Part 4

“There! there! I knew it all the time,” cried Jimmy. “I wish you’d tell him I did see two live rattlesnakes, and I did see—oh, lots of road-runners! He thinks I’m a pretty nearly fool! Almost!”

Mrs. Dunlee heard this scrap of conversation as Jimmy was entering the house. He came along to the pantry, looking rather vexed and discontented. His mother suspected he was thinking of the New York boy, and wondered a little that he should be so anxious to go that very afternoon to return his visit. Dick did not seem to be a very agreeable companion, yet he had a sort of fascination for Jimmy.

Jimmy-boy lingered about the pantry. The frosted cake “made by a new rule” sat cooling on a platter, and the flies outside on the window-screen were wildly longing to get in and have a share; but the wire they beat against was hard and strong, and would not let them in.

Jimmy did not blame the flies for desiring the cake. It was certainly beautiful to behold. Could Dick Somers ever have seen anything more spotlessly fair, even in the great city of New York?

“Mamma, is this a wedding-cake?”

“No, dear; we only have wedding-cake when people are married.”

“Oh, I forgot that! ’Course we don’t!”

Jimmy looked abashed. How could he have been so stupid? He knew now why the boys had laughed at him. Yes, and why Dick Somers was always enjoying such an astonishing amount of wedding-cake. Dick’s sister had been married in church, and the whole city had been carpeted for her to walk on, or so Dick pretended. And naturally there had been bushels and bushels of cake.

“When are you going to cut this, mamma?”

“To-night, my son.”

“Oh, goody! Wish I had a piece this minute to carry to the boys! Dick Somers thinks we don’t have anything good out here. Why, mamma, he just makes fun of everything in California!”

“You may give him a piece to-morrow, Jamie.”

“May I?”

The little boy gazed wistfully at the cake. He knew mamma had frosted it on purpose to please her children; she and papa never ate any frosting.

“It does look so smooth and nice before it is cut up. If Dick could only see it all whole!”

Jimmy seemed to be talking to himself, rather than to his mother, and Mrs. Dunlee did not answer him. But she recalled the remark afterwards, indeed that very evening, after something had happened of which I am about to tell you.

“I must go up-stairs now to change my dress,” said she.

Jimmy followed her out of the pantry, and she shut the door.

“Where are you going, my son?” asked papa a little later, coming home from his ride, and meeting Jimmy running off at full speed.

“To Gilly Irwin’s, papa; mamma said I might.”

Jimmy was in a hurry,—Mr. Dunlee observed it,—in an unusual hurry. And, as he rushed away like a whirlwind, he paused an instant to pick up a basket which stood under the large pepper-tree.

“I wonder what scheme the boy has in hand now,” said Mr. Dunlee to himself. “There’s not a man in town who carries on so much business as our James.”

Mrs. Dunlee came down-stairs fresh and smiling in her new cambric dress with lace trimmings, and sat with her husband in the shaded study. While she sewed, he read aloud, or sometimes he dropped his book, and they had a little chat.

It seemed very still, they both said. Not a sound, even of Vendla stepping about the kitchen, for Vendla was up-stairs sewing.

“How we do miss the children!” said Mrs. Dunlee.

And they agreed that they missed the “Prince Imperial,” as they called the baby, more than any one of the others. He was such a rollicking prince, never speaking a single word, but ruling his loving subjects by laughter and tears, and sometimes by a wave of his royal hand.

At four o’clock he was brought home in Mrs. Porter’s arms, beaming with joy; but refused to tell where he had been, or who had given him the string of pretty shells he wore on his neck. He only smiled and cooed, and mamma knelt at his feet, and said he was “the sweetest baby ever was born.”

Then Lucy came home with two of her cousins. She had visited a photographer with Aunt Jessie, and a man had “tooken her picture.”

“He kissed his hand to me, papa, and then he tooked it. But I don’t know where it is now.”

“Did you keep still, little daughter?”

“Oh, yes, papa; I kept just as still! I was very _gemplumly_.”

It had long been Lucy’s ambition to be “gemplumly, just like Jimmy.”

In a few minutes the two older girls came home. They brought a box full of wild-flowers, and were rather flushed and tired and talkative. Very hungry too; for a “tramp dog” had eaten most of their luncheon. Edy was afraid if she didn’t have something to eat in one minute, her head would fly into pieces, it ached so hard.

“We can’t allow that,” said mamma. “Go into the dining-room, every one of you! Draw up your chairs to the table, and I’ll bring you a plate of bread and butter.”

