LUCY’S FAULT.
Lucy had long silken golden curls, they fell quite to her waist. Her mother did not “do them up” in paper; her hair curled naturally. Lucy was not proud of her curls; she did not care any thing about them; ladies in the street, often stopped her to look at them: and her little playmates often said, “I wish my hair curled like Lucy’s,” but Lucy always said, “I wish they were off.”
One day Lucy went to her mother, and said: “May I have my curls cut off?”
“No,” said her mother, “I should not like to have them cut; I think it would be a great pity, they are so soft, so long, and so even; your head is always full of notions, run away and play.”
Lucy went away, but she kept thinking about her hair, and wishing her mother would let her have it all cut off, and when Lucy once got her heart set on any thing, she never would be satisfied till she got it.
A few days after, she thought she would try again, so she said, “Mother, if you would only let me go to Mr. Wynne, the barber, and have my hair cut close; may I mother?”
“Yes,” said her mother.
Lucy looked up in astonishment. “May I really? Do you know what you are saying?”
“Yes.”
Up sprang Lucy, her long golden curls streaming out behind her like a vail, up three steps at a time to her room, to get her bonnet and shawl, then down three stairs at a time to her mother, to get the money to pay Mr. Wynne for cutting her hair. Lucy never asked any one to go with her, she was a very independent little girl, she knew the way to the barber’s, because her father used to go there to get shaved, and when Lucy was much smaller, he used sometimes to take her with him.
So Lucy soon found the shop; there were no customers in it. Lucy was glad of that; nobody to bother her; but unfortunately Mr. Wynne was not in, either. But Lucy was determined that she would not be disappointed, so when the barber’s assistant said,
“What do you want of Mr. Wynne?”
She answered, “I want him to cut off my curls.”
“Cut your curls?” replied the man; “were they my sister’s, I would not have them cut off for a five dollar bill; one don’t see such curls as yours every day, miss.”
“They must be cut,” said little Lucy, shutting her lips together very firmly. “Why can’t you cut them for me?”
“Not I,” said the assistant, “at least not till Mr. Wynne comes in.”
“My mother knows about it,” said Lucy, with a vexed toss of her curls, “see, here is the money to pay you for cutting my hair.”
“Perhaps so—perhaps so!” said the assistant, “but I should rather not put scissors to that hair, till Mr. Wynne tells me to. I expect him in soon—you can wait, miss, if you choose.”
Lucy did choose; so untying her bonnet-strings, she seated herself before a cage, in which hung a red and green poll parrot, who cocked his head one side, and looking at her with a doleful twist in his red eye, said,
“Poll’s sick!”
Lucy had never seen a poll parrot before, and she looked this way and that way, as if she could not believe that the bird said this.
Then the poll parrot said,
“Give Poll some sugar! Poll’s sick!” and before Lucy had done laughing at this, he said,
“Want to be shaved? take a seat.”
“No,” said Lucy, laughing; “but I want my hair cut!”
The poll parrot cocked his head on one side again, and whined out,
“Poll’s sorry!”
“He don’t know what he is talking about, does he?” asked Lucy, looking a little abashed. “Any way I shall have my curls cut, Miss Polly; see if I don’t!”
“Your curls cut—that hair cut!” exclaimed old Mr. Wynne, coming in at the door; “not at my shop, you little rogue. What do you suppose your mother would do to me? I’ll be bound she sets her life by ’em: Many a lady who brings her little girl here to have her hair curled with the curling-tongs, when she is going to a party, would give her eyes for these natural curls of yours. No, no, Miss Lucy, you would get me into a pretty scrape there at home. Ah! when you are a little older, you will not be in such a hurry to part with ’em, to my thinking—better run home to your ma, Miss Lucy!”
“My mother sent me here,” said Lucy; “and see here is the money to pay you for cutting my hair.”
“Now really, Miss Lucy? honor bright?
“Really and truly,” said Lucy.
“Well—it’s a sin and a shame; but I’ll do it if your ma said so; look here, Jacob!” and Mr. Wynne lifted the heavy curls on his finger; “not an uneven hair in ’em, Jacob, and just as soft as silk.”
“Make a dozen frizettes,” said Jacob; “a good job for us, any how.”
“Yes; and if it was a boy’s hair I shouldn’t mind. I hate to see a boy curled and befrizzed; I think somehow it puts puppy notions in his head, that he don’t ever get rid of; but a little girl is another matter. St. Paul says, you know.”
“Never mind St. Paul;” said Jacob, “it will make at least a dozen frizettes, good full ones at that!”
“Well—here goes then, Miss Lucy,” and snipping the sharp shears, down fall the curls in a golden shower one after another upon the floor. Jacob meanwhile looked on in delighted astonishment.
“There miss,” said old Mr. Wynne, rubbing some cologne over her cropped head, “I think it is a chance if your own mother would know you now.”
“Never fear,” said Lucy, passing her hand over her shaven crown; and tying on her bonnet without stopping to look in the glass.
“It has really quite changed her,” said Mr. Wynne, pocketing his shilling, as Lucy went out the door; “but as you say, Jacob, those curls are worth something to us.”
On flew Lucy, as if wings were at her heels, and bursting into the parlor, where her brothers, and sisters, and mother were sitting, twitched off her bonnet, and stood to be admired.
Such a shout!
“What’s the matter?” said the astonished Lucy.
“Look in the glass—only look in the glass,” was all the merry laughers could say. “Oh, Lucy, what a fright you are!”
“An escaped bedlamite,” said her brother John.
Lucy ran to the glass—the blush which overspread her cheeks and temples might plainly be seen crimsoning the very roots of her shaved hair. “Did old Mr. Wynne put a bowl on your hair, and cut it to the shape of it?” asked John, holding his sides.
Poor Lucy! She did not expect that old Mr. Wynne would make her so ridiculous a figure. Rushing up-stairs into her room and into bed, she sprang between the sheets, and drawing them tightly over her unfortunate head, sobbed out her vexation.
By-and-by her mother came up.
“Lucy.”
“Oh, mother, I did not think he would make me such a fright. Why did you let me go, mother?”
“Because I thought the loss of my little daughter’s curls would be but a small sacrifice, should it cure her of that impetuous, impatient spirit which leads her into so many difficulties. I could easily, my dear child, have cut your curls (were it advisable to do so) in such a way as not to disfigure you; but, as usual, you asked no advice, and thought you knew best about it. Mr. Wynne is much better at scraping men’s chins than at cutting young girls’ hair.”
“But can’t you fix me up a little, mother? I don’t want John to call me ‘a bedlamite.’”
“Don’t lie a-bed then, Lucy.”
Lucy was too troubled to laugh; but she got up slowly, and her mother managed, with a comb, a brush, and a little water, to coax up the few hairs she had left, as only a mother’s fingers know how.
Now, when Lucy has any pet plan in that little head of hers, she always goes to her mother first, and says, “Tell me what you think about it, mother.”