"Mother, I love the old major!" I said one day.
"What major?" my mother asked, looking up from her work with a smile.
She was making small ruffled skirts and aprons with pockets. She could make the most beautiful things, all out of her own head.
"What major? Why, my major. Mother, has the old major any little girls or boys that I could play with? Oh, I should so like to play with his little girls and boys!"
"Major Daniel Clark hasn't any little girls or boys. He lost them all, dear. He is a very lonely man."
"Didn't he ever find them again, mother?"
"No, dear. Never again."
Now, I was very good at finding things. I found grandmother's spectacles ten times a day, even when they were only lost in her soft, white hair. And once I found mother's thimble when little brother Dick had it in his mouth, and it was just going down red lane. Norah said that I had a pair of bright eyes, and my very father, when he wanted his slippers, could think of no one so trustworthy to send as I. To find little girls and boys would be quite easy, for they were much larger things. I had only to ask all the girls and boys who came past my gate if they belonged to the major, and, when the right ones came, we would run hand-in-hand up to that distant door and go in. He would be so pleased, and never lonely again. And, perhaps—Just suppose that he would be my friend forever and ever!
I was waiting on my gate the next day when he came by.