The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Pair of Them, by Evelyn Raymond This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title: A Pair of Them Author: Evelyn Raymond Release date: March 20, 2021 [eBook #64891] Language: English Produced by: D A Alexander, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress) *** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A PAIR OF THEM *** A Pair of Them SUNSHINE LIBRARY. Aunt Hannah and Seth. By James Otis. Blind Brother (The). By Homer Greene. Captain’s Dog (The). By Louis Énault. Cat and the Candle (The). By Mary F. Leonard. Christmas at Deacon Hackett’s. By James Otis. Christmas-Tree Scholar. By Frances Bent Dillingham. Dear Little Marchioness. The Story of a Child’s Faith and Love. Dick in the Desert. By James Otis. Divided Skates. By Evelyn Raymond. Gold Thread (The). By Norman MacLeod, D.D. Half a Dozen Thinking Caps. By Mary Leonard. How Tommy Saved the Barn. By James Otis. Ingleside. By Barbara Yechton. J. Cole. By Emma Gellibrand. Jessica’s First Prayer. By Hesba Stretton. Laddie. By the author of “Miss Toosey’s Mission.” Little Crusaders. By Eva Madden. Little Sunshine’s Holiday. By Miss Mulock. Little Peter. By Lucas Malet. Master Sunshine. By Mrs. C. F. Fraser. Miss Toosey’s Mission. By the author of “Laddie.” Musical Journey of Dorothy and Delia. By Bradley Gilman. Our Uncle, the Major. A Story of 1765. By James Otis. Pair of Them (A). By Evelyn Raymond. Playground Toni. By Anna Chapin Ray. Play Lady (The). By Ella Farman Pratt. Prince Prigio. By Andrew Lang. Short Cruise (A). By James Otis. Smoky Days. By Edward W. Thomson. Strawberry Hill. By Mrs. C. F. Fraser. Sunbeams and Moonbeams. By Louise R. Baker. Two and One. By Charlotte M. Vaile. Wreck of the Circus (The). By James Otis. Young Boss (The). By Edward W. Thomson. THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY, NEW YORK. “WHY, YES, BONNY-GAY! I’VE COME.” See page 77. A PAIR OF THEM BY EVELYN RAYMOND New York. Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. Publishers. Copyright, 1901, By THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. Where the Houses are Big 1 II. Where the Houses are Small 15 III. How the Pair Met 29 IV. Max Reappears 44 V. Mary Jane Goes Visiting 59 VI. The Flight and Fright of Mary Jane 78 VII. On the Way Home 95 VIII. Confidences 112 IX. By the Strength of Love 132 Afterward 150 A Pair of Them CHAPTER I WHERE THE HOUSES ARE BIG “It’s a queer kind of a name, though it suits you,” observed the Gray Gentleman, thoughtfully. “How came you by it?” Bonny-Gay flashed the questioner a smile, hugged Max closer and replied: “I was born on a Sunday morning. That’s how.” “Ah, indeed? But I don’t quite understand.” “Don’t you? Seems easy. Let’s sit down here by ‘Father George’ and I’ll explain. If I can.” The Gray Gentleman was very tall and dignified, yet he had a habit of doing whatever Bonny-Gay asked him. So he now doubled himself up and perched on the low curb surrounding the monument, while the little girl and the big black dog dropped easily down beside him. Then he leaned his head back against the iron railing and gazed reflectively into the face of the big bronze lion, just opposite. Both the child and the man were fond of the wonderful lion, which seemed a mighty guardian of the beautiful Place, and he, at least, knew it to be a world-famous work of art. Bonny-Gay loved it as she loved all animals, alive or sculptured, and with much the same devotion she gave to Max. The park without either of these four-footed creatures would have seemed strange indeed to her, for they were her earliest playmates and remained still her dearest. “Now you can tell me,” again suggested the Gray Gentleman. “It was Easter, too. All the people were going to the churches, the bells were ringing, the organs playing, and everything just beautiful. Nurse Nance began it, my mother says. ‘For the child that is born on the Sabbath Day is lucky, and bonny, and wise, and gay.’ But my father says there isn’t any ‘luck’ and a child like me isn’t ‘wise,’ so they had to leave them out and I’m only Bonny-Gay. That’s all.” “A very satisfactory explanation,” said the Gray Gentleman, with one of his rare smiles, and laying his hand kindly upon the golden curls. “And now, my dear, one question more. In which of these beautiful houses do you live?” As he spoke, the stranger’s glance wandered all about that aristocratic neighborhood of Mt. Vernon Place, to which he had returned after many years of absence to make his own home. Since he had gone away all the small people whom he used to know and love had grown up, and he had felt quite lost and lonely, even in that familiar scene, till he had chanced to meet Bonny-Gay, just one week before. Since then, and her ready adoption of himself as a comrade, he had had no time for loneliness. She was always out in the charming Square, as much a part