Part 3

“I dried the dishes for Belle, and we had just settled down for the evening when one of the Strang boys came in. He didn’t know we children were there, and he had come up to see if Stanley and Truman and Belle would go home with him to a little frolic. His sister Esther had been married a few days before and had come home that afternoon, and they were going to have a serenade for them. Belle and the boys wanted Charlie and me to go down to the house so they could go, but we wouldn’t do it. We declared we were not afraid to stay by ourselves and told them to go on. Finally they did.

“Charlie and I didn’t mind being left alone at all. We thought it was great fun. For a while we played we were pioneers. Then Charlie got tired of that and wanted to play Indian, so we played Indian for a long time. But we had been out all day in the cold, and after a while we got sleepy and decided to go to bed. I went to the window to see if Belle and the boys were coming. There was a moon, and I could see the trees with their spouts and the buckets under them. I looked closely. At one of the buckets was a black shadow. I looked and looked at it and just then it moved a little.

“‘Charlie,’ I cried excitedly, ‘Brierly’s old black dog is out there drinking up our sap!’

“Charlie gave one hurried glance out the window, then he picked up a stick of firewood and opened the door.

“‘I bet I give that dog a good scare,’ he said, and rushed out the door and made straight for the black shadow. He raised the stick and brought it down ker-plunk on the back of what we thought was Brierly’s dog. But it wasn’t Brierly’s dog at all, nor anybody’s dog. It was a bear! I don’t know which was the most surprised, Charlie or the bear. Charlie darted back to the cabin, and when he reached the door he threw his stick with all his might and hit the bear on the nose. The nose is the bear’s tenderest point, you know. Charlie must have hurt him, for he gave a growl, backed away from the sap bucket, and scampered up the nearest tree. Maybe he meant to wait a while and come back for more sap, I don’t know. Anyway, up the tree he stayed while Charlie and I watched him through the window.

“‘If we could only keep him up the tree till the boys come home from Strangs’ one of them could get a gun and kill him,’ said Charlie, ‘and we’d get the money for his pelt.’

“‘Father says wolves won’t come near a fire,’ I remarked, and that gave Charlie an idea. He would build a fire and keep the bear treed until the boys came.

“At first I wouldn’t agree to help him. I was too afraid. But Charlie coaxed and threatened and was getting ready to do it himself. So I helped him carry out the first burning log from the fireplace in the cabin. After that my part was to watch the bear and warn Charlie if he moved while Charlie built up the fire. Once as the fire grew warmer and the smoke got thicker and thicker the bear snorted and moved to a limb higher up.

“Charlie kept a roaring fire going, and it wasn’t long until Belle and the boys came rushing up all out of breath from running. They were nearly scared to death because they had seen the smoke and thought the cabin was on fire.

“At first they wouldn’t believe we had a bear treed. Truman said, ‘Whoever heard of a bear climbing a tree like that?’ But Stanley said nobody knew what a bear might do, and Charlie said that there was the bear all right, they could see for themselves.

“Truman went home and got his gun and shot the bear. It turned out to be a young bear. Father sold the pelt and divided the money between Charlie and me.

“Now, let me see, what shall I tell you about tomorrow night? Oh, I know! I’ve thought of something, but I won’t tell. No, indeed, not a word till tomorrow night.”

THE NEW CHURCH ORGAN

Grandma had been to church Sunday morning and heard for the first time the wonderful new pipe organ, and in the evening she was talking about it—how beautiful the music was, how solemn, how sacred.

“And when I think,” she said, “of the opposition there was to the first little organ we had in our church and of the trouble we had getting it—well, well, times certainly have changed.

“It was like this. Some of our people were bitterly opposed to organ music in church and right up till the last minute did everything they could to keep us from getting an organ. This made it very hard to raise money for the organ, but after a long time we got enough—all but about forty dollars. It was decided to have a box social to raise this.

“At a box social each girl or woman took a box containing enough supper for two people. Then the boxes were auctioned off, and the men and boys bought them and ate supper with the girl whose box they got.

