Little Prudy's Cousin Grace

by Sophie May

CHAPTER VIII.

PRUDY PARLIN.

Isa Harrington's surprise was great when she saw all her artful plans overthrown, and Grace and Cassy the same "cup and saucer" as ever.

"O, Gracie," said she, "you don't love Isa any more, now Cassy has come home."

Grace drew coldly away. "You tried to turn me against my best friend,
Isa."

"O, Gracie, I never! I only told what I heard, and Lucy Lane was the one that said it. You may ask her."

Lucy was as harmless a fly as ever got caught in a spider's web. Isa thought she could manage her finely. So the moment she had done talking with Grace, she made Lucy tease Miss Allen to let them both go into the recitation-room to study their lessons.

"We'll promise, solemnly, we won't say a word only grammar," said Isa, earnestly. "Can't you trust us?"

The teacher hesitated, looked at timid little Lucy, and said, "Yes. But if you break your word, girls, remember, 'tis the last time you'll ever go in there to study."

Isa had no intention of keeping her word. She wanted to have Lucy to herself for the purpose of "managing" her.

For a while the girls studied in silence, their heads close together, and covered by a shawl.

"O, Lucy," said Isa, suddenly, "I've a compliment for you."

Lucy put her finger on her lip.

"Dear me, Lucy, didn't I speak good grammar? That's all the promise I made—that I wouldn't say anything but grammar, and I won't, unless I make a mistake. A certain person said you had lovely hair. Got a compliment for me?"

"Why, yes," said Lucy, innocently; "I heard a lady say you might be a right good little girl perhaps, but you're rather homely."

Isa bit her lip.

"It was Cassy Hallock that told yours, Lucy. By the way, did you ever hear her say Gracie's hair is fire-red?"

"Why, Isa, no, indeed!"

"Didn't? Why, that's nothing to the way she's slandered her; and Grace her best friend, too."

Lucy was horrified.

"Do you remember when you, and I, and Cassy staid, ever so long ago, to scrub our desks? Well, don't you know how Cassy spoke of Mrs. Clifford's oyster party?"

"Yes, I do. She said Grace appeared like a lady."

"There, Lucy Lane, is that the way you hear? Didn't understand it, did you, any more than a baby? She was hinting that Grace talked like old folks—very pert and bold."

"O, was she?"

"Of course she was, Lucy. Can't you see through a mill-stone, child? I wouldn't want any one to hint about me the way Cassy does about Grace."

"Nor I wouldn't, either," echoed Lucy.

"Didn't you think, Lucy, by what Cassy said, that her ma wanted to break up the friendship? You told me at the time that you thought so, now certainly."

"O, what a story!" Lucy spoke very loud in her surprise.

"Very well," said Isa, adjusting the shawl, "you've forgotten, perhaps. Your memory is about as long as my little finger, Lucy. But no matter; I know what Cassy meant if you didn't. Reckon I've got eyes in my head."

"Well, I knew what she meant, too, I suppose, at the time of it," said soft-voiced Lucy, anxious to prove that she had eyes in her head, and could see through a mill-stone. Foolish fly! When a cunning spider said, "Will you walk into my parlor?" Lucy always walked right in.

"I hate Cassy Hallock," cried Isa, unconsciously raising her voice very high: "I just hate her. She's no business to make believe friends with Gracie. Let's you and I put a stop to it."

"Hush, Isa; don't speak so loud."

"I didn't mean to. Peek out, Lucy, and see if the door is shut."

Lucy pushed the shawl to one side and peeped out. Terror-stricken, she drew back again, glad to hide her head. The door was wide open, and the school so still you might have heard a pin drop! Not a word had been lost. There stood Miss Allen by the desk, her finger up to hush the faintest noise. Having opened the door and found the girls talking, she decided to let the whole school know it.

Isa was in an agony of unavailing remorse. Not only had she lost her teacher's respect, but she had forever ruined her cause with Grace. She longed for the earth to open and hide her shame; but as the earth refused to take her in, the best she could do was, to steal home, her proud head bent low and concealed under her sun-bonnet. It was a bitter punishment; but Miss Allen, who had long understood her crooked conduct, was sure she deserved it.

She was discharged from the R. S. S. Angry and mortified, and not knowing of any better way to annoy the girls, she told their secrets to the wide world. Grace had never dreamed of this.

