Dorothy's House Party

Better get out of the wa-a-a-ay!”

“Mornin’ ladies! And let me assure you there’ll be peanuts and pink lemonade enough to go around; for Daniel, my friend here, has just unearthed a quarter from one of his multitudinous pockets and I’ll agree – to-lay-it-out-for-him-to-the-best-possible-advantage – Right this way, ladies and gentlemen, only ten cents to see the Double Headed Woman and to witness the astonishing feat of an Anaconda Swallowing his own Skin! Right this way, only ten – ”

“Monty Stark, behave yourself! The place for you, young sir, is in the monkeys’ cage, not under it! What have you horrid boys been doing out there in the barn so early, waking tired little girls out of their beauty-sleep?” demanded Molly B., appearing on the scene and interrupting the boy’s harangue.

“Oh! Just doing a few stunts. Practising, you know, against they call on us to take part in the ‘ceremonies.’ But it’s a pity about that beauty-sleep. You needed it and I apologize! I mean I never saw you so charming! Hooray for the circus!”

“Hooray!” answered Herbert, coming through the doorway, a twin on either arm. “Say it, ’Nias! Say it, ’Phira!”

The youngsters squirmed to get away, to slide down out of the boy’s grasp, but he held them securely till, at last grown desperate, one of them began gravely and distinctly to recite the doggerel which Monty and Daniel had just sung.

The performance received great applause and amid the jests and laughter all turned to follow the summons to breakfast; Herbert restraining the little ones long enough to adjure them to: “Mind, you’ve promised! And you know what happened to some folks you’re named for! No, I shouldn’t have said that, poor innocents! I mean you must do what I told you or you’ll lose what I promised.”

“Yep. We’s do it, we’s do it! I wants my brekkus!” answered one, while the other echoed: “Brekkus, brekkus!”

Herbert placed them at a small low table in the corner where Dinah had decided they must eat, or “take deir meals; fo’ as fo’ eatins, dey’s cwyin’ fo’ dem all de whole endu’in time! ’Peahs lak dem li’l ones nebah would get filled up an’ nebah had ernough yet in dis yere world.”

Yet once at table nobody could find fault with their behavior, except for the extreme rapidity with which they stowed away their rations. They seemed afraid to drop a crumb or mess themselves in any way and the furtive looks they shot out from beneath their long lashes were pitiful, as if they feared their food would be snatched from them and themselves punished with blows. That many blows had been administered, Dinah had early found out, since when bathing them she saw the scars upon their poor little bodies.

This had been sufficient to reconcile her to the extra care and labor their presence imposed upon her; for labor, indeed, they caused. For instance: stealing into the kitchen where Aunt Malinda had set upon the hearth a big pan of bread “sponge,” to rise, they industriously dotted its top with lumps of coal from the hod, in imitation of a huckleberry pudding which had appeared at table. They even essayed to eat the mixture; but finding this impracticable set to work to force one another down into the pan of dough – with sufficient success to ruin the new suits they wore as well as Aunt Malinda’s “risin’.” Having discovered that sugar was sweet they emptied a jar of what looked like it into a fine “floating island” and turned the custard to brine. They hid Ephraim’s glasses, and Dinah’s bandana; they unloosed the dogs, let the chains be fastened ever so securely; they opened the gate to the “new meadow” and let the young cattle wander therein; and with the most innocent, even angelic expressions, they plotted mischief the livelong day. But they redeemed all their wickedness by their entire truthfulness. Despite their handicap of names, they acknowledged every misdemeanor and took every punishment without a whimper.

“They’re regular little imps! But, alanna, what’d this big house be widout ’em and their pranks?” cried poor Norah, laughing and frowning together, when called upon for the third time that morning to change the youngsters’ clothes; the last necessity arising from the fact that they had filled the bathtub and taken a glorious dip without the formality of removing their garments. “You’re the plague of my life, so you are; but poor motherless darlin’s, I can’t but love you! And sorra the day, when him ’t you belongs to comes for you again!”

When that morning’s meal was over, the Master planned their day as had become his habit. Said he:

“A circus day and the first day of the county fair, as this is, will crowd the streets of the city with all sorts of teams and people. I’ve decided not to risk Mrs. Calvert’s horses in Newburgh to-day. We can all go up by train and have no anxiety about anything. It’s but a down-hill walk, if a rather long one, from here to our own station, and in town there’ll be plenty of stages to carry us to the grounds. Jim has consented to ride over on horseback early and secure our places on the front row of seats, if this is possible. I’ve seen no reserved seats advertised, but I don’t like those insecure upper benches – or boards – of the tiers of scaffolding, where a fellow has to swing his feet in space or jab his toes into the back of the spectator below. Besides, I always did like to be close to the ‘ring’ when I go to the circus.”

“O, Teacher! As if you ever went!” cried Alfaretta, giggling.

“Go? Of course I go every chance I get – to a real country circus – which isn’t often. There’s nothing so convinces me that I am still a little boy as the smell of tanbark and sawdust, and the sound of the clown’s squeaking voice!”

They laughed. It was so easy and so natural to laugh that morning. Even Helena, who had enjoyed many superior entertainments, felt her pulses thrill in anticipation of that day’s amusement; and she meant to let herself “go” for all the fun there might be, with as full – if not as noisy an abandon – as any “mountain girl” among them.

