Roberta looked through the window at the counterfeit baby; she flew out on the porch, took it away from the awkward nurse, saying:
"You will never make a nurse, Polly; there's no use trying to teach you;" carried it in and laid it on the dismantled bed, just in time to prevent the drapery from slipping off and exposing the shining metal. She darkened the room, and sat there patting it and singing to it till the search was over and the soldiers gone. Then the child put her head in her mamma's lap, and sobbed from pure nervousness. But she had kept her promise, the loyal little soul. In years to come, she made and kept another promise, that the first one led to, as links in a chain.
In the muddy back yard Polly was strutting, proud as a peacock, in her scarlet sash. The ends swept the ground, and she glanced back over her shoulder at them every step. Roberta burst out laughing, Polly looked so ridiculous.
"O, Mamma!" she said, "do call Polly in and sing to her about—
"The little girl that was so vain,
Strutting up a dirty lane,
With mamma's best dress for a train,
O, fie, fie, fie! O, fie, fie, fie!
She'd better sweep cob-webs from the sky;
She'd better bake, she'd better stew,
She'd better knit, she'd better sew;
O, fie, fie, fie! O, fie, fie, fie!
The little girl put her finger in her eye,
Looked down at her shoe, and said 'boo-oo.'"
Now I am going to tell you how the soldier boy kept his promise.
Old Squire had loaded a wagon with pumpkins, golden-brown russet apples, and splendid potatoes to take into town, a few miles off. He promised to give the children a lift as far as the forks of the road. Roberta coaxed Aunt Judy to fix her a nice lunch. They wanted to gather wild grapes and nuts in the woods and have a tea-party besides. Aunt Judy fried her some spiced apple turnovers, made beaten biscuits, crisp and brown, split them while they were hot, buttered them, and put thin slices of pink ham between. Then she got at least one half of an iced white mountain cake, left from Sunday, and packed that in with the other things. Little did Roberta suspect who would eat that lunch, and think it the best lunch ever eaten.
It was good; Aunt Judy knew all about fixing lunches. She was a great "Camp-meeting" woman.
Roberta took up the basket and flew out to the wood-pile, where Uncle Squire was cutting wood. He saw her coming, and called out:
"Look out, honey! chips iz mity keerless things, you never know when they gwiner fly at you, like some fo'ks I knows."