"What are we to do with that little black cow?" said Robert to Grace. "She always wants to be somewhere else. She's a regular tornado at tearing down fences. What say to her joining a secret society?"

Grace was helping train a prairie-rose.

"Don't know what you mean, Robin."

"Just what I say. These strong-minded cows ought to form a
Mutual-Improvement, Cows' Rights Society. I've thought of a good
name," added Robert, with a twinkle in his eye: "Princesses of the
Crooked Horn."

"Now, Robin, what do you mean? Tell, this minute," cried Grace, dropping her ball of twine, and blushing.

The boy whistled.

"Tell me, Robin, have you heard something?"

"I've heard something, yes."

"What have you heard?"

"Shan't tell. Reckon you've heard of the Ruby Seal!"

"That'll do, Robin," said Grace, suddenly looking down to watch an ant with threadlike limbs dragging off a cold shoulder of fly.

"See here, Gracie: what cute hands girls are to keep secrets!"

"Don't want to hear another word, Robin."

"Cassy," said Grace, a little later, "what'll we do about the R. S.
S.? Isa's been and spread it all over town!"

"You don't believe it, do you? Why that makes me think what Johnny said to-day. He's sorry I'm such a broken-hearted old maid at this time of life. Now I know what he meant."

"But what'll we do about our R. S. S.? I'm so mortified!"

"Let it die: who cares?"

"O, Cassy, I care. Don't let's give up at trifles."

"Then turn it into a Soldiers' Aid." Grace clapped her hands and waltzed across the street.

"So we will, Cassy; so we truly will! That's so very respectable!"

"We'll marry, too, if they're going to make such a fuss," suggested
Cassy.

"I won't—unless I please. I'll never be married to keep people from laughing, Cassy Hallock."

Here Grace set her little foot firmly upon a toad, which she mistook for solid ground.

"Cassy," continued she, after a little scream, "let's work for those darling old soldiers in the hospital. What have we been thinking about? Don't you let on! After a little, you know, when school stops, Cassy! O, can we wait that long?"

Meanwhile, we must attend to a new arrival. Uncle Edward Parlin dropped in suddenly, as good and smiling as ever, and with him little Prudy, blushing like a rose, but so dusty that she almost made you sneeze. But where was Susy? It seemed that Mrs. Parlin had not had time to prepare both the children for such a hasty journey.

Horace shouted like a young Indian. Grace clapped her hands, and laughed in every note of the scale up to the second octave and back again.

Prudy threw her arms about Mrs. Clifford's neck.

"O, aunt Ria," she whispered, "bimeby I shall cry."

"Aren't you well, darling?"

"Yes'm; but I feel as if I wasn't going to feel well."

It had been a hard journey for the poor little thing. She was soon nicely bathed and put in a comfortable bed, where, for about at minute, she lay wondering at the mosquito-bar, and then forgot all her trials in sleep. Next morning, Horace asked what she had dreamed.

"O," said Prudy, much refreshed, "I slept so fast I never heard my dreams. There, aunt Ria, you know Mrs. Mason, that gave Susy the bird? She's dead: I thought you'd be glad to hear that!"

"I didn't know the lady," said Mrs. Clifford, smiling; "yet I am not glad she is dead."

Prudy was constantly espying wonders. Her fear of pigs was extreme, and the whole Ohio valley seemed to her one vast pig-pen without any fence. The creatures had such long noses, too! From a safe distance, Prudy liked to watch them cracking nuts. She thought they could not have picked out the meats better if they had been gifted with fingers.

She wandered with Grace and Cassy about the beautiful garden and green-house in a maze of delight. She might have been too happy if the mosquitos had not laid plans to devour her. Grace bathed the poor child in camphor. "It hurts," said Prudy, the quiet bears rolling down her cheeks; "but Gracie bathes me for my good, and I won't cry. O, aunt Ria, when I'm naughty, and you want to punish me, you can just put me to bed, and let the skeeters bite me."

Owing to the savage conduct of these bloodthirsty creatures, there was no trace left of Prudy's beauty, except what Horace called her "killing little curls." Grace was disappointed, for she had hoped to exhibit her charming cousin to great advantage.