“Aggie and Belle trimmed their boxes with colored tissue paper and flowers and ribbon, but Mother just wrapped hers in plain white tissue paper and fastened a bunch of pinks out of the garden on top so Father would know it when it was put up to be sold. Father was going to buy Mother’s box, and I was going to eat with them. Charlie had money to buy a box for himself, and he said he meant to buy Aunt Livvy Orbison’s box because she always had so much to eat.

“Every one in the family was going, and there was a great rush and bustle to get ready. Mother cut Charlie’s hair and oiled it and curled mine. She scrubbed us till we shone, and at last, dressed in our best clothes, we started.

“Father and Mother and Belle and Aggie and I went in the surrey. All the boys walked over the hill, except Joe, who had gone to Clayville on business for Father that morning and was to stop at the church on his way home.

“It was a lovely warm evening, and there was a large crowd at the church when we got there, though it was early. The girls took their boxes in and then came right out again. Every one was having a splendid time, talking and laughing and visiting around.

“I was with Father. After a while I got tired hearing the men talk about the crops and the price of wool and the election, and I went to hunt Mother. I looked all around and I couldn’t find her. I thought maybe she had gone into the church, so I went in there to look for her, but there was no one in the church at all. The boxes had been piled on the pulpit and covered with a sheet so that no one could see them. Just as I was going out the door I noticed that the sheet was lying on the floor and the boxes were nowhere to be seen. I went on out and presently I found sister Belle. She was talking to John and Isabel Strang and Will Orbison.

“I tugged at Belle’s dress and pulled her to one side.

“‘What did they do with the boxes?’ I asked her.

“‘Why, they put them in the church, and after a while they will sell them,’ she said. ‘You run and find Mother now, like a good girl.’

“‘But the boxes aren’t on the pulpit,’ I whispered. ‘I was in the church hunting Mother, and the boxes are all gone and the sheet is lying on the floor.’

“Belle told the others, and they all went hurrying into the church, I following after. The boxes were gone, sure enough. The pulpit windows, which faced a strip of woods, were open. The boys said the boxes could have been taken out that way as the crowd was in front of the church. There was no place in the church to hide them. There was a loft, but it was entered through a hole in the ceiling and there was no ladder. Belle placed two chairs with their seats touching and covered them with the sheet so that no one could tell the boxes were not there.

“‘It looks as if some of the people who don’t want the organ have spoiled this box supper,’ said John Strang, ‘and they will keep us from having our organ for a while, too.’

“‘But that isn’t the worst of it,’ put in Isabel. ‘It’ll cause no end of trouble and hard feelings.’

“‘It may have been some of the boys who did it for a joke,’ said Belle. ‘Let us raise the money anyway and get ahead of them.’

“‘But how,’ Isabel asked anxiously, ‘with no boxes?’

“Then they thought out their plan. It was that John and Will were to go out and explain quietly to the boys in favor of the organ what had happened and get them to give the money they meant to spend on their boxes to John. Brother Joe had bought a new pair of shoes in town. They would put his shoe box up for sale just as if all the rest of the boxes were still under the sheet. Will was to bid against John and run the box up to the amount they had collected.

“Isabel stayed in the church to see that no one disturbed the sheet, and John and Will and Belle went outside to carry out their plan. I found Mother, and pretty soon we went into the church. The lamps had been lit, and I thought how nice it looked. The girls had come up the day before and swept the floor and dusted the benches and shined the tin reflectors on the lamps, and put great bunches of flowers and ferns over the doors and windows and covered the two big round stoves with boughs of evergreen. There was a short program first, and then Stanley, who was to auction off the boxes, stepped to the front of the pulpit and held up a plain white box tied with stout string.

“‘How much am I offered for this box?’ he said.

“The bidding started at twenty-five cents. At first there were lots of bids, but finally every one dropped out but John and Will. There wasn’t a sound in the church as the bidding went higher and higher—thirty dollars for that plain, white box, thirty-five dollars, forty dollars, forty-one dollars. Will stopped bidding and the box went to John for forty-one dollars.

