Transcriber’s Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

CRICKET

HOW CRICKET DELIVERED THE MESSAGE.

CRICKET

BY

ELIZABETH WESTYN TIMLOW

ILLUSTRATED BY

Harriet R. Richards

BOSTON

ESTES AND LAURIAT

PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1895,

By Estes and Lauriat

Typography and Printing by

C. H. Simonds & Co.

Electrotyping by Geo. C. Scott & Sons

Boston, U. S. A.

TO

My Little God-Daughter,

HELEN MUNN.

CONTENTS.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

CRICKET

CHAPTER I.
CRICKET.

Kayuna was the loveliest home in the world. At least, the Ward children said so. The family usually went out of the city as soon as the children’s schools closed, in June, and stayed in the country till quite the first of October.

Kayuna was also the name of a brook that danced gayly through the lower part of the grounds of the summer home, and that was a never-failing delight to the children. The house itself was wide, old-fashioned and roomy, with such a splendid great garret as you never saw before, for rainy days.

Do you want to know how many Wards there were? Well, let me count. Of course, first to be mentioned came Doctor papa, and dear, beautiful mamma, who was never very strong. Then there was Donald, who was seventeen, and a big fellow, as well, and Marjorie, who was two years younger, but who already began to give herself grown-up airs. Eunice was next, nearly twelve. Then came Cricket, the “middleman.” They never knew whether to take her with the older ones, or leave her at home with the small fry. Donald would call her “trundlebed trash,” to her great indignation. Her name was really Jean, but she was such a chirpy, cheery little soul, that Cricket seemed just to suit her. Below her were the six-year-old twins; and, lastly, baby Kenneth, everybody’s pet, who was nearly three.

Wasn’t that a house full? And such a noise as they were equal to when they set about it! Mamma often said that it was fortunate that the roof was high and the walls were strong, else surely the house would have come down about their ears.

This year, to the wild delight of the entire family, papa had decided to go out into the country very early, on mamma’s account, for she needed the country air. So the middle of April found them comfortably settled for a long, lovely summer.

It was so early that papa thought it quite worth while for Eunice and Cricket, at least, to go to the country school for the rest of the term, while the older ones had lessons at home with him.

Cricket, especially, was greatly delighted with this arrangement. Her little friend, Hilda Mason, of whom she was very fond, of course went to school, and it was such fun going together. The little girls were delighted to be with each other, and Hilda always looked forward to the summer, when Cricket would come out into the country.

Hilda was a year older than Cricket, for she was eleven in June, and Cricket was ten in August. By reason of this extra year, she always thought Cricket should do just as she, Hilda, wanted.

Hilda was an only child, and lived with her mother and grandmother, who thought her perfect. Cricket, on the other hand, was very used to giving up her own way, as children in a large family generally are. Hilda was a quiet, demure little girl, with polite, grown-up manners. She always remembered to say “How-do-you do!” and that mamma sent her love, and she never forgot any errand she was sent on.

Cricket was a heedless little witch, and rarely, by any chance, remembered anything she was told to do. Her father always said that any errand she was given meant two, for she was never known to bring home both her package and her change at the same time.

Hilda was pretty, with big brown eyes and long, orderly, golden curls. She was plump and straight, and rather proper.

Cricket had short, brown curls, every one of which took a different kink, and gray-blue eyes that twinkled like merry little stars. She was thin and tall for her age, and her papa used to tease her by calling her long legs “knitting-needles,” and offering them to mamma for her fancy knitting.

Every morning Hilda called for Cricket on her way to school. If Cricket had gone off earlier, having been sent on some errand, as often happened, she left a little red stone on the gate-post, as a sign to her little friend that she had gone. If Hilda came by early and couldn’t stop, as seldom happened, she picked up the little red stone from its hiding-place, and left it for Cricket to see.

But, usually, Hilda turned in at the gates promptly at twenty minutes of nine, and walked up the long avenue, around to the side piazza. Then she would open the door, and call gently up the side staircase, “Ready, Cricket?”

A voice from above would answer, promptly, “I’m coming. Have you got your sums?” and Cricket would come out of her room at the head of the stairs, giving a last, smoothing touch to her kinky hair.

Then she would plunge down stairs, usually arriving at the bottom by way of the bannisters, provided she did not trip at the top and come down head-foremost. Next would follow a wild search for her hat, until she remembered she had left it last night in the grape arbour; then her sacque must be found, and that was probably hanging on some tree,—where she had taken it off to climb better. Strange to say, her books were generally at hand, for heedless Cricket loved to study.

Hilda always carried her school-books in a neat little bag, for she said that a strap bent the edges of the books. Cricket strapped hers as tightly as possible, for she liked to swing them by the long end as she walked along. Besides, they made a splendid thing to throw at a stray cat,—which she never hit.

By the time she was fairly ready, Eunice would appear, fresh and sweet and unhurried. Then Hilda and Eunice would walk quietly down the piazza steps, while Cricket would say, “Want to see me jump off the piazza as far as that stone?” Off she would shoot through the air, and, alighting, would race down the avenue, to wait panting at the gate till Hilda and Eunice should come up. Then for two minutes, perhaps, they would keep side by side, while they talked over those dreadful decimals, which they hated so.

Hilda and Eunice kept straight along the shady path, but Cricket was seldom known to walk. She ran, she skipped, she danced, she went backward, and varied the way still further by betaking herself to the stone fences, wherever they were smooth enough on top.

When they arrived at school Hilda was orderly, cool and sweet, and as trim as if she had just left her mother’s hands; Cricket had riotous looking clothes, hot, tumbled curls, hat hanging off her head, but was always dimpling and smiling, and serenely sure that every one would greet her with a shout.