However, the mosquito-hills disappeared from her face in time, and then Prudy was quite "a lioness," as Horace said. The princesses admitted her to their social meetings. All they did now was, to state that they had read the required amount of Scripture, had told no wrong stories, and used no language which they regarded as unladylike. For the present, they met and played games, intending during holidays to begin work for the soldiers in earnest.

When Prudy visited the school, she sat with every one of the Princesses in turn, and liked them all but the discarded member of the society, Isa Harrington.

In private, she told Grace that Isa looked "like the woman that killed the man," meaning Lady Macbeth, whose face she had often seen in a picture.

"Don't you like me, darling?" said Isa, offering her a handful of peppermints.

"O, yes, I like you," said the child, accepting the sugar-plums, "but
I don't like the spirit of you."

"What does that mean, you funny thing?"

"I don't know, but that's the way they talk."

Prudy loved Mahla Linck at once. She said she had had just such a lameness her own self, and knew how it felt. "Ah, little dear," said Mahla, laying her wasted cheek close to Prudy's, "but you can walk now without a crutch, and I never can."

"O, Mahla, yes, you can never; you can when you grow an angel."

The Princesses liked to escort Prudy through the streets, and hear her exclamations of surprise. She told them the "Yankees wouldn't 'buze their horses so;" for it seemed to her rather unkind to braid their tails like heads of hair, and tie them up in knots; though Grace assured her this was done to keep them from trailing in the dust. The mules were another curiosity. Prudy was also amazed at the "loads of oxen" driven by men who sat in the carts, and "drove 'em and whipped 'em same as if they was horses." "Yankees," she said, "walked with the oxen, and talked into their ears."

She informed the girls that the Hoosier sky was very odd-looking. "It's Quaker color," she said; "but the sky to Portland is as blue as a robin's egg, 'cept when it fogs."

She described feathery snow-storms, "frost-bitten" windows, and the nice fishing in "Quoddy Bay;" told her listeners that eastern people "shave" their grass in summer, and when it is dry it's good to jump on.

For the short time Prudy staid in Indiana her sunny face was a pleasure to everybody.

"Why, aunt Ria," said she, "do you think I'm good, though? Well, I'm ever'n ever so much better away from home."

CHAPTER IX.

BARBARA's WEDDING.

Barbara had now been at home for some time making preparations for her wedding, and had cordially invited all the children to see her married,—Grace, Cassy, Prudy and Horace; everybody but little "Ruffle-neck," as Horace sometimes called the baby.

They set out in the morning in high spirits, Grace and Cassy walking under one umbrella, Horace and Prudy under another. Prudy was bareheaded, and her "killing little curls" were blown into wild confusion by the breezes.

The June air was very sweet, for it was "snowing roses." Prudy asked Horace if he didn't think "the world smelt nice?" Horace put on a look of calm superiority, and replied that "the flowers were very much like essence bottles, to be sure, what we call odiferous, Prudy."

Some way behind the two children sailed the other umbrella, marked, in white paint, "Stolen from H. S. Clifford;" while under it Grace and Cassy talked confidentially.

Prudy had heard they were going to a place called the Bayou, and supposed it to be some sort of a house. But after a walk of two miles, they came to an immense field, where the corn shot up very tall and luxuriant.

"There's the bayou over yonder," laid Horace, with a sweep of his thumb.

"Where?" said Prudy, straining her eyes. "I don't see a single thing but sugar-canes."

"Corn, you mean! Well, it's a bayou, and the water runs up over it in the spring, and that makes bottom-land rich as mud."

Prudy stared at the cornfield, then at the river.

"You don't mean that that little thing went over it," said she, waving her hat towards the Ohio.

"Poh! you needn't think our river looks that way," dropping the umbrella over his shoulder. "Tell you what it is: that river rises out of bed every spring, but it's hung out to dry in the summer, Prudy."

The little girl stopped short and swung her hat off into space. Horace gallantly restored it.

"O, what is that big thing there? a whale, or an ice-bug?"

Horace laughed. "Whales in the river! Goodness sakes, that's a sand-bar, miss. A man waded across here the other day. Tell you what, if he could do it, I could—want to see me?"

Prudy was alarmed, agreeably to expectation.

"Well, now," said the boy, holding the umbrella upright once more, "here we are at the Kinckles'. Come ahead, girls."

