Part 6

It was a warm night in early June. Hazel was thinking over many things as she lay wakeful in her wee bedroom. To-morrow was the day; somebody would get the prize chicken. Hazel hoped she might be the winner. Then she recalled something Chi had said about hens being curious creatures, set in their ways, and never doing anything just as they were expected to do it, and that there was n't any time-table by which chickens could be hatched to the minute. What if one were to come out to-night! The more she thought, the more she longed to assure herself of the condition of things in the barn. She tossed and turned, but could not settle to sleep. At last she rose softly; the great clock in the long-room had just struck eleven. She looked out of her one window and into the face of a moon that for a moment blinded her.

Then she quietly put on her white bath-robe, and, taking her shoes in her hand, stepped noiselessly out into the kitchen.

There was not a sound in the house except the ticking of the clock. Softly she crept to the woodshed door and slipped out.

Chi, who had the ears of an Indian, heard the soft "crush, crush," of the bark and chips underneath his room. He rose noiselessly, drew on his trousers, and slipped his suspenders over his shoulders, took his rifle from the rack, and crept stealthily as an Apache down the stairs. Chi thought he was on the track of an enormous woodchuck that had baffled all his efforts to trap, shoot, and decoy him, as well as his attempts to smoke and drown him out. But nothing was moving in or about the shed. He stepped outside, puzzled as to the noise he had heard.

"By George Washin'ton!" he exclaimed under his breath, "what's up now?" for he had caught sight of a little figure in white fairly scooting over the grass-plat under the elm towards the barn. In a moment she disappeared in the opening, for on warm nights the great doors were not shut.

"Guess I 'd better get out of the way; 't would scare her to death to see a man 'n' a gun at this time of night. It's that prize chicken, I 'll bet." And Chi chuckled to himself. Then he tiptoed as far as the barn door, looked in cautiously, and, seeing no one, but hearing a creak overhead, he slipped into a stall and crouched behind a pile of grass he had cut that afternoon for the cattle.

He heard the feet go "pat, pat, pat," overhead. He knew by the sound that Hazel was examining the nests. Then another noise--Cherry's familiar giggle--fell upon his ear. He looked out cautiously from behind the grass. Sure enough; there were the twins, robed in sheets and barefooted. Snickering and giggling, they made for the ladder leading to the loft.

"The Old Harry 's to pay to-night," said Chi, grimly, to himself. "When those two get together on a spree, things generally hum! I 'd better stay where I 'm needed most."

Hazel, too, had caught the sound of the giggle and snicker, and recognized it at once.

"Goodness!" she thought, "if they should see me, 't would frighten Cherry into fits, she 's so nervous. I 'd better hide while they 're here. They 've come to see about that chicken, just as I have!" Hazel had all she could do to keep from laughing out loud. She lay down upon a large pile of hay and drew it all over her. "They can't see me now, and I can watch them," she thought, with a good deal of satisfaction.

Surely the proceedings were worth watching. The moonlight flooded the flooring of the loft, and every detail could be plainly seen.

"Nobody can hear us here if we do talk," said Budd. "You 'll have to hoist them up first, to see if there are any chickens, and be sure and look at the rag on the legs; when you come to a green one, it's mine, you know."

"Oh, Budd! I can't hoist them," said Cherry, in a distressed voice.

"They do act kinder queer," replied Budd, who was trying to lift a sleeping hen off her nest, to which she seemed glued. "I 'll tell you what's better than that; just put your ear down and listen, and if you hear a 'peep-peep,' it's a chicken."

Cherry, the obedient slave of Budd, crawled about over the flooring on her hands and knees, listening first at one nest, then at another, for the expected "peep-peep."

"I don't hear anything," said Cherry, in an aggrieved tone, "but the old hens guggling when I poke under them. Oh! but here 's a green rag sticking out, Budd."

"And a speckled hen?" said Budd, eagerly.

"Yes."

"Well, that's the one I 've been looking for; it's dark over here in this corner. Lemme see."

Budd put both hands under the hen and lifted her gently. "Ak--ok--ork--ach," gasped the hen, as Budd took her firmly around the throat; but she was too sleepy to care much what became of her, and so hung limp and silent.

"I 'll hold the hen, Cherry, and you take up those eggs one at a time and hold them to my ear."

"What for?" said Cherry.