Eunice sat with her particular friend, Edith Craig, but Cricket and Hilda shared the same desk, to the distraction of the long-suffering teacher. She was always threatening to separate them, but her heart would melt, at the last minute, at their beseeching looks and penitent vows to be good and study hard, and never whisper any more. They usually did have their lessons, as it happened, for they were both bright, and both fond of study.

Hilda was not altogether a favourite, for she was apt to be both selfish and exacting, often a little jealous, and always determined to be first in everything. She was quick in all her studies but her arithmetic, and here Cricket excelled, greatly to Hilda’s disgust. Many a time she slyly rubbed out Cricket’s just completed work, and the surprised child would presently whisper, “Did you ever! I’ve gone and rubbed out my to-morrow’s examples by mistake. Did you ever see such a goose?” and by the time she had done them again, Hilda would have been able to make up her work.

Altogether their friendship was just on this basis: Hilda always wanted her own way, and Cricket was willing she should have it; so they got on swimmingly.

Nevertheless, one day they quarrelled. It happened in this wise:

Playing charades was one of the children’s favourite amusements. At Kayuna there was a fine, large nursery, opening off the wide hall, which gave a splendid field for action, and the good-natured nurse was always ready to help them out with their plans.

One rainy Saturday the whole troop were indoors, and after luncheon charades were voted for. There were Eunice and her little friend, Edith Craig, Hilda, Cricket, the twins, Helen and Zaidee, and Kenneth.

Kenneth was a star, by the way. He was always willing to be pulled about like a rag-doll, and really seemed to enjoy it. They would roll him up for a caterpillar, and stand him up straight for a post, and sprawl him out for a spider. He would take any position they put him in, as if he were wax, and would inquire anxiously, after the scene was over, “Did I do zat all right?”

On this particular day, for some reason, none of them were quite as good-natured as usual. Perhaps they had been together rather too long, for Edith and Hilda had both arrived quite early, and had stayed to luncheon. Perhaps, also, the unusual confinement in the house made them all a little irritable.

The children usually divided themselves into actors and audience, by turns. Cricket and Hilda had the stage now, with Kenneth as support. Eunice and Edith, with the twins, therefore, were audience.

The little actors were searching their brains for a new word to act. “Penobscot,” and “connundrum,” and “goldsmith,” and “antidote” had already been used, with dozens of others.

“I know,” cried Cricket, brightening up. “Let’s take secure.”

“Secure? Well, how shall we do it?” questioned Hilda.

“Why, sick-cure, of course,” answered Cricket, promptly. “Won’t that do? In the first scene, Kenneth would be sick—”

“And I’d be the doctor,” put in Hilda.

“And I’d be his mother,” went on Cricket.

“And I’d come and see him and give him some pills—”

“And in the next scene we’d cure him.”

“I ’on’t tate any pills,” announced the baby behind them, unexpectedly, and very decidedly.

“Oh, yes, you will,” said Hilda, impatiently, “they won’t taste bad—just little make-believe pills.”

“I don’t lite ’em,” wailed the baby, rebelling, for the first time, against his elders. He was tired, poor little fellow, for he had gone through many experiences that afternoon. He had been wound on to a lap-board with shawls, to represent an Esquimau baby. He had been placed on a very insecure table, with newspaper wings tied on his bare shoulders, to pose as a Cupid. Besides this, he had been Daniel in the lion’s den, with Zaidee and Helen as lions, growling and spitting so frightfully around him, and making such an alarming pretence of eating him up, that he had fled, in sudden dismay, to the audience, to take refuge behind Cricket, who was always his protection in times of trouble.

Now, the suggestion of pills was more than the little fellow could stand.

“Just pretend, baby dear,” coaxed Cricket. “See, I’ll sit down here with this funny old cap on, and this shawl over my shoulders, and I’ll play I’m your mamma,” dressing herself as she spoke. “And then,” she went on, “you can lie on my lap, this way, and Hilda will put on Donald’s overcoat and those big spectacles. Just see how funny she looks! and she’ll put that fur cap on her head, and she’ll come in and feel your pulse, and say, ‘Very sick child, marm.’ And then, she will only just pretend to give you some pills.”

Kenneth still looked doubtful, but Cricket caught up a shawl and wrapped it around him, and drew his head down.

“That’s a good boy. Put your head down on mamma’s arm,” she said, still coaxingly.

“I doesn’t ’ant to,” fretted Kenneth, but, nevertheless, he stretched himself obediently on Cricket’s lap. As his head dropped back, he shut his eyes very tightly, as he was told, and opened his mouth very wide, as he always did, in the funniest way, whenever he shut his eyes to order.

CHAPTER II.
THE QUARREL.

Now, Hilda was a good deal of a tease, in a quiet way. The little fellow looked so funny as he lay there with closely shut eyes, and wide-open mouth, that, quick as a flash, came the impulse to throw something in it. She turned to the washstand close by, where was still standing some water in which they had just washed their hands. Nurse’s big thimble was on the washstand also, and Hilda snatched it up, and emptied a thimbleful of the water right down the poor baby’s throat.

There was a gurgle, a howl, a choke, and Kenneth lay gasping and struggling for breath, for the water had gone down his little windpipe. The audience from the hall, and nurse from an adjoining room, came rushing in. Poor little Kenneth was purple in the face. Nurse snatched him up and patted his back, and blew in his mouth, to make him catch his breath.

Hilda stood frightened at the mischief she had unthinkingly done. Cricket turned upon her, in a sudden blind fury of rage, for almost the first time in her life.

“You mean, mean, horrid girl! To treat my baby so! I hate you, there! You’re always doing mean things, and you always take the biggest of everything, and you’ve made baby cry before.”

“You are mean,” chimed in Eunice; “I’ve seen you rub out Cricket’s sums, and I always meant to tell everybody, when I got a good chance.”

“And I know who ate up all my candy,” added Edith.