Prudy looked, and saw nothing but a crooked fence. Horace waited till Grace and Cassy came up, then let down the bars. Prudy trembled, and caught fast hold of Horace, for Farmer Kinckle's calves were wandering about the field, eating grass, or playfully biting one another. Tall hickory, persimmon, peach, apple, and mulberry trees cast a deep shade. For some time nothing was to be seen of the house; but at last it appeared in view—dark, unpainted, with chimneys built outside.

A cooking-stove stood in the yard, its long, black funnel puffing out smoke; and, strange to tell, under the stove a nest of young ducklings enjoying the heat and the smell of the cooking.

"Understand it to me, please," said little Prudy. "Do the folks know their stove is out here?"

Barbara appeared at the door with peony-colored cheeks and pleasant smiles. She would hardly have consented to be married unless the "childers" might be there to see.

There was no entry, and the front door was at the side of the house just opposite the back door. A huge fireplace spread itself over a large part of the room; but it was never used except for smoking hams or mosquitos. It was the only fireplace in the house. On the high mantel stood a candlestick, a pipe, a beer bottle, a wooden clock, and a bowl of blackberries. On one side, exactly in the way, were two or three long drawers of black walnut, which ran nearly the length of the room, and on the top of the drawers were tubs, buckets, and clothes baskets.

The house was propped on four feet. Horace discovered, under the house, a cat and kittens, a brood of chickens, and a dog. He called Prudy to admire this domestic menagerie, then crept under the house, and, by accident, overturned the cat's saucer of milk; whereat Pussy looked up at him with a glance of mild reproach. He next thrust both hands into a pool of corn-meal dough, which was meant for the chickens.

"O, Horace," said Grace, shocked at the dismal plight of her brother's clothes, "I did think you'd try to keep clean for the wedding."

This was expecting too much. Grace felt that it was a trial to take Horace visiting. At the table he declined mutton gravy, saying he never ate "tallow," and remarked about the cheese, that it was "as mouldy as castile soap;" yet Horace could not see that this was rude.

Mrs. Kinckle wore a small black cap, which reminded Prudy of a wire cover which is used to keep off flies. Horace thought it looked about as big as a percussion cap. Prudy watched the good woman doing work just like anybody, though she was a German and a Jewess, and therefore could not have known the "truly name" of a single dish she touched.

There were a few articles to be ironed for the bride, and Prudy had a mind to try the Jewish flatirons; so, with Barbara's leave, she smoothed out some handkerchiefs on a [text missing from book]

But soon the rabbi, or Jewish priest, arrived, and it was time for the wedding. The company formed a circle, as if they were playing the "Needle's Eye," thought Prudy. In the middle of the ring stood Barbara and Solomon, the rabbi before them. The bride's dress was a straw-colored silk, which must have cost many months' wages; but it was quite hidden under a long white veil, which enveloped Barbara from head to foot. The honest young bridegroom wore a solemn countenance; but how the bride's face looked, no one could tell.

The rabbi began to chant something in Hebrew, probably the marriage service. After this, Grace supposed he would pray; but he did not.

Mrs. Kinckle now kissed the bride—not through the veil, however—and then all the rest kissed her, this being the only part of the ceremony which the children fairly understood. Prudy espied a small tear in Barbara's eye, and wished Solomon only knew it, in which case he would never carry Barbara off in the world.

After the bride had been duly embraced, cake was passed around, and a certain Jewish wine, very strong and fiery, which, of course, the children did not taste. A basket of cigars came next, and in a few moments the gentlemen of the party were puffing at them. Thus the affair, after all, ended in smoke; and before sunset the children were on their way home.

It seemed to Grace that the world had begun to fall in pieces. To think that Barby would never more be seen in Mrs. Clifford's kitchen, polishing and scrubbing! To think that just a few little Hebrew words had made such a dreadful change; spiriting away that splendid Barby forever. Cassy wondered how the Jews could endure their synagogues, and rabbis, and strong wines. Horace thought it a deal worse than keeping pigs. Grace would even sooner be married with candles and crucifixes, like a Roman Catholic. Cassy said she should have fifteen bridesmaids, "like they had in Kentucky." Prudy gave it as her opinion that poor Barby was crying all the while the man "sing-songed." "She hates Solomon," added the child; "for I asked her if she didn't think so much whiskers was homely, and she said she did."

Before the children reached home the full moon was rising.

"I didn't use to know what the moon was," quoth Prudy. "I thought it was a chip."

