Bessie among the Mountains

"No," said Lem, "he le'me out; and Dol, I say, it was all along of those two little gals. They said they'd beg me off, and the old man said they did, and I aint goin' to trick 'em no more. Where was you last night?"

"In the Ice Glen," answered Dolly.

Lem gave a long, astonished whistle.

"You aint goin' to say you slept in the Ice Glen?"

"I didn't do no sleepin', but I was there all night, after I come away from Porter's. But I fixed 'em down there fust," she added with a malicious grin.

"But how came you into the Ice Glen; didn't you know better?" asked Lem.

In answer, she told him how she had been hanging about Mr. Porter's grounds till long after dark, when the storm broke, and she had lost her way; and, after one or two bad falls, had found herself in the Ice Glen; that, knowing the danger in the darkness of a fall over the rocks or into the lake, she had remained there all night, fearing to move till there was sufficient daylight to show her the way home.

"And what was you doin' to keep you down to Porter's so long?" asked Lem.

The reply to this question, instead of being received with praise and exclamations of triumph as she had expected, was met by a curse; and poor Dol shrank down in fear of a blow; for, though Lem was not often angry with her, when he was, she was used to feeling the weight of his hand. But he did not strike her now, but turned sullenly from her, and began trampling down the wet grass with his bare feet.

"What's come over you, now?" she asked at last.

"Nothin'. 'Taint no odds," he answered.

"Aint you glad I fixed 'em off so?"

"No: 'twant fair after they begged me off."

"They got you shut up first, sayin' you took the cup when you didn't."

"How do you know I didn't?"

"'Cause I know who did."

"Did you?"

"No, but I know who did; and what's more, I know where it is now," she answered.

"Tell me then."

But Dolly turned sulky in her turn, and refused to say a word more; and Lem, knowing it was useless to try to make her speak when she did not choose, strolled into the woods to see if he could find any berries for his breakfast; while she, still shivering from her night's exposure in the Ice Glen, tried to kindle a fire from the wet sticks which lay around; and finding this in vain, crept to her wretched bed, and tried to warm herself there.

But it is time to tell what was the new piece of mischief by which Dolly had thus brought punishment upon herself.

Two little pairs of feet danced through the hall, and out upon the piazza of the Lake House that morning.

"Oh, what a nice, pleasant day after the rain!" said Bessie. "The birdies are singing so to tell us how they like it."

"And it is so nice and cool after all the heat," said Maggie. "See! see! papa, how the rain-drops are hanging on the leaves, and how the sun shines in them and makes them sparkle. But what a lot of leaves are lying about over the grass! and there is a branch broken and hanging down."

"There is another lying by the well," said Bessie, "and those large bushes are all leaning over. Did the rain do that, papa?"

"The wind did it," said papa. "The storm was very severe last night, and I fear it may have done some harm to the farm and garden."

"Not to our gardens, I hope," said Maggie. "They looked so nicely yesterday, and Cousin Alexander is coming up to-day to see them; and if the storm did hurt them, we won't have time to fix them up again before he comes."

"If my garden was mussed up a little bit, I shouldn't mind it so very much, if only my dear heliotrope is not hurt," said Bessie.

"And my geranium," said Maggie. "We would be too disappointed if any thing happened to those two. Papa, do you know when Cousin Ernest was here the other day, he said not one of the children had such a fine heliotrope or geranium, and he thought they were sure to take prizes? and besides, he said our gardens were so neatly kept it was a pleasure to look at them."

"Yes," said papa: "you have been very industrious and persevering, and deserve much praise. Here comes Mr. Porter."

"What a terrible night it has been," said Mrs. Bradford, coming out at that moment. "I could not sleep for the noise of the thunder and the wind. I wonder what those two forlorn children have done: that wretched hut could be but poor protection on such a night."

"Better than they deserve," growled Mr. Porter, in a tone very unusual with him, coming up the piazza steps as Mrs. Bradford spoke. "Good-morning, madam. A bad night's work this. I've just been round with the boys to see what damage has been done."

"Not much I hope," said Mrs. Bradford.

"Well, not so much from the storm," said Mr. Porter. "The corn is beaten down a little, but it will rise again in a day or two, and some branches here and there stripped off; but there's been worse than the wind and rain abroad last night. Mr. Bradford, I'll speak with you a minute, sir."

