THE GINGHAM APRON PARTY
Fortunately, the ground under the big apple tree was soft and springy, and Patricia was used to both low and lofty tumbling; so when she landed, a little surprised heap, in the tangled grass, she lay still just long enough for the small black dog, nosing anxiously about her, to get in one or two licks of her sunburnt, bewildered face; then she sat up.
"My, Custard, that was a stunner! I reckon if Daddy was here he'd say, 'what a fall was there, my countrymen!'" Custard wagged agreeingly, and sniffed inquiringly at the strip of pink leg showing through the long jagged tear in one of his small mistress's tan stockings.
Patricia scrambled to her feet and began taking stock. There was another tear in the short skirt of her blue gingham frock, and one in one of the sleeves.
"Goodness! What will Aunt Julia say!" Patricia said ruefully; then remembered suddenly what Aunt Julia had said, no longer ago than yesterday morning, after a similar catastrophe.
"And if Aunt Julia isn't a 'Mede 'n' Persian,' she might almost as well be one—when it comes to unsaying things," Patricia told herself, as she started for the house.
Half-way up the back garden path, she came to an abrupt halt. "Custard," she gasped, "it's party day!"
As if Custard did not know that! He had never been to a party, but he was mighty glad to have been invited to this one. The pantry, always an enchanted spot to him, smelled even more delicious than usual. He had quite lost count of the number of times that Sarah had run him out of it this morning, with more haste than dignity.
Patricia sat down in an empty wheelbarrow to consider matters, not noticing that Jim had been using it that morning to bring fresh mold for Miss Kirby's flower beds.
"I didn't want to give a party anyhow." Patricia stared gravely out across the sunny drying-ground. Privately, she considered the average party a great waste of valuable time. Least of all had she wanted to give an "honor party" for Susy Vail. Susy was the rector's grandchild, and was on a visit here.
Patricia hadn't much use for Susy Vail. She was a city girl, she was quiet and shy, and she would be sure to come to the party in a stiff white dress and blue ribbons. Patricia was positive as to the blue ribbons.
"I've a good mind to run off to the woods and stay all day, Custard," Patricia said, getting up; "they can have the party without us."
Custard barked a prompt disapproval of this scheme. Maybe the party could do without him, but he was quite sure he could not do without the party.
"Come on," Patricia told him, starting back down the path.
She had got as far as the gate leading into the meadow, when a new idea came to her. Swinging slowly back and forth on the gate, she considered this idea; her gray eyes dancing, as its possibilities opened up before her mental vision.
"And if Susy Vail hasn't a gingham apron, I'll lend her one; she seems the sort of girl not to have one," Patricia confided to Custard, as they once more made their way towards the house.
If only the coast were clear!
Sarah was on the back piazza, pitting cherries, but Sarah was easily managed.
"My sakes, Miss P'tricia!" Sarah lifted her plump hands in horror, "whatever is you-un been up to now?"
"Where's Aunt Julia, Sarah?"
"Done left for Gar's Hollow just five minutes ago, your pa sent Jim back for her in the gig. What you say, Miss P'tricia?"
For under her breath, Patrica was saying jubilantly: "It's—providential!"
"N-nothing—that is, I was only thinking out loud," she told Sarah.
"Don't you go worrying 'bout dat ere party, honey; hit'll come off all right."
"I think it will—now," Patricia answered; her tone so full of some hidden enjoyment that Sarah glanced at her suspiciously.
"Miss Julia, she done left word for you-un to do everything like you know she'd want you to, Miss P'tricia."
Patricia selected a pair of earrings from the finest of Sarah's bowl of cherries. "Don't you worry, Sarah."
"You ain't 'xplained yet how you come to be in such a disrepec'ble condition, Miss P'tricia. If the rag man was to see you, he'd just up and toss you into his cart—he shore would."
"Have I got a clean gingham apron, Sarah?" Patricia was a past-mistress in the art of ignoring what she considered inconvenient, or personal, remarks.
"Looks to me like you's got more clean gingham aprons than you's got manners," Sarah said severely.
Patricia went indoors to the telephone, shutting the door behind her as she went. Sarah was too fat and too heavy on her feet to get out of a chair, once comfortably settled in it, unless the call were really urgent.