She went with a light step into the pantry; but when she returned there was a cloud on her face.

“I don’t know what to think,” said she, setting a plate of bread and the butter-dish on the table. “I baked a loaf of cake this morning, intending it for tea; but it is gone! Vendla!” she called, going to the back staircase.

Vendla came down, looking rather serious.

“I went into the pantry half an hour ago, ma’am,” said she, “and there was the empty platter sitting on the shelf. And, thinks I, ‘Where’s that cake? Mrs. Dunlee must have put it in the cake-chest,’ But I looked in the chest, and it wasn’t there. And that’s all I know about it.”

“Why didn’t you come at once and tell me, Vendla?”

The girl hesitated.

“I thought you might feel troubled about it, ma’am. I was afraid you’d think”—

Mrs. Dunlee knew she would have said, “I was afraid you’d think Master Jimmy took it.”

But Vendla could not speak the words, and Mrs. Dunlee liked her all the better for it.

“My good girl,” said she, “did you go down-stairs and lock the back door this afternoon when I asked you to do so.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And you saw no one about the house at that time, Vendla?”

“No, ma’am. Master Jimmy had just gone out. I heard his papa ask, ‘Where are you going?’ And Master Jimmy answered, ‘To Gilly Irwin’s.’ That was just as I stood locking the back door. And after that Mr. Dunlee came into the front hall, and I heard him hasp the screen door. I’m sure I did, ma’am.”

“And then you went up-stairs again, Vendla? And you didn’t go into the pantry?”

“No, ma’am; I went straight up-stairs. I was in a hurry to finish my blouse waist.”

“And you heard no one going or coming?”

“No, ma’am. Only once I heard John’s step; he was looking after the cow.”

“That will do, Vendla; I don’t know what to think about this!”

As Vendla left the dining-room, Kyzie looked up quickly, exclaiming, “O mamma, don’t look so! I can’t believe it was Jimmy!”

“Neither can I,” said Aunt Vi, forgetting to eat her bread and butter.

“It doesn’t seem in the least like him,” returned Mrs. Dunlee.

But she had grown quite pale, and was going toward the study when her husband entered the dining-room. He had overheard part of the conversation, and looked as amazed and distressed as his wife.

“Why, my dear,” said he, “it is incredible!”

“So it is, James. The boy is too old to do such a thing; he has too much conscience. But the question is, who took the cake? It could not have gone without hands.”

“I see, I see, Prudy. And the doors were all well fastened, and you and I sitting there in the study.”

“And the house so still,” added Mrs. Dunlee. “You know we spoke two or three times of the stillness.”

Mr. Dunlee paced the floor in deep thought.

“There must be a way out of this,” he said.

“The cat, you know,” suggested Edith.

“Yes,” said Aunt Vi; “there’s always a cat to be suspected when there has been mischief.”

“I’m afraid he put it in his basket,” went on Mrs. Dunlee, referring of course to Jimmy, and not the cat.

“He said he wanted some of the cake for those boys, Gilly Irwin and his cousin; and I told him he might have a piece to-morrow. But he didn’t seem quite satisfied; I remember it now distinctly. He said, ‘It does look so smooth and nice before it is cut up. If Dick could only see it all whole!’”

“What reply did you make?” asked Mr. Dunlee.

“I believe I didn’t make any reply. Do you suppose, now, Jimmy could have thought I meant to give him the cake?”

“Hardly likely,” said Mr. Dunlee. “But there is one possibility I can think of. He may have taken it to show to the boys, intending to bring it back uncut and uninjured. I know he had a basket in his hand; that large one he carries.”

“Did he really have that basket?” returned Mrs. Dunlee. “Then it does look very much as if he put the cake in it! Hush! isn’t that Jimmy’s step in the hall?”

IX

THE INDIAN BASKET

JIMMY-BOY came in swinging his basket on his arm. It was a remarkably pretty Indian basket; and ever since Aunt Vi had given it to him two weeks ago, it had travelled with him wherever he went.

“Jimmy,” said his mother as the little feet reached the threshold, “Jimmy, I would like to see you in the study.”

The tone was grave; the boy looked up in alarm. Mamma was sure to be “in earnest” when she spoke like this, and wished to see him in the study.

The moment they entered the study she closed the door and turned and looked at him. What was she going to say?

“Jamie, O Jamie! did you carry it off in the basket?”

“Carry what off, mamma?”

“He speaks very innocently, as if it were quite new to him,” thought his mother.

