“We won’t talk about this till after I have seen papa!” she said, gravely, and miserable Cricket went slowly off to bed.
Forlornly, she mounted the stairs. No thought of the new volume she had left on the rug came to her mind. Usually, it would have been safe enough, but to-night it chanced that Duster was in an unusually playful mood. All the older ones but mamma being out, and the younger ones in bed, Duster felt lonely, and wanted to play. He strolled into the library in search of amusement. The firelight played on the standing pages of the costly volume, open on the hearth-rug. Duster darted forward. With teeth and claws he worried the charming plaything, pitching it up, and shaking it vigorously, till the covers banged. He tore the leaves into fragments and chased them around, then settled down comfortably to chew up what was left.
It is but justice to Duster to say that he was generally a very well-behaved dog, and rarely did any mischief. He had his own playthings, and was expected to keep to them. Probably in the dim light, for mamma had turned down the gas, he did not realize that the new plaything was that forbidden delight, a book. However, in ten minutes the charming volume, with its beautiful pictures, and choice binding, was a wreck, and Duster trotted back to mamma, feeling perfectly virtuous, and much refreshed, as he lay down on her dress to take a nap.
But the next morning came Cricket’s reckoning with papa and mamma and the book—or rather with the remains of it.
Donald had returned the night before, saying that the Bruces had not seen papa, and mamma, of course, became very anxious. Donald had gone out again to two or three places where he thought his father might be, and then at the last minute had met him in the street. Dr. Ward had rushed to the station; Mr. Evans was there, hoping he might come, and they had a hurried talk, for fortunately the train was late. By this lucky chance, only, was a great amount of inconvenience saved to several people.
Then Dr. Ward came home to find mamma in the greatest anxiety; and then, to crown all, when they went into the library, there lay papa’s rare, new book, a wreck, upon the floor.
Cricket came from that interview the most wretched little girl that ever lived. It was seldom that her forgetfulness was the cause of so much mischief, and she had had a very severe lecture.
“I’m perfectly miserable,” Cricket sobbed, after papa had gone out. “I thought I was getting on so beautifully, and somehow, I felt sure that I was never going to forget again.”
“I’m afraid that was just the trouble, dear. Whenever you feel that you are most successful in overcoming a fault, then is just the time when you need double caution. ‘It’s always dangerous to be safe,’ you know.”
“Oh, is that what that saying means?” broke in Cricket. “I never could see how it was dangerous to be safe.”