Patricia first called up Mrs. Hardy. Quite unconsciously—being on her dignity and feeling, besides, very important—she spoke more slowly than was usual, and with more than a trace of her aunt's formality.
Back over the line came a prompt: "Why, good morning, Miss Kirby!"
Patricia's eyes sparkled and the demon of mischief, always lurking in her neighborhood, immediately put idea number two into her head. Her imitation of her aunt's voice and manner this time was perfect. "Good morning, Mrs. Hardy, I just called you up to let you know that the little party we are giving this afternoon is to be a gingham apron party."
"A w-what?" Mrs. Hardy questioned.
"Miss Kirby" gave herself vigorous mental treatment for a moment or so—one giggle and the game was up. As if Aunt Julia ever giggled!
"A gingham apron party," she repeated; "it is Patricia's suggestion, so that the children may have a nice jolly time."
"That sounds exactly like Patricia," Mrs. Hardy commented, laughing. "I'll tell Nell; I'm sure she will approve."
"Miss Kirby" said thank you, then she hung up the receiver; after which, seizing Custard, she hugged him ecstatically. "I really am 'Miss Kirby,' you know," she explained. "Daddy's only got me—and I didn't say a word that wasn't perfectly true. And Mr. Baker, out at Long Farm, always calls me that. Now, I'll have to finish 'phoning."
Mrs. Lane and Mrs. Blake were next informed as to the kind of party under way for that afternoon; then came Mrs. Vail, with her Patricia made a break. "And if Susy hasn't any gingham—" she began.
"If Susy hasn't what?" Mrs. Vail interrupted. "Why, of course—"
"I only thought—I mean," Patricia felt herself floundering—and Aunt Julia never floundered. "Then we may look for Susy," she said hastily.
"Why, certainly," Mrs. Vail answered.
"That is well. Good-by."
"Miss Kirby" hung up the receiver hastily.
"I think she almost suspected—something, Custard; I reckon she's the suspiciony kind—Susy Vail looks the kind of girl to have a suspiciony mother. But the rest didn't." Patricia danced the interested Custard down the hall.
As she reappeared on the back piazza, Sarah asked sternly: "What you been up to now, Miss P'tricia? You've been doing a heap of talking at dat ere 'phone."
"I had some very important business to transact," Patricia answered loftily, the mantle of her aunt's manner still enveloping her. "I guess I'll go put my apron on now."
Sarah sniffed indignantly, "You needn't tell me dere ain't some foolishness afoot," she declared.
"What time was you-un 'spectin' the comin' cer'mony to commence?" she asked, when Patricia came in to her solitary dinner. Neither Miss Kirby nor the doctor would be back before late afternoon.
"Aunt Julia said half-past three to seven; I suppose they'll begin coming 'long about three."
That note of hidden jubilation in her voice worried Sarah. She had not known Patricia for all of her eleven years for nothing. "Honey, what you cog'tating?" she coaxed; as she brought Patricia a generous slice of fresh cherry pie.
"I'm thinking about—my party. It's going to be a—a—corker, Sarah! You'll see!"
Sarah groaned, both in spirit and outwardly. "Honey," she pleaded, leaning on the back of a chair and studying her charge anxiously; "Honey, dat Miss Susy's a stranger in dis yere part—why, she's come clare from Phil'delphy. I'm told the chillerns down in Phil'delphy has beau-ti-ful manners."
"I dare say," Patricia did not appear greatly interested.
"And Miss Julia, she done plan dis yere party jest for her."
"I know—I didn't ask her to—I—"
"Honey, you wouldn't—you shore wouldn't do anything to—to disbobulate your aunt's plans?"
"May I have another piece of pie, Sarah, please?"
Sarah cast a pair of imploring eyes ceilingwards. "Of all the ignoringest young uns! I isn't discoursing 'bout pie, Miss P'tricia."
"But it's mighty good pie, Sarah! Will there be cherry pie among the refreshments this afternoon?"
"Miss P'tricia! And the cherry juice all a dripping down, like's not, on you-uns clean white dresses," Sarah protested. However, she brought Patricia a second piece, which was the important thing at the moment; the future might very well be allowed to take care of itself.