She took the basket from his hand, and measured it with her eye. Yes, it was large enough; it could easily have held the whole loaf. But it was empty now. If Jimmy had carried off the loaf to show to the boys, he had not brought it back.

“My son, where is the cake I baked and frosted this morning?”

“I don’t know! Why, mamma, you didn’t s’pose _I_ took that cake?”

There was a quiver of pain in the young voice. Mrs. Dunlee looked at her child eagerly, as if she would read his very soul.

“Did you take it, Jamie? You said you wanted to show it to Dick Somers; you wished him to see it before it was cut. Now the cake is gone. Did you take it?”

The tone was very gentle, but it moved Jimmy strangely. He hung his head and burst into tears. Was he sorry he had been found out? Or did it grieve him to be suspected wrongfully?

“No, mamma,” said he; “I never did it.”

“Jimmy, I want the truth! Remember your dear Heavenly Father hears what you say.”

Jimmy only sobbed the harder at this.

“If you took the cake, and are sorry for it, I will forgive you.”

“O mamma! did you think I took it?”

“I hope not, my dear. Only we don’t know what has become of it. And you said you wanted Dick Somers to see that we have nice things in California.”

Jimmy writhed in strong excitement.

“Yes, mamma, he’s just the meanest boy! I wish I could tell you how mean he is. When I carried him the”—

Jimmy paused suddenly. There was silence for half a minute while he struggled with himself. It seemed as if he were almost on the point of confession, and something held him back. Was it so? His mother could not be sure, for he would not let her see his face.

“So you carried something to Dick? What was it, Jamie?”

“O mamma, mamma! don’t ask me. I can’t tell. He was so mean about it, mamma!”

About the cake? Mrs. Dunlee wondered. Had Dick teased the little boy by finding fault with it? If so, Jimmy would not like to tell her. A word against his mother, or against anything his mother did, was always very hard for Jimmy to bear.

“What did Dick say or do that was mean, my son? Do not be afraid to tell mamma.”

“Oh, I can’t tell you what he said!”

Jimmy had not looked up at all, and now he hid his face in his hands.

“If he was innocent, why should he do so? Why shouldn’t he look at me?” thought Mrs. Dunlee, her heart aching with grief and pity.

But it was useless urging him. At any allusion to the cake he exclaimed,—

“No, mamma, I never.”

As if, having once said the words, he was determined to go on repeating them over and over. There had always been a strain of obstinacy in Jimmy’s character, as his mother was well aware. She turned sorrowfully away, and left the little boy alone in the study, his face buried deep in his father’s easy-chair.

It was a sad evening for everybody. Even the Prince Imperial ceased to enjoy his string of shells, and became too low-spirited to smile. No one but Kyzie had much hope of Jimmy’s innocence; but Kyzie said,—

“It wasn’t one bit like Jimmy-boy to take the cake in the first place. And then he never would lie about it! Mamma, do think again; couldn’t a thief have slipped into the house ever so softly by the back door?

“It only makes you sigh, mamma; you think it’s so absurd. I know it’s absurd. Somebody took that cake off the shelf, and left the platter, and it seems as if it must be Jimmy. Still, I can’t believe ’twas Jimmy. I almost think ’twas somebody that dropped down through the ‘sky-hole.’”

She meant the window in the roof. Lucy called it the sky-hole.

Mr. Dunlee turned as he was pacing the floor.

“I am almost as unreasonable as Katharine,” said he; “I can’t give it up that Jamie is guilty. I must have a little talk with him myself before I am convinced.”

He went into the study. The poor boy was still crying bitterly. Mr. Dunlee seated himself in the big chair, and took him in his arms.

“Perhaps you thought mamma meant to give you the cake? Was that what you thought? To divide with your little friends?”

Jimmy could not answer.

“If so, that was only a mistake. Perhaps you carried it away, and cut it up in big pieces for the boys? Tell papa all about it.”

“O papa! I can’t tell; but I never touched the cake.”

“Then what did you carry off in your basket?”

“O papa! please don’t ask me,” wailed Jimmy. “’Twas something—something I can’t talk about! I promised not to.”

“My son, this grows more and more mysterious. I can’t urge you to break a promise, though why you should have made one I can’t possibly see. If you promised not to tell about the cake, that was wrong, and”—

Jamie raised his head earnestly. “O papa! don’t you believe me when I speak?”

“My precious child, I do so long to believe you!”

Jimmy slipped down from his father’s knee, and stood upright before him, his eyes shining with a new thought.

“Does God know everything, papa?”

“Certainly, my child.”

