telegraph?" demanded Marjory, +with whom hope died hard. "Telegrams go pretty +fast, don't they?"</p> + +<p>"They cost terribly," said Bettie. "They're almost as +expensive as express packages. Still, we might find +out what it costs."</p> + +<p>"I dow the telegraph-mad," wheezed Mabel from +the wash-basin. "I'll go hobe ad telephode hib ad +ask what it costs—I've heard by father give hib bessages +lots of tibes. Oh, by, by dose is all stuffed up."</p> + +<p>"Try a handkerchief," suggested Jean. "Go ask, if +you want to; it won't do any harm, nor probably any +good."</p> + +<p>Mabel ran home, taking care to keep her back turned +toward the Milligan house. During her brief absence, +the girls bathed their eyes and made sundry other futile +attempts to do away with all outward signs of +grief.</p> + +<p>"He says," cried Mabel, bursting in excitedly, "that<span class="pagenum">[166]</span> +sixty cents is the regular price in the daytime, but it's +forty cents for a night message. It seems kind of mean +to wake folks up in the middle of the night just to +save twenty cents, doesn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Bettie. "I couldn't be impolite enough to +do that to anybody I like as well as I like Mr. Black. +If we haven't money enough to send a daytime message, +we mustn't send any."</p> + +<p>"Well, we haven't," said Jean. "We've only thirty-five +cents."</p> + +<p>"And we wouldn't have had that," said Mabel, "if +I hadn't remembered that wall paper just in the nick +of time."</p> + +<p>Strangely enough, not one of the girls thought of +the money in the bank. Perhaps it did not occur to +them that it would be possible to remove any portion +of their precious seven dollars and a half without +withdrawing it all; they knew little of business matters. +Nor did they think of appealing to their parents +for aid at this crisis. Indeed, they were all too dazed +by the suddenness and tremendousness of the blow to +think very clearly about anything. The sum needed +seemed a large one to the girls, who habitually bought +a cent's worth of candy at a time from the generous +proprietor of the little corner shop. Mabel, the only +one with an allowance, was, to her father's way of +thinking, a hopeless little spendthrift, already deeply<span class="pagenum">[167]</span> +plunged in debt by her unpaid fines for lateness to +meals.</p> + +<p>The Tucker income did not go round even for the +grown-ups, so of course there were few pennies for +the Tucker children. Marjory's Aunty Jane had ideas +of her own on the subject of spending-money for little +girls—Marjory did not suspect that the good but +rather austere woman made a weekly pilgrimage to +the bank for the purpose of religiously depositing a +small sum in her niece's name; and, if she had known +it, Marjory would probably have been improvident +enough to prefer spot cash in smaller amounts. Only +that morning tender-hearted Jean had heard patient +Mrs. Mapes lamenting because butter had gone up two +cents a pound and because all the bills had seemed +larger than those of the preceding month—Jean always +took the family bills very much to heart.</p> + +<p>The girls sorrowfully concluded that there was nothing +left for them to do but to obey Mr. Downing. +They had looked forward with dread to giving up the +cottage when winter should come, but the idea of +losing it in midsummer was a thousand times worse.</p> + +<p>"We'll just have to give it up," said grieved little +Bettie. "There's nothing else we <i>can</i> do, with Mr. +Black away. When I go home tonight I'll write to him +and apologize for not being able to keep our promise<span class="pagenum">[168]</span> +about the dinner party. That's the hardest thing of all +to give up."</p> + +<p>"But you don't know his address," objected Jean.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I do, because Father wrote to him about some +church business this morning, before going away, and +gave Dick the letter to mail. Of course Dick forgot all +about it and left it on the hall mantelpiece. It's probably +there yet, for I'm the only person that ever remembers +to mail Father's letters—he forgets them +himself most of the time."</p> + +<p>"Now let's get to work," said Jean. "Since we have +to move let's pretend we really want to. I've always +thought it must be quite exciting to really truly move. +You see, we <i>must</i> get it over before the Milligans +guess that we've begun, and there isn't any too much +time left. I'll begin to take down the things in the +parlor and tie them up in the bedclothes. We'll leave +all the curtains until the last so that no one will know +what we're doing."</p> + +<p>"I'll help you," said Bettie.</p> + +<p>"Mabel and I might be packing the dishes," said +Marjory. "It will be easier to do it while we have the +table left to work on. Come along, Mabel."</p> + +<p>Mabel followed obediently. When the forlorn pair +reached the kitchen, Marjory announced her intention +of exploring the little shed for empty baskets, leaving +Mabel to stack the cups and plates in compact piles.<span class="pagenum">[169]</span> +Mabel, without knowing just why she did it, picked +up her old friend, the cracked lemonade-pitcher and +gave it a little shake. Something rattled. Mabel, always +an inquisitive young person, thrust her fingers into the +dusty depths to bring up a piece of money—two +pieces—three pieces—four pieces.</p> + +<p>"Oh," she gasped, "it's my lemonade money! Oh, +what a lucky omen! Girls!"</p> + +<p>The next instant Mabel clapped a plump, dusty +hand over her own lips to keep them from announcing +the discovery, and then, stealthily concealing the +twenty cents in the pocket that still contained the +wall-paper money, she stole quickly through the cottage +and ran to her own home.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[170]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i178.jpg" width="400" height="336" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_16">CHAPTER 16</h2> + +<p class="h3">Mabel Plans a Surprise</p> + +<p>The girls were indignant later when they discovered +Mabel's apparent desertion. It was precisely like Mabel, +they said, to shirk when there was anything unpleasant +to be done. For once, however, they were +wronging Mabel—poor, self-sacrificing Mabel, who +with fifty-five cents at her disposal was planning a +beautiful surprise for her unappreciative cottage-mates. +The girls might have known that nothing short of an<span class="pagenum">[171]</span> +ambitious project for saving the cottage from the Milligans +would have kept the child away when so much +was going on. For Mabel was at that very moment +doing what was for her the hardest kind of work; all +alone in her own room at home she was laboriously +composing a telegram.</p> + +<p>She had never sent a telegram, nor had she even +read one. She could not consult her mother because +Mrs. Bennett had inconsiderately gone down town to +do her marketing. Dr. Bennett, however, was a very +busy man and sometimes received a number of important +messages in one day. Mabel felt that the occasion +justified her studying several late specimens which +she resurrected from the waste-paper basket under her +father's desk. These, however, proved rather unsatisfactory +models since none of them seemed to exactly +fit the existing emergency. Most of them, indeed, were +in cipher.</p> + +<p>"I suppose," said Mabel, nibbling her penholder +thoughtfully, "they make 'em short so they'll fit these +little sheets of yellow paper, but there's lots more +space they <i>might</i> use if they didn't leave such wide +margins. I'll write small so I can say all I want to, +but, dear me, I can't think of a thing to say."</p> + +<p>It took a long time, but the message was finished at +last. With a deep sigh of satisfaction, Mabel folded it +neatly and put it into an envelope which she carefully<span class="pagenum">[172]</span> +sealed. Then, putting on her hat, and taking the telegram +with her, she ran to Bettie's home and opened +the door—none of the four girls were required to ring +each other's doorbells. There, sure enough, was the +letter waiting to be mailed to Mr. Black. Mabel, who +had thought to bring a pencil, copied the address in +her big, vertical handwriting, and without further ado +ran with it to her friend, the telegraph operator, whose +office was just around the corner. All the distances in +the little town were short, and Mabel had frequently +been sent to the place with messages written by her +father, so she did not feel the need of asking permission.</p> + +<p>The clerk opened the envelope—Mabel considered +this decidedly rude of him—and proceeded to read the +message. It took him a long time. Then he looked +from Mabel's flushed cheeks and eager eyes to the little +collection of nickels and dimes she had placed on the +counter. Mabel wondered why the young man chewed +the ends of his sandy mustache so vigorously. Perhaps +he was amused at something; she looked about the +little office to see what it could be that pleased him so +greatly, but there seemed to be nothing to excite mirth. +She decided that he was either a very cheerful young +man naturally, or else he was feeling joyful because +the clock said that it was nearly time for luncheon.</p> + +<p>"It'll be all right, Miss Mabel," said he at last. "It's<span class="pagenum">[173]</span> +a pretty good fifty-five cents' worth; but I guess Mr. +Black won't object to that. I hope you'll always come +to me when you have messages to send."</p> + +<p>"I won't if you go and read them all," said Mabel, +at which her friend looked even more cheerful than +he had before.</p> + +<p>Ten minutes later Mabel, mumbling something +about having had an errand to attend to, presented +herself at the cottage. Beyond a few meekly received +reproaches from Marjory, no one said anything about +the unexplained absence. Indeed, they were all too +busy and too preoccupied to care, the greater grief of +losing the cottage having swallowed up all lesser +concerns.