"There's that little boy again—maybe he'd play," suggested Sister, pointing to the red-haired, barefooted little boy who stood staring on the walk that led up to the porch.
He could not see through the screens very clearly, but he had heard the voices of the children and, stopping to listen, had drawn nearer and nearer.
"That's Mickey Gaffney," whispered Brother. "Hello, Mickey," he called more loudly. "Want to come play school with us?"
Mickey came up on the steps, and flattened his nose against the screen door.
"I dunno," he said doubtfully. "How do you play?"
Sister pushed open the door for him, and Mickey rather shyly looked about him.
"It's nice and shady in here," he said appreciatively. "You got a blackboard, ain't you?"
"You should say 'have' a blackboard and 'ain't' is dreadful," corrected Sister, blissfully unaware that "dreadful" was not a good word to use. "You can use the chalk if you'll be a scholar, Mickey."
Mickey was anxious to draw on the blackboard and he consented to play "just for a little."
As Brother had said, two scholars were ever so much better than one and they had a beautiful time playing together. Mickey, in spite of his ragged clothes, and bad grammar, knew how to play, and he suggested several new things that Sister and Brother had never done.