CHAPTER IV

One Friday Afternoon

"AND what about Billy?" said Ruth. "You are his aunt, too, you know."

Ruth looked across the room at the cheerful Billy stowing away the wood for the morning's fire. "You know I am really and truly named Brackenbury for always and forever," said the little girl exultantly.

"I know," returned Billy. "It's all right for a girl."

"Billy is quite content to remain Billy Beatty. He says he would rather not have any other name, and, under the circumstances, I think it is just as well," said Miss Hester.

"I've always been called Bill Beatty and I'm always a-goin' to be," maintained Billy sturdily. "Why, the first week I was here, I licked a feller for callin' me sumthin' else."

"Why, Billy," said Miss Hester chidingly.

"Yes, I did. I didn't tell you nor Ruth neither. 'Twa'n't no use. You're awful good to me and I'm tickled to death to call you aunt, not having no kin, but aunts don't always have the same name as their nephews, I told the fellers. Besides I ain't just the Brackenbury kind like Ruth is."

"You are a very good kind, Billy," said Miss Hester, warmly.

"Oh, that's all right," returned Billy uneasily, moving off at the suggestion of a compliment.

It was quite natural that Billy, the street urchin, should not appeal to Miss Hester in the same way as did Ruth, the daughter of a refined and gentle mother, though to sturdy Billy, Miss Hester gave a warm affection while her sense of duty never allowed her to slight him or to lessen his opportunities.

But it was Ruth who shared her future when she sat over her sewing planning for the days to come. It was Ruth whose love she craved and of whom she felt that she could be proud.

Billy should be reared to be self-reliant that he might go forth into the world and make a name for himself. He should be sent to school, should have good moral instruction, and Miss Hester prayed that through her efforts, he would become a good man.

Ruth should stay with her and be as her own daughter, and one day they might go back together to the old home.

At school, Billy not only held his own among his comrades, but fought Ruth's battles as well, so that no one dared so much as hint that she had not a right to her new name.

That question came up one day not long after Lucia Field's birthday party, for one day at recess, there was a great discussion over in one corner of the playground.

Nora Petty and Annie Waite were contradicting each other and Ruth, who was eating her lunch with Lucia, heard "She has," from the one, and "She hasn't," from the other, repeated over and over again, the voices rising with the tempers of the two little girls who were quarreling.

"What do you suppose is the matter?" said Lucia. "Let's go over, Ruth, and find out."

So, with apples in hand, they crossed the playground.

"There she comes now," said Annie; "you can ask her."

"Oh, they are talking about us," said Lucia, in a low tone. "Ask who what?" she said, as she came up.

"Why, you know," began Nora, "this morning we had new copy-books given out, and we all had to write our names on them. I say Ruth has no right to the name she wrote on hers and Annie declares she has. Everybody knows Ruth's real name is Mayfield, and that it isn't the same as Miss Hester's and that she isn't one bit of relation to her."

"But it is her real name," cried Lucia, triumphantly. "That's the second time you have tried to hurt Ruth's feelings about it, and you've just got to stop it; she's my best friend, I'll have you to know."

"It isn't her name, either!"

"It is, too. I reckon my grandfather knows. He told me the law gave her that name and she is just exactly the same as if she were born with it, for Miss Brackenbury has legally adopted her, and if she ever gets back her old home, it could go to Ruth just the same as if she were her own child, so there. I reckon my grandfather ought to know if anybody does."

As Squire Field was the acknowledged authority upon most matters, Nora had not a word to say. She only stood and stared. The other children had gathered around.

One of the boys nudged Billy. "Is that so?" he whispered.

Billy nodded. "Sure pop."

"How about you?"

"Oh, I'm not in it. She's a girl and it's all right for her, and I can get along with any name. I told Aunt Hester I'd rather keep to Beatty. But I'd just like to see," he spoke up in a loud voice. "I'd just like to see anybody, boy or girl, say that Ruth hasn't a right to be called Brackenbury; I'll make it hot for 'em."

The girls shrank back and the boys hastened to assure Billy that no one doubted his word. Billy had made good use of his fists for too many years for his fighting qualities to be despised by his schoolmates.

"Come," said Lucia, putting her arm around Ruth, "let's go back and finish our lunch. I've got some nice little spice cakes in my basket. I made the cook put two in for you."

She glanced over her shoulder at Nora as she said this, for there had been a time when she and Lucia had eaten lunch together, but, since her Birthday Party, Lucia had chosen to ignore Nora and had invited Ruth to share the enticing contents of her lunch basket.

Every one knew that Lucia Field brought nicer lunches than any one else, and Nora felt herself distinctly snubbed. A great anger against Ruth arose in her heart. Ruth, whom she despised as an interloper and of whom she was wildly jealous, to be preferred before her was too much, and she determined that if there was any way to annoy her that the chance of doing so should not be lost.