</p> + +<p>At a less trying time the girls would have discovered +within ten minutes that Mabel was suffering from a +suppressed secret; but everything was changed now. +Although Mabel fairly bristled with importance and +gave out sundry very broad hints, no one paid the +slightest attention. Gradually, in the stress of packing, +the matter of the telegram faded from Mabel's short +memory, for preparing to move proved a most exciting +operation, and also a harrowing one. Every few moments +somebody would say: "Our last day," and then +the other three would fall to weeping on anything +that happened to come handy. Of course the packing +had stirred up considerable dust; this, mingled with<span class="pagenum">[174]</span> +tears, added much to the forlornness of the cottagers' +appearance when they went home at noon with their +news.</p> + +<p>The parents and Aunty Jane said it was a shame, +but all agreed that there was nothing to be done. All +were sorry to have the girls deprived of the cottage, +for the mothers had certainly found it a relief to have +their little daughters' leisure hours so safely and happily +occupied. Mabel's mother was especially sorry.</p> + +<p>Never was moving more melancholy nor house +more forlorn when the moving, done after dark with +great caution, and mostly through the dining-room +window on the side of the house farthest from the +Milligans, was finally accomplished. The Tucker boys +had been only too delighted to help. By bedtime the +cottage was empty of everything but the curtains on +the Milligan side of the house. An hour later the tired +girls were asleep; but under each pillow there was a +handkerchief rolled in a tight, grimy little ball and +soaked with tears.</p> + +<p>In the morning, the girls returned for a last look, +and for the remaining curtains. Dandelion Cottage, +stripped of its furniture and without its pictures, +showed its age and all its infirmities. Great patches of +plaster and wall paper were missing, for the gay posters +had covered a multitude of defects. The indignant +Tucker boys had disobeyed Bettie and had removed<span class="pagenum">[175]</span> +not only the tin they had put on the leaking roof, but +the steps they had built at the back door, the drain +they had found it necessary to place under the kitchen +sink, and the bricks with which they had propped the +tottering chimneys.</p> + +<p>Before the day was over, the tenants whom the Milligans +had found for their own house were clamoring +to move in, so the Milligans took possession of the +cottage late that afternoon, getting the key from Mr. +Downing, into whose keeping the girls had silently +delivered it that morning. To do Mr. Downing justice, +nothing had ever hurt him quite as much as did +the dignified silence of the three pale girls who waited +for a moment in the doorway, while equally pallid +Jean went quietly forward to lay the key on his desk. +He realized suddenly that not one of them could have +spoken a word without bursting into tears; and for +the rest of that day he hated himself most heartily.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[176]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i184.jpg" width="400" height="335" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_17">CHAPTER 17</h2> + +<p class="h3">Several Surprises Take Effect</p> + +<p>Mr. Black opened the door of his hotel apartment in +Washington one sultry noon in response to a vigorous, +prolonged rapping from without. The bellboy handed +him a telegram. When Mr. Black had read the long +message he smiled and frowned, but cheerfully paid +the three dollars and forty-one cents additional +charges that the messenger demanded.</p> + +<p>It was Mabel's message; the clerk had transmitted it<span class="pagenum">[177]</span> +faithfully, even to the two misspelled words that had +proved too much for the excited little writer. If the +receiving clerk had not considerately tucked in a few +periods for the sake of clearness, there would have +been no punctuation marks, because, as everybody +knows, very few telegrams <i>are</i> punctuated; but Mabel, +of course, had not taken that into consideration. It +was quite the longest message and certainly the most +amusing one that Mr. Black had ever received. It read:</p> + +<blockquote><p>"<span class="smcap">Dear Mr. Black</span>,</p> + +<p>"We are well but terribly unhappy for the worst +has happened. Cant you come to the reskew as they +say in books for we are really in great trouble because +the Milligans a very unpolite and untruthful family +next door want dandelion cottage for themselves the +pigs and Mr. Downing says we must move out at +once and return the key our own darling key that +you gave us. We are moving out now and crying so +hard we can hardly write. I mean myself. Is Mr. +Downing the boss of the whole church. Cant you tell +him we truly paid the rent for all summer by digging +dandelions. He does not believe us. We are too sad to +write any more with love from your little friends</p> + +<p>"<span class="smcap">Jean Marjory Bettie and I</span>.</p> + +<p>"P. S. How about your dinner party if we lose the +cottage?"</p></blockquote><p><span class="pagenum">[178]</span></p> + +<p>Mr. Black read and reread the typewritten yellow +sheet a great many times; sometimes he frowned, +sometimes he chuckled; the postscript seemed to +please him particularly, for whenever he reached that +point his deep-set eyes twinkled merrily. Presently he +propped the dispatch against the wall at the back of +his table and sat down in front of it to write a reply. +He wrote several messages, some long, some short; +then he tore them all up—they seemed inadequate +compared with Mabel's.</p> + +<p>"That man Downing," said he, dropping the scraps +into the waste-basket, "means well, but he muddles +every pie he puts his finger in. Probably if I wire him +he'll botch things worse than ever. Dear me, it <i>is</i> too +bad for those nice children to lose any part of their +precious stay in that cottage, now, for of course they'll +have to give it up when cold weather comes. If I can +wind my business up today there isn't any good reason +why I can't go straight through without stopping in +Chicago. It's time I was home, anyway; it's pretty +warm here for a man that likes a cold climate."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, things were happening in Mr. Black's +own town.</p> + +<p>It was a dark, threatening day when the Milligans, +delighted at the success of their efforts to dislodge its +rightful tenants, hurriedly moved into Dandelion Cottage; +but, dark though it was, Mrs. Milligan soon<span class="pagenum">[179]</span> +began to find her new possession full of unsuspected +blemishes. Now that the pictures were down and the +rugs were up, she discovered the badly broken plaster, +the tattered condition of the wall paper, the leaking +drain, and the clumsily mended rat-holes. She found, +too, that she had made a grievous mistake in her calculations. +She had supposed that the tiny pantry was +a third bedroom; with its neat muslin curtains, it certainly +looked like one when viewed from the outside; +and crafty Laura, intensely desirous of seeing the +enemy ousted from the cottage at any price, had not +considered it necessary to enlighten her mother.</p> + +<p>"My goodness!" exclaimed Mrs. Milligan, a thin +woman with a shrewish countenance now much +streaked with dust. "I thought you said there was a +fine cellar under this house? It's barely three feet deep, +and there's no stairs and no floor. It's full of old +rubbish."</p> + +<p>"I never was down there," admitted Laura, dropping +a dishpanful of cooking utensils with a crash +and hastily making for safe quarters behind a mountain +of Milligan furniture, "but I've often seen the +trap door."</p> + +<p>"It hasn't been opened for years. And where's the +nice big closet you said opened off the bedroom? There +isn't a decent closet in this house. I don't see what +possessed you—"<span class="pagenum">[180]</span></p> + +<p>"It serves you right," said Mr. Milligan, unsympathetically. +"You wouldn't wait for anything, but had +to rush right in. I told you you'd better take your +time about it, but no—"</p> + +<p>"You know very well, James Milligan," snapped the +irate lady, "that the Knapps wouldn't have taken our +house if they couldn't have had it at once."</p> + +<p>"Well, I <i>don't</i> know," growled Mr. Milligan, scowling +crossly at the constantly growing heaps of incongruously +mixed household goods, "where in Sam Hill +you're going to put all that stuff. There isn't room for +a cat to turn around, and the place ain't fit to live in, +anyway."</p> + +<p>Bad as things looked, even Mr. Milligan did not +guess that first busy day how hopelessly out of repair +the cottage really was; but he was soon to find out.</p> + +<p>The summer had been an unusually dry one; so dry +that the girls had been obliged to carry many pails of +water to their garden every evening. The moving-day +had been cloudy—out of sympathy, perhaps, for the +little cottagers. That night it rained, the first long, +steady downpour in weeks. This proved no gentle +shower, but a fierce, robust, pelting flood. Seemingly +a discriminating rain, too, choosing carefully between +the just and the unjust, for most of it fell upon the +Milligans. With the sole exception of the dining-room, +every room in the house leaked like a sieve.<span class="pagenum">[181]</span></p> + +<p>The tired, disgusted Milligans, drenched in their +beds, leaped hastily from their shower baths to look +about, by candlelight, for shelter. Mr. Milligan spread +a mattress, driest side up, on the dining-room floor, +and the unfortunate family spent the rest of the night +huddled in an uncomfortable heap in the one dry spot +the house afforded.</p> + +<p>Very early the next morning they sent post-haste for +Mr. Downing.</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing, who hated to be disturbed before +eight, arrived at ten o'clock; and, with an expert carpenter, +made a thorough examination of the house, +which the rain had certainly not improved.</p> + +<p>"It will take three hundred—possibly four hundred +dollars," said the carpenter, who had been making a +great many figures in a worn little note-book, "to +make this place habitable. It needs a new roof, new +chimneys, new floors, a new foundation, new plumbing, +new plaster—in short, just about <i>everything</i> except +the four outside walls. Then there are no lights and +no heating plant, which of course would be extra. It's +probably one of the oldest houses in town. What's it +renting for?"</p> + +<p>"Ten dollars a month."