Later, as she did up her dinner work, Sarah cast more than one anxious glance out of the window to where Patricia lay on the back lawn, under the shade of the big cherry tree. Patricia's very quietness was alarming.
Was it too much cherry pie? Or was she plotting something.
"Honey," Sarah came out on the piazza, "it's getting time for you to get dressed for the festiv'ties."
Patricia, tickling one of Custard's long ears with a blade of grass, smiled serenely. "But I am dressed, Sarah."
Sarah sat down heavily on the piazza bench; "I knowed it! I jest 'spicioned you-un was shore up to something!"
Patricia rolled over on her back, stretching her wiry little frame out lazily.
"You come right 'long into dis yere house, Miss P'tricia!" Sarah rose commandingly.
"But what for?" Patricia questioned.
"What for? If you wasn't a white child, Miss P'tricia, I'd shore say you was onery. I's going be 'bliged to disport you to your pa, if you continues such disbehavior."
Patricia scrambled to her feet, and came slowly over to the edge of the lawn. Then, lifting her apron, she asked quietly: "Is my frock torn, Sarah, or isn't it?"
"You knows it is, Miss P'tricia!"
Patricia stretched out one slender leg. "Is my stocking torn, or isn't it?"
Sarah groaned.
Wheeling suddenly round, and still holding up her apron, Patricia demanded: "Is my frock dirty, or isn't it?"
"Miss P'tricia, you's shore possessed to-day!"
"Aunt Julia said yesterday morning, that the very next time I got myself torn or dirty, needlessly, I must put a clean gingham apron on and go that way for the rest of the day."
"But, honey—you know Miss Julia never 'tended you to come to your own party in any such fixings! A gingham apron at a party! You come 'long upstairs with me, Miss P'tricia; I'll resume all the 'sponsibility."
"Aunt Julia said 'the very next time'; this is the very next time."
"She done lay out your dress 'fore she went, honey—so crisp and nice and all the pretty pink ribbons," Sarah spoke coaxingly.
"Aunt Julia didn't know—I hadn't tumbled out of the apple tree then."
"I'se going phonegraph your aunt right off!" Sarah declared.
Patricia caught her breath. Then she remembered. "But they haven't any 'phone at Gar's Hollow!"
Sarah wrung her hands. "And all them little ladies in white dresses, and the hostess o' the 'casion looking like 'straction!"
"I always feel like distraction when I'm all stiff and starchy and uncomfortable," Patricia said; "I'd rather look it than feel it."
"Oh, I ain't overlooking that you're powerful reconciled to going to your own party dressed like you is now, Miss P'tricia! Anyhow, you're going to have a good wash-up and your hair combed; Miss Julia ain't laid down no commands against that."
"W-well," Patricia slowly conceded, "only I'll see to it myself, Sarah."
Patricia's thick mop of brown curls was of the tangly order; and when things had gone wrong, Sarah's touch was not always of the gentlest.
An hour later, Sarah, from her post of vantage on the side porch, saw six little girls coming up the path. There were no boys invited. Miss Kirby thought it so much nicer for little girls to play quietly by themselves.
A moment, Sarah stared at them in amazement; then her fat sides shook with laughter. "I shore might've knowed it! So that's what she was so busy phonegraphing 'bout! That chile shore weren't born yesterday. Gingham aprons, every last one o' them!"
Some of the six wore sunbonnets, the rest plain garden hats; and all wore stout serviceable shoes and stockings. Never had those six little girls gone to a party before in such unparty-like costumes.
Patricia came dancing to meet them, bareheaded as usual. "Let's go down to the barn right off," she proposed. "Goodness, how funny you do look!" she giggled.
"So do you," Nell Hardy retorted; then the seven stood still a moment to survey one another.
"Oh!" Mable Lane cried, "whatever put such an idea into your head, Pat?"
"I—I happened to think of it, that was all," Patricia answered vaguely. "Come on—we'll play hide and seek, and no going out of the barn."
"Are—are there any horses there?" Susy asked.
Patricia shook her head. "Not today; Daddy's got Sam and Dick's gone to pasture."
They played hide and seek all over the delightful big dusty old barn; until Patricia, trying to reach goal by a short cut down from the loft, came to an abrupt halt in her descent, caught on a projecting beam.