"Now don't be a loony, but do as I tell you," said Budd, impatiently. Cherry did as she was bidden; Budd listened intently.

"By cracky! there 's one!" he exclaimed. "Here, help me set this hen back again, and keep that one out."

"What for?" queried Cherry, forgetting her former lesson.

"Oh, you ninny!--here, listen, will you?" Budd put the egg to her ear.

"Why, that's a chicken peeping inside. I can _hear_ him," said Cherry, in an awed voice.

"Yes, and I 'm going to let him out," said Budd, triumphantly.

"But then you'll have the prize chicken, Budd," said Cherry, rather dubiously, for she had wanted it herself.

"Of course, you goosey, what do you suppose I came out here for?" demanded Budd.

"But, Budd, will it be fair?" said Cherry, timidly.

"Fair!" muttered Budd; "it's fair enough if it's out first. It's their own fault if they don't know enough to get ahead of us."

"Did you think it all out yourself, Budd?" queried Cherry, admiringly, watching Budd's proceeding with wide-open eyes.

"Yup," said Budd, shortly.

They were not far from Hazel's hiding-place, and, by raising her head a few inches, she could see the whole process.

First Budd listened intently at one end of the egg, then at the other. He drew out a large pin from his pajamas and began very carefully to pick the shell.

"Oh, gracious, Budd! what are you doing?" cried Cherry.

"What you see," said Budd, a little crossly, for his conscience was not wholly at ease.

He picked and picked, and finally made an opening. He examined it carefully.

"Oh, thunder!" he exclaimed under his breath, "I 've picked the wrong end."

"What do you mean?" persisted Cherry.

"I wanted to open the 'peep-peep' end first, so he could breathe," replied Budd, intent upon his work. Cherry watched breathlessly. At last the other end was opened, and Budd began to detach the shell from something which might have been a worm, a fish, a pollywog, or a baby white mouse, for all it looked like a chicken. It lay in Budd's hand.

"Oh, Budd, you 've killed it!" cried Cherry, beginning to sniff.

"Shut up, Cherry Blossom, or I'll leave you," threatened Budd. Just then the moon was obscured by a passing cloud, and the loft became suddenly dark and shadowy. Cherry screamed under her breath.

"Oh, Budd, don't leave me; I can't see you!"

There was a soft rapid stride over the flooring; and before Budd well knew what had happened, he was seized by the binding of his pajamas, lifted, and shaken with such vigor that his teeth struck together and he felt the jar in the top of his head.

As the form loomed so unexpectedly before her, Cherry screamed with fright.

"I 'll teach you to play a business trick like this on us, you mean sneaking little rascal!" roared March. "Do you think I did n't see you creeping out of the room along the side of my bed on all fours? You did n't dare to walk out like a man, and I might have known you were up to no good!" Another shake followed that for a moment dazed Budd. Then, as he felt the flooring beneath his feet, he turned in a towering passion of guilt and rage on March.

"You 're a darned sneak yourself," he howled rather than cried. "Take that for your trouble!" Raising his doubled fist, he aimed a quick, hard blow at March's stomach. But, somehow, before it struck, one strong hand--not March's--held his as in a vice, and another, stronger, hoisted him by the waist-band of his pajamas and held him, squirming and howling, suspended for a moment; then he felt himself tossed somewhere. He fell upon the hay under which Hazel had taken refuge, and landed upon her with almost force enough to knock the breath from her body. Cherry, meanwhile, had not ceased screaming under her breath, and, as Budd descended so unexpectedly upon Hazel, a great groan and a sharp wail came forth from the hay, to the mortal terror of all but Chi, who grew white at the thought of what might have happened to his Lady-bird, and, unintentionally, through him.

That awful groan proved too much for the children. Gathering themselves together in less time than it takes to tell it, they fled as well as they could in the dark,--down the ladder, out through the barn, over the grass-plat, into the house, and dove into bed, trembling in every limb.

"What on earth is the matter, children?" said Mrs. Blossom, appearing at the foot of the stairs. "Did one of you fall out of bed?"

Budd's head was under the bedclothes, his teeth chattering through fear; likewise Cherry. March assumed as firm a tone as he could.

"Budd had a sort of nightmare, mother, but he 's all right now." March felt sick at the deception.

"Well, settle down now and go to sleep; it's just twelve." And Mrs. Blossom went back into the bedroom where Mr. Blossom was still soundly sleeping.