“Well, then, when you go to heaven, papa, you just ask God if I haven’t told you the truth,” said Jimmy; and broke down again, and shook with sobs.

Mr. Dunlee caught the little pleader in his arms. He knew no more than before what had become of the cake, but he was sure from that moment that Jimmy had not taken it.

“If he had, he never would have dared make a speech like that,” said the minister to his wife as he came out of the study, looking much happier than when he had gone in.

“I hope you are right; I believe you are right,” replied Mrs. Dunlee, her eyes brimming with tears. “Still, we must wait a while to make sure.”

The next day, Sunday, was not a happy one. The older children knew the exceeding sinfulness of a lie, and it was certain that Jimmy knew it also. Yet what had become of the cake?

“Jimmy, what’s the matter o’ you?” asked wee Lucy, going up to her brother, and putting her little arms around his neck.

“Oh, they just despise me as hard as anything!” he replied.

It broke his heart to be “despised.” He did not know how everybody pitied and longed to help him, or he would not have been so unhappy.

Just before dinner Kyzie happened to go into the pantry. As she was returning to the kitchen she heard a noise at the pantry window, like the rattling of dishes, and, looking that way, saw Jessie, the pretty cow, eating a custard-pie.

The pie was sitting on the window-ledge, within easy reach, and Jessie was helping herself without fork or spoon.

“Come, mamma! come quick!” cried Kyzie.

Mamma came; and Jessie stood still, and finished the pie before her eyes, licking the plate too, as though she would not miss a morsel.

“Did you ever see such impudence?” said Kyzie, laughing.

But mamma was not listening.

“Jessie ate that cake!” she exclaimed. “Where is John?”

John was surprised to see every one so excited.

“I let the cow out into the back yard yesterday about two minutes,” said he; “but I never thought of her cutting up a caper in the pantry! When I went after her, she was standing close to the pantry window, to be sure, and the screen was out. I put it back; and thinks I, ‘That’s the second time I’ve done it to-day. I’ll fix that screen Monday so it will act better.’”

“Did you see Jessie eating the cake?”

“No, ma’am; she must have swallowed it pretty spry, for I never saw a crumb of it.”

“O Jessie, Jessie! we never knew you were a thief!” said Edith, hugging the pretty animal whose “sweet tooth” had caused all this trouble.

Mrs. Dunlee had no time or thought for the cow. She was watching the happy smiles on Jimmy’s face.

“My precious, innocent boy!” said she, holding him close, as if she could never let him go.

“You made a mistake when you said the cake couldn’t have gone without hands; didn’t you, mamma?” said Kyzie, trying to laugh; but somehow the tears would come first.

“Mamma,” whispered Jimmy-boy,—and a lighter-hearted boy you never saw,—“mamma, put your ear down close; I want to say something. I knew all the time I didn’t do it, and I knew God knew I didn’t do it.”

“Yes, dear; that is so.”

“And I knew God would tell you and papa all about it when you got to heaven, mamma; but, oh, I didn’t want to wait!”

“No, you dear, suffering child,” replied his mother. “And, thank God, we didn’t any of us have to wait! We’re so glad to know it all now!”

And then she kissed Jimmy on his mouth and hair and eyes; and the children all gathered around, and Kyzie said,—

“Isn’t this a beautiful Sunday? I’d rather have it than a diamond ring.”

It was not till Tuesday that they learned what Jimmy had carried off in the basket; and then Mr. Somers, Dick’s father, told it, laughing, to Mr. Dunlee. It was horned toads.

Little Dick had declared that they had eyes in the backs of their heads. Jimmy and Gilbert disputed this, and told him to look for himself.

“I won’t look,” said Dick. “Guess I _know_! I’ll leave it to my _papa_ if I don’t know!”

The more he was laughed at, the more he insisted, saying at last,—

“I’ll give you five cents, Jimmy Dunlee, for every toad you’ll find that _hasn’t_ got eyes back of his head! Bring ’em along, sir, and let my papa see ’em, and I’ll give you fi—ive cents apiece!”

So Jimmy, expecting to make a small fortune, had roamed far and wide, and collected five toads; for he could not spare his tame ones. But when he took them to Major Irwin’s, Dick only said,—

“What you s’pose _I_ want o’ those toads?”

Jimmy was angry.

“You _told_ me to bring ’em! Look at ’em now; look this minute! You _said_ they had eyes back o’ their heads!”

