“They said I could go next time,” grumbled Sunny Boy, not a bit sunnily. “Mother said so. ’Tain’t fair.”
“Don’t say ’tain’t,” corrected Araminta, who was very careful of Sunny’s grammar. “Say it isn’t fair. Only it is—how could you go when you were down in the field with your grandpa?”
Sunny Boy felt that if Araminta had deserted him, there was no friend left. He went on into the house and wept a little, curled up in the big leather chair in the sitting room. He felt very sorry for himself.
But even a little boy whose mother and grandmother have gone away and left him can not feel sorry very long when a June breeze is ruffling the white curtains at the window and there is a whole farm ready and waiting for him to come out and play. After a few big raindrop tears and a sniff or two, Sunny Boy wiped his eyes on his “hanky,” and decided that he would be brave and cheerful and then perhaps his family would be sorry to think how they had treated him.
He decided to make a kite and go out and fly it, the wind at the window making him think of kite-flying and the sight of a mass of papers on Grandpa’s desk in one corner of the room suggesting what to make the kite of. He went over to the desk and climbed upon the chair standing before it.
Ordinarily Sunny Boy had a good memory. He could remember things for Mother and he seldom forgot where he had left his toys, but this morning a strange thing happened—his memory did not work at all. He forgot completely that Mother had told him not to touch other people’s things without permission and that books and papers were not to be opened or even unfolded unless one first asked.
Sunny Boy thrust a hand down among the papers on Grandpa’s desk and pulled out two nice smooth brown pieces of paper that seemed strong and just exactly right for a kite. For good measure he took a letter or two, and then scurried out to the kitchen for string.
He had never made a kite, but he had often watched the boys in the park at home flying them, and he had a very good idea of how they were made. He had his own bottle of paste Mother had brought for him and he found the kind of sticks he wanted out in the yard. In half an hour he had the papers pasted smoothly over the sticks, a wiggly tail of crumpled papers from the waste-basket tied on, and yards and yards of string wound on a piece of wood. Sunny Boy was ready to sail his kite.
Araminta gave him a cookie and advised him to go down by the brook.
“There’s more breeze there,” she said. “But for mercy’s sake don’t fall in again. And come in when you hear me ring the bell.”