“Some one called out, ‘Open the box!’ and that started things. ‘Open the box!’ they shouted. ‘Open it!’ ‘Let’s see what’s in it!’ ‘Open, open, open!’

“When they quieted down a little, Stanley explained about the boxes disappearing and everything. Then he untied the string, took the lid off the box, and held up a pair of men’s shoes number ten. Then that crowd went wild. They clapped and shouted and yelled. Stanley said he thought the boxes had been taken for a joke and suggested that they be returned.

“‘We have enough money for the organ,’ he said. ‘Now let us have our suppers and some fun.’

“One of the boys on the side opposing the organ got up and said that the boxes had been taken for a joke and would immediately be returned. And you couldn’t guess where those boxes were hidden! Right in the big round stoves there in the church! Of course everybody laughed again and laughed and laughed. Such a good-humored crowd you never saw.

“They handed out the boxes first to the people who had paid in their money, and sold the others. There weren’t enough boxes to go around, but each had plenty in it for three or four people. Every one divided, and there was not a person in the church who did not get something to eat. People who had been in favor of the organ ate out of the same boxes with those who had been against it and forgot that they had ever disagreed. And when the organ came and sister Aggie played it that first Sunday, why, it sounded sweeter to me than that beautiful big organ in your church did this morning.

“And now, ‘’night, ’night,’ everybody, and next time I think—yes. I’m pretty sure—next time we’ll have something about my school.”

SCHOOL DAYS

“All my brothers and sisters had liked to go to school,” Grandma began the next evening, “and in the sitting room, after supper, Father would hear their lessons while Mother knitted or sewed or darned. Father had read books and papers aloud to us as long as I could remember, and he always told us how important education was. So as soon as I got to be six years old I was anxious to start to school.

“I was small for my age, and as we lived two miles from the schoolhouse and the snow in winter was often two or three feet deep, Mother did not want me to go until I was seven or eight years old. She said she and Father could teach me at home for a couple of years yet, but I coaxed and coaxed to go. At last Mother said I could go as long as the weather was good.

“So on the very first day—it was along toward the last of October—I started down the road with a brand new primer under my arm and a lunch basket of my very own and shiny new shoes. Mother stood at the front gate to watch me out of sight and wave when I came to the turn in the road.

“Our schoolhouse wasn’t like yours. It was just a little frame building painted red. There were no globes or books or maps or pictures to make learning interesting. Just rough, scarred benches, a water bucket and a dipper on a shelf in one corner, and a big round stove in the center of the room, and of course the teacher’s desk and chair on the platform up in front.

“The teacher was usually a man, but that winter it was a woman—Miss Amma Morton. Miss Amma was a tall, bony woman with snapping, black eyes that saw everything, and thin gray hair combed straight back from her face. She wore a brown alpaca dress with a very full gathered skirt and black and white calico aprons and a little black shoulder shawl fastened with a gold brooch.

“She lived with a married sister who had a very large family. In those days all the stockings and socks were knitted at home, and Miss Amma did the knitting for her sister’s family. She did it in school. She would sit at the stove or at her desk and knit and knit on long gray stockings or on red mittens. She would knit all day while she heard our lessons. The only time she couldn’t knit was when she set our copies. We had no copy books, and the teacher had to write the copies out for us.

“I liked to go to school. It was fun to peep into my lunch basket at recess to see what Mother had put in and maybe slip out a piece of pie or cake to eat. I liked to make playhouses on the big flat rocks with Annie Brierly and the other little girls, and hunt soft, green moss to furnish them with, and smooth pebbles down at the run. I loved to learn my A B C’s and listen to the older children recite, and at noon and recess to play ‘Prisoners’ Base’ and ‘Copenhagen.’ But school wasn’t always so pleasant.

“One day not long after I started there was a heavy wind and rain storm. We couldn’t recite our lessons, the rain made so much noise on the roof. Through the windows we could see the trees swaying this way and that in the wind.