</p> + +<p>"It isn't worth it. Half that money would be a high +price. Even if it were placed in good repair it would +be six years at least before you could expect to get the<span class="pagenum">[182]</span> +money expended on repairs back in rent. The only +thing to do is to tear it down and build a larger and +more modern house that will bring a better rent, for +there's no money in a ten-dollar house on a lot of this +size—the taxes eat all the profits."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Downing, "this house certainly +looked far more comfortable when I saw it the other +day than it does now. Those children must have had +the defects very well concealed. They deceived me +completely."</p> + +<p>"They deceived us all," said Mrs. Milligan, resentfully. +"Half of our furniture is ruined. Look at that +sofa!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing looked. The drenched old-gold plush +sofa certainly looked very much like a half-drowned +Jersey calf.</p> + +<p>"Of course," continued Mrs. Milligan, sharply, "we +expect to have our losses made good. Then we've had +all our trouble for nothing, too. Of course we can't +stay here—the place isn't fit for pigs. I suppose the +best thing <i>we</i> can do is to move right back into our +own house."</p> + +<p>"Ye-es," said Mr. Milligan, overlooking the fact +that Mrs. Milligan had inadvertently called her family +pigs, "it certainly looks like the best thing to do. I'll +go and tell the Knapps that they'll have to move out<span class="pagenum">[183]</span> +at once—we can't spend another night under this +roof."</p> + +<p>The Knapps, however, proved disobliging and flatly +declined to move a second time. The Milligans had +begged them to take the house off their hands, and +they had signed a contract. Moreover, it was just the +kind of house the Knapps had long been looking for, +and now that they were moved, more than half settled, +and altogether satisfied with their part of the +bargain, they politely but firmly announced their intention +of staying where they were until the lease +should expire.</p> + +<p>There was nothing the former tenants could do +about it. They were homeless and quite as helpless as +the four little girls had been in similar circumstances; +and they made a far greater fuss about it. By this they +gained, however, nothing but the disapproval of everybody +concerned; so, finally, the Milligans, disgusted +with Dandelion Cottage, with Mr. Downing, and for +once even a little bit with themselves, dejectedly +hunted up a new home in a far less pleasant neighborhood, +and moved hurriedly out of Dandelion Cottage—and, +except for the memories they left behind +them, out of the story.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[184]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i192.jpg" width="400" height="369" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_18">CHAPTER 18</h2> + +<p class="h3">A Hurried Retreat</p> + +<p>The girls, of course, had been barred out while all +these exciting latest events were taking place in their +dear cottage; but Marjory, who lived next door to it, +had seen something of the Milligans' hasty exit and +had guessed at part of the truth. Mrs. Knapp, who +seemed a pleasant, likable little woman, in spite of her +unwillingness to accommodate her new landlord, unknowingly<span class="pagenum">[185]</span> +confirmed their suspicions when she told +her friend Mrs. Crane about it; for Mrs. Crane, in her +turn, told the news to the four little housekeepers the +next morning as they sat homeless and forlorn on her +doorstep. It was always Mrs. Crane to whom the +Dandelion Cottagers turned whenever they were in +need of consolation and, as in this case, consolation +was usually forthcoming.</p> + +<p>The girls, in their excitement at hearing the news +about their late possession, did not notice that sympathetic +Mrs. Crane looked tired and worried as she +sat, in the big red rocking chair on her porch, peeling +potatoes.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" squealed Mabel, from the broad arm of Mrs. +Crane's chair, "I'm glad! I'm glad! I'm glad!"</p> + +<p>"I can't help being a little bit glad, too," said fair-minded +Jean. "I suppose it wasn't very pleasant for +the Milligans, but I guess they deserved all they got."</p> + +<p>"They deserved a great deal more," said Marjory, +resentfully. "Think of these last awful days!"</p> + +<p>"If they'd had <i>much</i> more," said Mrs. Crane, "they'd +have been drowned. Why, children! the place was just +flooded."</p> + +<p>"I'm ashamed to tell of it," said Bettie, "but I'm +awfully afraid that our boys took off part of the pieces +of tin that they nailed on the roof last spring. I heard<span class="pagenum">[186]</span> +them doing <i>something</i> up there the night we moved; +but Bob only grinned when I asked him about it."</p> + +<p>"Good for the boys!" cried Marjory, gleefully. "I +wouldn't be unladylike enough to set traps for the +Milligans myself, but I can't help feeling glad that +somebody else did."</p> + +<p>"It was Bob's own tin," giggled delighted Mabel, +almost tumbling into Mrs. Crane's potato pan in her +joy. "I guess he had a right to take it home if he +wanted to."</p> + +<p>"Anyway," said Jean, from her perch on the porch +railing, "I'm glad they're gone."</p> + +<p>"But it doesn't do <i>us</i> any good," sighed Bettie. "And +the summer's just flying."</p> + +<p>"Yes, it does," insisted Jean. "We <i>can</i> stand having +the cottage empty—we can pretend, you know, that +it's an enchanted castle that can be opened only by a +certain magic key that—"</p> + +<p>"Somebody's baby has swallowed," shrieked Mabel, +the matter-of-fact.</p> + +<p>"Mercy no, goosie," said Marjory. "She means a +magic word that nobody can remember."</p> + +<p>"That's it," said Jean. "Of course we couldn't do +even that with the cottage full of Milligans."</p> + +<p>"No," assented Marjory, "the most active imagination +would refuse to activate—"</p> + +<p>"To <i>what</i>?" gasped Mabel.<span class="pagenum">[187]</span></p> + +<p>"To work," explained Marjory.</p> + +<p>"I should say so," agreed Mabel, again threatening +the potatoes. "It was just as much as I could do to +come over here this morning to breathe the same air +with that cottage with those folks in it staring me in +the face, but now—"</p> + +<p>"After all," sighed Bettie, sorrowfully, from the +other arm of Mrs. Crane's big chair, "having the Milligans +out of the cottage doesn't make <i>much</i> difference, +as long as we're out, too. Oh, I <i>did</i> love that +little house so. I just hated to think of cold weather +coming to drive us out; but I never dreamed of anything +so dreadful as having to leave it right in this +lovely warm weather."</p> + +<p>"If Mr. Black had stayed in town," said Mabel, feelingly, +"we'd be dusting that darling cottage this very +minute."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crane sniffed in the odd way she always did +whenever Mr. Black's name was mentioned. This +scornful sniff, accompanying Mrs. Crane's evident disapproval +of their dearest friend, was the only thing +that the girls disliked about Mrs. Crane.</p> + +<p>"I <i>know</i> you'd like Mr. Black if you only knew +him," said Bettie, earnestly. "In some ways you're a +good deal like him. You're both the same color, your +eyebrows turn up the same way at the outside corners, +and you both like us. Mr. Black has a beautiful soul."<span class="pagenum">[188]</span></p> + +<p>"Indeed," said Mrs. Crane. "And haven't I a beautiful +soul too?"</p> + +<p>"Why, of course," said Bettie, leaning down to rub +her cheek against Mrs. Crane's. "I meant <i>both</i> of you. +We like you both just the same."</p> + +<p>"Only it's different," explained Jean. "Mr. Black +doesn't need us, and sometimes you do. We <i>like</i> to do +things for you."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad of that," said Mrs. Crane, "for I need you +this very minute. But don't you be too sure about his +not needing you as well. He must lead a pretty lonely +life, because it's years since his wife died. I never heard +of anybody else liking her, but I guess <i>he</i> did. He's one +of the faithful kind, maybe, for he's lived all alone in +that great big house ever since. I guess it does him +good to have you little girls for friends."</p> + +<p>"What was his wife like?" asked Mabel, eagerly. +"Did you use to know her?"</p> + +<p>"No, indeed," said Mrs. Crane, again giving the +objectionable sniff. "That is, not so very well—a little +light-headed, useless thing, no more fit to keep house—but +there! there. It doesn't make any difference <i>now</i>, +and I've learned that it isn't the best housekeepers that +get married easiest. If it was, I wouldn't be so worried +<i>now</i>."</p> + +<p>"Is anything the matter?" asked Jean, quick to note +the distress in Mrs. Crane's voice.<span class="pagenum">[189]</span></p> + +<p>"Yes," returned the good woman, "there are two +things the matter."</p> + +<p>"Your poor foot?" queried Bettie, instantly all sympathy.</p> + +<p>"No, the foot's all right. It's Mr. Barlow and my +eyes. Mr. Barlow is going to be married to a young +lady he's been writing to for a long time, and I'm +going to lose him because he wants to keep house. It +won't be easy to find another lodger for that little, +shabby, old-fashioned room. I'm trying to make a new +rag carpet for it, but I'm all at a standstill because I +can't see to thread my needle. I declare, I don't know +what is going to become of me."</p> + +<p>"When I grow up," said Bettie, "you shall live with +me."</p> + +<p>"But what am I to do while I'm waiting for you to +grow up?" asked Mrs. Crane, smiling at Bettie's protecting +manner.</p> + +<p>"Let us be your eyes," suggested Jean. "Couldn't we +thread about a million needles for you? Don't you +think a million would last all day?"</p> + +<p>"I should think it might," said Mrs. Crane, somewhat +comforted. "I haven't quite a million, but if +Marjory will get my cushion and a spool of cotton I'll +be very glad to have you thread all I have."</p> + +<p>The girls worked in silence for fully five minutes.<span class="pagenum">[190]</span> +Then Mabel jabbed the solitary needle she had +threaded into the sawdust cushion and said:</p> + +<p>"Don't you suppose Mr. Downing might let us +have the cottage <i>now</i>, if we went to him? Nobody +else seems to care about it. What do you think, Mrs. +Crane?"