Part 4

But the words were scarcely out of her mouth before they were stopped with kisses, and Adele looked as happy as she had looked miserable a moment before. “Now come,” she said, “let’s go to the grotto. I brought paper dolls; one is Wendy and the other is Tinker Bell. Now you can finish the story, and we’ll have a lovely time.”

They started off very happily, Mrs. Loomis watching them from the window. “I don’t know how it is going to turn out,” she said to herself, “but I hope Jessie will learn self-control by seeing how it looks to fly into such tantrums as Adele’s. I think the sight of them will do her more good than any amount of precept.”

Having given her word that Polly should no more have first place, Jessie was ready to be very amiably disposed toward Adele, yet from nine o’clock in the morning till six in the evening is a long stretch, and it was rather too much to expect that two excitable little girls could spend all that time in one another’s company without disagreements. Once during the day Jessie gathered up her dolls and started for home, leaving Adele disconsolately sitting on a stone, but Adele was the first to ask to make up, and begged so hard to be taken back into favor that Jessie yielded. Once, too, Adele in a sudden rage threatened to demolish the grotto, because Jessie insisted upon having her way with Wendy.

“She’s mine,” protested Adele.

“I don’t care. I know all about her better than you. I saw the play and you didn’t,” this conclusively.

Adele flung Wendy on the ground and added insult to injury by threatening to chop down Playmate Polly some night. “And when you get up in the morning, she will be gone forever,” said Adele.

This was too much for Jessie. “You won’t dare to do such a thing,” she cried. “I shall tell my father never to let you step your foot on the place again. You can just take your old paper dolls and go home.”

Adele arose speechless with rage. She deliberately tore Tinker Bell into bits and threw the pieces at Jessie, then snatching up Wendy she turned toward home.

At once Jessie seemed to hear her mother say: “We must be patient with her; she has no mother.” And she was filled with remorse. “Come back, come back,” she cried. “I didn’t mean it at all. You can have Wendy do anything you like. And it doesn’t matter about Tinker Bell. No one ever sees her anyway, for she’s just a little twinkling light. One of the candles will do for her. I’m sorry; I really am, Adele.” So peace was made, and the rest of the day passed happily enough.

When they went up to the house for dinner Sam met them. “I’ve got a new pet for you,” he said to Jessie. “Come down to the barn after dinner and I’ll show you.”

“Oh, what is it? Do tell us,” begged Jessie.

But Sam laughed and walked away, so Jessie knew it was no use to question further, for Sam never would be coaxed to tell. She was in great haste to finish her dinner, but Adele was hungry and seemed to enjoy everything so much that Jessie felt that it would not be polite to hurry her. She did not hesitate, however, to urge Adele to make haste as soon as her last mouthful of dessert was swallowed. “Do come right away,” she said. “I must see what Sam has. Aren’t you wild to know? I am.”

“What do you think it is?” said Adele. “Maybe he was only fooling.”

“No, I am sure he was in earnest. I know Sam well enough for that. He often brings me things, and I have an idea this is something alive.”

The two children were not long in reaching the barn, the big door of which was open. It was a big, roomy place smelling of hay. Three horses stood in their stalls, and as the little girls entered, a brown hen flew cackling from one of the empty mangers. “I’ll have Sam get that egg for us,” remarked Jessie. “I wonder where he is. Sam! Sam!” she called.

A voice answered from the harness room and Jessie led the way thither. Sam was sitting on a box mending harness. “Here we are,” said Jessie. “Show us what you said you had.”

“See if you can find it,” said Sam, and Jessie immediately set to work to search. She knew all the corners and crannies, if Adele did not. It was quite like a game, and rather an entertaining one. Here they came upon a setting hen who had stolen a nest in the hay; there a squeaking mouse would scuttle across the timbers, scaring both girls into shrieking. At last they made their discovery, for, as they were searching in front of Barney’s stall, directly above their heads something suddenly cried out: “Caw!”

The children looked up to see a black crow looking down at them from a perch in the corner. “Oh, I believe that is it,” said Jessie. “Sam! Sam! is it a crow?”

Sam came forward and lifted down the bird which was tethered by a long cord. “Yes,” he said. “He is a young one that got a little hurt somehow. I found him in the cornfield. He’ll learn to talk after a bit, and I’ve clipped his wings so he can’t fly far. He will get as tame as a dog after a while.”

Jessie put a finger on the shining black head of the crow. “Isn’t he funny?” she said. “It will be perfectly lovely to have a pet who can talk, and I think you are very good, Sam, to bring him to me. Will he say real words, like people?”

“He won’t be quite as glib as a parrot, maybe, but he will say a number of words, and it won’t be long before he will be following you everywhere.”

“I don’t think he is very pretty,” remarked Adele, who was standing at one side and did not seem to care about touching the bird.

