The Brass Bound Box

"Meaning to Aunt Eunice's. That's exactly what I want to do. So let's be off."

"I s-s-said y-you," corrected Master Sturtevant, rising and taking a few cautious steps to test the state of his legs. He found them usable, though rather wobbly about the knees, and would have started off across the ravine's bottom had not Katharine caught and held him. She was herself shivering violently, but only from the cold of an autumn midnight, against which her light summer dress was small protection. She ached from long sitting on the stony ground, and from holding the heavy shoulders of her companion. She was frightened by the lateness of the hour and the intense loneliness of the place; and she felt that she had sacrificed herself for just the very meanest boy who ever lived. Though she was not a girl who often cried, tears came then, and that worst of all feelings – homesickness – seized her and turned her faint.

Poor Monty! Here was a situation, indeed, for a boy who despised girls! Yet also a boy who was a gentleman by birth; so that, while his first impulse was to run away, his second was to offer such comfort as he could.

"W-w-what you cryin' for, a-a-anyway? I-I-I'm all right, I guess."

"Well, if you are, I'm not. I'm just as anxious to go home as you are, only how can I? I don't know the way, and I'm afraid. I'm afraid of everything! Of that terrible forest, of Aunt Eunice's anger, of her refusing to keep me and sending me off to that boarding-school, of – Oh, dear! I wish I was back in Baltimore!"

Never had the cold countenance of the second Mrs. John or those of the round little Snowballs seemed so humanly lovable to Katharine as they did at that moment, remembering them in her banishment.

"F-f-fudge! Q-q-quit it! If we're goin' to get scolded for part, might's well b-b-be for the w-w-w-whole. 'Tain't far to the pool. We can go f-f-fishin', after all, if you behave. I th-th-thought you was good as a boy, an' – Will you?"

Kate dried her eyes. She didn't enjoy grief, and the prospect of any novelty was delightful. She forgot that she was cold, that it was late and she was where she should not have been at such an hour, and exclaimed, with an eagerness equal to Montgomery's own:

"Oh, let's! I never went fishing in my life!"

"Come on, t-th-then!" cried the relieved lad, now readily taking her cold hand and setting off with all the speed he could attain.

The moon was shining brilliantly, making every object as distinct as day, and to the city-reared girl the scene was like fairy-land. Her spirits rose to the highest, and none the less, it may be, because all the time she was conscious of a certain daring and danger in their escapade; and her pace more than outstripped Monty's as they crossed the short distance to the river, warming themselves by their own speed, and listening intently for the sound of voices which should have reached them long before.

"Oh, I'm so delightfully goose-fleshy! This is the most thrilling adventure of my life! I begin to feel as if I were part of a story-book myself, like all the rest of Marsden!" said Kate, half-breathless with running, when her mate came to a sudden halt among the shadows of the trees beside the famous pool.

"S-s-s-sh!" warned the other, leaning forward at the risk of a tumble into the still, deep water, listening and peering up and down the stream. Then, with disappointment depicted in every line of his suddenly weary body, he gloomily stammered: "Th-th-th-they've gone home!"

There was nothing left but for themselves to follow; but surely, there were never fields so wide and rough as these over which Master Sturtevant now guided Katharine; herself, also, so tired from her day of travel and her night of adventure; and finally, feeling as if the stubble pierced every inch of her thin shoes, and that she could endure the discomfort no longer, she begged:

"Oh! please do go by some road, and not on this grass any longer."

"Huh! 'T-t-tain't grass. Oat-st-st-stubble," he explained, doggedly keeping on his way, which he knew was shorter, and for the further reason that he could rid himself of her at Miss Maitland's back garden fence. From there he meant to make his own rapid transit to his grandmother's low kitchen roof and through a window to his bed, as he fondly hoped, forgotten and unobserved. He didn't intend that any strange girl should throw all his plans agley, for she had done more than mischief enough already. Yet even as he spoke, he looked furtively around and was dismayed to see how white she was, and how big and troubled her dark eyes were. Fudge! They were even larger and finer than his own blue ones, yet she had not once seemed conscious of the fact.

It was the Madam's opinion that "blood would tell," and the good blood of many past Sturtevants stirred now in their descendant's veins, rousing his unselfishness, and making him say:

"F-f-fudge! You look b-b-beat out. I'll go the road, all right. I don't m-m-m-mind it – m-m-much, not much;" for even chivalry could not prevent this last truthful word of regret.

