“Wal’, ’twas all I could do to keep from dancin’, I dew declare,” said old Deacon Turnbull, which made every one laugh, as the deacon was a very dignified old man.
Helen rose and saying, “Now, Jotham,” she stepped behind the curtains. “Our next number,” announced Jotham, “will be a tableau as nearly as possible like the painting entitled ‘The Age of Innocence.’”
“That’s it over there,” said Mrs. Buffum to her husband, pointing at the photograph on the wall, and every one looked that way. When the curtain was drawn aside, there was chubby little Hitty Buffum, her hands clasped upon her breast, a wee bit of a smile on her parted lips—a very good counterpart of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s picture.
“Oh! oh my! She looks just like it. Isn’t she cunnin’?” and similar remarks greeted the little girl in the first tableau. She had done her very best for Miss Dayton. Then the curtain swung across the frame and Jotham announced, “The next number will be a song by little Miss Weston.”
“I didn’t know as the Weston children could sing, did you?” queried one neighbor, but there was no time for an answer, for little Prue had taken her place on the improvised platform, and Helen was playing a little prelude.
Mrs. Weston laid her hand upon her husband’s arm. Would Prue, her little Prue, get through the song without faltering? She need not have feared. Out rang the childish treble in the song which Miss Dayton had taught her. How fresh and clear the little voice sounded!
“Sometimes I am a daisy bloom,
I make believe ’tis true,
I play that all I ever eat
Is early morning dew.
“Sometimes I am a butterfly,—
Just see my gauzy wings!
Sometimes I play I am a bird,
Who only sits and sings.
“But always I am mama’s girl,
And papa’s girlie, too,
And next to them I love the best,
I love each one of you.”
Putting up her dimpled hands she daintily kissed her finger tips, made a very cunning little bow, and tripped back to Miss Dayton, saying, “Did I do it nice?”
“Just splendid, little Prue,” said Jotham.
“Couldn’t have been better,” said old Mrs. Green.