“You tooked my dolly and hided her, and I cried!” put in Zaidee, joining the attacking force.

“And I know who’s a sneak, and told on Mabel Wilson, when none of the other girls would!” cried Eunice.

“You’re the selfishest, meanest old thing!” it was Cricket’s turn again. She had gotten hold of Kenneth now, and he was clinging with both arms around the neck of his favourite sister.

“To pour that horrid, dirty water down his throat, just to tease him,” went on Cricket, furiously. “I’ll never forgive you, and I won’t play with you any more, forever ’n’ ever, ’n’ I wish you’d go home this moment, Hilda Mason, there!”

Hilda stared helplessly, as the unexpected words rained around her. Could they be really talking to her? Was it her little Cricket who was blazing like a little fury, and actually telling her to go home? She was quite too frightened to speak, at first, as the angry group around her all talked at once.

“I didn’t mean,” she faltered, at last; then she, too, burst into angry tears. “You’re horrid, rude girls to say such things to company,” she sobbed. “I’m going straight home to tell mamma how you treated me, and she’ll never let me come here again.”

“You’d better go right away, Miss Hilda,” said nurse, dryly, and she brought the little girl’s hat and put on her sacque. Hilda had never been at all a favourite with her, for she had often seen her slyly tease the little ones.

Hilda marched off abused, excited and angry. The idea—the very idea of such language to her, to Hilda Mason, whom everybody called so good, and who was used to being held up as the model child of the neighbourhood.

HILDA BY THE BROOK.

And Cricket, her dear Cricket, whom she really loved heartily, had told her she hated her, and would never forgive her, and wouldn’t ever play with her any more.

What had she done to deserve all this? Why, nothing at all; only poured a little water down the baby’s throat, when he looked so funny, lying there with his eyes squeezed shut, and his mouth wide open. She didn’t know it would choke him so; of course she didn’t mean to hurt him. Such a fuss about nothing. Then, suddenly, they all flew at her, and said dreadful things, right before nurse. Hilda did not realize that such an outbreak is seldom as sudden as it seems, and that many grievances will often smoulder for a long time, till some trifle fires the flame.

She walked along, miserable enough, half-crying, half-indignant. The rain had ceased, and the sky had cleared, so she stopped by the brook in the grassy lane, which the children used as a short cut, and sat down by the little bridge. She was ashamed to go on into the village street while she was crying.

Here she and Cricket had spent many happy hours, and had never, never quarrelled before. She did not stop to think, then, to whom the credit of this belonged. Cricket certainly always did as Hilda wished, but she was sure she was equally ready to do as Cricket wished, wasn’t she? She began to think. Cricket always liked to keep on through the woods to Hilda’s house, while she liked to strike off into the village street. How seldom they went through the woods, although it was nearer, and Cricket liked it so well! Cricket loved marsh-mallows, while Hilda was devoted to chocolate-creams; but when they spent their weekly pennies together for candy, as they always did, how was it they so rarely bought marsh-mallows? Hilda’s conscience pricked her faintly.

“Well, I am always willing she should buy them, if she’d just say she would, any way,” she reflected, uneasily.

But then, Cricket never did say she “would, anyway.”

What a delight it was to her little friend to be out in the fields and woods, searching out the earliest wild-flowers, exploring for the first chestnuts, perfectly happy if she were simply out-of-doors. She, herself, preferred quiet, indoor sports and dolls, excepting when the weather just suited her, and was neither too warm nor too cold. Did they ever stay out when she did not wish to?

And she did rub out Cricket’s examples, often and often.

“Cricket was so quick,” she argued, with her conscience, “and she could do them right over, and she didn’t like to get behind herself. Cricket was such a silly, not to guess it.” And why shouldn’t she take the biggest of anything? One of them had to have it, and she was the oldest. Still, she remembered, with another faint sting of conscience, she didn’t like it when Eunice took things for the same reason, and Cricket had to yield to them both.

Had Cricket ever been heard telling the twins they must do certain things because they were younger?

Hilda began to feel very queerly. She was so used to praise and petting, that the plain speeches she had heard had almost taken her breath away, true though they were. Cricket was always being lectured, because she was careless and disorderly, and heedless and forgetful, and Hilda had always felt superior. But was she really horrid? was she hateful? was she selfish? was she a sneak?

“Mamma doesn’t think so, anyway,” she said, with a little sob. But it was that very morning, when she asked permission to go and see Cricket, that her mother had hesitated, and said,—

“I thought perhaps you would be willing to stay at home this morning, darling. My head aches badly, and poor, sick grandmamma says she has scarcely seen her little girl this week.”

But Hilda looked so abused that her mother hastened to add,—

“Never mind, dear, go on and have a good time, but I would like you to come home to lunch;” and the little girl had neglected her mother’s words, as of no importance.

It was a very sober, subdued Hilda, who, much later, slipped quietly into the house.

Her mother had been in bed all day, with one of her worst headaches, the maid said, and she herself had been sitting with grandmamma, and reading to her, for the old lady felt very lonely. Hilda winced as she thought of that hard, rasping voice reading to an invalid.

Mrs. Mason heard her little girl’s voice and spoke to her, and Hilda crept quietly into her mother’s room. She knew, well enough, that her little soft fingers had magic power to drive away mamma’s nervous headaches, but usually it was “such a bother” to sit in the darkened room, that often, as she now guiltily remembered, she had slipped away, when she knew mamma had a headache, lest she should be asked to do it. Oh, she was a selfish, selfish Hilda!

That night, when her head was better, mamma and Hilda had a long talk. The whole story came out, and Hilda confessed that she believed that she was the horridest, selfishest girl in the whole town. And her mother’s tears fell quietly and fast, as she realized, for the first time, how she had been spoiling her darling. Because her little daughter was dainty and orderly, and sweet and polite, she had been ruining her with too much praise, and letting her grow up selfish and inconsiderate.