</p> + +<p>"Why, my dear, I suppose it wouldn't do any harm +to ask. You'd better see what your own people think +about it."</p> + +<p>"Let's go ask them now," cried impetuous Mabel, +springing to her feet. Forgetting all about the needles +and without waiting to say good-by to Mrs. Crane, +the eager girl made a diagonal rush for the corner +nearest her own home.</p> + +<p>The others remained long enough to thread all the +needles. Then they, too, went home with the news +about the cottage and about Mrs. Crane. They were +realizing, for the first time, that their good friend +might become helpless long before they were ready to +use her as a grandmother for their children, but they +couldn't see just what was to be done about it. The +idea of going to Mr. Downing, however, soon drove +every other thought away, for the parents and Aunty +Jane, too, advised them to ask. They even encouraged +them.</p> + +<p>But when Jean and Bettie, hopefully dressed in their +Sunday-best, and Marjory and Mabel, with their abundant<span class="pagenum">[191]</span> +locks elaborately curled besides, presented themselves +and their request at Mr. Downing's house that +evening, they were not at all encouraged by their +reception.</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing, a man of moods, had just come off +second-best in an encounter with Mrs. Milligan, whom +he had accidentally met on his way home to dinner, +and, at the moment the girls appeared, the cottage was +just about the last subject that the badgered man cared +to discuss. Before Jean had fairly stated her errand, +the enraged Mr. Downing roared "<i>No!</i>" so emphatically +that his four alarmed visitors backed hurriedly +off the Downing porch and fled as one girl. Mabel, to +be sure, measured her length in the canna bed near +the gate, but she scrambled up, snorting with fright +and indignation, and none of them paused again in +their flight until Jean's door, which seemed safest, had +closed behind them.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[192]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i200.jpg" width="400" height="363" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_19">CHAPTER 19</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Response to Mabel's Telegram</p> + +<p>The night of their flitting from Dandelion Cottage, +the girls had hastily eaten all the radishes in the +cottage garden to prevent their falling into the hands +of the grasping Milligans. Now, the morning after +their visit to Mr. Downing, they were wishing that +they hadn't; not because the radishes had disagreed +with them, but for quite a different reason. They<span class="pagenum">[193]</span> +could not enter the cottage, of course, but it had occurred +to them that it might be possible to derive a +certain melancholy satisfaction from tending and replenishing +the little garden. That pleasure, at least, +had not been forbidden them; but before beginning +active operations, they took the precaution of enlarging +the hole in the back fence, so that instantaneous +flight would be possible in case Mr. Downing should +stroll cottageward.</p> + +<p>Their motive was good. When Mr. Black returned, +if he ever should, Bettie meant that he should find the +little yard in perfect order.</p> + +<p>"We'll keep to our part of the bargain, anyway," +said Bettie, as the four girls were making their first +cautious tour of inspection about the cottage yard. +"There's lots of work to be done."</p> + +<p>"Yes," agreed Jean. "We said we'd keep this yard +nice all summer, and it wouldn't be right not to +do it."</p> + +<p>"I wonder if we ought to ask Mr. Downing?" asked +conscientious Bettie, stooping to pull off some gone-to-seed +pansies.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you'd like the job!" suggested Marjory, +with mild sarcasm.</p> + +<p>"My sakes!" said Mabel. "I wouldn't go near that +man again if I was going to swallow an automobile +the next moment if I didn't. I could hear him roar<span class="pagenum">[194]</span> +'<i>No</i>' every few minutes all night. I fell out of bed +twice, dreaming that I was trying to get off of that +old porch of his before he could grab me."</p> + +<p>"Well, I guess we'd better not ask," said Jean, "because +I'm pretty sure he'd have the same answer +ready."</p> + +<p>"He certainly ought not to mind having us take care +of our own flowers," said Marjory.</p> + +<p>"That's true," said Bettie, poking the moist +earth with a friendly finger. "They're growing splendidly +since the rain. See how nice and full of growiness +the ground is."</p> + +<p>"I can get more pansy plants," offered Marjory, "to +fill up these holes the Milligan dog made."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crane promised to give us some aster plants," +said Mabel. "Let's put 'em along by the fence."</p> + +<p>"Let's do," said Jean. "You go see if you can have +them now."</p> + +<p>"I <i>know</i> Mr. Black will be pleased," declared Bettie, +"if he finds this place looking nice. I'm so thankful +we didn't remember to ask Mr. Downing about it."</p> + +<p>"We didn't have a chance," said Jean, ruefully; "but +just the same, I'm willing to keep on forgetting until +Mr. Black comes."</p> + +<p>It began to look, however, as if Mr. Black were +never coming. Bettie had written as she had promised +but had had no reply, though the letter had not been<span class="pagenum">[195]</span> +mailed for ten minutes before she began to watch for +the postman. Even Mabel, having had no response to +her telegram and supposing it to have gone astray, +had given up hope.</p> + +<p>Mabel, ever averse to confessing the failure of any +of her enterprises, had decided to postpone saying anything +about the telegram until one or another of the +girls should remember to ask what had become of the +thirty-five cents. So far, none of them had thought +of it.</p> + +<p>Still, it seemed probable, in spite of Mr. Black's continued +absence, that he would get home some time, +for he had left so much behind him. In the business +portion of the town there was a huge building whose +sign read: "<span class="smcap">peter black and company</span>." Then, in +the prettiest part of the residence district, where the +lawns were big and the shrubs were planted scientifically +by a landscape gardener and where the hillside +bristled with roses, there was a large, handsome +stone house that, as everybody knew, belonged +to Mr. Black. Although there were industrious clerks +at work in the one, and a middle-aged housekeeper, +with a furnace-tending, grass-cutting husband equally +busy in the other, it was reasonable to suppose that +Mr. Black, even if he had no family, would have to +return some time, if only to enjoy his beloved rose-bushes.<span class="pagenum">[196]</span></p> + +<p>Thanks to Mabel's telegram (Bettie's letter, forwarded +from Washington, did not reach him for +many days) he did come. He had had to stop in Chicago, +after all, and there had been unexpected delays; +but just a week from the day the Milligans had left +the cottage, Mr. Black returned.</p> + +<p>Without even stopping to look in at his own office, +the traveler went straight to the rectory to ask for +Bettie. Bettie, Mrs. Tucker told him, he would probably +find in the cottage yard.</p> + +<p>Mr. Black took a short cut through the hole in the +back fence, arriving on the cottage lawn just in time +to meet a procession of girls entering the front gate. +Each girl was carrying a huge, heavy clod of earth, +out of the top of which grew a sturdy green plant; +for the cottageless cottagers had discovered the only +successful way of performing the difficult feat of restocking +their garden with half-grown vegetables. +Their neighbors had proved generous when Bettie +had explained that if one could only dig deep enough +one could transplant <i>anything</i>, from a cabbage to +pole-beans. Some of the grown-up gardeners, to be +sure, had been skeptical, but they were all willing that +the girls should make the attempt.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Black!" shrieked the four girls, dropping +their burdens to make a simultaneous rush for the<span class="pagenum">[197]</span> +senior warden. "Oh! oh! oh! Is it really you? We're +so glad—so awfully glad you've come!"</p> + +<p>"Well, I declare! So am I," said Mr. Black, with his +arms full of girls. "It seems like getting home again +to have a family of nice girls waiting with a welcome, +even if it's a pretty sandy one. What are you doing +with all the real estate? I thought you'd all been +turned out, but you seem to be all here. I declare, if +you haven't all been growing!"</p> + +<p>"We were—we are—we have," cried the girls, dancing +up and down delightedly. "Mr. Downing made +us give up the cottage, but he didn't say anything +about the garden—and—and—we thought we'd better +forget to ask about it."</p> + +<p>"Tell me the whole story," said Mr. Black. "Let's +sit here on the doorstep. I'm sure I could listen more +comfortably if there were not so many excited girls +dancing on my best toes."</p> + +<p>So Mr. Black, with a girl at each side and two at his +feet, heard the story from beginning to end, and he +seemed to find it much more amusing than the girls +had at any time considered it. He simply roared with +laughter when Bettie apologized about Bob and the +tin.</p> + +<p>"Well," said he, when the recital was ended, and he +had shown the girls Mabel's telegram, and the thoroughly +delighted Mabel had been praised and enthusiastically<span class="pagenum">[198]</span> +hugged by the other three, "I <i>have</i> heard of +cottages with more than one key. Suppose you see, +Bettie, if anything on this ring will fit that keyhole."</p> + +<p>Three of the flat, slender keys did not, but the +fourth turned easily in the lock. Bettie opened the +door.</p> + +<p>"Possession," said Mr. Black, with a twinkle in his +eye, "is nine points of the law. You'd better go to +work at once and move in and get to cooking; you +see, there's a vacancy under my vest that nothing but +that promised dinner party can fill. The sooner you +get settled, the sooner I get that good square meal. +Besides, if you don't work, you won't have an appetite +for a great big box of candy that I have in my +trunk."