"Go back!" Ruth Martin advised; but Patricia, wriggling herself free, dropped in a laughing heap on the barn floor.
"But you've torn your apron, Pat!" Nell exclaimed.
Patricia glanced up at the bit of blue gingham hanging from a nail in the beam.
"Look's like this was my busy day," she observed; "I'll go put another on."
"I put it on over the first," she explained, on her return. "You see, Aunt Julia said—I mean, I thought it would be—fun; and, anyhow, it saved time, it takes a lot of time to unbutton these aprons. Let's go down to the brook and wade." She glanced at Susy, who was looking rather doubtful. "Aren't you allowed to wade in brooks?"
"I—don't know," Susy began, then her mild little face took on a look of sudden resolution, "but I'm going to."
Patricia smiled in prompt friendliness. "Mostly, when I'm not sure I just take the chance," she encouraged.
Sitting on the edge of the brook, the seven took off shoes and stockings. "It's the queerest, nicest party," Bessy Martin declared.
It was a gay little brook, running between a broad, sunny meadow and the old Kirby apple orchard, broad enough in places to make the crossing of it on stepping stones delightfully uncertain, and again narrowing to a mere thread. To Patricia, it was like some live thing, one of the dearest and most intimate of playmates.
"Let's play Follow my Leader," Nell suggested, and they drew lots to see who should be first leader.
It fell to Kitty Hall, next to Susy the quietest of the seven; the lead she set them was a very mild affair, limited to the shallowest and narrowest parts of the brook.
But with Patricia's turn, matters took a change for the better, or worse, according to the point of view. Patricia hopped and skipped, and did everything except walk demurely on two feet, out of the safe, pleasant shallows straight for the "pool," which was quite knee deep at this time of year.
Once there, she turned to view her followers, and it wouldn't have been Patricia, if she hadn't slipped and, with a little shriek of surprise, sat right down in the pool.
There was a moment's hesitation, then Nell boldly followed suit; one by one, ending with Susy, the other five dropped down in the cool rippling water, which seemed to laugh, as if it saw the joke.
"Oh!" Patricia cried, "I never meant—" She was on her feet as quickly as possible. Susy was just the kind to go and catch cold, why she had begun to shiver and shake already.
The next few moments were strenuous ones for Patricia's followers. Never had she led them such a chase, through all the hottest, sunniest parts of the big meadow.
"We've got to run, so as not to catch cold," she panted; and run they did, their wet skirts flapping against their bare legs, hats and sunbonnets sent scattering in every direction. While Custard, regarding it as a game gotten up for his especial benefit, urged them on, barking and leaping about them, taking little pretend nips at the seven sets of bare toes, choosing Susy's the oftenest, because she always squealed the loudest.
At last the seven dropped down breathless in the middle of the meadow. Patricia felt of Susy's skirts anxiously. "They're 'most dry; let's—" She turned over on her face, and the six followed suit once more.
"The sun feels good, doesn't it," Susy said, she was on one side of Patricia. "I'm having a be-au-ti-ful time!"
Patricia raised herself on her elbows, and, chin in hand, surveyed Susy closely. "Truly true?"
"Truly true," Susy insisted.
Patricia smiled approvingly; and, when she liked, Patricia's smile could be very approving indeed. "I guess maybe I'm going to like knowing you," she said.
Susy's little pink and white face had lost its look of peaceful placidity, her yellow curls their smoothness. Wet, bedraggled, but happier than ever before in her life, and joyfully conscious that she had for once boldly strayed from the narrow path of harmless routine, she smiled back at Patricia.
"I guess we're all dry now," Patricia said presently. "It seems to me as if it must be pretty near supper time."
Nell spread out her limp skirts. "Pretty looking set, we are, to go to supper!"
But Patricia was thinking. "A gingham apron party supper ought to be different," she said slowly; "Nell, let's you and me go get the refreshments and bring them out here."
It was a glorious suggestion. Six pairs of eyes opened wide with delight.
"B-but Sarah—" Mabel asked. Mabel had a knack of asking such questions.