of it as the Washington monument, which the little folks called “Father George,” or the bronzes, and the smooth lawns. She seemed as bright as the sunshine and almost as well-beloved, for the other children flocked about her, the keeper consulted her and the keeper’s dog followed her like a shadow. With a toss of her yellow locks she pointed her forefinger westward. “There, in that corner one, all covered by vines, with places for the windows cut out, and the chimneys all green, and I think it’s the prettiest one in the whole place, when it has its summer clothes on. Don’t you?” The Gray Gentleman’s glance followed the direction of the pointing finger. “Yes. It is a very lovely home and a very big one. I hope you are not the only child who lives in it.” “But I am. Why?” “Why what?” “Do you hope it?” “You would be lonely, I should think.” “Lonely? I? Why—why—I just never have a single minute to myself. There’s my thirteen dolls, and the parrot, and the two canaries, and the aquarium, and my pony, and—Oh! dear! you can’t guess. That’s why I have to come out here— to rest myself.” “Ah, so! Well, I should judge that you spend the most of your time in ‘resting,’” commented the other. “Whenever I come out you’re always here.” Bonny-Gay laughed; so merrily that Max lifted his head and licked her cheek. That reminded her of something and she asked: “Have you seen him get his second dinner?” “Not even his first!” “You haven’t? How odd!” Bonny-Gay shook out her skirts and proceeded to enlighten her comrade’s ignorance. She [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] took it for granted, or she had done so, that he knew as much about things as she herself; but if not, why, there was a deal to tell. Max’s history first. She began by declaring: “He’s the smartest dog in the world. Everybody knows that. He’s lived in the Place nine years. That’s one year longer than I have. All the children’s big brothers and sisters have played with him, same’s we do now. He never lets a tramp come near. He never steps on a flower bed or lets us. If we forget and go on the grass he barks us off. He gets his first dinner at our house. When the clocks strike twelve he goes to the gardener and gets his basket. Then he walks to our back entrance, puts the basket down, stands up on his hind feet and pushes his nose against the ’lectric bell. That rings up the cook and—she’s a man just now—he—she takes the basket and puts in some food. Then Max walks down that side street, about a square, and sits on the curb to eat it. ‘Just like a beggar,’ the gardener says, ‘’cause he likes to feed his own dog his own self.’ I would, too, wouldn’t you?” “If I owned the ‘smartest dog in the whole world’ I presume I should.” “Max feels ashamed of it, too; don’t you, dear?” The dog replied by dropping his black head from Bonny-Gay’s shoulder to the ground and by blinking in a deprecating way from that lowly position. “Then, in a few minutes, he comes back to the gardener with the empty basket and stands and wags his tail as if he were the hungriest dog that ever was. Then the keeper says: ‘Yes. You may go, Max!’ And off he trots, away down the other way, to some place where his master lives and gets a second basket full. That he brings back here, and the man puts a paper on the ground under the bushes and he eats again. Just like folks to their own table, that time; don’t you, Max Doggie, smart doggie!” The handsome animal shook his wavy fleece and sprang up, ready for a frolic and evidently aware that he had been the subject of discussion. “No, not yet, sir. The best thing hasn’t been told. Listen, please, Mr.——” The stranger waited a moment, then inquired: “Mr. what, Bonny-Gay? I wonder if you know my name.” “Not your truly one, but that doesn’t matter.” “What do you happen to call me, if you ever speak of me when I’m not here?” The little girl hesitated an instant, then frankly answered: “Why, just the ‘Gray Gentleman.’ ’Cause you are all gray, you see. Your hair, and your moustache, and your eyes, and your clothes, and your hat, and your gloves, and—and—things.” “Exactly. Trust a child to find an appropriate nickname. But I like it, little one. Go on, about Max and the best thing yet.” “That splendid dog has—saved—his—master’s life! As true as true!” cried Bonny-Gay, impressively. “Indeed! Wonderful! How was it?” “It was pay-day night and Mr. Weems, that’s his name, had a lot of money. And some bad men knew it. And they came, do you believe, right in the middle of that night, and broke a window in Mr. Weems’s house; and Max heard them and flew—and flew—” The Gray Gentleman stooped and searched for the dog’s wings. “Well, ran, then,” laughed Bonny-Gay, “and he drove them all off and they had revolvers or something and one was shot and a policeman caught him and Max was shot and the gardener would have been killed—” “Only he wasn’t,” interrupted somebody, coming from