Letty and the Twins

by Helen Sherman Griffith

“Oh, yes, I would like to go, so much—if you can spare me, Mrs. Drake,” replied Letty, trying to think of some one else before herself.

Grandmother overheard this unselfish little speech and it helped to strengthen the resolve that was forming in her mind.

The picnic was a very jolly affair, and Letty felt that she had not enjoyed herself so much since that happy summer, three long years before—which she and her mother had spent out in the country near Willow Grove. When everybody had eaten as much as he or she could possibly hold (and Christopher a wee bit more) Letty won Huldah’s heart by insisting upon helping with the tidying up.

“I always help Mrs. Drake, so please let me,” she said.

The twins asked leave to help too, and found it great fun to wash dishes in the brook. The time passed by much more rapidly than any one realized and Letty had to run off very hastily at length, in order to be ready in time to take her place in the grand march at the opening of the circus performance. It was agreed before she left that Mr. Baker should return in the morning to see about Punch and Judy and he promised the twins to bring them with him, that they might have another visit with Letty.

Soon it was time for every one who was to attend the circus to go inside the tent. Grandfather gave Joshua tickets for Huldah and himself, and then he and grandmother and the twins crossed the wide field again.

THEY GIGGLED AT EVERYTHING THE CLOWN SAID

There was a great hubbub about the group of tents; men were calling out the attractions of the side-shows, a band was playing and boys moved about through the crowd with trays of peanuts and lemonade, shouting their wares in shrill, loud voices.

All boys and girls who have been to a circus know exactly how Jane and Christopher felt when they got inside that tent. It was not the first circus they had been to, by any means, but that does not make any difference; one always has that same furry creepiness in the back of one’s neck, and the same swelled-up, lost breath, wish-to-laugh-without-being-heard feeling.