Mr. Bradford walked aside with the old man, who said to him in a low voice, —

"There's a sore trouble in store for those little dears, and I hadn't the heart to tell them myself. You'll know best how to do it. Their gardens are all destroyed, root and branch; not a thing left. Their pet plants, the heliotrope and geranium that they set so much store by, are rooted up and torn to bits, not a piece left as big as my hand. And it was not the storm either that did it, but just those wicked children, Lem and Dolly, or one of them. I don't think it could have been the boy, for I don't see how he could have found his way down here again last night after John saw him home; but, alone or together, the girl has had a hand in it for sure. John picked up a dirty old sunbonnet she used to wear, lying right in Bessie's garden, and he says she was not at home when he went up with Lem last night. She's done it out of revenge for his being shut up, and I wish Buffer had caught her at it, so I do. My patience is quite at an end, and I'll have them routed out of that place, and sent off somewhere, as sure as my name is Thomas Porter."

Mr. Bradford was very much troubled, for he knew how greatly the children would be distressed; and, as the breakfast-bell rang just then, he said he should not tell them till the meal was over, or no breakfast would be eaten by Maggie or Bessie. He could scarcely eat his own as he watched the bright faces of his two little daughters, and thought what a different look they would wear when they heard the bad news.

It was as he had feared: their grief was distressing to see, all the more so when they found who had done this injury to them. Their father had wished to keep this secret, but they begged so to go and see the gardens, that he thought it best to take them and let them know the worst at once; and they were so astonished when they saw the utter desolation of their own beds, and the difference between them and those which lay around, and asked so many questions, that he was obliged to tell them.

The two brothers, with Hafed and Bob, were already on the spot, spades and rakes in hand, to see what could be done; but, alas! there was little or nothing.

It was indeed sad to see the ruin of what had, but yesterday, looked so neat and pretty. The tiny fences were pulled up, and scattered far and wide; lady-slippers, mignonette, verbenas, and all the other simple flowers which had flourished so well, and given such pride and delight to the little gardeners, were rooted up and trampled into the earth; and, worse than all, the beloved heliotrope and geranium were torn leaf from leaf and sprig from sprig, while their main stems had been twisted and bent, till no hope remained that even these could be revived.

The boys' gardens had suffered some, but not so much as those of the little girls; whether it was that Dolly fancied Maggie and Bessie had been the most to blame for Lem's imprisonment, and so chose first to revenge herself on them; whether it was that their gardens lay nearer to her hand and she had been interrupted in her wicked work before she had quite destroyed the boys', – could not be known.

The grief of the children was pitiful to see. Bessie's could not find words, but she clung about her father's neck, and sobbed so violently that he feared she would be ill, and carried her back to the house to see if mamma could not comfort her. Maggie's was not less violent, but it was more outspoken, and she said and thought many angry things of Lem and Dolly, as she gathered up the bruised leaves and stalks of her own geranium and Bessie's heliotrope. The boys were quite ready to join her in all, and more than all, that she said.

"What are you going to do with that, pet?" asked Uncle Ruthven, coming down to see the ruin, and finding Maggie sitting on an upturned flower-pot, her hot tears still falling on the remains of the two favorite plants.

"Oh! Uncle Ruthven!" sobbed poor Maggie, "I could not bear to see them lying there in the mud and dirt. It seems to me 'most as if they were something live, and we were so fond of them. I don't think I can bear it. And, oh! I am so sorry we asked Mr. Porter to let Lem out, just so he could do this, – the bad, wicked boy!"

"I do not think it was Lem's doing, dear," said Mr. Stanton; and then he told Maggie how John Porter had taken Lem home last night just before the storm began, and that it was scarcely possible that the boy could have made his way back in the darkness and worked all this mischief.

"Well, it was Dolly, then," said Maggie; "and I can never, never forgive her: no, never, Uncle Ruthven."

Uncle Ruthven would not argue with her, or try to persuade her to feel less hardly towards Dolly now: he knew it was not the time; the wound was too fresh, the little heart still too sore. Nor did he think it worth while to try and make her forget the trouble yet, but talked to her about it in an interested but soothing manner, till at last he led her back to her mother in a more quiet, gentle mood than he had found her.

Meanwhile the boys had all four set to work with a good will to try what they could do to make the poor gardens look somewhat less forlorn. It was too late in the season to think of planting new seeds or roots; and the flowers which had been torn up were too entirely destroyed ever to revive again.

Hafed would have taken up every flower from his own garden and transplanted it to those of his "Missy's," if the other boys had not made him understand that this would be useless, and most of them would only droop and die.

The disordered beds were raked smoothly over; the little fence carefully cleaned from the mud which covered it, and set up again; and all the withered, bruised flowers and leaves carried away. Then came John Porter and his brothers, bringing a dozen or so of flowering shrubs in pots, which were neatly set out, taking from the gardens the desolate look they had worn. Next, some bright lady-slippers, sweet pinks and other late summer flowers were taken up with plenty of earth about their roots so that they might not droop, and they too, were put down in their new home.