“Oh, I think he is,” returned Jessie. “He is so jetty black, and has such a knowing look. I like him very much. I don’t suppose I can keep him in the house, Sam.”

“Better not, or he’ll be playing havoc with things. He’ll soon learn to stay around with the chickens, and when you want to have him near you can tether him. I knew one once that was as good as a watch-dog. Let any one come around day or night and he’d set up his Caw! Caw! I’ll take him out-of-doors for you now. He can’t get away very far, but I’d better tether him. Where’ll you have him?”

“Oh, down by the brook where we play,” Jessie told him.

The two little girls led the way and Sam tethered the bird by a long cord. He hopped around contentedly, and soon became tame enough to come quite close to the girls and peck at their feet. “Polly can take care of him, you see,” said Jessie. “I think she rather likes birds, at least I’ve seen her holding them quite often.”

Adele laughed. “You do say such ridiculous things about Polly.”

Jessie paid no attention to this remark but continued her line of thought. “I think she misses my playing with her as much as I used to, so I’ll tell her she can play with the crow all she likes. I wonder what we’d better call him. He’s as shiny and black as coal; you know the kind that has all sorts of colors in it. He looks that way when he turns his head.”

“I don’t think Coal would be a very pretty name,” objected Adele.

“I don’t think so either,” Jessie agreed with her. “I’ll have to think of something else.” They turned over in their minds all the things that suggested blackness or darkness, from ink to thunder-clouds, finally hitting upon Ebony, which was a happy thought of Jessie’s who remembered an ebony chest in her Aunt Lucy’s house. “We can call him Ebon for short,” she said. “It is a nice, easy name.”

“And Eb would be still shorter,” said Adele. “Hello, Eb.”

The crow responded by putting his head to one side and remarking “Caw!” in a way which made both girls laugh.

“When I get the gray kitten,” said Jessie, “I shall have two new pets.”

“And I haven’t any,” said Adele wistfully.

“I am sure Effie Hinsdale would give you one of the kittens,” said Jessie. “I’ll ask mother if we can go there Saturday. I know she will be glad--Effie I mean--to get a good home for another kitten. There is a gray something like mine and two black ones.”

“I’d rather have black, I think, and I’ll call it Velvet,” said Adele swift in decision.

“I’ve named mine Cloudy,” Jessie told her. “We can’t have them yet, you know.”

“Why not?”

“They’re not big enough to leave their mother. I thought I saw a cat, a yellow cat, on your porch one morning.”

“Oh, that’s the stable cat. He is very wild and won’t let me come near him. I’d rather have a kitten anyway.”

“Well, we can go see the kittens at Effie’s even if we can’t take them just yet, and we shall have the crow.”

“And Polly,” put in Adele with a laugh.

“She isn’t a pet; she is a friend,” replied Jessie with some dignity, feeling that Adele meant to underrate Playmate Polly’s importance.

In a very short time Ebon had become quite tame, and followed the little girls as if he were a dog. He constantly amused them by his funny ways. Although he had not yet learned to talk, Sam declared that he would in time, and meanwhile Adele went with Jessie to see Effie’s kittens, and was promised a black one. So from having no companions at all, Jessie felt that she would be very well supplied that winter. “There will be you and your kitten, me and my kitten, Polly and Eb,” she said to Adele. “That will be a great many of us to play together.”

“Yes, and there will be Miss Eloise and horrid lessons,” returned Adele.

Jessie sighed. “Yes,” she said, “I have been thinking of that. I wish we could take lessons like pills and have done with them.”

“In jelly?”

“No, I’d just gulp them down with water and have some bread and jelly afterward.”

The children were in the sitting-room, having just returned from Effie’s. Mrs. Loomis was sitting there sewing. She smiled as she listened to what the children were saying. “I think you will be doing just about as you say,” she remarked. “You will swallow down your lessons in the morning, and in the afternoon you will have your bread and jelly in the shape of play. I don’t believe you will find the lessons such a terrible dose as you think.”

“Indeed, I hope so,” returned Jessie with a sigh. “Come on, Adele; Peter Pan has lost his shadow again and I must find it.” This Peter Pan of Jessie’s lost his shadow much more frequently than did the original one, for the shadow was nothing but a bit of newspaper fastened by a piece of thread and it was torn off very often.

“I’m going to have a Peter Pan, too,” Adele announced triumphantly. “Aunt Betty has written papa to bring me one the next time he comes.”

“There couldn’t be two Peter Pans,” said Jessie in an annoyed tone.

“There could, too. I am sure I have just as much right to name my doll after the Peter Pan as you have. There are hundreds and hundreds of George Washingtons in the world and lots and lots of Grover Clevelands.”