behind them. So the child paused in her breathless description of a scene she had often pictured to herself and looked up into the face of the hero of the affair, himself. “Why, Mr. Weems! you almost frightened me! and you please tell the rest.” But though the gardener smiled upon her he nodded his head gravely. “Guess it won’t do for me to think about that just now, or any other of our good times, old Max! Good fellow, fine fellow! Poor old doggie! It’s going to be as hard on you as on me, I’m afraid.” By this time Bonny-Gay saw that something was amiss. She half fancied that there were tears in the keeper’s eyes, and she always afterward declared that there were tears in his voice. As for Max, that sagacious animal sank suddenly upon his haunches, looked sternly into his master’s face, and demanded by his earnest, startled expression to know what was wrong. Something was. He knew that, even more positively than did Bonny-Gay. “It’s an outrageous law. There ought to be exceptions to it. All dogs—Well, there’s no other dog like Max. Ah! hum. Old doggie!” The Gray Gentleman was tempted to ask questions, but the little girl was sure to do that; so he waited. In a few minutes she had gotten the whole sad story from her old friend, the gardener, and her sunny head had gone down upon the [6] [7] [8] [9] dog’s black one in a paroxysm of grief. A moment later it was lifted defiantly. “But he shan’t. He shall not! Nobody shall ever, ever take our Max away! Why—why—it wouldn’t be the Place without him! Why—why—the children—Oh! Nettie! oh! Tom!” and catching sight of a group of playmates Bonny-Gay darted toward them, calling as she ran: “They’re going to take him away! They’re going to take him away!” Tom planted his feet wide apart upon the smooth path and obstructed her advance. “Take who away, Bonny-Gay? Where to? When?” “Max! Our Max! He can never come here any more. This is his last day in our park—his very last!” and the child flung herself headlong upon the shaven grass, for once regardless of rules. Not so regardless was Max, the trusty. It didn’t matter to him that this was Bonny-Gay, his best-loved playmate, or that her frantic sorrow was all on his account. What he saw was his duty and he did it, instantly. From a distance the Gray Gentleman watched the dog race toward the prostrate little girl and shake her short skirts vigorously, loosing them now and then to bark at her with equal vigor. Presently she sprang up and to the footpath, and again indulged in a wild embrace of the faithful canine. Indeed, he was at once the center of an ever-increasing company of small people, who seemed to vie with each other in attempts to hug his breath away and to outdo everybody in the way of fierce indignation. Finally, this assembly resolved itself into an advancing army, and with Tom and Bonny-Gay as leaders—each tightly holding to one of the dog’s soft ears, as they marched him between them—they returned to the spot where the lion calmly awaited them, and Tom announced their decision: “We won’t ever let him go. There’s no need for you nor the law-men nor nobody to interfere. This dog belongs to this park; and this park belongs to us children; and if anybody tries to—tries to—to—do—things—he won’t never be let! So there! And if he is, we’ll—we’ll augernize; and we’ll get every boy and girl in all the streets around to come, too; and we’ll all go march to where the law-men live; and we won’t never, never leave go talking at them till they take it all back. ’Cause Max isn’t going to be took. That’s the fact, Mr. Weems, and you can just tell them so.” “Yes,” cried Nettie, “and my big brother goes to the law school and he’ll suesan them. And my big sister’s friends will help; and if he does have to, I’ll never, never—NEVER—play in this hateful old park ever again. I will not!” “Whew!” whistled the Gray Gentleman, softly. “This looks serious. A children’s crusade, indeed. Well, that should be irresistible.” And this old lover of all little people looked admiringly over the group of flushed and indignant faces; and at the noble animal which was the very center of it, and whose silent protest was the most eloquent of all. His own heart echoed their indignation and he quietly resolved to make an effort on their and Max’s behalf. But the dire, unspoken threats of the children, and the silent resolution of the Gray Gentleman, were useless. For when upon the next morning the sun rose over the pleasant Place, and the monument and the lion began to cast their shadows earthward, there was no Max to gambol at their feet, and over the heart of Bonny-Gay had fallen her first real grief. She was out early, to see if the dreadful thing were true; and the Gray Gentleman met her and scarcely knew her— without the smiles. When he did recognize her he said, hopefully: “We’ll trust it’s all for the best, my dear. Besides, you will now have more time for the thirteen dolls, and the parrot, and the two canaries, and—” “But they—they aren’t Max! He was the only! We loved him so and now he’ll just be wasted on strangers! Oh! it’s too bad, too bad!” The Gray Gentleman clasped the little hand in sympathy. “I am very sorry for your sorrow, Bonny-Gay, and yet I can’t believe that Max is ‘wasted.’ No good thing ever is. Besides that, I have a plan in my head. With your parents’ permission, I am going to take you this day to visit your twin sister.” “My—twin—sister! Why there isn’t any. Don’t you remember? I told you. I’m the only, only one. There never was any other.” “Nevertheless, I am obliged to contradict you. Very rude, I know, and I shouldn’t do so, if I were not so positive of what I claim. I hope you’ll love her and I think you will. After breakfast I’ll see you again. Good morning.” With that he walked briskly away and Bonny-Gay saw him enter the big gray house in the middle of the Place. The house where the wooden shutters had always been up, ever since she could remember, until just this spring, when a few of the windows had been uncovered to let the sunlight in. “My—twin—sister! How queer that is!” mused the watching child. [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] CHAPTER II WHERE THE HOUSES ARE SMALL Mary Jane dropped her crutches on the floor and readjusted the baby. He had a most trying habit of not staying “put,” and sometimes the other children slapped him. Mary Jane never did that. She merely set him up again, gave his cheek a pat or a kiss, and went on about her business. For, indeed, she was almost the very busiest small body in the world. Besides her own mother’s five other children there were the neighbors’ broods, big and little, with never a soul to mind them save their self-constituted nurse. That very morning Mrs. Bump had paused in her washing to look up and exclaim: “I never did see how the little things do take to her! She can do just wonders with them, that she can; and I reckon it was about the best thing ever happened to her, that falling out the top window, like she did. Seemed to knock all the selfishness out of her. Maybe it’s that settled in her poor body. Yes, maybe it’s that, dear heart. Anyhow, her inside’s all right. The rightest there ever was. If this world was just full of Mary Janes, what a grand place it would be!” Then, after a regretful sigh for this beatific state of things, the mother thrust her strong arms again into the suds, with a splash and a rub-a-dub-dub which told plainly enough from whom Mary Jane inherited her energy. Just then Mrs. Stebbins thrust her head out of the window, next door, to remark: “There was fifty-four of them gardens given out. My boy’s goin’ to raise cabbages.” “You don’t say! Now, ain’t that fine? I wish I had a son to get one, but all my boys is girls, save the baby, and he don’t count. Though he’ll grow, won’t he, mother’s lamb? He’ll grow just as fast as he can and get a playground garden, good’s the next one, so he will, the precious!” chirruped Mrs. Bump, to the year-old heir of the house. “Gah, gah!” cooed the baby; and emphasized his reply by losing his balance against the wall and rolling over on his face. He was too fat and too phlegmatic to right himself, so Mary Jane hopped back across the narrow room and set him up again, laughing as if this were the funniest thing she had ever seen. “Pshaw, daughter! If I was you and you was me, I’d leave him lie that way a spell. He don’t ’pear to have the sense the rest of you had, no he don’t, the sweet! Maybe that’s because he’s a boy. But even a boy might learn something after a while, if he was let. Only you’re so right on hand all the time he expects you to just about breathe for him, seems.” “Now, mother, now! And you know he’s the biggest, roundest—” “Pudding-headedest!” growled a masculine voice, at the narrow doorway. Mrs. Bump wheeled round so sharply that her rubbing-board fell out of the tub and scared the baby, who promptly began to scream. “Why father! You home? It can’t be dinner-time, yet. What’s happened? Anything wrong?” “Is anything ever right?” demanded the man, sulkily. “Plenty of things,” answered the wife, cheerfully, though her heart sank. “One of the right things is my getting kicked out, I s’pose.” “Father! you don’t mean it! No.” “I’m not much of a joker, am I?” “No. That you’re not. But tell me, man.” With a quiver in the usually cheerful voice, Mrs. Bump wiped the suds from her arms and went to her husband. Laying her hand kindly upon his shoulder she demanded, as was her right, to know the facts of the disaster that had befallen them. “’Twon’t take long to tell, woman. The company’s cuttin’ down expenses and I was one of the expenses lopped off. That’s all.” “Is that all—all, William Bump?” The question was sternly put and the man cowered before it. “It’s the truth, any way. No matter how it happened, here I am and no work.” With