SCOUTS
WHEN, toward the latter part of March, the days were so warm that Johnnie was able once more to take short, daily walks, he never went without bringing home a box to split up for kindling. The box was an excuse. And he wanted the excuse, not to ease his conscience about leaving Grandpa alone, but to save himself should Big Tom happen home and find him gone.
So far as Grandpa was concerned, the feeble veteran scarcely seemed to know any more whether he was alone or not, there being small difference between the flat without Johnnie and the flat with Johnnie if Johnnie had a book. But also Grandpa always had some one else with him now—some one who comforted his old heart greatly. This was Letitia.
Grandpa had always shown much fondness for the old doll. And one day—soon after Cis received the new one—when Johnnie chanced to give Letitia into the hands of the old man, the latter was so happy that Johnnie had not taken Letitia away, and Cis had not. Instead, she gave the old doll to Grandpa. And so it came about that Letitia shared the wheel chair, where she lay in the crook of Grandpa's left arm like a limp infant (she was shedding sawdust at a dreadful rate, what with the neglect she was suffering of late), while her poor eyes fixed themselves on distance.
"She don't look like she's happy," Johnnie had declared to Cis more than once. "She looks like she's just standin' it."
"Why, Johnnie!" Cis had reproved, "And here you've always said that I was silly about her!"
"Who's silly?" Johnnie had demanded, defensive, and blushing furiously.
"Grandpa's tickled to have her," Cis had continued.
There the matter was dropped. Nevertheless, Johnnie had then formed a certain firm conviction, which he continued to hold. It was that Cis was lacking in loyalty to the old doll (forgetting that only recently he had hurled Letitia headfirst into the tiny room).
By the end of March Johnnie had begun to fret about One-Eye. He missed the cowboy sadly; and what made the latter's absence seem all the harder to bear was the belief that his friend was back in New York again, yet was not visiting the flat because he was, for some reason, displeased. With Cis?—about that new doll—or what?