“Well,” said Cousin Ann, “what has that got to do with ’Lias knowing who did it?”
“Why, he wouldn’t know who to be grateful to,” cried Betsy.
“Oh,” said Cousin Ann. “Oh, I see. You didn’t do it to help ’Lias. You did it to have him grateful to you. I see. Molly is such a little girl, it’s no wonder she didn’t really take in what you girls were up to.” She nodded her head wisely, as though now she understood.
But if she did, little Molly certainly did not. She had not the least idea what everybody was talking about. She looked from one sober, downcast face to another rather anxiously. What was the matter?
Apparently nothing was really the matter, she decided, for after a minute’s silence Miss Ann got up with entirely her usual face of cheerful gravity, and said: “Don’t you think you little girls ought to top off this last afternoon with a tea-party? There’s a new batch of cookies, and you can make yourselves some lemonade if you want to.”
They had these refreshments out on the porch, in the sunshine, with their dolls for guests and a great deal of chatter for sauce. Nobody said another word about how to give the clothes to ’Lias, till, just as the girls were going away, Betsy said, walking along with the two older ones, “Say, don’t you think it’d be fun to go some evening after dark and leave the clothes on ’Lias’s doorstep, and knock and run away quick before anybody comes to the door?” She spoke in an uncertain voice and smoothed Deborah’s carved wooden curls.
“Yes, I do!” said Ellen, not looking at Betsy but down at the weeds by the road. “I think it would be lots of fun!”
Little Molly, playing with Annie and Eliza, did not hear this; but she was allowed to go with the older girls on the great expedition.
It was a warm, dark evening in late May, with the frogs piping their sweet, high note, and the first of the fireflies wheeling over the wet meadows near the tumble-down house where ’Lias lived. The girls took turns in carrying the big paper-wrapped bundle, and stole along in the shadow of the trees, full of excitement, looking over their shoulders at nothing and pressing their hands over their mouths to keep back the giggles. There was, of course, no reason on earth why they should giggle, which is, of course, the very reason why they did. If you’ve ever been a little girl you know about that.
One window of the small house was dimly lighted, they found, when they came in sight of it, and they thrilled with excitement and joyful alarm. Suppose ’Lias’s dreadful stepfather should come out and yell at them! They came forward on tiptoe, making a great deal of noise by stepping on twigs, rustling bushes, crackling gravel under their feet and doing all the other things that make such a noise at night and never do in the daytime. But nobody stirred inside the room with the lighted window. They crept forward and peeped cautiously inside ... and stopped giggling. The dim light coming from a little kerosene lamp with a smoky chimney fell on a dismal, cluttered room, a bare, greasy wooden table, and two broken-backed chairs, with little ’Lias in one of them. He had fallen asleep with his head on his arms, his pinched, dirty, sad little figure showing in the light from the lamp. His feet dangled high above the floor in their broken, muddy shoes. One sleeve was torn to the shoulder. A piece of dry bread had slipped from his bony little hand and a tin dipper stood beside him on the bare table. Nobody else was in the room, nor evidently in the darkened, empty, fireless house.