“We will both begin again, my little girl,” she said, holding Hilda close. “And to begin with, do you know you ought to tell Cricket you are sorry?”

“Oh, mamma, I can’t—oh, I can’t! I shouldn’t know anything what to say.”

“It is the only honourable thing to do, darling. You have been much to blame. I will tell Cricket for you, if you like. She is a dear little girl, and I’m sure she will forgive you and love you just the same.” Nevertheless, Hilda could not quite make up her mind, that night, to take this step.

The next Monday she started off, very soberly and unhappily, for school. As she turned into the lane, however, she saw a familiar little red dress fluttering by the hedge, and in a moment Cricket came in view. Both little girls stopped and looked at each other shyly for a moment. Cricket spoke first.

“Mamma says I was very rude to you,” she began, very soberly, but Hilda ran up to her, impulsively, and threw both her arms around her neck.

“I was rude and horrid, Cricket, and I did rub out your sums, and I’ve teased the children, and I’ve torn up your jography questions often and often; and I should think you’d hate me.” Hilda said all this in a breath.

Cricket looked too astonished to speak.

“Oh, please, Cricket, forgive me, and love me just the same, and we’ll always buy marsh-mallows, for I like them pretty well, and it doesn’t make any difference if I don’t!” finished Hilda, very much mixed up, but very much in earnest.

But Cricket, while she did not quite understand all Hilda meant, was, nevertheless, only too glad to kiss and make friends, and so their quarrel was made up.

CHAPTER III.
DAMMING THE BROOK.

One bright May morning three little maids sat perched on the topmost rail of an old fence down by the brook. It was very pleasant just at that particular spot, where the tiny stream babbled along gayly in its wide, deep bed. There was only a ribbon of water there now, though early in the spring the current ran full and strong. The trees in the neighbouring woods waved and nodded their heads in cordial welcome to their constant little visitors.

This was a favourite spot with these little people, for they were well out of sight of the rest of the world. The lane curved around the hill which was behind them, wound over the rustic bridge, and lost itself in the green woods on the other side. Below them were the meadows, where loads of “roosters”—as country children call the sweet little white violets—grew in abundance.

There sat the three little maids, I say, swinging their black-stockinged legs, and nodding their three heads, black, brown and golden, keeping time to the clatter of their busy tongues.

There was so much to talk about, you see, for Hilda’s mamma had promised her that she might have all her little friends come to supper next week, to celebrate her eleventh birthday. Of course they had to arrange about the invitations and the amusements.

At last Cricket’s active body tired of being still so long, and she began to look around for exercise, for she had been sitting there for quite fifteen minutes. She edged along on her somewhat unsteady seat, when suddenly the treacherous rail turned completely over, and laid her on her back in the soft meadow grass. Hilda and Eunice shouted with laughter, for such an accident was so like Cricket; but the little girl, not in the least troubled, picked herself up. To be sure, there was a jagged tear in her fresh, blue gingham, and a great grass-stain on it, as well, but these were every-day affairs.

She jumped over the fence and sat down on the end of the wooden bridge, which crossed the road, with her feet hanging over the water, idly dropping pebbles down. Presently this inspired her with a new idea.

“Oh, girls!” she exclaimed, “let’s dam up the brook!”

This proposal immediately met with the greatest favor. Hilda and Eunice jumped briskly down, and Cricket jumped briskly up. The stone wall along the road supplied them with material, and they fell energetically to work.

Back and forth they went like little beavers, carrying stones instead of wood. They stood at the end of the bridge, and dropped the stones down, splash, just in the right place. It was great fun, tugging at the stones from the wall, finding the loose ones they could take, without leaving too large a space; or pulling out the wrong one, and bringing half a dozen more rattling about their feet, so that they had to jump, screaming, out of the way. Then they must tug and strain to roll them up the bank to the lane, and then on to the bridge, and over into the stream.

Being, as I said, a lonely, out-of-the-way place, it happened that no one passed to notice the mischief the children were doing. So they worked away undisturbed.

They lifted stones that were twice the size of their own heads, quite scorning the little ones, excepting to fill in with. When they presently paused to take breath and to survey their work, the stones lay closely packed together from side to side, and the water was deepening fast. Panting and quite tired out, they threw themselves on the grassy bank to rest.

“I’m glad,” sighed Cricket, “that I’m not a dammer by trade.”

“If you were,” said Eunice, wisely, “you would be a strong man, and then it would not be hard work.”

“What are you going to do, girls, when you’re grown-up?” asked Hilda.

“I know,” answered Cricket, promptly; “I thought of it last night. I’m going to write hymns for the missionaries, and p’raps I’ll be a missionary myself. Anyway, I’d like to go to Africa and have all the bananas I could eat, for once.”

“I won’t be a missionary,” returned Hilda, with decision. “I don’t want to go to Africa. Horrid old skeeters and things, and cannibals to eat you up.”

“I’d convert them. That’s what missionaries are for,” answered Cricket, serenely.

“But you wouldn’t get a chance,” persisted Hilda. “They’d catch you and kill you and eat you up just as quick. You’d be in somebody’s stomach before you could say Jack Robinson.”

“But hymns, Cricket,” said Eunice, who had been meditating over the word, rather overcome by the ambition of her younger sister. “Would you write hymns like those in the hymnbook?”

“Yes. Of course they might not be quite so good just at first, but I could practise. I made up one last night. Do you want to hear it? It’s rather long.”

“Yes, indeed,” cried both the others, much impressed.

And Cricket cleared her throat, and began:——

“A big, black cannibal lived by the sea,

And he was black as he could be,

And he ate up children, one, two, three.

“One day he found a little child,

A little white one, meek and mild,

And the little boy looked up and smiled.