Not long after this, her chance came, for on Friday afternoons the little girls brought their dolls to school at the request of the teacher who gave sewing lessons upon that day, and who had cut out and put into the hands of each a petticoat to hem, gather and sew on a band.

Ruth had learned to sew very nicely under Miss Hester's instructions and made so neat a hem as to call forth the teacher's praise.

"That is very well done," she said. "See, Nora, what neat little stitches Ruth has taken. Try to make yours look as well. I am afraid you will have to pick out half of what you have done. You are in too much of a hurry. If you want to sew neatly, you must take more time."

Nora pouted and gave her shoulders a twitch as the teacher turned away. She did not dare say anything but she gave Ruth so black and threatening a look as to make that young person wish she could change her seat, it being, unfortunately, next to Nora's. The best she could do, however, was to turn half way around toward Lucia who sat on the other side and who gave Ruth a pleased smile when Miss Mullins praised her.

Henrietta, though a less magnificent person than Lucia's Annabel Lee or Nora's Violetta was, nevertheless, quite as well dressed as her smiling neighbors who, staring at the maps on the wall, sat up stiffly on the desks in front of their several owners. Miss Hester, previous to the last Christmas, had given many a spare moment to the exquisite needlework which Henrietta's clothes displayed, and her dainty cambric underwear and pink frock were quite the admiration of Ruth's schoolfellows. To be sure, Lucia had excused the appearance of her doll by saying, "An only child as yours is, Ruth, must expect to dress better than the others. Now with my six, I find it hard to keep them all properly clothed and sometimes they even have to wear each other's clothes. I can't get enough clean things to go around."

Then little Ruth had embraced Henrietta tenderly, for she was indeed her only child and her coming had been one of Ruth's greatest joys, for though she remembered her babyhood's dolls, these were all broken and lost long before Ruth had come to Miss Hester's to live, and a forlorn rag-baby was her only plaything at the time her mother died. What had become of the rag-baby, she never had found out, for when she looked for it that sad day when the good doctor took her for a last time to the empty attic, there was no rag-baby to be seen. Possibly some even less fortunate child had found it and had treasured it. This Miss Hester told her for her comfort, but because Ruth so mourned her lost darling, that first Christmas in the big house, Henrietta was given to her.

Miss Hester had little money to spend, even then, and the doll was the first thing taken from the old chest which held the possessions of the little sister Henrietta and which was destined to furnish Ruth with many comforts and pleasures. The doll Henrietta, having been in the world some years longer than her neighbors, was rather an old-fashioned beauty. She was not of the bisque of which the more modern dolls are made, but a sort of composition and wax gave her a soft expression. Her eyes were large and beautiful and her hair long and curling. Ruth admired her beyond measure and because she was different from the rest, the girls all admired her immensely, and it was considered quite a privilege to be allowed to hold her.

On this Friday afternoon, Ruth stole a pleased glance every now and then to Henrietta sitting in silent state upon her desk. Nora's doll in silk attire she did not think near so lovely, for Violetta had an unkempt frowsy appearance. Lucia's Annabel Lee was a sweet insipid creature with very light hair and an innocent smile which showed two of her tiny teeth. She was clad in blue cashmere somewhat streaked and faded from Lucia's attempt to wash the frock for this occasion. Her efforts had not turned out well, but, as she confided to Ruth, it was clean, which was more than could be said of some costumes. Between two such representatives as Violetta and Annabel Lee, it was no wonder that Ruth viewed Henrietta with complacency.

The room was very quiet, for the girls were not allowed to talk without permission. Once in a while, there was a subdued whisper from one corner or Miss Mullins's low tones were heard as she bent over the work of some pupil. There was an odor of geraniums from the plants in the window. Sometimes, when a desk lid was raised there was a sudden spicy whiff from a hidden apple. Outside the sparrows were twittering in the vines and the rumble of wagons sounded indistinctly. It was a very quiet, orderly class indeed, thought Miss Mullins.

Suddenly from one corner came a crash, a distressed cry followed by wild sobbing. Miss Mullins looked up quickly. There was a disturbance in the direction of Ruth's seat. Miss Mullins went quickly to the scene of trouble. Crouching on the floor and holding fragments of a broken doll in her lap was Ruth wailing "She's dead! She's dead! She can never come to life again."

"You shall have mine, my Annabel Lee," Lucia was saying as she placed her own doll in Ruth's lap.

"No, no," wept Ruth, "I don't want any one but Henrietta. There was only one like her in the whole world, and she's dead, she's dead forever."

"Let me see, Ruth;" Miss Mullins bent over the weeping child. "Perhaps she can be mended."

"She can't, she can't," sobbed Ruth. "She's all broken to bits."

