A Dear Little Girl's Summer Holidays

by Amy Ella Blanchard

The children looked at each other with rather abashed faces, for they had not had sense enough to do that, and might not have thought of it but for Mrs. Cox.

"Before you give an account of yourselves," Ben went on, "I must telephone to Mrs. Ramsey and relieve her mind. We agreed that I was to do that and settled on a drug store where she would go to get any message I might have." He rushed off, leaving the little girls feeling very guilty. After all that Mrs. Ramsey had done for them to give her so much uneasiness, struck them both as being very heartless.

"I wish that old window was in the bottom of the sea before I ever stopped to look in," presently said Dorothy vindictively.

Edna made no reply. She knew that it was not the fault of the window, but of their own curiosity and heedlessness. They should have kept directly behind their friends, she well knew. Her mother had told her times enough that it was cowardly to blame inanimate objects for things which we were to blame for ourselves, and Aunt Elizabeth went further and said no one but a person without any [170]wits would abuse a senseless thing for what was his own thoughtlessness or carelessness.

But she was spared moralizing upon this to Dorothy, for Ben returned saying that Mrs. Ramsey would be here in a few moments and that the expedition to Lexington and Concord would be given up for the day, as it was too late now to undertake so long a trip. He was quite grumpy about it and the little girls were most unhappy at being under his displeasure, for Ben was usually the sunniest of persons and rarely gave them a cross look. He did not stay to talk to them now, but went to the door to meet Mrs. Ramsey when she should return and the children sat one at either end of the sofa, silent and downcast.

Mrs. Cox had not waited for further developments once she had seen that her charges were safe, and had gone out again. After what was a long time to the two culprits they saw Mrs. Ramsey and Ben approaching with Jennie. At sight of them Edna could no longer restrain her tears, but burst into a noiseless fit of weeping, and Dorothy, seeing this, began to do the same.

This was too much for Ben. He was very fond of his little cousin and hated to see her cry. "Here, here," he cried, "don't do that. Why, Ande, you are safe now. What's the use of crying when it's all over?" He sat down beside her and began to wipe away the tears. "I say, Mrs. Ramsey," he went on, looking up, "it is really my fault as much as theirs. [171]In that thickly settled part of the city, among all those crooked streets, I ought to have kept a better lookout for these children, and we don't know yet how it happened, anyhow. I haven't even asked them. They may have been knocked down or anything else may have happened for all we know."

The two felt that this was very generous of Ben, and their tears flowed less plentifully. Mrs. Ramsey drew up a chair and said in a pleasant, confidential tone, "Now tell us all about it. How did it happen?"

The children faltered out an explanation in which the queer things in the shop-window, the hideous old woman, the man at the church and the subway all figured. Once or twice Mrs. Ramsey repressed a smile, though for the most part she listened very soberly. At the close of the narrative she turned to Ben. "It is just as you said; we ought to have kept better watch upon them. One of us should have walked with them instead of leaving them to follow alone."

Ben nodded. "That's just what I think. Now, chicks, dry your eyes. We are going to have an early lunch and go somewhere, to see the glass flowers, very likely."