The Story of Dago

by Annie F. Johnston

"Her room was always in perfect order. Even her toys were never left scattered about the house. She has her old doll packed away now, in lavender, in nearly as good condition as when it was given to her, sixty years ago. You can see how anything would annoy her that would break in on these lifelong habits of hers. She was a child that took great pleasure in her little keepsakes, and the longer she owned them the dearer they became. She kept that little gold coin, that her grandfather gave her, for over half a century; and that is the dollar that Dago lost. Do you wonder that she grieved over the loss of it?

"The old blue china dragon is one of her earliest recollections. It used to sit on a cabinet in her grandmother's room, and there were always sugar-plums in it, as there have been ever since it was given to her. I can remember it myself when I was a boy. One of the pleasures of my visit to the old house was listening in the firelight to grandfather's 'dragon tales,' as we called them. They were about all sorts of wonderful things, and we called them that because, while he told them, the old dragon was always passed around and we sat and munched sugar-plums. That jar has been in the family so long that your great-great-grandfather remembered it when he was a boy,—and that is the jar that Dago broke.

"There were very few children in the neighbourhood where your Aunt Patricia lived. For a long time she had no playmates except the little boy who lived on the adjoining place, Donald McClain. But he came over nearly every day for four years, and they grew to love each other like brother and sister. It was a lonesome time for the little Patricia when the McClains moved away. Donald brought her a tiny carnelian ring the day he came over for the last time. 'To remember me by,' he said, and she put it on her finger and remembered him always, as the kindest, manliest little playmate any child ever had.

"She grew up after awhile to be a beautiful young girl. I will show you her miniature sometime, with the pearls around it. The little carnelian ring was too small then, and she had to lay it away; but she never forgot her old playmate. When she was nineteen her mother died, and, soon after, her father lost his eyesight, and she gave up all her time to caring for him. She sang to him, read to him, led him around the garden, and amused him constantly. She never went anywhere without him, never thought of her own pleasure, but stayed alone with him in the quiet old house, year after year, until he died.

"Donald came back once after he was a man, and had been through college, and stayed all summer in his old home. He was going to Scotland in the fall. Before he left, he asked Aunt Patricia to be his wife and go with him. She said, 'I would, Donald, if I were not needed so much here at home; but how could I go away and leave my poor old blind father?'

"He would not take no for an answer, but went away, saying that he would be back again in a year, and then they would take care of the dear old father together. But when the year was over, the ship that was bringing him home went down at sea in a storm, and all that Aunt Patricia had left of his was his letters, and the little carnelian ring he had given her, when they were children, to 'remember him by.' And that is the ring that Dago lost."

Phil raised his head quickly from his father's shoulder. "Oh, papa!" he cried. "I'm so sorry! I never could have said anything mean to her if I had known all that."

His father went on. "That is why I am telling you this now, my son. Maybe children could understand old people better, if they knew how much they had suffered in their long lives, how much they had lost, and how much they had given up for other people's sakes. Aunt Patricia has been like a mother to me ever since I was left without any, when I was Stuart's age. She sent me to college, she gave me a home with her until I was successfully started in my profession, and has shown me a thousand other kindnesses that I have not been able to repay. I have been able to make up to her what she has spent in money, but a lifetime would not be long enough to cancel my debt to her for all the loving care she has given me. But even if she hadn't been so kind; even if she were crabbed and cross and unreasonable, I couldn't let a son of mine be rude to an old lady under my roof. One never knows what troubles have whitened the hair and made the wrinkles come in the temper as well as the face. Old age must be respected, no matter how unlovely.

"As for Aunt Patricia,—if you would only remember how good she was to you after your accident, how she nursed you, and waited on you, and read to you hour after hour,—she has been tender and loving to all of you, especially little Elsie, and is trying to help me bring up my children as best we can, alone. And, Phil, my boy, sometimes it is as hard for us as it is for you, to always know what is best to do without the little mother's help."

Phil's arm stole around his father's neck. "I'll ask Aunt Patricia's pardon in the morning, the very first thing," he said, in a low voice. "I'll tell her that I didn't understand her, just like she didn't understand me, and after this I'll be like the three wise monkeys of Japan."