The kitchen was in its usual order; a boiled dinner was under way on the stove, beneath which the puppy slept, while Mrs. Pegrim sat mending some socks with the rocker drawn up close to the lounge upon which the lady baby was enthroned and playing gayly with a string of spools. When she saw Gilbert, she dropped them and tried to roll off the sofa to her feet.
"No, no!" said Mrs. Pegrim, pleasantly but decidedly, "it's too cold down there for little girls." Her face flushed, puckered up to cry; then, for some reason, she changed her mind and held out her arms.
"So she knows daddy already, does she?" crooned Gilbert, "and here's a little boy come to see her, the very first caller. Satira, this is Hugh Oldys from the Mills—Richard Oldys's boy, you know."
Richard Oldys was one of the representative men of this section of New England. He had rebuilt the original Harley's Mills near the mouth of the Moosatuck, for which the town had been named, and made them a great distributing centre of flour and all grains. The land had come down to his wife, whose mother had been a Harley and was, therefore, kin of the Misses Felton, who also had Harley blood in the female line. While a man of less wealth than John Angus, Oldys was so much more liberal with it, so much broader in his sympathies and culture, that nothing of importance was undertaken in the community without his advice and sanction. As for his wife,—in that clannish and conservative little town, almost old-world-like in its simplicity and loyalty to tradition,—it was a belief that a real Harley could do no wrong. Coupled with this, Pamela Oldys was a rare woman, almost too highly keyed to the needs and wishes of others for her own peace, and wrapped up in this boy Hugh, the only child that her frail health had allowed her.
Hugh surveyed the lady baby in silence for a moment, and then gravely shook her hand, saying, "How do you do?" A crow came from the prettily curved lips by way of answer, and she began a sort of game of peek-a-boo, covering her face with her hands and then peeping out. Evidently she had lived among responsive people.
"I suppose God sent her the same as usual," remarked Hugh, in the most matter-of-fact way. "She's nice and big though, being so new; they're mostly blinky and queer at first, like kittens. We've never had a baby at our house; they often have them next door, but not as nice as this one."
At this moment the puppy spied Hugh's rubber-boots that had been left at the door, and made a dash for them, for if there is anything a young dog loves, it is either shoe leather or shoe rubber.
"Hi! there's a puppy. Is it yours, Mr. Gilbert? I had a puppy once and it died, and father's going to buy me one of a better kind next Christmas. I'll be seven then. There's so many cats around the mill that I hope they won't scratch its eyes out."
"That pup belongs to the lady baby," answered Gilbert, who was now brushing his tousled hair in front of the mirror over the sink.
"Did it come with her?" asked Hugh, eagerly.