Meanwhile, Chi was testing Hazel to see that no harm had been done.

"Oh, I 'm all right," said Hazel, rather breathlessly. "But it really knocked the breath out of my body." She laughed. "I never thought of your catching up Budd that way and plumping him down on top of me!"

"Guess my wits had gone wool-gatherin', when I never thought of your hidin' there," said Chi, recovering from his fright. "But that boy made me so pesky mad, tryin' to play such a game on all of us, that I kind of lost my temper 'n' did n't see straight. Well--" he heaved a sigh of relief, "he 's got his come-uppance!"

"Where do you suppose that poor little chicken is?"

"We 'll look him up; the moon 's comin' out again."

There, close by the nest, lay the queer something on the floor. "I 'll tuck it in right under the old hen's breast, 'n' then, if there 's any life in it, it 'll come to by mornin'." He examined it closely. "I 'll come out 'n' see. Come, we 'd better be gettin' in 'fore 't is dark again--"

He put the poor mite of a would-be chicken carefully under the old hen, where it was warm and downy, and as he did so, he caught sight of the rag hanging over the edge of the nest. He looked at it closely; then slapping his thigh, he burst into a roar of laughter.

"What is it, Chi?" said Hazel, laughing, too, at Chi's mirth.

"Look here, Lady-bird! you 've got the Prize Chicken, after all. That boy could n't tell green from blue in the moonlight, 'n' he 's hatched out one of yours. By George Washin'ton! that's a good one,--serves him right," he said, wiping the tears of mirth from his eyes.

The chicken lived, but never seemed to belong to any one in particular; and as Chi said solemnly the next morning, "The less said on this Mountain about prize chickens, the better it 'll be for us all."

X

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING

It was a busy summer in and about the farmhouse on Mount Hunger. What with tending the chickens--there were four hundred and two in all--and strawberry-picking and preserving, and in due season a repetition of the process with raspberries and blackberries, the days seemed hardly long enough to accomplish all the young people had planned.

Mr. Clyde came up for two days in June, and upon his return told Doctor Heath that he, too, felt as if he needed that kind of a cure.

Hazel was the picture of health and fast becoming what Chi had predicted, "an A Number 1" beauty. Her dark eyes sparkled with the joy of life; on her rounded cheeks there was the red of the rose; the skull-cap had been discarded, and a fine crop of soft, silky rings of dark brown hair had taken its place.

"Never, no, never, have I had such good times," she wrote to her Cousin Jack at Newport. "We eat on the porch, and make believe camp out in the woods, and we ride on Bess and Bob all over the Mountain. We've about finished the preserves and jams, and Rose has only burnt herself twice. The chickens, Chi says, are going to be prime ones; it 's awfully funny to see them come flying and hopping and running towards us the minute they see us--March says it's the 'Charge of the Light Brigade.'

"I wish you could be up here and have some of the fun,--but I 'm afraid you 're too old. I enclose the song Rose sings which you asked me for. I don't understand it, but it's perfectly beautiful when she sings it."

Hazel had asked Rose for the words of the song, telling her that her Cousin Jack at Harvard would like to have them. Rose looked surprised for a moment.

"What can he want of them?" she asked in a rather dignified manner; and Hazel, thinking she was giving the explanation the most reasonable as well as agreeable, replied:--

"I don't know for sure, but I think--you won't tell, will you, Rose?"

"Of course I won't. I don't even know your cousin, to begin with."

"I think he is going to be engaged, or is, to Miss Seaton of New York. All his friends think she is awfully pretty, and papa says she is fascinating. I think Jack wanted them to give to her."

"Oh," said Rose, in a cool voice with a circumflex inflection, then added in a decidedly toploftical tone, "I've no objection to his making use of them. I 'll copy them for you."

"Thank you, Rose," said Hazel, rather puzzled and a little hurt at Rose's new manner.

This conversation took place the first week in August, and the verses were duly forwarded to Jack, who read them over twice, and then, thrusting them into his breast-pocket, went over to the Casino, whistling softly to himself on the way. There, meeting his chum and some other friends, he proposed a riding-trip through the Green Mountain region for the latter part of August.

"The Colonel and his wife will go with us, I 'm sure, and any of the girls who can ride well will jump at the chance," said his chum. "It's a novelty after so much coaching."