“‘Oh, don’t you know it’s wrong,’ said he,

‘To eat a little child like me?

And God won’t love you then, you see.

“‘And don’t you know if you’re not good,

And don’t do everything you should,

And eat up children in the wood,

“‘You will not then to Heaven go,

But you will suffer down below,

And wonder why you did do so?’

“The cannibal was softened through,

And said to him, ‘Forgive me, do,

And I will go to Heaven with you.’

“If little children only knew

All the good that they could do,

They’d be missionaries, too.”

“Oh, it’s lovely!” exclaimed both little girls, as Cricket finished her very rapid recitation.

“Cricket! how could you make that all up?”

“Some parts of it were hard,” answered Cricket, modestly. “I couldn’t get the rhymes right at first, and I had to change it some. I wanted to say——

“The cannibal fell on his knees,

And said to him, ‘Forgive me, please,’

but I couldn’t think of another rhyme to match it.”

“Well, it’s beautiful,” said Eunice, drawing a long breath of admiration.

“Aren’t you rested now?” asked Cricket, jumping up. “Let’s dump some more stones over. Oh—oh! look at the brook!”

They had been resting for half an hour, under a tree, with their backs to the brook. Now, as they approached it, they were amazed to see how much their work had deepened the water. Instead of a narrow trickle that they could easily jump over, it had widened to a deep pool just above the stones.

“Oh-h!” squealed the children, in delight. Cricket plunged forward to plug up a tiny little hole in their dam. Of course she stopped on an insecure stone, and of course, in attempting to get her balance, she stumbled forward, and stepped into the water up to her knees.

“There; I knew Cricket would do that,” said Hilda, calmly.

Cricket scrambled out.

“My feet are wet,” she remarked, with much surprise. Both the other girls shouted with laughter.

“Did you think the water wasn’t wet?” asked Hilda.

Going home for dry stockings and shoes never occurred to Cricket. It would have been altogether too much trouble. She pulled off her soaked shoes and stockings, and spread them on a sunny stone to dry, and danced around in her little bare feet.

But the stones hurt her tender skin, and the hot sand blistered it. So she sat down on the bank, further up, and dabbled her feet in the clear, running water. The others immediately desired to follow suit, when Cricket “set the Psalm,” as their old nurse used to say, and in a few minutes six little bare feet were paddling about.

“It’s very strange,” said Cricket, at last, after a brief fit of silence, “that Eunice never falls in the water, nor tears her clothes, nor anything. I b’lieve my mother’d just think herself in luck if she had two like you, ’stead of me. I’m the most misfortunate girl always.”

Eunice was a careful little girl, and not nearly so much of a romp as Cricket was. She seldom did have the accidents that so constantly befel her heedless little sister.

“You do so many more things than I do,” Eunice hastened to explain. “You do things that I’m afraid to do.”

“I’m afraid this minute,” remarked Hilda.

“Afraid! why, what of?” exclaimed both the others, in chorus.

“’Fraid we’ve got to go home. It’s twelve o’clock, for there’s the whistle.”

“Oh, is that all! I thought you must have seen a snake, at least,” laughed Cricket, drawing on her damp stockings and stiff shoes. “Ugh! these stockings feel just like frogs.”

“We must come back to-morrow,” said Hilda, as they trudged off, “and see how deep this water is, and we will get some boards and make a raft, and have piles of fun.”

CHAPTER IV.
THE CONSEQUENCES.

But both Monday and Tuesday were unfavourable for nautical adventures, for they brought a driving, pouring rain. Wednesday was too damp for them to go to the meadows at all, and on Thursday came the famous birthday party. So it happened that their dam was forgotten till Saturday, when they turned their steps brookward.

“Oh, look at the water!” they cried, in one breath, as they came around the curve. They could hardly believe their eyes, for a wide, deep stream filled the bed from side to side. The combination of the heavy rains with their dam had worked wonders.

“See the water roll over the dam, girls! it’s just like the mill-dam,” exclaimed Cricket. “Let’s roll more stones down and make a bigger one still.”

So, with eager hands, they got great stones again, lugging them from their places in the stone wall with infinite toil. They balanced them on the edge of the bridge, and counting, “One,—two,—three,—go!” They each pushed over one, jumping and screaming with delight, at the tremendous splashes, as the water flew up, spattering them well.

“Ow—ow! there goes my hat!” It was Cricket’s wail of anguish, of course. Her next-to-her-best white Leghorn, it was too, for her every-day hat had come to grief through Dixie’s chewing off her ribbons, and was laid up for repairs. There lay the pretty broad-brim, caught right on one of those big stones, with the water lapping all around it. Vainly they ran down to the side of the bridge and tried to reach it. It was too near the middle. The water was already so deep and black that they hesitated to wade in for it.

“Perhaps we can get a stick and reach it,” suggested Hilda. They accordingly broke long sticks from the bushes near by, and then Cricket lay flat down on the bridge, with her head and arms hanging over, and tried to reach the unfortunate hat.

“I can’t quite do it,” she panted. “You hold on to my legs, Eunice, while I lean over a little further, and, Hilda, you catch it with your stick at the side, when I poke it over there.”

So Eunice clung to Cricket’s legs with all her might, while Cricket, fully half over the bridge, made desperate lunges; at last she was successful.

“There it goes! now, catch it, Hilda!” triumphant and breathless.

Just at this critical moment there rose suddenly a tremendous shout from the woods.

“Hi! hi! I’ve caught ye, ye young rogues! I’ll teach ye a lesson, a-dammin’ up my brooks and a-swampin’ my medders, and a-drownin’ my caows! I’ll hev the law on ye!”

Fright and terror! What awful words were these? Cricket hung, paralyzed, over the bridge, and Eunice clung to her black-stockinged legs, with fingers that made black and blue spots in the tender flesh. Hilda, poised on two uncertain stones, stood like a small Colossus, and all of them were white with terror, for an awful, great, big, blue-bloused man was getting over the fence, with, oh, horror, a gun on his shoulder, and a slovenly bull-dog tagging at his heels!