"Oh, I reckon Sarah'll ask a heap of questions—Sarah's mighty inquisitive at times," Patricia answered. "I rather think the best way will be just to go ahead and not bother her about it."
"But how?" Mabel insisted.
"You leave that to Nell and me—we'll manage. The rest of you must wait here; keep Custard with you. Oh, dear! I thought you were beautifully dry, Susy Vail; what did you go sneeze for? Well, you'll just have to keep moving, that's all. You see that she does, Mabel."
Patricia's commands seldom fell on deaf ears and Mabel promptly insisted on a game of tag; while Patricia herself, accompanied by Nell Hardy, started on a brisk run across the meadow.
At the garden gate, Patricia called a halt. "Duck," she ordered, dropping on the grass. From half-way up the path, came Sarah's voice: "Oh, Miss P'tricia! Miss P'tricia!"
"She'll go back presently, if she doesn't hear us," Patricia whispered with elaborate caution; "then we must get to the house as quickly and as quietly as possible and secure the re—the booty. Oh, go away!" she added sternly, as Custard came sniffing about them.
But Custard only wriggled and danced about and over them, urging them as eloquently as he could to get up and continue their way indoors. Wasn't the pantry indoors? Custard could have told his mistress long ago that it was quite supper time.
At half-past six, the doctor and Miss Kirby drove into the yard. As the gig drew up before the side door, Sarah, voluble and indignant, appeared. From the mass of information she hurled upon them, one fact only was quite clear—Patricia was missing.
She was so often missing, that the announcement failed to excite any great apprehension in the mind of either her father or her aunt.
"But the party—" Miss Kirby began.
"She done take the party with her!" Sarah wailed.
Miss Kirby looked more indignant than surprised; to have come home and found that nothing untowards had happened would have been the surprising thing.
"I ain't laid my eyes on her since them six gingham aprons came gavorting up the walk!" Sarah proclaimed dramatically. "That young-un's a limb, for shore!"
Miss Kirby sat down on the piazza bench. "Gingham aprons, Sarah," she repeated. "Patrick, what can she mean?"
The doctor shook his head, smiling, "That remains to be discovered."
"For the love o' goodness, Miss Julia!" Sarah implored; "the nexest time you sets out to give a party for that there young-un, I hopes and prays you stays home to sup'intend the obsequies youself!"
The doctor turned to send Sam on to the barn.
"Gingham aprons," Miss Kirby murmured.
"Ain't Miss P'tricia done 'tire herself in one for the 'casion!" Sarah exclaimed; "and ain't she done tell all the others over that 'phone to do the very same—I ain't never held with thet there 'phone, nohow—'tain't nothin' better'n devilment, anyhow. My sakes, such doings, Marse Doctor! You and Miss Julia just come cast your glance over this supper table!"
They followed her into the dining-room.
"It certainly looks very pretty," the doctor said, glancing at the table.
Sarah groaned. "Where's them plates o' sandwiches gone? I ask you that! Where's them plates o' biscuits gone? I ask you that! Where's the little cakes, what I iced so pretty, gone? I ask you that! Ain't I done fix them all in place and then I goes out to call them—ginham aprons—to come in,—and I done galivant all over the place and all up and down the street and I ain't seen the least speck o' one o' them—but when I comes indoors—the party done vanish! And that ain't all—the cherry pie I done make for you's and Miss Julia's supper done vanish too. But they ain't got the ice cream—I reckon the freezer was too heavy."
"That at least is something to be thankful for," the doctor said, "there would probably have been—consequences—had they secured both the cherry pie and the ice cream."
"And the table looking so stylish," Sarah mourned, "with the flowers and all the fixings. Where's that plate o' chicken gone? I ask you that!"
"Patrick," Miss Kirby said, "you really must go look that child up! such behavior is—"
"I'm going," the doctor assured her, and as he went Miss Kirby saw him put his handkerchief to his eyes more than once.
Through the garden he went, through the orchard. Half-way across the meadow beyond the orchard he came upon Custard dining at second table, and too busy to do more than wag a welcome.
A few yards further on stood an old apple tree, and from the top-most branch came, in Patricia's clear notes:
"'If I could find a higher tree
Farther and farther I should see,
To where the grown-up river slips
Into the sea among the ships.'"