"I 'll go over and see Miss Seaton about it," said Jack, and walked off singing to himself,--

"'--the stars above Shine ever on Love'--"

His friend turned to the others. "That's a go; I 've never seen Sherrill so hard hit before." Then he fell to discussing the new plan with the rest.

Jack was wily enough, as he laid the plan before Maude Seaton, to attempt to kill two birds with one stone. He had had a desire, ever since the first letter of Hazel's, to see his little cousin in her new surroundings, and this desire was immeasurably strengthened by his curiosity to see a girl who sang Barry Cornwall's love-lyrics on Mount Hunger. Consequently, in planning the high-roads to be followed through the Green Mountains, he had not omitted to include Barton's River, as it boasted a good inn.

"Here 's Woodstock,--just here," he explained to pretty Maude Seaton, as they sat on the broad morning-porch of the palatial Newport cottage, with a map of Vermont on the table between them. "We can stop there a day or two, and make our next stop at Barton's River; I 've heard it's a beautiful place, with glorious mountain rides within easy distance. Suppose we arrange to stop three or four days there and take it all in? I 've been told it's the finest river-valley in New England."

"Oh, do let's! The whole thing is going to be delightful. I 'm so tired of coaching; I believe nobody enjoys it now, unless it's the one who holds the reins, and then all the others are bored. But with fine horses this will be no end of fun. We can send on our trunks ahead, can't we?"

"Oh, yes, that's easily arranged. By the way, what horse will you take? Remember," he said, looking her squarely in the eyes with a flattering concern, "it's a mountain country, and we can't afford to have anything happen to you."

"No danger for me," laughed Maude, meeting his look as squarely. "And I can't worry about you after seeing the polo game you played yesterday," she added with frank admiration.

"It was a good one, was n't it?" said Jack, his eyes kindling at the remembrance. "It was my mascot did the business--see?" He put his hand in his breast-pocket, expecting to draw forth a ribbon bow of Maude's that she had given him for "colors;" but, to his amazement, and to Miss Seaton's private chagrin, he drew forth only the slip of paper with Barry Cornwall's love-song in Rose Blossom's handwriting.

Where the dickens was that bow? Jack felt the absurdity of hunting in all his pockets for something he had intended should express one phase, at least, of his sentiments. He felt the blood mounting to the roots of his hair, and, laughing, put a bold face on it.

He held out the slip of paper. "It looks innocent, doesn't it?" he said mischievously, and enjoyed to the full Maude's look of discomfiture, which, only for a second, she could not help showing. "She 'll know now how a fellow feels when he has sent her flowers and sees her wearing another man's offering," he thought. He turned to the map again.

"Well, what horse will you ride?"

"I 'll take Old Jo; he 's safe, and splendid for fences. Of course you 'll take Little Shaver?"

"Yes, he and I don't part company very often. So it's settled, is it?" he asked, feeling cooler than he did.

"So far as I am concerned, it is; and I know the Colonel and Mrs. Fenlick will go; it's just the thing they like."

"Well, I 'll leave you to speak to the other girls, and I 'll go over and see Mrs. Fenlick. Good-bye." He held out his hand, but Miss Seaton chose to be looking down the avenue at that moment.

"Oh, there are the Graysons beckoning to me!" she exclaimed eagerly. "Excuse me, and good-bye--I must run down to see them." As she walked swiftly and gracefully over the lawn, she knew Jack Sherrill was watching her. "Yes, it's settled," she thought, as she hurried on; "and something else is settled, too, Mr. Sherrill! You 've been hanging fire long enough--and the idea of his forgetting that bow!"

The Graysons thought they had never seen Maude Seaton quite so pretty as she was that morning, when she stood chatting and laughing with all in general, and fascinating each in particular. The result was, the Graysons joined the riding-party in a body, and Sam Grayson vowed he would cut Jack Sherrill out if he had to fight for it.

It was a glorious first of September when the riding-party, ten in number, cantered up to the inn at Barton's River, and it was a merry group in fresh toilets that gathered after dinner and a rest of an hour or two in their rooms, on the long, narrow, vine-covered veranda of the inn. It had been a warm day, and the afternoon shadows were gratefully cooling.

"Will you look at that load coming down the street?" said Mrs. Fenlick. "I never saw anything so funny!"