“I’ve been a-watchin’ for ye, since a long time back,” the man said, leisurely coming nearer, seeing that the children were too frightened to run away. “I’m not a-goin’ to eat yer, but I want to know what in thunder you’re allers up to mischief for. Yer’s the doctor’s gal,” he went on, addressing Cricket, “and yer a limb.”

Cricket drew herself up on to the bridge. They recognized the man now as a farmer in the neighbourhood, a gruff old fellow, whom all the children feared. They quaked still more with fright.

“Now I’ll tell yer, young uns, I could hev the law on ye all for this flew-doodle-um of yourn, and I ain’t sure,—I—ain’t—sure, I ain’t a-goin’ ter. Now, what hev ye got to say fer yourselves why I shouldn’t?”

“We didn’t know we were doing any mischief,” faltered Cricket, really conscience-smitten, as well as frightened.

“Mischief!” growled the farmer, “when ain’t ye young ’uns in mischief? I’m goin’ to hev ye all in the lock-up.”

“Oh, please, please, Mr. Trante,” cried Cricket, in mortal terror. “If we’ve done any mischief, please ask my father to pay you for it, but oh, don’t put us in the lock-up!”

“Wal, I dunno but I re’lly orter,” said Mr. Trante, enjoying their terror.

“See all the damage ye’ve done. Las’ Sunday I was a-strollin’ round my medder, up yander”—pointing up beyond where the white violets grew—“an’ I see it was all soft an sorter soggy, by the bank, and the brook was a considderbal wider. I kinder wondered at that, seein’ as we hadn’t hed no rain for quite a spell then. Ev’ry night this week the caows kep’ a-comin’ home all wet to their knees, an’ las’ night the boy brung ’em in, and says he, ‘the medder’s all a-swimming, and the caows has stayed up into the woods all day.’ It didn’t seem nateral that the rain could ha’ did all thet, so this mornin’ I sot out to explore, an’ I found this big dam o’ yourn. I hed a big mornin’s work, so I hed to leave it till this afternoon. I re’lly orter make ye take ’em out yerselves.”

“I don’t believe we could,” answered Cricket, doubtfully. Then she brightened up.

“But I’ll ask papa to send Thomas to-morrow morning to help you. I’m so sorry about the cows, Mr. Trante, and getting the meadow so wet. We never thought. Will it ever dry up again?” she asked, anxiously.

“Wall, I guess the medder’ll dry up, if you give it a chance,” the farmer answered, grimly. “How did you young rogues roll up all them big stones, tearin’ down my stone walls? Look at them big holes!”

Three shamefaced children looked more downcast than ever at this new view of their mischief.

“I’ll ask papa to pay you for all the trouble we’ve made,” repeated Cricket.

“Wal, I dunno how I could put a money vally on it, skursely,” growled the man, “but I’ll see your pa. An’ about the lock-up. Ef you’ll promise me not to go a-dammin’ up no more streams, not even little dribblin’ things like that ’un there was, mebbe I’ll let ye off this time.”

“Oh, we promise!” cried the three, fervently, while their hearts danced jigs of joy at their escape.

“An’ tell yer pa to send Thomas over in the morning at seven o’clock sharp, an’ I an’ he’ll work at them stuns a spell. Looks like it would be considerable of a chore to hist ’em out,” said Mr. Trante, looking at the stones, through one eye.

“Come, Bruiser,” he went on, “you an’ me’s a-goin fur the caows now. Ye kin go home, young ’uns, and don’t do no more damage than ye kin help a-doin’, while ye’re going thar;” and three very subdued-looking children immediately took advantage of his permission to disappear around the curve.

The next day Thomas told Dr. Ward that he had had the hardest half-day’s work he had done in one while.

“Them crazy young ’uns will be the death o’ me,” he grumbled. “Me an’ Dan’el Trante worked up’ards of half a day to ease them stuns up. An’ the next time they go to dammin’ up creeks, I ’low they better do suthin’ else with the time.”

And the children concluded they would.

CHAPTER V.
FOURTH OF JULY.

Of course, with such a troop of children as there was at Kayuna, Fourth of July was a wildly exciting time. They were always up at unearthly hours in the morning, and used up, before breakfast, an immense supply of giant torpedoes and fire-crackers, by way of opening the day. Later, they were allowed free range of the back-kitchen, in order that they might carry out, all by themselves, the grand performance of the day. This was making and freezing a great can of ice-cream, with no interference, even to the extent of a suggestion, from the cook. This was always eaten by the assembled family, on the piazza, at five in the afternoon.

In the evening all the people in the neighbourhood gathered on the piazza and lawn, to see the display of a great quantity of fireworks, which Dr. Ward always had sent out from town. So they wound up the Glorious Fourth in a very patriotic manner.

It was really very good-natured of Dr. Ward to allow the display on his grounds, for it always took Thomas and one of the other men all the next day to take away the débris, clear up the lawn, and restore things to their usual trim order.

This particular Fourth really began the night before.

Hilda Mason had been invited to come and spend the night with Cricket and Eunice, in order to be on hand in the morning. It was barely dark when the three children decided it was quite time to go to bed, in order to shorten the long hours that stretched before to-morrow morning. Nurse had put up a cot in Cricket’s room for Hilda, close beside the larger bed, so it was quite like sleeping all together.

They were far too much excited to settle down very soon, especially as it was earlier than their usual bedtime, so they frolicked and built tents of the sheets, and ended up with a game of tag around the foot-board. But this speedily brought Eliza to the scene, with a very peremptory order “to go to sleep, and not disturb everybody in the house with their jim-jams.”