Jessie could not deny this, but she was not pleased with the idea of there being another Peter Pan so close at hand. “If you name your doll Peter Pan, I’ll call mine something else,” she said, and then she added, “I won’t have any use for the grotto, of course, so I will just pull it down.”

“I think you are horrid mean,” said Adele. “You know I do love that grotto.”

“Well, you can make one for yourself,” said Jessie calmly. “There’s just as much stuff for it on your side of the brook as there is on mine.”

The tears rushed to Adele’s eyes. “You know I couldn’t. I should never know how, and besides your side of the brook has a much better bank.”

“Well,” said Jessie, unmoved, “there simply cannot be two Peter Pans.”

Adele snatched up her hat and ran from the room. Jessie, watching her from the window rather shamefacedly, saw her hurrying down the hill. She waited till Adele had safely crossed the log, then she turned away saying to herself, “There couldn’t possibly be two Peter Pans.”

_CHAPTER VI_

_A Mystery_

_CHAPTER VI_

_A Mystery_

Like most of their quarrels this between the two little girls did not last long, for the next morning Jessie had scarcely finished breakfast before Adele appeared eager and smiling. “Papa came last night,” she said, “and so did Miss Eloise.”

“Then are we to begin taking our pills to-day?” asked Jessie.

Adele laughed. “No, not till to-morrow. Aunt Betty and Miss Eloise want to talk, and besides Aunt Betty says Miss Eloise is tired and she mustn’t begin to work right away.”

“I thought we were the ones who had to work,” remarked Jessie.

“Don’t you suppose it is going to be just as hard for Miss Eloise?” put in Mrs. Loomis. “Do you imagine it is going to be very amusing to be shut up with two wilful little girls who don’t like lessons?”

“Oh!” Jessie had never thought of this side of the question. She looked at Adele.

“Oh,” said Adele. Then after a pause, “But she doesn’t have to do it if she doesn’t want to, and we do have to.”

“Do you think all persons who do their duty in this world really prefer not to do some other thing?” asked Mr. Loomis. “Some persons like to teach, I admit, but there are many who have to learn to like teaching just as much as you will have to learn to like studying. So don’t imagine it will be all fun for Miss Laurent. From what I can learn Miss Eloise consented to be your teacher because she is a loyal friend, and as your Aunt Betty, Adele, dreaded the thought of having a stranger in the house, Miss Eloise consented to come. She fortunately has a gift for teaching, but she is willing to come to this little country village because she can be of use to Miss Hallett, and because she thinks she can help you little girls. I hope both of you will remember that, and that you will do nothing to make her sorry that she decided to come.”

This very serious way of taking it made the two little girls feel quite subdued. Adele was first to recover her spirits. “You don’t know what I’ve got,” she sang out as she held something in her hand behind her.

“Let me see,” cried Jessie springing toward her. Adele backed away.

“Guess,” she said.

Jessie shook her head. “Can’t.”

“Something papa brought me.”

“Oh, I know; a doll.”

Adele displayed her new possession. “Yes, but I am not going to call it Peter Pan, at least, not yet a while, for it is smaller than yours. I don’t say I never will, but now I am going to name it after papa.”

“What is his name?” asked Jessie.

“James. I shall call my doll Jamie. Come on, let’s go down to the grotto. I wish now I hadn’t asked for a boy-doll; if it had been a girl one I could have called it Wendy instead of the paper one. Do you know, Jessie, Miss Eloise says that Peter Pan’s house was in the tree tops.”

“So it was,” Jessie remembered.

“But I like the grotto better,” declared Adele. “Aren’t you ready to go?”

“We can’t go yet; the grass is too wet. We’ll have to wait till the sun dries it a little. We can play in here for a while.”

Jessie had not been very enthusiastic over the new doll though she was relieved that it was not exactly like her own, and that Adele had decided to call it Jamie. The doll wore a scarlet coat with tiny brass buttons upon it, white trousers and a little red cap. He was quite a pretty little fellow, and Jessie admired him, though she did not say so. When the sun had dried the grass enough the children set forth, Ebon hopping behind them, sometimes taking a short flight with flapping wings. It was a bright autumn morning, the sky very blue and the air pleasant.

“I’m so glad it isn’t raining,” remarked Adele, “for it is our last morning.”

“Except Saturday. We shall not study on Saturdays, shall we?”

“Oh, no, of course not.”

They had reached the foot of the hill, and Adele made straight for the grotto, but Jessie stopped in front of the little Polly Willow. “Good-morning, Polly,” she said, gently patting the rough bark.

Adele watched her, and then said mockingly, “Good-morning, old Polly.” Then she exclaimed, “I know what I’m going to do; I’m going to have a house for my Peter Pan, and I am going to build it on Polly’s head.”