The whole party burst out laughing, as the vehicle, an old apple-green cart, apparently filled with bobbing calico sunbonnets and straw hats, shackled and rattled up to the side door of the inn.

"I shall call them the Antediluvians," laughed Maude Seaton. "Do you know where they come from?" she said, speaking in at the open office-window to the boy.

"I guess they come to sell berries from a place the folks round here call 'The Lost Nation,'" he replied, grinning.

"'The Lost Nation!' Do you hear that?" said Sam Grayson. "Let's have a nearer view of the natives." They all went to the end of the veranda nearest the cart. Sam Grayson and Jack went out to investigate.

Two boys in faded blue overalls and almost brimless straw hats jumped down before the wagon stopped, and began lifting out six-quart pails of shining blackberries from beneath an old buffalo robe. Jack, with his hands in his pockets, sauntered up to the tail of the cart.

"Buy them all, do--do!" cried Miss Seaton, clapping her hands. "We need them to-morrow for our picnic; and pay a good price," she added, "for the sake of the looks. I wouldn't have missed it for anything?"

"How do you sell them?" said Jack to the tall boy who stood with his back to him, busied with the berries.

The boy turned at the sound of the pleasant voice, and lifted his brimless hat by the crown with an air a Harvard freshman might have envied. Jack, seeing it, was sorry he was bareheaded, for he hated to be outdone in such courtesy.

"Ten cents a quart, sir."

"What a handsome fellow!" whispered Mrs. Fenlick. "You rarely see such a face; and where did he get such manners?"

"How many quarts have--halloo, Little Sunbonnet! Look out!" said Jack, laughing, as he caught the owner of the yellow sunbonnet, who, perched on the side of the wagon, suddenly lost her balance because of Bess's uneasy movements in fly-time.

"Well, you are an armful," he laughed as he set her down and tried in vain to peer up under the drooping bonnet and discover a face.

"Whoa--ah, Bess!" shouted the driver, as Bess reared and snorted and shuddered and finally rid herself of the tormenting horse-fly. "All right, Cherry Bounce?" he said, turning at last when the horse was quieted.

But Cherry was dumb with embarrassment, and Jack answered for her.

"Little Sunbonnet's all safe, but what--" He got no further with that sentence. To the amazement of the group on the veranda and Jack's overwhelming astonishment, a wild, gleeful "Oh-ee!" issued from the depths of another sunbonnet in the cart, and the owner thereof precipitated herself recklessly over the side, and cast herself upon Jack's neck, hugging and "oh-eeing" with all her might.

"Why, Hazel! Hazel!" Except for that, Jack was dumb like Cherry, but not with embarrassment. Was this Hazel? Her sunbonnet had fallen off, and the dark blue gingham dress set off the wonderful richness of coloring that helped to make Hazel what she had become, "a perfect beauty."

"Oh, Jack, you old darling, why did n't you let us know you were coming? Chi, Chi!" Hazel was fairly wild with joy at seeing a dearly loved home-face. "This is my Cousin Jack we 've talked about. Jack, this is my friend, Chi."

Chi put out his horny brown hand, and Jack grasped it.

"Guess she 's givin' you away pretty smart, ain't she?" said Chi, with a twist of his mouth and a motion of his thumb backwards to the veranda.

"Well, rather," said Jack, laughing, for he felt that Chi's keen eyes had taken in the whole situation at a glance. "I meant to surprise her, but she has succeeded in surprising me." He stood with his arm about Hazel. "And these are your friends, Hazel?" he inquired; he felt he must make the best of it now.

"Oh, Jack, I 'm ashamed of myself; I 'm so glad to see you I 've forgotten my manners. Rose," she spoke up to the other sunbonnet that had kept its position straight towards the horse and never moved during this surprise party. Then Rose turned. "Rose, this is Cousin Jack."

The sunbonnet bowed stiffly, and Jack heard a low laugh behind him. It was Maude Seaton's. Rose heard it, too; so did Chi and March. It affected each in the same way. As Chi said afterwards, he "b'iled" when he heard it. Then Rose spoke:--

"I 'm very glad to see you, Mr. Sherrill, we 've heard so much of you." Her voice rang sweet and clear; every word was heard on the veranda. "And these berries are n't to be preserved; but evidently you are going to buy them just the same,--as well as your friends," she added, looking towards the veranda.