“At afternoon recess Annie and I ran out to see if our playhouses had been spoiled by the rain. When we came back the girls were standing around in little excited groups. They told us that the roof had blown off Bowser’s house—they lived about half a mile down the road—and that most of the boys had gone to see it.

“‘Did Charlie go?’ I asked eagerly.

“‘I reckon he did,’ one of the girls answered. ‘He was with the other boys and they went that way. I wouldn’t be in their boots for anything. They won’t be back before books, and Teacher’ll whip them if they’re late.’

“I drew Annie away. ‘I’m going after Charlie,’ I told her. ‘I’m going to take the short cut across the hill and catch up to him and bring him back.’

“Annie said she would go with me, and we started. The ground was wet and it was hard walking. We slipped at every step. After I thought about it a little, I was not at all sure that Charlie would thank me for coming. Maybe he’d sooner take a whipping than miss seeing a house without a roof. Boys are so different from girls that way.

“We got clear to Bowser’s without seeing a sign of a single boy, and the roof wasn’t off at all—just a little corner of it. Mr. Bowser was nailing it up as fast as ever he could. He said none of the boys had been there, so we started back.

“That was the longest walk I ever took. I thought we’d never get to the schoolhouse. My feet were wet and my legs ached and I was so tired I could hardly move. When we got to the top of the hill and looked down at the schoolhouse, there was no one in sight. Recess was over! We reached the door at last and stood trembling outside, afraid to open it and go in and afraid not to. Annie had been to school the winter before and was not so scared as I was. She took my hand reassuringly.

“‘Don’t let on you’re frightened,’ she whispered. ‘Maybe Miss Amma hasn’t missed us and we can slip into our seats without being seen.’

“Annie opened the door just as easy, and we slid in without a sound. But alas! alas! Miss Amma was hearing the advanced arithmetic class and she stood facing the door, so the second we stepped in she saw us.

“She stopped explaining a problem long enough to order Annie and me to stand in opposite corners up on the platform where everybody could see us.

“No one had had to stand in the corner since I had started to school, so instead of facing the corner as I should have done I stood with my face toward the school. I looked to see if Charlie was in his place. When he saw me looking at him, he began making motions. I thought he meant for me to stand tight in the corner, so I pushed as close as I could to the wall. All over the room pupils were smiling at me and pointing and shaking their heads. I wondered what they meant. I looked across at Annie. She was laughing and she made a motion, too. Then I thought of what she had said—not to let on I was frightened. Maybe I looked scared. I looked at Annie again. She stuck her head into the corner, looked at me, frowned, put her head in the corner again. What did she mean? It was too funny the way they were all acting. Then I laughed, too, right out loud, before I knew it. I laughed and laughed. I couldn’t stop.

“Teacher gave me a long, severe look.

“‘Turn around and face the corner, Sarah,’ she said, ‘and you may remain after school.’

“Then I knew what Charlie and Annie and the others had been trying to tell me. I stood there in the corner until the scholars had all gone home and Miss Amma had swept the floor and cleaned the blackboard and emptied the water bucket.

“Finally she called me, and I went over to her desk. When she asked me why I had run off at recess and then disturbed the whole school by laughing, I told her all about it, and she said she would forgive me that time and helped me on with my cape and hood.

“Charlie was waiting for me down the road a piece. He hadn’t even thought of going to see Bowser’s house, but had been down in the meadow watching the big boys dig out a woodchuck.

“And, now, an apple all around and good night.”

A BIRTHDAY PARTY

“Mm! Isn’t it beautiful?” exclaimed Grandma as she stood with Bobby and Alice and Pink admiring the table decorated for Pink’s birthday party. Everything was pink and white. The lovely white-frosted cake had pink candles in pink rose-holders—seven, one for each year and one to grow on. There were pink candies and pink flowers and pink caps for the little girls and boys to wear.

“‘And the ice cream is to be pink,’ Alice explained, ‘pink ice cream shaped like animals—dogs and bunnies and kittens.’