</p> + +<p>"Oh," sighed Bettie, rubbing her cheek against Mr. +Black's sleeve, "it seems too good to be true."</p> + +<p>"What, the candy?" teased Mr. Black.</p> + +<p>"No, the cottage," explained Bettie, earnestly. "Oh, +I do hope winter will be about six months late this +year to make up for this."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it'll forget to come at all," breathed Mabel, +hopefully. "I'd almost be willing to skip Christmas if +there was any way of stretching this summer out to +February. Somebody please pinch me—I'm afraid I'm +dreaming—Oh! ouch! I didn't say <i>everybody</i>."</p> + +<p>By this time, of course, all the young housekeepers'<span class="pagenum">[199]</span> +relatives were deeply interested in the cottage. After +living for a never-to-be-forgotten week with the four +unhappiest little girls in town, all were eager to reinstate +them in the restored treasure. The girls, having +rushed home with the joyful news, were almost overwhelmed +with unexpected offers of parental assistance. +The grown-ups were not only willing but anxious +to help. Then, too, the Mapes boys and the young +Tuckers almost came to blows over who should have +the honor of mending the roof with the bundles of +shingles that Dr. Bennett insisted on furnishing. Marjory's +Aunty Jane said that if somebody who could +drive nails without smashing his thumb would mend +the holes in the parlor floor she would give the girls +a pretty ingrain carpet, one side of which looked +almost new. Dr. Bennett himself laid a clean new floor +in the little kitchen over the rough old one, and Mrs. +Mapes mended the broken plaster in all the rooms by +pasting unbleached muslin over the holes. Mr. Tucker +replaced all broken panes of glass, while his busy wife +found time to tack mosquito-netting over the kitchen +and pantry windows.</p> + +<p>So interested, indeed, were all the grown-ups and all +the brothers that the girls chuckled delightedly. It +wouldn't have surprised them so very much if all their +people had fallen suddenly to playing with dolls and +to having tea-parties in the cottage; but the place was<span class="pagenum">[200]</span> +still far too disorderly for either of these juvenile occupations +to prove attractive to anybody.</p> + +<p>In the midst of the confusion, Mr. Downing stopped +at the cottage door one noon and asked for the girls, +who eyed him doubtfully and resentfully as they met +him, after Marjory had hesitatingly ushered him into +the untidy little parlor.</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing smiled at them in a friendly but decidedly +embarrassed manner. He had not forgotten +his own lack of cordiality when the girls had called +on him, and he wanted to atone for it. Mr. Black had +tactfully but effectively pointed out to Mr. Downing—already +deeply disgusted with the Milligans—the error +of his ways, and Mr. Downing, as generous as he was +hasty and irascible, was honest enough to admit that +he had been mistaken not only in his estimate of Mr. +Black, but also in his treatment of the little cottagers. +Now, eager to make amends, he looked somewhat +anxiously from one to another of his silent hostesses, +who in return looked questioningly at Mr. Downing. +Surely, with Mr. Black in town, Mr. Downing <i>couldn't</i> +be thinking of turning them out a second time; still, +he had disappointed them before, probably he would +again, and the girls meant to take no chances. So they +kept still, with searching eyes glued upon Mr. Downing's +countenance. All at once, they realized that they +were looking into friendly eyes, and three of them<span class="pagenum">[201]</span> +jumped to the conclusion that the junior warden was +not the heartless monster they had considered him.</p> + +<p>"I came," said Mr. Downing, noticing the change +of expression in Bettie's face, "to offer you, with my +apologies, this key and this little document. The paper, +as you will see, is signed by all the vestrymen—my +own name is written <i>very</i> large—and it gives you the +right to the use of this cottage until such time as the +church feels rich enough to tear it down and build a +new one. There is no immediate cause for alarm on +this score, for there were only sixty-two cents in the +plate last Sunday. I have come to the conclusion, young +ladies, that I was overhasty in my judgment. I didn't +understand the matter, and I'm afraid I acted without +due consideration—I often do. But I hope you'll forgive +me, for I sincerely beg <i>all</i> your pardons."</p> + +<p>"It's all right," said Bettie, "as long as it was just +a mistake. It's easy to forgive mistakes."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Marjory, sagely, "we all make 'em."</p> + +<p>"It's all right, anyway," added Jean.</p> + +<p>Mr. Downing looked expectantly at Mabel, who for +once had preserved a dead silence.</p> + +<p>"Well?" he asked, interrogatively.</p> + +<p>"I don't suppose I can ever really <i>quite</i> forgive you," +confessed Mabel, with evident reluctance. "It'll be awfully +hard work, but I guess I can try."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps my peace-offering will help your efforts a<span class="pagenum">[202]</span> +little," said Mr. Downing, smiling. "It seems to be +coming in now at your gate."</p> + +<p>The girls turned hastily to look, but all they could +see was a very untidy man with a large book under +his arm.</p> + +<p>"These," said Mr. Downing, taking the book from +the man, who had walked in at the open door, "are +samples of inexpensive wall papers. You're to choose +as much as you need of the kinds you like best, and +this man will put it wherever it will do the most good, +and I'll pay the bill. Now, Miss Blue Eyes, do I stand +a better chance of forgiveness?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes!" cried Mabel. "I'm almost glad you needed +to apologize. You did it beautifully, too. Mercy, when +<i>I</i> apologize—and I have to do a <i>fearful</i> lot of apologizing—I +don't begin to do it so nicely!"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," offered Mr. Downing, "when you've had +as much practice as I have, it will come easier. I see, +however, that you are far more suitable tenants than +the Milligans would have been, for my humble apologies +to them met with a very different reception. I +assure you that, if there's ever any rivalry between +you again, my vote goes with you—you're so easily +satisfied. Now don't hesitate to choose whatever you +want from this book. This paperhanger is yours, too, +until you're done with him."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you, thank you, <i>thank</i> you," cried the<span class="pagenum">[203]</span> +girls, with happy voices, as Mr. Downing turned to +go; "you <i>couldn't</i> have thought of a nicer peace-offering."</p> + +<p>Of course it took a long, long time for so many +young housekeepers to choose papers for the parlor +and the two bedrooms, but after much discussion and +many differences of opinion, it was finally selected. +The girls decided on green for the parlor, blue for one +bedroom, and pink for the other, and they were easily +persuaded to choose small patterns.</p> + +<p>Then the smiling paperhanger worked with astonishing +rapidity and said that he didn't object in the +least to having four pairs of bright eyes watch from +the doorway every strip go into place. It seemed to be +no trouble at all to paper the little low-ceilinged cottage, +and, oh! how beautiful it was when it was all +done. The cool, cucumber-green parlor was just the +right shade to melt into the soft blue and white of the +front bedroom. As for the dainty pink room, as Bettie +said rapturously, it fairly made one smell roses to look +at it, it was so sweet.</p> + +<p>It was finished by the following night, for no paperhanger +could have had the heart to linger over his +work with so many anxious eyes following every movement. +Mrs. Tucker washed and ironed and mended +the white muslin curtains; and, with such a bower to<span class="pagenum">[204]</span> +move into, the second moving-in and settling, the +girls decided, was really better than the first. When +their belongings were finally reinstalled in the cottage +even Mabel no longer felt resentful toward the Milligans.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[205]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i213.jpg" width="400" height="338" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_20">CHAPTER 20</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Odd Behavior of the Grown-ups</p> + +<p>Even with all its ingenious though 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.</p> + +<p>At last, it looked 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<span class="pagenum">[206]</span> +Crane—who might easily, as Mabel suggested +harrowingly, have moved away or died at any +moment during the summer.</p> + +<p>One day, very soon after the cottage was settled, +a not-at-all-surprised Mr. Black and a very-much-astonished +Mrs. Crane each received a formal invitation +to dine under its reshingled roof. Composed by +all four, the note was written by Jean, whose writing +and spelling all conceded to be better than the combined +efforts of the other three. Bettie delivered the +notes with her own hand, two days before the event, +and on the morning of the party she went a second +time to each house to make certain that neither of the +expected guests had forgotten the date.</p> + +<p>"Forget!" exclaimed Mr. Black, standing framed in +his own doorway. "My dear little girl, how <i>could</i> I +forget, when I've been saving room for that dinner +ever since early last spring? Nothing, I assure you, +could keep me away or even delay me. I have eaten +a <i>very</i> light breakfast, I shall go entirely without +luncheon—"</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't do that," warned Bettie. "You see it's +our first dinner party and something <i>might</i> go wrong. +The soup might scorch—"</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't have the heart to," said Mr. Black. +"<i>No</i> soup could be so unkind."</p> + +<p>Of course the cottage was the busiest place imaginable<span class="pagenum">[207]</span> +during the days immediately preceding the +dinner party. The girls had made elaborate plans and +their pockets fairly bulged with lists of things that +they were to be sure to remember and not on any +account to forget. Then the time came for them to +begin to do all the things that they had planned to +do, and the cottage hummed like a hive of bees.