Thus commanded, and being tired by this time, they were quite ready to subside, and very soon, after numberless “good-nights” and “don’t you wish it was to-morrows,” they settled down.

Cricket woke first. The room was already beginning to grow light.

“Oh, girls, girls!” she cried, scrambling out of bed. “We’ve overslept, I know. There’s the sun rising now.” There certainly was light behind the trees, as she looked from the east windows.

“Funny we don’t hear the boys,” said Eunice, sitting up and trying to rub the sleep out of her eyes. “I’m awful sleepy—seems as if we’d just gone to bed.”

“I should say it did. How quiet everything seems. Hilda, wake up! it’s morning.”

“I don’t care,” returned Hilda, sleepily, turning over.

“But it’s Fourth of July! Do get up! We want to get ahead of the boys.” For two boy cousins, Will and Archie Somers, were visiting them.

“Oh, dear!” yawned Hilda, who was always a sleepy head. “I think I’d rather not have any Fourth of July.”

“But the Fourth’s here, and we’ve got to have it!” said Cricket, pulling the sheet from under Hilda. “Get up, you lazy girl. I’m all dressed.” For Cricket dressed as she did everything else, “like a streak of greased lightning,” as Donald said.

“Oh, I’m getting up!” and Hilda turned out reluctantly.

“I’m going to the boys’ door, while you’re finishing,” said Cricket. “I’ll be back in a minute.” She slipped out into the hall, as still as a mouse. It was very dark out there, and she had to feel her way along.

Suddenly, ahead of her, came a glimmer of light, and a tall, white figure appeared, that startled Cricket so that she turned, with a scream, to run back. It was only Eliza, who, aroused by the children’s voices, was coming from the nursery to see what was the matter, but Cricket was blinded by the sudden light, so that she did not recognize her. She lost her bearings, turned to the left instead of the right, and the next moment she was plunging head-foremost down the stairs, with a crash that in two minutes assembled a white-clad household.

“What is the matter?” asked everybody, hurriedly, of everybody else.

Doctor Ward sprang down the staircase to investigate. At the bottom lay a little heap.

“Cricket!” he exclaimed, with his heart in his mouth.

“I guess I’m all right, papa,” came a scared little voice from the heap, “but I don’t know, ’xactly, where I am.”

Her father lifted her up, and felt of her arms and legs.

“No bones broken. Is your back all right? and your head? In the name of common-sense, child, what are you doing around the house, all dressed, at midnight?”

“Why, it’s morning,” said Eunice and Hilda together, who, with the others, had gathered at the foot of the stairs, everybody asking questions and talking at once.

“It’s morning, and it’s the Fourth of July,” explained Eunice, “and we got up, and Cricket was going to wake the boys, and get a rise out of them. Is Cricket hurt?”

The doctor was still feeling Cricket’s back, and her mamma was rubbing her hands anxiously, but they all laughed at Eunice’s explanation.

“Morning, dear child? It’s just ten minutes of twelve,” she answered, looking at the tall hall clock. “Just midnight.”

“Midnight!” cried all the three girls, incredulously. “We saw the sun rising, anyway,” said Hilda, bewildered.

“The moon, you mean,” said the doctor, laughing.

“You’re sure you’re not hurt, darling?” he added. “Well, since Cricket is not killed, it proves to be a good joke.”

“She must be hurt somewhere,” persisted mamma, still anxiously. “How could a child go head-foremost down stairs and not be hurt?”

“Nobody could but Cricket,” said her father, kissing her; “but I am coming to the conclusion that this young woman is not built of ordinary human material, but on the principle of indestructible dolls. She always comes right side up with care.”

“I thought I was killed just at first,” said Cricket, sitting up straight on her father’s knee, and still looking bewildered, “for the house seemed just to open and let me down, and the first thing I knew, papa was calling ‘Cricket.’”

“But now,” said mamma, “since nobody is seriously injured, you children may go back to bed and sleep quietly—if you can—the rest of the night. And remember that you must not one of you get up in the morning till you are called. That’s the only safe way. Eliza will call you at five o’clock, and you must not stir till then.”

In view of the circumstances, the children were quite willing to promise this, and soon quiet reigned again.

It was broad daylight in good earnest when the children opened their eyes next, in response to Eliza’s call. Their night’s experience seemed very far away in the light of day. The boys were already up and out, and were firing torpedoes at the girls’ windows. Cricket felt a little stiff and lame at first, but that soon wore off. She really did seem to be of some material unlike other children, for her constant accidents rarely disabled her, and she seldom had even a bad scar. When she nearly cut her finger off in the hay-cutter once, so that it hung by a thread of skin, she clapped it on and ran to her father, and it grew together like two pieces of melted wax. Deep cuts healed as if made in soft pitch. She had fallen from innumerable trees, and would come crashing through the branches, and land on the ground, stunned for a moment, perhaps, but with no further injuries. She was very slightly built, without an ounce of superfluous flesh on her slender bones, and she was very agile and flexible. She used to amuse her sisters by sitting on the ground and twisting both legs around her neck, like a clown in the circus. When she fell, she fell as a baby does, without making the slightest effort to save herself, and probably this was the reason why she escaped serious injury.

CELEBRATING THE FOURTH OF JULY.

When the girls appeared, the boys were ready with a fire of jokes concerning the midnight adventures. Archie suggested that it would be a good plan to pin a big label to the moon, so they need not mistake it again for the sun. Will chanted,—

“The Man in the Moon

Came up too soon,

And waked the girls too early.

Cricket ran into the hall

And got a great fall,

And made a great hurly-burly.”

Fortunately, Cricket did not mind teasing, else her life would have been a burden.

By breakfast they had fired off dozens of packages of giant torpedoes and an unlimited number of fire-crackers, and went trooping into the house, feeling, they said, as if they had been up for at least six weeks.