Continued Mr. Seth, closely observing Dorothy who, alone of all the company, was not smiling: “Now, for the morning. I suggest that you pass it quietly at home; tennis, reading, lounging in hammocks – any way to leave yourselves free from fatigue for the afternoon. Dinah says ‘Y’arly dinnah’; because all the ‘help’ want to go to the circus and I want to have them. So we must get the dishes washed betimes, for the ‘Greatest Show On Earth’ opens its afternoon performance at two o’clock sharp precisely to the minute! and I, for one, cannot, positively cannot, miss the Grand Entrance! Umm. I see them now, in fancy’s eye, the cream colored horses, the glittering spangles, the acrobats in tights, the monkeys, the – the – ”

“Oh! Don’t say any more, dear Master, or I shall have to ride over with Jim this morning and see the street parade!” cried Molly Breckenridge clasping her plump hands in absurd entreaty, while every lad present looked enviously upon the thus honored James.

“I could buy circus tickets if I put my whole mind to it. How about you, Littlejohn Smith?” observed Monty.

“Give me the cash and let me try!”

Danny said nothing but his eyes were wistfully fixed upon vacancy, while Frazer Moore sadly stated:

“All I ever did see about a circus – so far – was the parade. I run away to that – once.”

“And got a lickin’ for it afterwards, I remember,” commented Mike Martin.

This was too much for the discipline of that dear old “boy,” Seth Winters, and he cried:

“See here, lads! I can’t stand for that. Nor need I be afraid of fatigue for you. Nothing will tire a single boy of the lot, to-day, except missing some part of this delectable Show! Scamper! Scatter! Trot! Vamoose! In short, run to the stables and see if there are horses enough to go around, counting in the workers. There’ll none of them be needed at Deerhurst to-day. Then you can all ride to town with our treasurer and put your horses up at the big livery on the High Street back of the town. See to it that they are made perfectly safe and comfortable for the day, and tell the proprietor that they are to be looked after for me. Here, Jamie lad, is an extra ten dollar bill. Use it judiciously, for anything needed, especially for luncheon for eight hungry boys. Better get that at some reputable restaurant and not on the grounds. Also, one of you meet the rest of us at the station at one o’clock with the tickets. Our whole big Party will make our own Grand Entrance!”

“Oh! thank you, thank you!”

With a simultaneous cry of rapture the lads sped stablewards, leaving some rather downcast girlish faces behind them.

“I – I can ride horseback,” said Molly B., with a sigh.

“So can I; and ’tain’t far to our house. I guess Pa Martin’d have let me have old Bess to ride on,” responded the other Molly.

“Shucks! Molly M. How’d you look, rockin’ along on that old mare? Besides, you couldn’t keep in sight, even, of the way them boys’ll tear along. Another besides; you know, well’s I do, that Mr. Martin wouldn’t hold with no such nonsense as your trapesin’ after a circus parade. Who wants to, anyway? We’re born girls and we can’t be boys, no matter how much we try. Since I ain’t let to go I’d rather – I guess I’d rather stay to home and crochet some lace,” said practical Alfaretta and pushed back from table.

“Wait a minute, Alfy. There’s something else I’ve got to say. It has been a secret between Dolly and me, but of course we can’t keep it always and I can’t a minute longer. It’s this: We two girls have adopted for all their lives the two twins! We’ve adopted them with our pocket-money,” proudly stated Molly B.

“Molly! Molly!” cried Dorothy, her face aflame and her eyes swiftly filling.

“Yes I shall tell, too. Secrets are the killingest things to bear. I expect Papa will scold and Auntie Lu make fun but I’m doing it for charity. I shall put away every bit of my allowance to educate my – my son – and I shall call him Augustus Algernon Breckenridge. I thought you might as well know,” and with this startling statement the Judge’s daughter threw back her head and eyed the company defiantly.

The girls stared, all save Dorothy, and the Master laughed, while from their corners the twins echoed a shrill cackle; then immediately began to practice the somersaults which Herbert had been at such pains to teach them. Then Molly rose, with what she considered great dignity, and, forcing Ananias to stand upon his feet, said in a sweet maternal tone:

“Come, my little boy. I want you to keep nice and rested till I take you to the circus.” Then she led him away, Sapphira tugging at her skirts and Alfaretta remarking:

“Guess you’ll have to adopt the pair, Molly Breckenridge. Them two stick closer’n glue!”

In another moment all but the Master and Dorothy had left the room, and seizing this opportunity he called her to him.

“Dolly Doodles, I want to talk with you a little. Let’s go out to the old barn – I mean the new one – and have a visit. We haven’t had any cosy confidence talks, remember, since this House Party began.”

It was the very thing she craved. Frank and outspoken by nature, long used to telling everything to this wise old friend, they had no sooner settled themselves upon the straw divan, than out it came, with a burst of sobs:

“Oh! dear Mr. Seth, I’m so unhappy!”

“Yes, child. I’ve seen it. Such a pity, too, on a circus day!”

“Please, please don’t tease me now. Aunt Betty thinks – thinks – I hardly know – only – read that!”

From the tiny pocket of her blouse she pulled the fateful telegram and thrust it into his hand. He had some ado to smooth it out and decipher the blurred writing, for it had been wet with many tears and frequently handled.

“You have made me dangerously angry. You must find that money. Heretofore there has been no thievery in my house.” Signed, “Mrs. Elisabeth Cecil Somerset-Calvert.”

The farrier whistled softly, and slowly refolded the document; then drew Dorothy’s wet face to his shoulder and said:

“Yes, little girl, we must find that money. We must. There is no other way.”

“But how can we? And why should she – she be so angry after having told me I was all the world to her and that all she had was mine, or would be.”

“Well, dearie, ‘would be’ and ‘is’ are two widely differing conditions. Besides, she is Betty Calvert and you are you.”

“That’s no answer, as I can see.”