Elizabeth with the Children
One day Elizabeth came over to spend the afternoon with Johnnie Jones, who was very glad to see her.
"Let's play horse," suggested Johnnie Jones. "I have a new pair of reins with bells on them."
"No, I don't want to play horse," Elizabeth said. "I want to play "I Spy," and I want to hide. You must find me."
"All right!" answered Johnnie Jones.
But as soon as it was Johnnie Jones's turn to hide, and Elizabeth's to find him, she decided that she would rather play fire-engine. "I'll be the fireman and put out the fire with your real little hose, and you be the horse and engine," she said.
"All right," Johnnie Jones answered again.
After they had extinguished several fires, Elizabeth said: "Now we'll play grocery-store, and I'll be the man who keeps it. We'll borrow some apples and potatoes from the cook, and you come to buy them."
"No," said Johnnie Jones this time, "I'll be the grocery man, and you the lady who comes to buy."
"I won't play if I mayn't be the storekeeper," threatened Elizabeth.
"But that's not fair," said Johnnie Jones. "You have chosen every game, and have taken the best part in each one for yourself. Now it is my turn to choose."
"I'll go home if you won't let me be the grocery man," Elizabeth told him.
"No," he answered, "because that's not a fair way to play."
Then Elizabeth left him. She did not go home, however, but just next door to Katherine's house. She found Katherine and Mary at home, playing with their dolls.
As soon as the little girls saw Elizabeth, they said: "You can't play with us unless you play the right way. You can't be Mother all the time."
"Well, if you won't let me play my way, I won't play at all," said Elizabeth, and ran on until she came to Sarah's house.
Sarah, Tom and Ned were jumping rope, and they called out to Elizabeth: "You can't play with us unless you will turn the rope part of the time."
"I don't like to turn, I like to jump," Elizabeth complained. But when she realized that she would not be allowed to jump until she first turned the rope for the others, she left these children too, and went next door to visit Sammy Smith.
That little boy and Susie were playing with a big wagon. They asked Elizabeth to play with them, and because they were courteous little children, and she was their visitor, they permitted her to take the first ride, and pretended that they were two strong horses hitched to her carriage. When they were tired, they told Elizabeth that it was time for her to become a horse and let one of them ride.
"No," said Elizabeth, "I like to ride better than to pull the wagon."
"We won't let you ride any longer," they answered, "because it's your turn to play that you are a horse."
"Then I'll go home," she said, and this time she did.
"What is the matter?" asked her mother.
"The children won't play the way I want them to, and I don't like them any more because I think they are unkind," she answered. "I wish I could go to fairy-land and be a princess, or else that I were a grown-up lady."
"Even grown-up ladies and princesses cannot always have their own way," her mother said.
Elizabeth stood at the window and looked out across the street. Most of the children had gathered there in front of Johnnie Jones's house, and were jumping rope. Elizabeth could hear them counting, and laughing, and talking. She began to feel very lonely. At last she put on her hat again and ran back to join the children.
"If you will let me play with you," she said, "I'll play anything you like."
"All right!" they answered, "and sometimes we'll play what you like."
"And I won't always ask for the best part any more," she said.
"You may have the part you like when it is your turn to choose," they told her.
"I'll turn the rope now," Elizabeth added.
"You turn until some one trips," the others answered.
Elizabeth spent the remainder of the afternoon with the children, who were glad to have her because she played fair. Elizabeth herself was very happy. She was even glad that she wasn't a princess or a grown-up lady; glad that she was just a little girl who had learned to play with other children.