that he dropped his arms upon the window sill and his face upon his arms, and lapsed into a sullen silence. Mrs. Bump caught her breath, whisked away a tear that had crept into her eye, and returned to her tub. Mary Jane ceased staring at her parents, tipped the baby’s home-made go-cart on end, rolled him into it, righted the awkward vehicle, threw its leather strap over her shoulders, called to the children: “Come!” and hopped away upon her crutches. Though she paused, for just one second, beside her father and imprinted a hasty kiss upon the back of his bent head. A kiss so light it seemed he could scarcely have felt it, though it was quite sufficient to thrill the man’s soul with an added sense of regret and degradation. “We’re off to the park, mother, and I’ve taken a loaf with me!” she called backward, as she clicked out of sight. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] Again the woman idled for a moment, looking through the open doorway toward the small, misshapen figure of her eldest child as it swung swiftly forward upon its “wooden feet.” The baby’s soap-box wagon rattled and bumped along behind, bouncing his plump body about, and drawn by Mary Jane in the only manner possible to her—with a strap across her chest. She needed both her hands just then to support herself upon her crutches; for her lower limbs were useless and swung heavily between these crutches—a leaden weight from which she never could be free. Even so, there were few who could travel as rapidly as Mary Jane and this morning she was especially eager to get on. Because down at the pretty park upon which her own dingy street terminated, the children’s “Playgrounds” had been opened for the summer and the small gardens given out. She was anxious to see the planting and seed-sowing, by the tiny farmers of this free kindergarten, and down in her heart was a faint hope that even to her, a girl, might a bit of land be assigned; where she, too, could raise some of the wonderful vegetables which would be her very own when the autumn came and the small crops were harvested. The hope was so deep and so intense, that she had to stop, turn about, shake up the baby and tell him about it. “You see, Baby Bump, they don’t give ’em out to just girls. Only I’m not a regular plain kind of girl, I’m a crippley sort. That might make a difference. Though there’s Hattie Moran, she’s lame, too. Not very lame, Baby, only a little lame. She doesn’t have to have crutches, she just goes hoppety-pat, hoppety-pat, easy like. Sophia Guttmacher, she’s a hunchback, same’s me, course, but she can walk. Besides that she doesn’t want a garden and I do. As for Ernest Knabe, his foot’s just twisted and that’s all. Then, too, he’s a boy. He could have one if he wanted. He’d have to dig one, I guess, if it wasn’t for his foot. Oh! Baby dear. Do you s’pose I might—I might, maybe, get one?” “Goo, goo,” murmured the infant, encouragingly, and vainly trying to bring his own foot within reach of his mouth. “Oh! you sweet! You can’t do that, you know. You’re far too fat. And I declare, all the other children have gone on while I’ve stood here just talking to you. That won’t do, sir, much as I love you. Sit up, now, there’s sister’s little man, and I’ll hurry up.” But just then, Baby made a final, desperate effort to taste his toes, lost his balance, and rolled forward out of his box, as a ball might have done. Mary Jane, burst into a peal of laughter which recalled the other children to the spot and she explained between breaths: “The cute little fellow was trying to make ‘huckleberry-bread’; I do believe he was, the darling! Well, he’s so round it doesn’t matter which way he tumbles, and he’s so soft nothing ever hurts him. Does it, precious?” They all lent a hand in setting the infant right again. Several holding the soap-box level, a couple supporting Mary Jane without her crutches which left her arms free to lift and replace the dislodged baby. When things were once more in order the caravan started onward afresh. By this time the small, dingy houses bordering the narrow unpaved street had given place to open lots and weedy patches, where the sun lay warmly and a fresh breeze blew. To the right of the open space was a railway embankment, and on the left there was the cling-clanging of a mighty steel structure, in process of building. The railway and the monster “sheds” belonged to the same company for which William Bump had toiled—when he felt inclined—and by which he had just been discharged. Mary Jane had been accustomed to look for him, either along the rails, with the gang that seemed always to be replacing old “ties” by new ones; or else serving the skilled workmen, who hammered, hammered, all day long upon the great metal girders. As she now caught the echo of these strokes a pang shot through her loving heart and for a moment her sunny face clouded. She need look no more, to either