</p> + +<p>First the precious seven dollars and a half, swelled +by some mysterious process to seven dollars and fifty-seven +cents, had to be withdrawn from the bank, the +most imposing building in town with its almost oppressive +air of formal dignity. The rather diffident +girls went in a body to get the money and looked +with astonishment at the extra pennies.</p> + +<p>"That's the interest," explained the cashier, noting +with quiet amusement the puzzled faces.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Jean, "we've had that in school, but this +is the first time we've ever seen any."</p> + +<p>"We didn't suppose," supplemented Bettie, "that +interest was real money. <i>I</i> thought it was something +like those x-plus-y things that the boys have in +algebra."</p> + +<p>"Or like mermaids and goddesses," said Mabel.</p> + +<p>"She means myths," interpreted Marjory.</p> + +<p>"I see," said the cashier. "Perhaps you like real, +tangible interest better than the kind you have in +school."<span class="pagenum">[208]</span></p> + +<p>"Oh, we do, we do!" cried the four girls.</p> + +<p>"After this," confided Bettie, "it will be easier to +study about."</p> + +<p>Then, with the money carefully divided into three +portions, placed in three separate purses, which in +turn were deposited one each in Jean's, Marjory's, and +Bettie's pockets, Mabel having flatly declined to burden +herself with any such weighty responsibility, the four +went to purchase their groceries.</p> + +<p>The smiling clerks at the various shops confused +them a little at first by offering them new brands of +breakfast foods with strange, oddly spelled names, but +the girls explained patiently at each place that they +were giving a dinner party, not a breakfast, and that +they wanted nothing but the things on their list. It +took time and a great deal of discussion to make so +many important purchases, but finally the groceries +were all ordered.</p> + +<p>Next the little housekeepers went to the butcher's +to ask for a chicken.</p> + +<p>"Vat kind of schicken you vant?" asked the stout, +impatient German butcher.</p> + +<p>Jean looked at Bettie, Bettie looked at Marjory, and +Marjory, although she knew it was hopeless, looked at +Mabel.</p> + +<p>"Vell?" said the busy butcher, interrogatively.</p> + +<p>"One to cook—without feathers," gasped Jean.<span class="pagenum">[209]</span></p> + +<p>"A spring schicken?"</p> + +<p>"Is that—is that better than a summer one?" faltered +Bettie, cautiously. "You see it's summer now."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," suggested Mabel, seized with a bright +thought, "an August one—"</p> + +<p>"Here, Schon," shouted the busy butcher to his +assistant, "you pring oudt three-four schicken. You +can pick von oudt vile I vaits on dese odder gostomer."</p> + +<p>"I think," said Jean, indicating one of the fowls +John had produced for her inspection, "that that's +about the right size. It's so small and smooth that it +ought to be tender."</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't take that one, Miss," cautioned honest +John, under his breath, "it looks to me like a little old +bantam rooster. Leave it to me and I'll find you a +good one."</p> + +<p>To his credit, John was as good as his word.</p> + +<p>The little housekeepers felt very important indeed, +when, later in the day, a procession of genuine grocery +wagons, drawn by flesh-and-blood horses, drew up +before the cottage door to deliver all kinds of really-truly +parcels. They had not quite escaped the breakfast +foods after all, because each consignment of groceries +was enriched by several sample packages; enough +altogether, the girls declared joyously, to provide a +great many noon luncheons.</p> + +<p>Of course all the parcels had to be unwrapped, admired,<span class="pagenum">[210]</span> +and sorted before being carefully arranged in +the pantry cupboard, which had never before found +itself so bountifully supplied. Then, for a busy half-day, +cook books and real cooks were anxiously consulted; +for, as Mabel said, it was really surprising to +see how many different ways there were to cook even +the simplest things.</p> + +<p>Jean and Bettie were to do the actual cooking. The +other two, in elaborately starched caps and aprons of +spotless white (provided Mabel, though this seemed +doubtful, could keep hers white), were to take turns +serving the courses. The first course was to be tomato +soup; it came in a can with directions outside and cost +fifteen cents, which Mabel considered cheap because +of the printed cooking lesson.</p> + +<p>"If they'd send printed directions with their raw +chickens and vegetables," said she, "maybe folks might +be able to tell which recipe belonged to which thing."</p> + +<p>"Well," laughed Marjory, "<i>some</i> cooks don't have +to read a whole page before they discover that directions +for making plum pudding don't help them to +make corned-beef hash. You always forget to look at +the top of the page."</p> + +<p>"Never mind," said Jean, "she found a good recipe +for salad dressing."</p> + +<p>"That's true," said Marjory, "but before you use it +you'd better make sure that it isn't a polish for hardwood<span class="pagenum">[211]</span> +floors. There, don't throw the book at me, +Mabel—I won't say another word."</p> + +<p>The three mothers and Aunty Jane, grown suddenly +astonishingly obliging, not only consented to lend +whatever the girls asked for, but actually thrust their +belongings upon them to an extent that was almost +overwhelming. The same impulse seemed to have +seized them all. It puzzled the girls, yet it pleased +them too, for it was such a decided novelty to have +six parents (even the fathers appeared interested) and +one aunt positively vying with one another to aid the +young cottagers with their latest plan. The girls could +remember a time, not so very far distant, when it was +almost hopeless to ask for even such common things +as potatoes, not to mention eggs and butter. Now, +however, everything was changed. Aunty Jane would +provide soup spoons, napkins, and a tablecloth—yes, +her very best short one. Marjory could hardly believe +her ears, but hastily accepted the cloth lest the offer +should be withdrawn. The girls, having set their +hearts on using the "Frog that would a-wooing go" +plates for the escalloped salmon (to their minds there +seemed to be some vague connection between frogs +and fishes), were compelled to decline offers of all the +fish plates belonging to the four families. The potato +salad, garnished with lettuce from the cottage garden, +was to be eaten with Mrs. Bennett's best salad forks<span class="pagenum">[212]</span> +The roasted chicken was not to be entrusted to the +not-always-reliable cottage oven but was to be cooked +at the Tuckers' house and carved with Mr. Mapes's +best game set. Mrs. Bennett's cook would make a pie—yes, +even a difficult lemon pie with a meringue on top, +promised Mrs. Bennett.</p> + +<p>Then there were to be butter beans out of the cottage +garden, and sliced cucumbers from the green-grocer's +because Mrs. Crane had confessed to a fondness +for cucumbers. There was one beet in the garden +almost large enough to be eaten; that, too, was to be +sacrificed. The dessert had been something of a problem. +It had proved so hard to decide this matter that +they decided to compromise by adding both pudding +and ice cream to the Bennett pie. A brick of ice cream +and some little cakes could easily be purchased ready-made +from the town caterer, with the change they had +left. Thoughts of their money's giving out no longer +troubled them, for had not Mabel's surprising father +told them that if they ran short they need not hesitate +to ask him for any amount within reason?</p> + +<p>"I declare," said bewildered Mabel, "I can't see what +has come over Papa and Mamma. Do I look pale, or +anything—as if I might be going to die before very +long?"</p> + +<p>"No," said Marjory, "you certainly don't; but I've +wondered if Aunty Jane could be worried about <i>me</i>.<span class="pagenum">[213]</span> +I never knew her to be so generous—why, it's getting +to be a kind of nuisance! Do you s'pose they're going +to insist on doing <i>everything</i>?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Bettie, "they've certainly helped us a +lot. I don't know <i>why</i> they've done it, but I'm glad +they have. You see, we <i>must</i> have everything perfectly +beautiful because Mr. Black is rich and is accustomed +to good dinners, and Mrs. Crane is poor and never has +any very nice ones. If our people keep all their promises, +it can't help being a splendid dinner."</p> + +<p>The three mothers and Aunty Jane and all the fathers +did keep their promises. They, too, wanted the +dinner to be a success, for they knew, as all the older +residents of the little town knew—and as the children +themselves might have known if the story had not +been so old and their parents had been in the habit of +gossiping (which fortunately they were not)—that +there was a reason why Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane +were the last two persons to be invited to a tête-à-tête +dinner party. Yet, strangely enough, there was an +equally good reason why no one wanted to interfere +and why everyone wanted to help.</p> + +<hr class="chapter" /> + +<span class="pagenum">[214]</span> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/i222.jpg" width="400" height="321" alt="" />> +</div> + +<h2 id="CHAPTER_21">CHAPTER 21</h2> + +<p class="h3">The Dinner</p> + +<p>The girls, a little uneasy lest their alarmingly interested +parents should insist on cooking and serving the +entire dinner, were both relieved and perplexed to find +that the grown-ups, while perfectly willing to help +with the dinner provided they could work in their +own kitchens, flatly declined the most urgent invitations +to enter the cottage on the afternoon or evening +of the party.