So by the road they went; and by the road – retribution came. Nemesis in the form of Moses Jones; no longer in a mood to be "uncled" by any boy, not even Montgomery, and in his sternness grown almost unfamiliar. He was not alone. Two neighbors were with him, and, despite the fact that the moon was shining, all three men carried lighted lanterns. They were overcoated and muffled to a degree, and Moses' first action was to unfold a great shawl which he had carried on his shoulder, and wrap Kate in it. He did this in silence, not so much as asking "by your leave," and not observing that he was smothering her at the same time. Then he took hold of her arm through the folds of the shawl, and, facing about, started back along the route he had come.

They were well outside the village limits, and a weary tramp yet lay before them, the longer strides of the men taxing the fatigue of the children, till it seemed to them both as if they must fall by the way. That terrible silence, too, and the firm grip of her arm, made Kate wonder if Mr. Jones had suddenly become a constable in fact, and if she were the first victim to be arrested. Once she wriggled herself free from her captor's hand, only to find herself again secured and even more rigidly.

As for poor Montgomery, the pain and confusion had returned, and he could think of nothing save that tormenting headache. His temple was swollen and throbbing, and the one idea he still retained was a longing for rest. It seemed to him that he had been hurried and tramping along ever since he was born. That never had he done a single thing besides lifting one heavy foot after another and planting each a bit farther along that glaring road. The lanterns bobbed about outrageously, as if they were trying to make him more dizzy still; and he scarcely knew when they entered the now deserted village street and came to a halt at Miss Maitland's gate.

There, he fancied, some women rushed out and grabbed Katharine, for he dimly saw her borne away into the house where more dazzling lights were gleaming. To avoid their bewildering rays he closed his eyes a moment; and when he opened them again he found himself being carried swiftly homeward in Moses' strong arms. He being carried! like one of Mis' Turner's babies! More ignominy still. As if his having been coddled and wept over by a strange little girl hadn't been mortifying enough. But his own voice sounded queer to him as he tried to say, with unstammering distinctness and dignity:

"You – needn't carry me n-n-none, Un-un-uncle Mose. What you doin' it for? Put me d-d-down!"

The other two men had vanished, and there was nobody to hear Uncle Moses' tender, troubled answer:

"Why, you poor little shaver, lie still. I don't know what's happened ye, nor what sort of scrape you've been in. You an' that t'other one, who's come to turn things topsyturvy. But betwixt the pair of you you've nigh druv two old women crazy, and set the whole village a-teeter. Just because I walked through it ringin' a bell an' cryin', like any respectable constable would have done if I'd been one, and this 'most makes me feel I am, just cryin': 'Child lost! Boy lost! Girl lost!' and a couple the neighborin' men j'inin' in the search, with our lanterns lit, sence we didn't know what sort of a hole or ditch you might fell into – "

"F-F-Foxes' Gully!" exclaimed Montgomery, no longer resisting the relief of walking on somebody else's feet, so to speak.

Uncle Moses stopped short, amazed and alarmed. "What? What's that you say?"

"F-f-fell down it. An' she come to say she was s-s-s-sor-ry."

"And wasn't killed? Well now, and forever after, I'll believe in guardeen angels! Fell down it an' wasn't killed! But what made ye? Hadn't you any sense? Why, there's been more'n a half-dozen cattle killed in that plaguey hollow sence I can remember. Yet you wasn't. Well, I'm glad of it," and though this seemed a very mild expression of his satisfaction, the sudden squeeze which Moses gave his burden emphasized it sufficiently.

For a few minutes neither spoke again, then Monty suddenly asked: "How many you catch, Un-un-uncle Mose?"

"Enough for breakfast. But I missed ye, sonny, I missed ye. An' I'm real glad you wasn't killed. As for that t'other one, I declare, I wish't she hadn't come. 'Peared like Eunice would lose her seventy senses, a-worryin' lest the child take cold or get hurt or somethin'. And there she has landed on her feet sound as a cat. Though speakin' of cats, Sir Philip has had the bout of his life, and he looks pretty peaked to me. But here we are to home, an' your grandma ain't likely to scold you none if you just mention to her 'Foxes' Gully.' 'Twas one of the Sturtevant calves got killed there, the very first off, an' she will remember. As for me, a respectable hired man, kep' out of my bed like this – why, sonny! Soon's you get over it I'll teach you a lesson you'll remember!"