“My, but isn’t that fine!” said Grandma. “Now my first party wasn’t a bit like this. Maybe tonight if you are not too tired I’ll tell you about my party.”

And that night after they had told Grandma about Pink’s party she told them about hers.

“We didn’t have many parties when I was little,” Grandma began, “and we never had regular little girls’ parties. Everyone, big and little, came, and they were generally surprise parties and the guests would bring the refreshments with them. One evening going home from school, the girls were wishing that some one would get up a surprise party, when suddenly Annie Brierly said, ‘Why don’t we get up a party for Sarah, girls? Friday is her birthday. Do you think your Mother would care, Sarah?’

“‘We’d both help her,’ Callie Orbison put in before I could answer. ‘You don’t need to do much getting ready for a surprise party. We could have it Friday night, and Saturday we’d both come over and help clean up the house.’

“‘Not a soul but Callie and me would know you knew anything about it,’ urged Annie, ‘and we could have just loads of fun.’

“I promised to think about it, and the more I thought about it the better I liked the idea of having a party of my very own. It didn’t take much persuasion the next day to make me consent. Annie and Callie were delighted and immediately fell to making plans, but they agreed that nothing should be said to Mother until Thursday evening, the date set for the party being Friday night.

“The days that followed were full of mingled pleasure and pain for me. I was happy at the idea of having a real party, but it didn’t seem fair to deceive Mother. Once I thought of telling her all about it just as I told her about everything else. But I was afraid she would say I was too young to have a party, and I had never been to a party in my life. Sister Aggie was visiting Aunt Louisa in Clayville, and Mother had no one to help her except for what I could do mornings and evenings. But I would be at home all day Saturday, and Annie and Callie had said that they would help.

“Thursday morning Annie told me that she had baked a cake and put my initials on top in little red candies, and Callie said her mother was going to bake an election cake with spices and raisins in it. All day Thursday I kept thinking about the party. It wasn’t off my mind a minute. I couldn’t study for thinking about it, and I missed a word in spelling—the first word I’d missed that term—and had to go to the foot of the class.

“But by the time we had started home I had made up my mind to one thing, that if I could not have a party with everything open and above board I did not want one at all. And so I told the girls that I had changed my mind and did not want them to have a surprise party for me. They coaxed and argued and teased, but I was firm. I was sorry that Annie had baked a cake and I hated to disappoint them, but I did not want a party. The girls were cross with me, and I felt miserable when Annie turned in her gate without saying good-by.

“Aggie had come home from Clayville that afternoon, and she was so busy telling Mother the news and describing the latest fashions, and showing the things she had bought, that no one noticed me much. Not a word was said all evening about my birthday being so near. Even Charlie didn’t tease me about what he would do, such as ducking me in the rain barrel, as he always did, and I thought everyone had forgotten all about my birthday.

“But Friday morning just before I started to school Aggie gave me a plain little handkerchief that she had hemstitched before she went away, and then I knew for sure that she had not brought me anything from Clayville. And when Mother gave me a pair of common home-knit stockings, I thought I should cry right out before everybody instead of waiting until I got started to school.

“Annie and Callie were in a good humor again and as pleasant as could be, but I felt so unhappy that day that I didn’t notice that the girls at school seemed unusually happy and excited. When I finally did notice it, I was afraid that Annie and Callie had gone ahead with plans for the party. I accused them of this, but they denied it.

“‘No, no, we didn’t do another thing about the party,’ they declared. But they looked at each other and laughed when they said it, and I didn’t believe them.

“‘You did,’ I said, ‘you know you did.’

“‘Cross my heart and hope to die if we did,’ Callie insisted.

“‘Here’s some of the cake that I baked for your party that we didn’t have,’ said Annie. ‘Now will you believe us? I brought you girls each a piece, but it was a sin to cut that cake—it was such a beautiful cake.’ And she handed us each a slice of delicious, yellow sponge cake decorated with red candies.

“Mother had given me an errand to do at the store on my way home, so it was later than usual when, hungry and tired, I opened the kitchen door. Mother met me and took my bundles and books.