“You’re sure you’re not hurt, darling?” he added. “Well, since Cricket is not killed, it proves to be a good joke.”
“She must be hurt somewhere,” persisted mamma, still anxiously. “How could a child go head-foremost down stairs and not be hurt?”
“Nobody could but Cricket,” said her father, kissing her; “but I am coming to the conclusion that this young woman is not built of ordinary human material, but on the principle of indestructible dolls. She always comes right side up with care.”
“I thought I was killed just at first,” said Cricket, sitting up straight on her father’s knee, and still looking bewildered, “for the house seemed just to open and let me down, and the first thing I knew, papa was calling ‘Cricket.’”
“But now,” said mamma, “since nobody is seriously injured, you children may go back to bed and sleep quietly—if you can—the rest of the night. And remember that you must not one of you get up in the morning till you are called. That’s the only safe way. Eliza will call you at five o’clock, and you must not stir till then.”
In view of the circumstances, the children were quite willing to promise this, and soon quiet reigned again.
It was broad daylight in good earnest when the children opened their eyes next, in response to Eliza’s call. Their night’s experience seemed very far away in the light of day. The boys were already up and out, and were firing torpedoes at the girls’ windows. Cricket felt a little stiff and lame at first, but that soon wore off. She really did seem to be of some material unlike other children, for her constant accidents rarely disabled her, and she seldom had even a bad scar. When she nearly cut her finger off in the hay-cutter once, so that it hung by a thread of skin, she clapped it on and ran to her father, and it grew together like two pieces of melted wax. Deep cuts healed as if made in soft pitch. She had fallen from innumerable trees, and would come crashing through the branches, and land on the ground, stunned for a moment, perhaps, but with no further injuries. She was very slightly built, without an ounce of superfluous flesh on her slender bones, and she was very agile and flexible. She used to amuse her sisters by sitting on the ground and twisting both legs around her neck, like a clown in the circus. When she fell, she fell as a baby does, without making the slightest effort to save herself, and probably this was the reason why she escaped serious injury.
CELEBRATING THE FOURTH OF JULY.
When the girls appeared, the boys were ready with a fire of jokes concerning the midnight adventures. Archie suggested that it would be a good plan to pin a big label to the moon, so they need not mistake it again for the sun. Will chanted,—