So, still grumbling and petting, Moses set his burden down in Madam Sturtevant's presence, and saw her open her lips to reprove her erring grandson, then as suddenly close them again and strain the boy to her heart, while her stately figure shook like an aspen. But Moses knew the lady's temperament of old, and how her alternate severity and indulgence had been bad for the child she idolized, and, fearing that severity might have the upper hand now, when it was least needed, he remained long enough to mention:

"Nothin' much the matter with the little shaver, Madam, only he fell down Foxes' Gully, and is – he's sort of tuckered out."

Then he quietly withdrew, and of Montgomery Sturtevant he had no further glimpse during what he himself termed "a consid'able spell."

As for Katharine, she was sound asleep long before Moses returned from Madam Sturtevant's. To the anxiety and reproof with which she had been received, she had, fortunately, but little to say beyond the statement that, "I went to apologize, and I stayed to – to fish, I guess." The relief of being safe indoors again was all she realized, just then, and she submitted to being warmed, blanketed, and dosed with hot sage tea, with a meek humility that won her pardon.

Indeed, when at last the dark curls rested on the pillow, and the childish face softened in slumber, she looked so like Aunt Eunice's lost "little John," that the lady stooped and kissed her for his sake. But she confided to the faithful Widow Sprigg, who had also watched and waited:

"I'm afraid, Susanna, that our peaceful days are over. While she was out to-night, and I knew not where, and I was so troubled and anxious, I felt that it would be wrong, really wrong to burden myself with such a charge. For years her father left me ignorant of how his life was passing, and it seemed to me he had no right to impose the care of his daughter upon me, just because I had once tried to be good to him and he had once seemed to love me. And I knew it would be hard for you and Moses, too. We're all old together; and to rear another child – such an odd child, at that – I wonder, is it right?"

Now it so chanced that old Susanna had been entirely won by the manner in which Kate had chosen to be undressed and tended by the servant rather than the statelier mistress. Also, in the old days when "Johnny" had been with them, though the aunt had loved she had, also, reproved him; but childless Susanna, whose own little son had died, simply loved and never reproved. She now answered, promptly:

"Yes, Eunice Maitland, it's as right as right. She wouldn't have been sent if she hadn't been meant, would she? And she's the cut an' dried image of her own pa, bless him. Send her off? Course you'll do nothin' o' the kind. If you do, I'll leave, an' you can get somebody else to take my place. So there, that's my say-so, an' you're welcome to it."

At the thought of Katharine's mobile little face being a "cut and dried image" of anybody Miss Eunice smiled, and her perplexity vanished – for the time, at least. Then, hearing the kitchen door unclose, she remarked:

"Well, I hear Moses coming in, and we three old people must get to rest. I am surely obliged to you for the help and comfort you are to me, Susanna, and to Moses, too. We'll do the best we can, and day by day."

"Certain, Eunice. That's the way to live, an' all's well 'at ends well, as we hope she will – this little orphant thrust upon us without no druther of our own, an' a bad beginnin' gen'ally makes a good ending; an' I 'low I'd best take one more peek into the sittin'-room chamber, afore I go to bed myself. Good night. Don't worry. I've fixed fish-cakes for breakfast."

With which comforting assurance for the morrow, the Widow Sprigg took herself out of the room, and quiet fell upon the old home.

CHAPTER V.

CHESTNUTS AND GOLD MINES

"May I help? I think I could do that. It doesn't look hard," said Katharine, wandering into the kitchen where Susanna was seeding raisins – more raisins than the girl had ever seen together, save at a grocer's counter. "What are you doing it for?"

"Fruit-cake. For Thanksgivin' an' Christmas. I ought to of done it long ago, but the weather kep' so warm, an' one thing another's hendered. I'm all behind with everything this fall, seems if. I've got to make my soft soap yet, and – Laws, child, what do you lug that humbly dog all round with you for? A beast as ugly favored as he is ought to do his own walkin', and would, if he belonged to me."

"That's just why, I suppose. Because he 'belongs.' And because he isn't old. Not so very. He isn't gray, anyway."

The Widow Sprigg looked over her spectacles and saw such a dejected face that she immediately suggested caraway cookies. A delicacy which had used to bring smiles to "Johnny's" countenance, even after he had suffered that worst of all boyish trials, – a "lickin'," – and if there was anything in heredity should restore cheer to the heart of "Johnny's" daughter.

"No, thank you. But I'd like to help. I shall – shall burst if I don't do something mighty soon," said Kate, excitedly. "I am hungry, but it's for folks, not cookies. And why do you make cake for Christmas now when it's forever and ever before it will come?"