right or left, for the blue-shirted figure, which had been wont to wave a salutation to her as she passed with her brood of nurselings. Fortunately, the baby was on hand to banish the cloud, which he promptly did in his accustomed manner—with a slight variation. For his small charioteer had not observed a big stone in the path, though the loose ricketty wheel of the wagon found and struck it squarely. This raised the soap-box in front and its occupant performed a backward somersault. “Oh! my sake! Mary Jane—Mary Jane!” shrieked several small voices in wild reproach. Mary Jane picked up the little one, who smiled, unhurt; and the others helped her shake him back to a normal condition and pose. After which, the park lying just before them, between the railway and the buildings, they scurried into it, and over the slope, and around to a sunny spot where scores of other little people were hard at work or play. “Hi! Mary Jane! Oh, Mary Jane!” shouted one and another; and the kind-faced “teachers” who guided the wee ones, also nodded their friendly welcome. For well they knew that there was no “assistant” in the whole city who could be as useful to them as this same humble little girl from Dingy street. “Thirteen, Mary Jane! I’m thirteen! Come see. Cucumbers!” cried Bobby Saunders, dragging her forward so eagerly that the soap-box strap slipped up across her throat and choked her. But she quickly released herself now from her burden, certain that in the midst of so many friends no harm could befall her darling; and once freed from this incubus, she outstripped Bobby in reaching the long rows of well-prepared garden plots, wherein as yet was never a sign of any growing thing. But oh! how soft and rich and brown the earth did look! How sweet the fragrance of it in Mary Jane’s nature-loving nostrils! And how, for once, she longed to be a boy! As straight-limbed, as strong, as unhindered at her toil, as any of [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] these happy little lads who clustered about, each interrupting his neighbor in his eagerness for her sympathy and interest. “Fifty-one, Mary Jane!” cried Joe Stebbins, pointing proudly to the numbered stick at the foot of his plot. “Cabbages— cabbages! The gardener’s bringing a box of plants this minute. I’ll give you one to bile when they get growed. Like that?” “Prime!” answered the girl, her own face aglow. “But I’m limas, Mary Jane. I’m Seven. Away over here. I’ve sowed ’em and to-morrer I’ll hoe ’em, I guess.” “And I guess I wouldn’t till they sprout,” laughed she hopping along, at perilous speed, to inspect number seven. “Don’t go so fast, Mary Jane! I can’t keep up with you. See. I’m right up front—number Three. I’m tomatuses, I am. Like ’em?” demanded Ned Smith, a seven-year-old farmer. “I’m potatoes. They’re the best for your money,” observed Jimmy O’Brien. “We’ll roast some in the ashes, bime-by. Does the baby like ’tatoes?” “Don’t he? You just ought to see him eat them—when we have them,” she added, cautiously. “Oh! you’ll have ’em, plenty. When I dig my crop. Why, I s’pose there’ll be enough in my ‘farm’ to keep your folks and mine all winter; and I might have some to sell on the street,” observed Jimmy, casting a speculative glance upon the diminutive plot of ground over which he was now master. “Might you; ain’t that splendid!” commented Mary Jane, delightedly. “Why, if you could give us all our potatoes, mother could easy wash for the rent and the bread and things. My sake! I ’most forgot the baby. Where’s he at? Can you see him?” “He’s right in the middle of the sand-heap and the teacher has give him a little shovel. Say, what you bring him for? this ain’t no day-nursery, this ain’t. It’s a playground farm and one-year-olds don’t belong.” “Maybe they don’t, but the baby belongs. That is if I do,” said the sister stoutly; “maybe you’ll say next I don’t.” “No, I shan’t say that. Why, what could we do without you? And say, Mary Jane.” “Well, say it quick. The girls are calling me to swing on the Maypole. ’Cause that’s one thing I can do without my crutches.” “Well, in a minute. But, say. Sometimes I used to let you hoe in my garden, last summer. Remember?” “Course. I helped you a lot.” “Don’t know about that. But you might this year. That is, maybe. If we went partners, you see; and if the teacher didn’t get on to it; and if there was a medal give and you let me have it, ’cause I’m the one has the farm, course. What you say?” “I say we couldn’t do such a thing without the teacher knowing and I wouldn’t if we could. And you’ll never get a medal, you’re too lazy. But you’re real gen’rous, too, and I’ll be so glad to help. Oh! I love it! I just feel’s if I could put my face right down on that crumbly ground and go to sleep. It’s so dear.” “Huh! If you did I s’pose you’d get earwigs in your ears and—and angleworms, and—things. Maybe snakes. But I’ll let you,” concluded