"What put that in your head, dear?" said Grace.

"O, I threw it up, you know, when I wasn't three years old, there at grandma's. I threw it up in the air, and didn't see it go down; and then, when I looked up, there was the moon; and I said, 'O, grandma, see my chip!'"

"But you don't know what 'tis now any better than you did then, I'll warrant," said Horace, sitting down in the road to laugh.

"Don't know, Horace Clifford? I guess I do!"

"Well, tell then, can't you?"

"Silver, of course! Didn't you never know that before?"

"It's a big world, darling," said Grace, laughing.

"I know that, Gracie Clifford; did I say it wasn't? It's a silver ball as big as a house, and there's a man lives there, and I've seen him making up faces."

Everybody laughed, and Prudy tried to be angry; but her fiercest indignation frightened you about as much as a firefly trying to flash out a little chain-lightning.

Mr. Parlin was daily expected back from St. Louis, and Grace and Horace clung to their little cousin, dreading the thought of losing her.

"Aunt Ria," said Prudy, "don't you think 'twould be a good plan for you to get the baby's picture took, and send it to my mamma for a present?"

Mrs. Clifford said she would try; so, on Saturday afternoon, she went to Mr. Drake's photograph-rooms with the little girls, while Horace wheeled the baby in her small carriage.

It was of no use. There were sure to be a dozen noses in Katie's picture, or as many mouths. In vain Horace chirruped to her, calling her dove-names. "Still, now, Brownbrimmer! Ho, little Topknot!" The more he tried to hush her, the more eager she grew for a frolic.

"My fine little fellow," said the artist, "suppose you and the young misses go in the next room for a while?"

They all went. Prudy threw off her hat, and sat down to hold the white kitty which she had carried in her arms all the way.

"Sit still, little youngling," cried Horace; "I'll take you!"

So the boy arranged an apparatus by turning down one chair, setting another across it, and throwing over both a table-cover for a screen. Prudy looked solemnly at her finger-nails.

"That's jolly, Miss Parlin. Just keep that little nose straight, so it won't be foreshortened or forelengthened. Now, young lady," continued the little artist, poking his roguish face between the bars of the chair, "afraid your dress won't take! too near—ahem—snuff color."

"Don't say snuff-color, Horace, or I'll sneeze, and that'll spoil my nose."

"O, what foolishness!" laughed Grace and Cassy.

"Hush! There, I've fixed the focus. Now, observe this fly on my jacket (coat, I mean), young lady, and don't you wink." Horace consulted a small bottle he held in his hand for a watch.

"These pictures were all failures," he said. "Some had 'no focus,' while others were 'all focus;' they 'flattered,' and were likewise too 'negative.'"

Meanwhile, the artist, Mr. Drake, much amused, brought in his photographic apparatus, and made a picture of the little group. This picture Mrs. Clifford purchased for Mrs. Parlin, instead of the many-nosed miniature of the baby.

The day before starting for the east, Prudy went with Mrs. Clifford, her cousins, and Cassy, to visit the hospital, which was filled with sick and wounded soldiers. They wanted to give something to every man they saw, and mourned when their "goody-basket" was emptied of its contents.

"O, ma," said Grace, with ready tears, "it just makes me feel like we must get up that fair, and raise money!"

"I only wish I could be here to help," said little Prudy.

"Come here, my dear," said a pale gentleman who heard the child's voice. "I cannot see you, for I am blind. Will you tell me who you all are?"

"Yes, sir; this is me, that's got your hand. My name is Prudy Parlin, and that boy that isn't in this room is Horace."

"Horace! Whose son?"

"He's my uncle Henry Clifford's son; but uncle Henry isn't his uncle: he's his father. Horace is his only son, and me, and Susy, and Dotty is my father's only daughters!"

"Possible! Now, my sweet little one, will you ask Horace to come here?"

It was Mr. Lazelle, with whom the Cliffords had travelled east the year before. They had a pleasant meeting. Horace had once been angry with this very gentleman for boxing his ears; but he forgot it all when he looked at the blind, helpless soldier, and wanted to open his savings' bank at once in his behalf.

Next day Prudy went home. Grace and all the Princesses wept bitterly at parting with the dear child; still, it was better for them that she should go away. She claimed too much of their attention at the very time when they should have thought only of study.