And indeed poor Henrietta was in a very sorry state for, though the body, legs and arms were not injured, most of the head was a total wreck.

"How did it happen? Did you let her fall?" asked Miss Mullins sympathetically.

"No, I didn't do it. Nora pushed her off my desk on purpose."

Miss Mullins straightened herself from her bending position. "Nora," she said gravely, "is that true?"

Nora, looking honestly ashamed, hung her head. "I did knock her off, but I—I didn't do it on purpose."

"But how came you to be meddling with Ruth's doll?"

Nora was silent.

"I had just taken her up for a minute," Ruth began to explain. "I wanted to measure the band around the waist, and I laid her down just for a second while I cut the band, and Nora leaned over and jogged her elbow just so and Henrietta went sliding off before I could catch her."

Miss Mullins looked again at Nora. "If that is true, it was a wicked thing to do, Nora, and I am greatly grieved that one of my class could purposely destroy another's doll."

Nora began to sniffle and look aggrieved. "I didn't think she would break. I just wanted to scare Ruth."

"You should have known that a doll was liable to break, if it fell from any distance upon a hard floor, and, in any event, you intended to do wrong. Even in trying to scare Ruth, you were to blame." Miss Mullins stood looking from the culprit to the mourning Ruth.

"The only thing I can think of that you can do to make reparation, is that you give Ruth your doll," she continued.

Ruth scrambled to her feet. "Do you suppose I would take anything she had played with? Do you suppose her horrid Violetta could take the place of my dear lovely Henrietta? And I wouldn't touch that ugly greasy old silk dress with that common cotton lace on it. I would be ashamed to be seen with such an untidy looking thing."

"Ruth, Ruth," Miss Mullins's hand was laid on her shoulder, "this will not do. I realize that you are much grieved and excited, but you must not talk so. The only way Nora can make any sort of reparation is to give you her doll, and I want her to do it."

"She can send it to the heathen or the missionaries; I don't want it, and I won't have it. Miss Mullins, do you think your mother would want to change you for some one that looked like Nora's Violetta?"

Miss Mullins tried to hide a smile.

Ruth was so fierce and contemptuous and, though she felt very sorry for her, she could not but be amused at the same time that she tried to be stern.

"You must try to curb that violent tongue of yours, Ruth," she said. "I see nothing else to be done. I am sure we are all very sorry for you, and regret what has happened. I will excuse you from sewing any more to-day and, if you and Lucia will speak in whispers, you two may take that empty seat by the door, and I will give you permission to speak to one another, if you do not disturb the rest of the class. Nora, you may come to the platform and sit by me. I want to speak to you after school is dismissed."

Bearing the fragments of her broken doll, Ruth made her way to the seat her teacher had pointed out, Lucia following with her own and Ruth's sewing materials.

At sight of the unfinished petticoat, the tears welled up into Ruth's eyes again.

"Henrietta will never need it," she sobbed, burying her face in her hands.

Lucia put her arms around her. "Don't cry," she whispered. "You can have any of my other dolls if you don't care for Annabel Lee."

Ruth gave her friend's hand a little squeeze. "You are awfully good, Lucia," she whispered. "I don't mean that your dolls aren't lovely when I say I don't want any of them, but you know there isn't any other one like Henrietta in the whole wide world. She isn't near so big as your Annabel Lee nor so 'spensive, maybe, but she isn't like anybody else and now I shall never, never see her again." And the tears flowed more plentifully.

Lucia tried to whisper comforting words though there seemed little consolation to offer.

"You can have the petticoat for your Marie; it will just fit her," said Ruth after a pause. "I shall never need it."

"Oh, no, I couldn't take it," returned Lucia, though she secretly admired the neat work.

"Please do; it will always remind me of this dreadful day and I couldn't stand it. It is nearly done, you see, and I can easily finish it."

So, realizing that Ruth really desired to give her the small garment, Lucia accepted it, determining that some day when time had softened Ruth's grief, she would again offer her one of her dolls.

It was not long before school was dismissed; then the girls gathered around Ruth with many expressions of sympathy for her and sharp censure for Nora.

"I'd never speak to her," said one.

"I wish I didn't ever have to see her face again," returned Ruth.

"I don't see how you can bear to sit by her; she was always hateful to you;" this from Annie Waite.

"I'm going to ask Miss Mullins if Lucia and I can't change our seats," returned Ruth.

But this she did not have to do, for on Monday, to her relief, she found Nora established on the other side of the schoolroom in a seat by herself, this being Miss Mullins's punishment for what she realized was a spiteful and cruel act.

Ruth, escorted by a band of sympathizing comrades, bore her doll solemnly home that fateful afternoon and poured forth her pitiful tale in the ears of Miss Hester and Billy.