Dick was laughed at by the whole family, and made to confess that these were the first horned toads he had ever seen. His father called him “a little braggart;” and for once in his life the boy was ashamed, and ran crying down cellar to hide.

Jimmy threw back his shoulders proudly. It was a great triumph to have humbled Dick Somers! And then, besides that, to have earned twenty-five cents!

But when he modestly asked for his money, what did those people all do but fall to laughing again?

And the wider his honest brown eyes opened with surprise, the harder they all laughed!

Jimmy could not see anything funny in the affair; he only saw that he had been cheated and imposed upon. As he turned indignantly on his heel, Hatty Irwin, Gilbert’s sister, said in a low tone,—

“The little toad-merchant is going home to see if his mamma will buy his toads.”

Hatty did not expect to be overheard; but Jimmy caught the words, and was cut to the heart. He shouted wildly,—

“I shall _not_ tell my mamma! I shall _not_ tell any single body at my house, so there!”

And all the while he was running away from these cruel people as fast as he could go.

If he had not made this sudden, impulsive promise to Hatty, all might have been different. For then he would have related his woes to his own family; mamma would have pitied and soothed him; and, better than all, there would have been no mystery as to what was carried off in the basket.

Instead of that,—but you know the story, and can fancy how poor Jimmy-boy suffered.

Dick Somers went home that very week; and Mrs. Dunlee said to her husband,—

“I am really glad for Jimmy’s sake. I am sure Jimmy has not been made very happy by the little boy from New York.”

X

A GREAT SECRET

PEOPLE were beginning to think and talk about Christmas. There was a pleasant stir in the air of something mysterious and delightful about to happen. Mamma and Aunt Vi were often together in Aunt Vi’s “snuggery” up-stairs, and what they were consulting about nobody ventured to ask; some uncommonly fine present for each of the children, no doubt.

One day Aunt Vi, who was sewing in the back parlor, looked up from her work, and said,—

“Jimmy-boy, do you think you could go to the store and buy me some blue sewing-silk like this pattern?”

And she held up a bit of blue satin.

“Why don’t you ask _me_, Auntie?” exclaimed Edith, dropping the doll she was dressing in a new tea-gown. “Boys don’t know the difference between a skein of silk and a clothes-line.”

Aunt Vi secretly thought that she could trust Jimmy better than Edith, but she did not like to say so.

“Then you may get me the silk, if you will, Edith; two spools.”

“Well, I’ll go with you,” said Jimmy-boy.

“If you’re going, I’ll have to go too,” piped wee Lucy.

“Of course,” thought Edith. “And there’s the dog, _he’ll_ have to follow,—the ‘inevitable dog,’ Aunt Vi calls him. Oh, dear!”

“If the whole family is to go, we may as well have more errands done!” exclaimed mamma with a playful smile. “Can I trust you, Edith, to call at our grocer’s, Mr. Ladd’s, and ask him to send me two pounds of Santa Isabel butter?”

“‘Can I trust you?’” repeated Edith to herself. “Why do people always say that to me, as if they didn’t feel _sure_?”

“Yes, mamma,” she added aloud; “two pounds blue silk, two spools San Isabel’s butter;” then corrected her own mistake, laughing.

The little party went skipping along in a very gay mood, the “inevitable dog” at their heels. Instead of proceeding at once to the stores, Edith chose to go two or three blocks out of the way, to watch a couple of tiny boys riding together on the back of a burro, and to see how fast the workmen were getting on in building a tall house she greatly admired.

They passed Mrs. Phillips’s brown cottage, with the bird-of-paradise flowers in the garden. Edith had a fancy for these gay, graceful flowers, with their very long scarlet streamers floating on the air like little banners. But just now she should not have gone that way; it was one of her mistakes. Her mother had said to her only the day before,—

“Edith, when you are out with Lucy, I would prefer you shouldn’t go near Mrs. Phillips’s house, for I don’t like to expose Lucy to whooping-cough.”

Edith would not have “exposed” her little sister on any account if she had only stopped to think. She believed whooping-cough to be almost sure death. Hadn’t she had it herself just before Jimmy was born, and nearly died of it? So she firmly believed. At any rate, the nurse, Mrs. Chick, had not allowed her to go near the new baby,—only think of that! She had had to look at Jimmy through the window! She was only two years old at the time, and could not remember anything about it, but this was what everybody said. It had always impressed Edith as something very strange and dreadful, that she had been shut away like that from her own baby Jimmy! And, after all, he had had whooping-cough just the same.

“Why, there’s Sadie Phillips at the window!” said Jimmy. “What makes her face so red?”