<span class="pagenum">[215]</span></p> + +<p>It was incomprehensible. Until noon of the very +day of the feast the parents and Aunty Jane had paid +the girls an almost embarrassing number of visits. +Now, when the girls really wanted them and actually +gave each of them a very special invitation, each one +unexpectedly held aloof. For, as the hour approached, +the girls momentarily became more and more convinced +that something would surely go wrong in the +cottage kitchen with no experienced person to keep +things moving. They decided, at four o'clock, to ask +Mrs. Mapes to oversee things.</p> + +<p>"No, indeed," said Mrs. Mapes. "You may have +anything there is in my house, but you can't have <i>me</i>. +You don't need <i>anybody</i>; you won't have a mite of +trouble."</p> + +<p>Finding Mrs. Mapes unpersuadable, they went to +Mrs. Tucker, who, next to Jean's mother, was usually +the most obliging of parents.</p> + +<p>"No," said Mrs. Tucker, "I couldn't think of it. +No, no, no, not for one moment. It's much better for +you to do it all by yourselves."</p> + +<p>Still hopeful, the girls ran to Mrs. Bennett.</p> + +<p>"Mercy, no!" exclaimed that good woman, with discouraging +emphasis. "I'm not a bit of use in a strange +kitchen, and there are reasons—Oh! I mean it's your +party and it won't be any fun if somebody else +runs it."<span class="pagenum">[216]</span></p> + +<p>"Shall we ask your Aunty Jane?" asked Bettie. "We +don't seem to be having any luck."</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied Marjory. "She loves to manage +things."</p> + +<p>But Marjory's Aunty Jane proved no more willing +than the rest.</p> + +<p>"No, <i>ma'am</i>!" she said, emphatically. "I wouldn't do +it for ten dollars. Why, it would just spoil everything +to have a grown person around. Don't even <i>think</i> of +such a thing."</p> + +<p>So the girls, feeling just a little indignant at their +disobliging relatives, decided to get along as well as +they could without them.</p> + +<p>At last, everything was either cooked or cooking. +The table was beautifully set and decorated and flowers +bloomed everywhere in Dandelion Cottage. Jean and +Bettie, in the freshest of gingham aprons, were taking +turns watching the things simmering on the stove. +Mabel, looking fatter than ever in her short, white, +stiffly starched apron, was on the doorstep craning her +neck to see if the guests showed any signs of coming, +and Marjory was busily putting a few entirely unnecessary +finishing touches to the table.</p> + +<p>The guests were invited for half-past six, but had +been hospitably urged by Bettie to appear sooner if +they wished. At exactly fifteen minutes after six, Mrs. +Crane, in her old-fashioned, threadbare, best black<span class="pagenum">[217]</span> +silk and a very-much-mended real-lace collar, and +with her iron-gray hair far more elaborately arranged +than she usually wore it, crossed the street, lifting her +skirts high and stepping gingerly to avoid the dust. +She supposed that she was to be the only guest, for +the girls had not mentioned any other.</p> + +<p>Mabel, prodigiously formal and most unusually +solemn, met her at the door, ushered her into the +blue room, and invited her to remove her wraps. The +light shawl that Mrs. Crane had worn over her head +was the only wrap she had, but it was not so easily +removed as it might have been. It caught on one of +her hair pins, which necessitated rearranging several +locks of hair that had slipped from place. This took +some time and, while she was thus occupied, Mr. Black +turned the corner, went swiftly toward the cottage, +mounted the steps, and rang the doorbell.</p> + +<p>Mabel received him with even greater solemnity +than she had Mrs. Crane.</p> + +<p>"I think I'd better take your hat," said she. "We +haven't any hat rack, but it'll be perfectly safe on the +pink-room bed because we haven't any Tucker babies +taking naps on it today."</p> + +<p>Mr. Black handed his hat to her with an elaborate +politeness that equaled her own.</p> + +<p>"Marjory!" she whispered as she went through the +dining-room. "He's wearing his dress suit!"<span class="pagenum">[218]</span></p> + +<p>"Sh! he'll hear you," warned Marjory.</p> + +<p>"Well, anyway, I'm frightened half to death. Oh, +<i>would</i> you mind passing all the wettest things? I +hadn't thought about his clothes."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I guess I'd better; he might want to wear 'em +again."</p> + +<p>"They're both here," announced Mabel, opening the +kitchen door.</p> + +<p>"You help Bettie stir the soup and the mashed potatoes," +said Jean, whisking off her apron and tying it +about Mabel's neck. "I'll go in and shake hands with +them and then come back and dish up."</p> + +<p>Jean found both guests looking decidedly ill at ease. +Mr. Black stood by the parlor table absent-mindedly +undressing a family of paper dolls. Mrs. Crane, pale +and nervously clutching the curtain, seemed unable to +move from the bedroom doorway.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Jean, "I do believe Mabel forgot all +about introducing you. We told her to be sure to remember, +but she hasn't been able to take her mind off +of her apron since she put it on. Mrs. Crane, this is +our—our preserver, Mr. Black."</p> + +<p>The guests bowed stiffly.</p> + +<p>Jean began to wish that she could think of some +way to break the ice. Both were jolly enough on ordinary +occasions, but apparently both had suddenly been +stricken dumb. Perhaps dinner parties always affected<span class="pagenum">[219]</span> +grown persons that way, or perhaps the starch from +Mabel's apron had proved contagious; Jean smiled at +the thought. Then she made another effort to promote +sociability.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crane," explained Jean, turning to Mr. Black, +who was nervously tearing the legs off of the father +of the paper-doll family, "is our very nicest neighbor. +We like her just ever so much—everybody does. We've +often told <i>you</i>, Mrs. Crane, how fond we are of Mr. +Black. It was because you are our two very dearest +friends that we invited you both—"</p> + +<p>"Je-e-e-e-an!" called a distressed voice from the +kitchen.</p> + +<p>"Mercy!" exclaimed Jean, making a hurried exit, +"I hope that soup isn't scorched!"</p> + +<p>"No," said Bettie, slightly aggrieved, "but <i>I</i> wanted +a chance, too, to say how-do-you-do to those people +before I get all mixed up with the cooking. I thought +you were <i>never</i> coming back."</p> + +<p>"Well, it's your turn now," said Jean. "Give me that +spoon."</p> + +<p>Bettie, finding their guests seated in opposite corners +of the room and apparently deeply interested in the +cottage literature—Mr. Black buried in <i>Dottie Dimple</i> +and Mrs. Crane absorbed in <i>Mother Goose</i>—naturally +concluded that they were waiting to be introduced, +and accordingly made the presentation.<span class="pagenum">[220]</span></p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crane," said she, "I want you to meet Mr. +Black, and I hope," added warm-hearted Bettie, "that +you'll like each other very much because we're so fond +of you both. You're each a surprise party for the +other—we thought you'd both like it better if you had +somebody besides children to talk to."</p> + +<p>"Very kind, I'm sure," mumbled Mr. Black, whose +company manners, it seemed to Bettie, were far from +being as pleasant as his everyday ones. Bettie gave a +deep sigh and made one more effort to set the conversational +ball rolling.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid I'll have to go back to the kitchen now, +and leave you to entertain each other. Please both of +you be <i>very</i> entertaining—you're both so jolly when +you just run in."</p> + +<p>Bettie's eyes were wistful as she went toward the +kitchen. Was it possible, she wondered, that her beloved +Mr. Black could despise Mrs. Crane because she +was <i>poor</i>? It didn't seem possible, yet there was certainly +something wrong. Perhaps he was merely hungry. +That was it, of course; she would put the dinner +on at once—even good-natured Dr. Tucker, she remembered, +was sometimes a little bearlike when meals +were delayed.</p> + +<p>Five minutes later, Marjory escorted the guests to +the dining-room, and, finding both of these usually +talkative persons alarmingly silent, she inferred of<span class="pagenum">[221]</span> +course that Mabel had forgotten—as indeed Mabel +had—her instructions in regard to introducing them. +Marjory's manners on formal occasions were very +pretty; they were pretty now, and so was she, as she +hastened to make up for Mabel's oversight.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Black," she cried, earnestly, "I'm afraid +no one remembered to introduce you. It's our first +dinner party, you know, and we're not very wise. This +is our dearest neighbor, Mrs. Crane, Mr. Black."</p> + +<p>The guests bowed stiffly for the third time. Practice +should have lent grace to the salutation, but seemingly +it had not.</p> + +<p>"Aren't some of you young people going to sit down +with me?" demanded Mr. Black, noticing suddenly +that the table was set for only two.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mrs. Crane with evident dismay, "surely +you're coming to the table, too."</p> + +<p>"We can't," explained Marjory. "It takes all of us to +do the serving. Besides, we haven't but two dining-room +chairs. Sit here, please, Mrs. Crane; and this is +your place, Mr. Black."</p> + +<p>Mr. Black looked red and uncomfortable as he unfolded +his napkin. Mrs. Crane looked, as Marjory said +afterward, for all the world as if she were going to +cry. Perhaps the prospect of a good dinner after a +long siege of poor ones was too much for her, for +ordinarily Mrs. Crane was a very cheerful woman.<span class="pagenum">[222]</span></p> + +<p>Although both guests declared that the soup was +very good indeed, neither seemed to really enjoy it.</p> + +<p>"They just kind of worried a little of it down," said +the distressed Marjory, when she handed Mr. Black's +plate, still three-quarters full, to Jean in the kitchen. +"Do you suppose there's anything the matter with it?"</p> + +<p>"There can't be," said Bettie. "I've tasted it and it's +good."</p> + +<p>"They're just saving room for the other things," +comforted Mabel. "I guess <i>I</i> wouldn't fill myself up +with soup if I could smell roasted chicken keeping +warm in the oven."</p> + +<p>Although Mabel had asked to be spared passing the +spillable things, it seemed reasonably safe to trust her +with the dish of escalloped salmon. She succeeded in +passing it without disaster to either the dish or the +guests' garments, and her apron was still immaculate.