CHAPTER VI.
MAKING ICE-CREAM.

After breakfast there came a little lull in the excitement. The edge had been taken off of the enjoyment of torpedoes, by this time, and the delights of fire-crackers palled.

To be sure, little Kenneth was still all agog. In his small brain this day was hopelessly confused with April-Fool’s-Day, which was the latest special occasion in his narrow experience. He ran around from one to another, crying excitedly, “Look a-hind you!” and then shrieked in great glee, “Apple-fool!” enjoying to the full the unfailing surprise of each person, however often he tried it.

By ten o’clock, however, came the great excitement of the day, making ice-cream in the back-kitchen. Will and Archie, and even seventeen-year-old Donald, pounded the ice which Thomas had already put there, in a big tub, while Marjorie measured the cream and milk and put in the sugar.

It seemed to be part of the programme regularly to forget the flavouring till the cream was in the can and the dasher adjusted. Then, at the last moment, it would suddenly be remembered, and off must come the cover, to the boys’ disgust, with imminent danger of a deposit of salt within, while the flavouring was added. Then they would find that they could not put back the dasher in its place without taking out the can. So out would come the can, and the cream must be poured out, the dasher slipped in place, all the ice and salt taken out of the freezer, in order to put the can back, and the whole thing repacked. All this served to “vary the monotony,” Donald remarked.

To-day, however, Marjorie, who was chief-cook, had the flavouring in her mind from the beginning, and she gave the cream a liberal supply of lemon extract.

“Will you stir this for a moment, please, Eunice,” she said, as Eunice came into the pantry just then, where Marjorie stood. “I want to speak to cook.”

Eunice gave it a stir, as Marjorie went out, and then bethought herself of the flavouring.

“We won’t forget it this time,” she thought. “I know Marjorie has not remembered it. She never does.” She surveyed the extract-bottles for a moment.

“I believe bitter-almond ice-cream would be nice,” she thought. “I’ve never tasted any, but it makes a nice flavour for frosting and cake. I wonder how much it takes? I guess half a bottle, certainly, for all this cream,” and in went the bitter-almond, for Eunice had not the vaguest idea of the necessary quantity.

“Oh, Marjorie,” she called, “I’ve just put in—”

“Do come here, Eunice, I don’t think the boys have chopped this ice fine enough, and they say it will do,” interrupted Marjorie. “Cricket, you go and stir the cream.”

Eunice ran out, thinking to herself,—

“I won’t tell her, after all, and she’ll think she’s forgotten it, as usual.”

Cricket took her turn at the spoon.

“There,” she thought, “the girls never said a word about the flavouring, and I just s’pose they’ve gone and forgotten it, as usual. I’ll put it in myself, and just as they think they’ve got to take the can out, I’ll tell them. Let me see. We always have lemon or vanilla. Essence of wintergreen. Wintergreen candy is lovely. I’ll just put in some wintergreen,” and she took the bottle hastily, after turning for a spoon.

“Oh! oh! it’s peppermint I’ve got,” she exclaimed, in dismay, as the first spoonful went into the mixture. “Bah! I don’t like peppermint, I’ll just put in an extra amount of wintergreen to cover it up. Cook says she often mixes flavours.” And in went plenty of wintergreen. By this time the whole pantry had a strong odour of essences, principally peppermint.

“What a strong smell!” said Marjorie, coming back. “What’s the peppermint bottle doing down here with the cork out?” But Cricket vanished, and Marjorie, concluding that the cook had come in and used it, corked it up, and put it back.

“How horribly strong that peppermint is,” she said, as she stirred her cream. “That bottle, just open for a moment, has scented everything, or perhaps some of it was spilled.”

Archie appeared now to carry out the cream to pour in the can.

“Whew! peppermint!” he whistled.

“Yes; cook has been using some here, and left the bottle uncorked. Awful, isn’t it?”

“Thing flavoured this time?”

“Yes, Master Archie, it is. I flavoured it myself, and it’s all right.”

“Good girl. I shall be glad to have some properly flavoured cream of our manufacture for once. Last year, seems to me, we didn’t get any in.”

The freezing of the cream went rapidly forward now. The three girls made no remarks about the flavouring, each thinking to surprise the others by the fact the flavouring had not been forgotten, after all.

Taking the can out, when the cream was frozen, removing the dasher, and the accompanying tastings, were all important features of the operation. To-day, however, as the critical moment drew near, mamma came out, and said there were two wandering minstrels in Highland dress and with Scottish bag-pipes, in front of the house. Of course they all wanted to go and see them, so they gave the cream into cook’s charge and all rushed off. When they returned half an hour later, they found, much to their disappointment, that the ice-cream was all frozen and packed in the moulds, to stand till the afternoon.

Making ice-cream had been such a long process that, by the time everything was put away, a point mamma always insisted on, it was time to dress for dinner.

The afternoon was rather uninteresting. Some one says that very early risers are apt to be conceited all the morning and stupid all the afternoon, and so the children found it. Year after year they had the same experience, but the twelve months between destroyed the recollection of everything but the excitement of early morning.

By half-past four, however, they began to brighten up again, for ice-cream time approached.

This was the children’s day, and the rule was for them to wait on themselves, so for some time they were busy bringing out plates and spoons and doylies, and arranging cakes and crackers on the table on the piazza, where the feast was always served. Cook took the ice-cream out of the moulds for them, and put it on the ice-cream platter, and when the grown-up people were all assembled and the party was ready, Maggie, smiling broadly, appeared with it. The children all sat around with eyes expectant and mouths watering, for this was their especial and particular feast, and entirely unlike the ice-cream that was served every Sunday for dessert.

The cream had certainly been beautifully frozen, and looked very tempting on this hot afternoon. Marjorie officiated at the platter, and distributed the dainty with a liberal hand.