Jimmy, graciously. Then they turned around and there was—what seemed to the beholders, a veritable small angel! Mary Jane was so startled she dropped her crutches and, for an instant, quite forgot all about the baby. The apparition was clothed in white, so soft and fine and transparent that it seemed to enwrap her as a cloud; and above the cloud rose a face so lovely and so winning that it made Mary Jane’s heart almost stand still in ecstasy. [25] [26] [27] [28] CHAPTER III HOW THE PAIR MET But when things cleared a little, it was only Bonny-Gay! and the Gray Gentleman was supporting Mary Jane without her crutches—though she didn’t realize that, at first. Afterward she was able to look up into his face and smile a welcome, because he and she were already quite close friends. What had happened was this: the Gray Gentleman had sent his elderly black “boy” with a note to the vine-covered house in Mt. Vernon Place and had requested “the favor of Miss Beulah’s company upon a drive, that morning. He intended to visit one of the ‘Playgrounds’ in the south-western part of the city, and he felt that the little girl whose society he so greatly enjoyed would find much to interest her, if she might be with him.” To this he had signed a name which was quite powerful enough to secure Mrs. McClure’s instant and delighted assent; and she had at once returned a very graceful note of acceptance by the “boy.” Then at ten o’clock precisely, the Gray Gentleman’s carriage had gone around for “Miss McClure,” and she had been lifted into it and to a seat beside her friend. A half-hour’s drive followed; through streets and avenues which Bonny-Gay had never seen before, and which continually grew narrower and more crowded. Even the houses seemed to shrink in size, and the little girl had finally exclaimed: “Why, it’s like the buildings were so little that they just squeeze the folks out of them, upon the steps and through the windows. I never, never saw! Will they get to be just playhouses, by-and-by?” “No, Bonny-Gay, I’m sure you never did. Yet it’s the same city in which is your own big home, and they are just the same sort of human beings as you and I.” “Are they? It doesn’t—doesn’t just seem so, does it? And why do they all stare at us like that?” “Because we do at them, maybe; and it’s not a common thing to see carriages with liveried attendants pass this way. I suppose you, in your dainty clothes, are as much a ‘show’ to them as they to you in their coarse attire, or rags.” Bonny-Gay looked thoughtfully at her frock. She would have preferred to wear a simpler one; and a comfortable “Tam” instead of the feathered hat which adorned her sunny head. But her mother had decided otherwise; since the Gray Gentleman had done her the honor of that morning it was but courtesy to show appreciation of it by a good appearance. After a moment she looked up and observed: “It’s the queerest thing! I feel as if I ought to get out and walk; and as if I should give this hat to that little girl who hasn’t any.” The Gray Gentleman smiled. “That would be going to the other extreme, my dear, and would help neither you nor them. Besides, this is not all we came to see, and here we are!” Then the street had suddenly ended and the carriage had turned in at a big gate, to roll almost silently onward till it stopped before a “Mansion,” with ancient wooden shutters and a clematis-draped porch. This was natural and quite suggestive to Bonny-Gay of her own beloved Druid Hill, wherein she was accustomed to take her stately drives in her father’s own carriage; and when she heard the shouts and laughter of children from the tree-hidden “Playgrounds,” her spirits rose to the normal again and she laughed in return. Dancing along beside him, with her hand in his, she had demanded eagerly: “Is it here I am to see my ‘twin sister?’ Oh! I want to find her—quick, quick!” “Yes, it is here, and this is—she;” answered her guide, as they paused behind Jimmy and Mary Jane, toward whom he silently nodded. This was how the pair met; and while Mary Jane saw what she fancied was an “angel” that which Bonny-Gay saw was a girl of her own age, with short, limp legs, very long arms, and a crooked back. But the dark head above the poor humped shoulders was as shapely as the “angel’s” own; the dark eyes as beautiful as the blue ones; and from the wide, merry mouth flashed a smile quite as radiant and winning. As soon as she saw the smile Bonny-Gay began to understand what the Gray Gentleman had meant, and she telegraphed him a glance that said she did. Then she laughed and held out her two hands to Mary Jane. “I guess you’re the girl I’ve come to see: my ‘twin sister!’ How-de-do?” “How-de-do?” echoed Mary Jane, too astonished to say more. The Gray Gentleman quietly slipped her crutches under the cripple’s arms, and seizing Jimmy’s hand walked swiftly away. Both girls looked after him with regret but he neither glanced back nor expected them to follow. Then they regarded each other with curiosity, till Mary Jane remembered she was the hostess. “Let’s sit down,” she said pointing to the grass. [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] Bonny-Gay hesitated, and, seeing this, the other whisked off her apron and spread it for her guest. “You might spoil your dress, that’s so. Salt and lemon juice’ll take out grass-stain. My mother uses that when there’s spots on the ‘wash.’” “Does she? I wasn’t thinking of my frock, though, but of that;” answered the visitor, pointing to a “Keep Off” sign behind them. “Oh! that? Nobody minds that. You see, this is our park now. We play where we choose, only on the terraces and slopey places. You’d better use my apron though, it’s such a splendid dress. Your mother would feel bad if you smirched it.” “I suppose she would. She’s very particular.” “So’s mine. They say she’s the very neatest woman in Dingy street. The neighbors say it.” “And our cook says mine is the ‘fussiest’ one in the Place. That might be some of the ‘sister’ part, mightn’t it?” “It might. Only, course, he’s just fooling.” “I don’t believe the Gray Gentleman ever fools. He means things. He’s made us children think a lot. More’n we ever did before. And he says things mean things, too, every single one. Even ‘Father George,’ and the lion, and Max, and— and everything.” After this exhausting speech Bonny-Gay removed her hat and laid it upon the grass, where Mary Jane regarded it admiringly. It was so pretty she would have liked to touch it, just once. The hat’s owner saw the admiration, and remarked: “Put it on, Mary Jane. See if it will fit you.” “Oh! I daren’t!” gasped the other. “I might hurt it.” Bonny-Gay lifted the hat and placed it upon the cripple’s dark head, which was held perfectly motionless, while the face beneath the brim took on an expression of bewildered happiness. “My! ain’t it lovely! I should think you’d want to wear it all the time!” “I don’t, then. I like my ‘Tam’ better, and nothing best of all. You can wear it as long as I stay, if you wish.” “That’s good of you. Some of the other girls wouldn’t even let me touch their best hats, they wouldn’t.” “Must be selfish things, then. How old are you, Mary Jane?” “How’d you know my name? and what’s yours?” Bonny-Gay stated it and explained: “I heard that Jimmy boy call you. How old did you say?” “I didn’t say, but I’m eight, going on nine.” “Why, so am I. I’m a ‘Sunday’s bairn’.” “And I!” cried Mary Jane, breathlessly. After that confidences were swift; and, presently, each little girl knew all about the other; till, in one pause for breath, the cripple suddenly remembered the baby. Then she caught up her crutches, swung herself upon them, and started off in pursuit of him. Bonny-Gay watched her disappear in the midst of the crowd of children, who had all shyly held aloof from herself, saw how they clung about her and how some of the tiniest ones held up their faces to be kissed. She saw her stoop to tie the ragged shoe of one and button the frock of another; saw her pause to listen to the complaint of a sobbing lad and smartly box the ears of his tormentor. Then another glimmering of the Gray Gentleman’s meaning, when he called these two “sisters,” came into Bonny-Gay’s mind. “She has to take care of the children down here just as I do in our park. I suppose we two are the only ones have time to bother, but how can she do it! Her face is so pretty—prettier, even, than Nettie’s, but I dare not look at the rest of her. I just dare not. Poor little girl, how she must ache! Supposing I was that way. My arms stretched way down there, and my feet shortened way up here, and my back all scrouged up so! Oh! poor, poor Mary Jane! It hurts me just to make believe and she has it all the time. But here she comes back and I mustn’t let her see I notice her looks. I mustn’t, for anything. It’s bad enough to have her body hurt, I mustn’t hurt her feelings, too.” However, there was no sign of suffering about the little cripple as she returned to the side of her guest, dragging the soap-box wagon behind her and recklessly rolling the baby about in it, so eager was her advance. There were tears in Bonny-Gay’s eyes for a moment, though, till she caught sight of the baby and heard Mary Jane exclaim: “Did you ever see such a sight? What do you s’pose mother will say? The teacher set him in the sand-box and somebody gave him a stick of ’lasses candy, and he’s messed from head to foot. But isn’t he a dear?” and dropping to the ground she caught the little one to her breast and covered his sandy, bedaubed countenance with adoring kisses. “He’s the funniest thing I ever saw!” laughed Bonny-Gay, so merrily that the Gray Gentleman drew near to join in the fun. After him trailed an army of young “farmers” and in another moment the visitor had ceased to be a stranger to [34] [35] [36] [37] [38]