The doctor stood still, making a trumpet of his hands. "Ship ahoy!" he called.
The next instant seven girls came wriggling and scrambling down from the various branches. "Oh! Daddy," Patricia cried joyously, "we're having the jolliest time—we're pirates! I'm captain—
"'My name is Captain Kidd,
And most wickedly I did,
As I sailed, as I sailed!'"
"And, according to report, before you sailed, young lady. Suppose you make explanation regarding certain late extremely piratical proceedings."
"You mean about the supper, Daddy? You see, we didn't feel very partified—at least, we thought we didn't look exactly—"
As she hesitated, the doctor, glancing from one to another of the seven, nodded comprehendingly. "I quite agree with you, Pat; you do not look very—partified."
They were so dusty, so disheveled; all but Patricia had shoes on—Custard had made off with both of Susy's, and Patricia had most willingly offered hers—the opportunity to go barefoot was too good to be lost; Nell had only one stocking, Kitty none at all, Ruth was wearing Patricia's, Custard had certainly made the most of his chance to carry off things that afternoon.
"But we've had a be-au-ti-ful time," Susy said, slipping a hand into the doctor's. She quite forgot that he was a comparative stranger, remembering only that he was Patricia's father—Patricia, who had invited her to this most wonderful of parties, where one had been so busy having fun that there had been no time for feeling shy and strange.
Dr. Kirby smiled down at the little guest of honor. "Upon my word, I believe you have," he said.
"Aunt Julia says," Patricia possessed herself of his other hand, "that to feel sure that one's guests have honestly enjoyed themselves is to know that one's party has been a success. So I reckon mine's been a perfectly tremendous success."
"Suppose you come up to the house—all of you—and see if you can reassure Aunt Julia and—Sarah," the doctor suggested.
Patricia sighed. "I—I sort of wish Aunt Julia—looked at things the way we do, Daddy."
They went on up to the house. On the back steps, Miss Kirby was waiting; in the kitchen doorway stood Sarah.
"Patricia Kirby!" Aunt Julia exclaimed. "Well of all the—"
"Miss P'tricia," Sarah broke in wrathfully, "where's that cherry pie I done made for Marse Doctor's supper?"
Patricia slowly drew up her uppermost apron. "It's here—most of it; Custard got the rest. I—I stumbled and fell—into it. You see, we were playing pirate—and we were smuggling."
The doctor, much to his sister's indignation, sat down suddenly on one of the garden benches. "Oh, Pat, Pat!" he gasped.
"Patricia Kirby, how many gingham aprons have you on?" Miss Kirby demanded.
"Three, Aunt Julia; you said I must wear the first one all the afternoon—and I tore it—and then the pie sort of stained the second; I got kind of interested to see how many it would take to get me through the afternoon. I had to make it a gingham apron party, Aunt Julia, on account of what you said yesterday. You see, I got pretty well torn and dirty this morning—and, of course, I needn't have climbed that tree."
"Casabianca," the doctor murmured; Miss Kirby was past murmuring anything; all her efforts were directed towards at least a semblance of self-control.
"I shore told you, that young-un was a limb," Sarah muttered.
"Sarah was very anxious to fix me all up properly, Aunt Julia," Patricia went on, "but of course, after you had said—and I thought you'd feel better if the rest wore gingham aprons too. Sarah was very kind about it though," with a smile in her direction.
"You go 'long, Miss P'tricia," Sarah protested.
Miss Kirby bit her lip. "That is all very well, Patricia, but—"
"We've had such fun, haven't we, girls?" Captain Kidd appealed to her fellow pirates.
"Oh, we have," they chorused back.
"And having supper out in the meadow when we hadn't expected it was the best part," Nell added.
"What would you suggest?" Miss Kirby turned to her brother.
His smile told her that he knew quite well that she was shifting upon him the responsibility of deciding. As a strict disciplinarian—in theory—it would never do for her to countenance such unlawful proceedings. He rose to the occasion promptly. "Soap and water for these highly reprehensible young folks, after that—the ice cream—seeing that the cherry pie came to a timely end. And for us—supper."
"Isn't Daddy the dearest?" Patricia demanded, as she led her guests upstairs. "Daddy's always so understandified."