</p> + +<p>"Why," exclaimed Mabel, suddenly noticing that the +guests sat stiff and silent, "the girls said I was to be +sure to introduce you the moment you came, and I +never thought a thing about it. Do forgive me—I'm +the stupidest girl. Mrs. Black—I mean Mr. Crane—no, +<i>Mrs.</i> Crane—"</p> + +<p>"We've been introduced," said Mr. Black, rather +shortly. "Might I have a glass of water?"</p> + +<p>A pained, surprised look crept into Mabel's eyes. +A moment later she went to the kitchen.<span class="pagenum">[223]</span></p> + +<p>The instant the guests were left alone, Mrs. Crane +did an odd thing. She leaned forward and spoke in a +low, earnest tone to Mr. Black.</p> + +<p>"Peter," she said, "can't we pretend to be sociable +for a little while? It isn't comfortable, of course, but +it isn't right to spoil those children's pleasure by acting +like a pair of wooden dolls. Let's talk to each +other whenever they're in the room just as if we had +just met for the first time."</p> + +<p>"You're right, Sarah," said Mr. Black. "Let's talk +about the weather. It's a safe topic and there's always +plenty of it."</p> + +<p>When Marjory opened the door to carry in the salad +there was a pleasant hum of voices in the dining-room. +It seemed to all the girls that the guests were +really enjoying themselves, for Mr. Black was telling +Mrs. Crane how much warmer it was in Washington, +and Mrs. Crane was informing Mr. Black that, except +for the one shower that fell so opportunely on the +Milligans, it had been a remarkably dry summer. The +four anxious hostesses, feeling suddenly cheered, fell +joyously to eating the soup and the salmon that remained +on the stove. Until that moment, they had +been too uneasy to realize that they were hungry; but +as Marjory carried in the crackers, half-famished +Mabel breathed a fervent hope that the guests wouldn't +help themselves too lavishly to the salad.<span class="pagenum">[224]</span></p> + +<p>To the astonishment of Mabel, who carried the +chicken successfully to its place before Mr. Black, who +was to carve it, Mr. Black did not ask the other guest +what part she liked best, but, with a whimsical smile, +quietly cut off both wings and put them on Mrs. +Crane's plate.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crane looked up with an odd, tremulous expression—sort +of weepy, Mabel called it afterwards—and +said: "Thank you, Peter."</p> + +<p>It seemed to Mabel at the time that the guests were +getting acquainted with a rapidity that was little short +of remarkable—"Peter" indeed.</p> + +<p>Then, when everything else was eaten, and Marjory +had brought the nuts and served them, Mrs. Crane, +hardly waiting for the door to close behind the little +waitress, leaned forward suddenly and said:</p> + +<p>"Peter, do you remember how you pounded my +thumb when I held that hard black walnut for you +to crack?"</p> + +<p>"I remember everything, Sarah. I've always been +sorry about that thumb—and I've been sorry about a +good many other things since. Do you think—do you +think you could forgive me?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I just guess I could," returned Mrs. Crane, +heartily. "After all, it was just as much my fault as it +was yours—maybe more."<span class="pagenum">[225]</span></p> + +<p>"No, I never thought that, Sarah. <i>I</i> was the one to +blame."</p> + +<p>When the door opened a moment later to admit the +finger-bowls and all four of the girls, who had licked +the ice-cream platter and had nothing more to do in +the kitchen since everything had been served—there, +to the housekeepers' unbounded amazement, were +Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane, with their arms stretched +across the little table, holding each other's middle-aged +hands in a tight clasp, and both had tears in their +eyes.</p> + +<p>The girls looked at them in consternation.</p> + +<p>"Was—was it the dinner?" ventured Mabel, at last. +"Was it as bad as—as all that?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Black, rising to go around the +table to place an affectionate arm across Mrs. Crane's +plump shoulders, "it <i>was</i> the dinner, but not its badness—or +even its very goodness."</p> + +<p>"I guess you'd better tell 'em all about it, Peter," +suggested Mrs. Crane, whose eyes were shining happily. +"It's only fair they should know about it—bless +their little hearts."</p> + +<p>"Well, you see," said Mr. Black, who, as the girls +had quickly discovered, was once more their own +delightfully jolly friend, "once upon a time, a long +time ago, there was a black-eyed girl named Sarah, +and a two-years-younger boy, who looked a good<span class="pagenum">[226]</span> +deal like her, named Peter, and they were brother and +sister. They were all the brothers and sisters that each +had, for their parents died when this boy and girl +were very young. 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."</p> + +<p>"Yes," agreed Mrs. Crane, nodding her head and +smiling mistily, "they certainly did. The poor young +things had no one else to love."</p> + +<p>"That," said Mr. Black, "was no doubt the reason +why, when the headstrong boy grew up and married +a girl that his sister didn't like, and the equally headstrong +girl grew up and married a man that her +brother <i>couldn't</i> like—a regular scoundrel that—"</p> + +<p>"Peter!" warned Mrs. Crane.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Black, hastily, "it's all over now, +and perhaps we <i>had</i> better leave that part of it out. +It isn't a pretty story, and we'll never mention it +again, Sarah. But anyway, girls, this foolish brother +and sister quarreled, and the brothers-in-law and +sisters-in-law and even the grandmother, who was old<span class="pagenum">[227]</span> +enough to know better, quarreled, until finally all +four of those hot-tempered young persons were so +angry that the brother named Peter said he'd never +speak to his sister again, and the sister named Sarah +said she'd never speak to her brother again—and they +haven't until this very day. Just a pair of young geese, +weren't they, Sarah?"</p> + +<p>"Old geese, too," agreed Mrs. Crane, "for they've +both been fearfully lonely ever since and they've both +been too proud to say so. One of them, at least, has +wished a great many times that there had never been +any quarrel."</p> + +<p>"<i>Two</i> of 'em. But now this one," said Mr. Black, +placing his forefinger against his own broad chest, "is +going to ask this one—" and 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?"</p> + +<p>"I say yes," said Mrs. Crane; "yes, with all my +heart."</p> + +<p>"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 +a while, because we'd both like to have our house full +of happy little girls. You never had any children, +Sarah?"<span class="pagenum">[228]</span></p> + +<p>"No, and you lost your only one, Peter."</p> + +<p>"Yes, a little brown-eyed thing like Bettie here—she'd +be a woman now, probably with children of +her own."</p> + +<p>"It's—it's just like a story," breathed Bettie, happily. +"We've been part of a real story and never knew it! +I'm so glad you let us have Dandelion Cottage, <i>so</i> +glad we invited you to dinner, and that nothing happened +to keep either of you away."</p> + +<p>"Peter and I are glad, too," said Mrs. Crane, who +indeed looked wonderfully happy.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mr. Black, "it's the most successful +dinner party I've ever attended. Of course I can't hope +to equal it, but as soon as Sarah and I get to keeping +house properly and have decided which is to pour the +coffee, we're going to return the compliment with a +dinner that will make your eyes stick out, aren't we, +Sarah?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, we'll do a great deal more than that," responded +generous Mrs. Crane. "We'll keep four extra +places set at our table all the time."</p> + +<p>"Of course we will," cried Mr. Black, heartily. +"And we'll fill the biggest case in the library with +children's books—we'll all go tomorrow to pick out +the first shelfful—so that when it gets too cold for you +to stay in Dandelion Cottage you'll have something +to take its place. You're going to be little sunny Dandelions<span class="pagenum">[229]</span> +in the Black-Crane house whenever your own +people can spare you. But what's the matter? Have +you all lost your tongues? I didn't suppose you could +be so astonishingly quiet."</p> + +<p>"Oh," sighed Bettie, joyfully, "you've taken <i>such</i> a +load off our minds. We were simply dreading the +winter, with no cottage to have good times in."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Jean. "We didn't know how we could +manage to <i>live</i> with the cottage closed. We've been +wondering what in the world we were going to do."</p> + +<p>"But with school, and you dear people to visit every +day on the way home," said Marjory, "we'll hardly +have time to miss it. Oh! won't it be perfectly lovely?"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to begin at once to practice being on +time to meals," said Mabel. "I'm not going to let that +extra place do any waiting for <i>me</i>."</p> + +<p>These were the things that the four girls said aloud; +but the joyous look that flashed from Jean to Bettie, +from Bettie to Marjory, from Marjory to Mabel, and +from Mabel back again to Jean, said even more plainly: +"<i>Now</i> there'll be somebody to take care of Mrs. Crane. +<i>Now</i> there'll be somebody to make a home for lonely +Mr. Black."</p> + +<p>And indeed, subsequent events proved that it was +a beautiful arrangement for everybody, besides being +quite the most astonishing thing that had happened +in the history of Lakeville.</p> + +</div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Dandelion Cottage, by Carroll Watson Rankin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DANDELION COTTAGE *** + +***** This file should be named 37871-h.htm or 37871-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/8/7/37871/ + +Produced by Charlene Taylor, Betsie Bush, Matthew Wheaton +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions 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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