“Indeed you shall not,” replied Jessie. “She is mine and I shall not let you. Besides you said you weren’t going to call your doll Peter Pan.”

“I said I wasn’t at first.”

“This is at first.”

“No, it was at first when I said that; now it is after a while.”

Jessie turned her back on Adele and it seemed as if their last evening’s quarrel would break out afresh.

“Are you mad, Jessie?” questioned Adele.

No answer.

“Are you, Jessie?”

“Yes, I am.” The reply came in offended tones. “You know I don’t like you to make fun of Polly.”

“Then say you like me best.”

“I have said that.”

“But do you really mean it?”

“Ye-es,” rather reluctantly. “At least I do when you don’t do me so mean.”

“I won’t have the house on Polly’s head then. I’ll take this high bush.” She set the scarlet-coated little figure in a bush close by. “He looks like some red flower there, doesn’t he? I’m going to get something to build the house with.”

“What kind of things?”

“Oh, leaves and moss and things.”

“Then I’ll stay here and get the grotto in order,” Jessie decided.

“I’m going to make a cradle for Peter Pan,” said Adele as she moved off.

Jessie did not follow, but busied herself in sweeping up, with a bunch of twigs, the bits of earth which had fallen down over night upon the floor of the cave, and in putting the moss into place. Ebon, hopping about, regarded her with his bright eyes, and coming nearer tried to peck at the shining piece of glass which made the lake in the centre of the grotto. “Go away, Eb,” cried Jessie. “You are getting too fusty entirely.” She shoved him away with her elbow, and he strutted off dipping his head and uttering some protesting caws. After a few minutes Jessie had the grotto in pretty good order, but concluded a few more pebbles would not come amiss. These must be found in the brook. The water was very clear, and in the shallow parts one could easily get at the pebbles lying at the bottom of the stream. There was a scraggy tree trunk at the water’s edge, and on this Jessie sat, holding on to one gnarly root while she reached over to get the pebbles. Brown leaves went drifting by on the stream; a Bob White called from the grass near by. Jessie nodded understandingly to Playmate Polly. “You like it, don’t you, Polly, or you wouldn’t stay here. The idea of any one’s building a house on your head. I shall put your hat on and then you will be able to show that you are not just an ordinary tree. But now I must take back my pebbles.”

She gathered up the little stones and returned to the grotto where she went on with her paving till she heard Adele’s voice saying: “I have some beauty leaves all red and yellow, and I found some moss, too.” Then an exclamation: “Why, where is my Peter Pan? Jessie Loomis, you have hidden him just to tease me.”

“’Deed I have not,” returned Jessie. “I have been getting pebbles from the brook.”

“I put him right here on top of this bush,” said Adele, “and he’s gone, so you must have taken him. You did it on purpose just because you didn’t want me to have a Peter Pan.”

“I did not,” returned Jessie indignantly. “He could easily have fallen off. Look all around, in the grass and the leaves.”

“Has Mrs. Mooky been here?” asked Adele. “You know that story of the little Tom Thumb that the cow was going to eat.”

“I believe Mrs. Mooky was somewhere about,” Jessie told her. “No,” she remembered, “it wasn’t near here that I saw her; it was on the other side of the fence in the pasture.”

Adele began to hunt around diligently, Jessie joining in the search, but no lost doll was to be found. Once a bunch of scarlet berries on a bush deceived them into thinking that by some mysterious means the doll had been spirited away. “For you know he could fly,” said Adele.

At last they were obliged to give up looking, and Adele went home quite convinced that Jessie knew where the doll was hidden, and Jessie, in her turn went off up the hill toward the house, hurt and distressed to think that Adele should not have believed her.

She went back after dinner to renew the search, and became satisfied after a long hunt that Adele had mistaken the bush and that she had put it somewhere else. A hollow stump in the neighborhood seemed the most likely place, but though she managed to climb up where she could peep into the hollow, it was all dark within and a stick poked in did nothing more than scare a chipmunk nearly out of his wits, so that presently he came out chattering and bristling with rage and fear. Jessie went home and told her mother all about it, and after Mrs. Loomis had gone with her to see what she could do, they both concluded that the doll must have fallen far down into this same hollow stump, and that it could not be found unless the stump were grubbed up.

“Do you think I ought to give her my Peter Pan?” Jessie asked hesitatingly. “I like him best of all my dolls except Charity.”

“No, I don’t think you need do that,” her mother told her, “but when I go to town I will try to find one that you can give her to replace this.”

“May I tell her so?”

“Yes, if you like. I think if you do, it will convince her that you spoke the truth.”

“She ought to have believed me anyhow.”

“Circumstances were against you, my dear. I know it is very hard to be suspected, but there was some reason for Adele’s doing so, and I am sure she will be satisfied when you tell her she is to have another doll.”