Squib and His Friends

by Evelyn Everett-Green

“That is right, darlings,” answered the mother. “Make him happy, and give him a nice supper; for he’s a very good doggie, and very fond of little people”—and the twins trotted off hand-in-hand perfectly happy, with Moor snuggling in between them, very willing to do anything that was desired of him when Squib had explained that he would come too by-and-by.

So Squib sat at table with the elders that evening, at a meal that was something like dinner and tea and supper all rolled into one. He sat at a corner, between Mary and Philippa, and poured a perfect broadside of information into their willing ears as he ate. As for them, they listened greedily, and piled his plate with every kind of delicacy. It was nice to be home again, Squib thought, although he had enjoyed himself so much away. It was nice to find out how very kind his sisters were. He felt he had not quite appreciated them before. They were so glad to have him back, and made so much of him, although he was younger than they, and they wanted to know everything that he had to tell them.

But it was getting late to-night; and mother by-and-by told him he must run off to bed, and finish his stories to-morrow. Squib felt that it would take a great many to-morrows before all was told; but when he came to think of it, he found that he was rather sleepy, and he did want to see how his own little iron bedstead would look after the funny wooden ones he had slept on all these weeks.

His bedroom was in the nursery wing, and he had to pass his little sisters’ door before he reached his own. As he softly stepped along the matted corridor, he heard the soft flopping of a tail against the boards, and found Moor stretched out upon the mat just outside the night-nursery.

“Good dog! good Moor!” he said, pausing to pat him. “Yes, take care of the little mistresses all night. Good dog! good old fellow!”

The sound of his voice attracted the attention of nurse, who came out of the day-nursery with a beaming face.

“Master Squib, my dear, how well you look, and how brown! and I declare if you haven’t grown, too! Well, we shall all be glad to see you back, I am sure. The young ladies have missed you sadly since you went. But there, there, as I tell them, they’ll have to get used to it, seeing that you are just going off to school.”

“But it’s nice of them to miss me—I didn’t think they would,” said Squib, holding nurse’s hand and looking up into her face, and thinking how nice and kind it was. “Oh, nurse, Lisa sent her love to you, and such a lot of messages. I’ve got something in my box that she knitted for you, too. I’ve got such a lot of things to unpack to-morrow. I’ve brought such a heap of things home. And Moor has come instead of Czar. I’m dreadfully sorry poor Czar is dead; but I think the children will like Moor better. And he is our very own; and we may have him in the nursery, mother says.”

Squib looked up under his eyebrows at nurse as he spoke, for he was not quite sure how she would take to the idea of a nursery dog—she had never favoured Czar’s presence there; but she was looking quite smiling and pleasant, and even put out a hand to stroke Moor, who had come up at the sound of his name, and seemed to desire to propitiate the presiding authority of these regions.

“Well, he seems a nice, faithful, attached creature, and Miss Hilda and Miss Hulda are so set on animals, there’s no keeping them away. If your mother does not mind having the dog up here, and he’ll be clean and quiet, I don’t say but he might be useful in his way. It’s a long way from here to the kitchens when I’m at supper, and now you’ll be so much away, Master Squib, I confess I haven’t always been quite comfortable to think of leaving them all alone, in the dark days, so far from everybody. But a nice, sensible dog up here beside their door would make me quite happy. And he seems wonderful understanding with children—as though he was used to them. I’ve taken rather a fancy to him myself, I own; though I never liked that big Russian fellow. I never felt that he mightn’t turn upon them if they teased him; and he’d soon have made an end of a child if he’d been angry.”