Part 11

“I think she is all right, now,” said mother. “We will get her into the workshop to Hazard’s cot.”

So there, despite all my protestations, they put me, and after a while the doctor came up and gave me some medicine in a glass. It was very mortifying, but he said I could not help it, and perhaps if I had not made up my mind to expect the worst, I should have borne the news better. And, next, if you please, I went to sleep,—it was that medicine, don’t tell me!—and never woke till evening, when dear Haze brought up a tray and sat beside me while I ate some chicken broth.

“Bobsie is doing splendidly,” he said. “Of course, we have none of us seen him yet, except mother. And, Elizabeth,—don’t faint, there’s a good girl,—but Geof has passed the crisis! They telephoned Uncle George at noon. The office had a half-holiday. I came home, heard the good news about Robin, and then went shopping!”

“Shopping, Hazey?” I repeated; for it seemed rather an odd way for him to spend his afternoon.

“Yes,” returned Hazard. “Want to see what I got?” And, with a somewhat conscious smile, he sidled toward the workshop door. A moment later and he was back, bearing a portentous-looking package:—which, the wrappings being quickly removed, revealed a beautiful Clement Braun print of the Sistine Madonna, finished in soft sepia tints and set off by a charmingly tasteful frame.

“Oh, Hazard!” I cried. “How lovely! Is it for Robin? No,—he is hardly old enough. You must have bought it for mother.”

“Well, I didn’t then,” contradicted Haze. “It’s just for you, my dear. You see I had planned to get something like this at Christmas, but I lost my money, and couldn’t; and you stood by me like a trump, while all the rest of the world thought I was pretty much of an ass,—and didn’t hesitate to say so, occasionally. Sometimes I have been afraid you didn’t know that I appreciate what a splendid chum you are, Elizabeth. So I determined to find some way to show you, and as soon as I began to draw my salary again I thought of this. It’s an Easter present,—but I wanted you to have it to-day.”

“You dear!” I cried. “Oh, Haze, I’ve always wanted this Madonna. But it must have cost a lot,—and you have given mother two dollars every single week! How did you ever manage?”

Hazey blushed beamfully. “That’s all right,” he answered with becoming modesty. “I’m glad you like it.”

And, looking up, I noticed again what mother and I were commenting upon only the other day.

“Hazard,” I accused, “you are thin! You have been saving from your lunches,—don’t deny it!”

“Oh, I’m used to short rations,” admitted Hazard. “It wasn’t anything at all, Elizabeth. But it needn’t happen again, because (now _don’t_ faint, there’s a dear) I’ve been promoted, and am to get five dollars a week from now on! It all comes from my head for figures. You see, I’ve been helping Mr. Simpkins lately,—he’s senior accountant,—and he was pretty well satisfied with my work. So when Bridges spoke of taking me back into the outside office, what should the old man do but go direct to Uncle George with the matter, and say he couldn’t get along without me. Uncle George was very much pleased, I really think; so I’m to have what is practically a junior clerk’s position,—though my official title is only ‘Simpkins’ boy,’—and a two-dollar increase in salary. Rather a pretty turn of luck, hey?”

“Then you helped turn it, Haze darling,” I answered. “And you’ve earned it every bit! You have worked well and faithfully at things you hated, without any hope of reward. Oh, I’m proud of you,—we all are!”

And just at that moment mother and Ernie came up, and helped me congratulate him;—and after a bit, when we had discussed the news from every possible point of view, we all went down to hang the picture, and Ernie and Haze insisted upon supporting me tenderly, one on either hand, which was ridiculous! And before I went to bed they let me in to kiss Robin; ... and now it is to-morrow morning. I am sitting at my desk writing, with, oh, such a thankful heart! while above me on the wall hangs Raphael’s most beautiful Madonna, quite glorifying and illuminating this shabby little room.

Sunday, April 5.

Spring has come at last with Easter. Such a beautiful blue sky as we woke to this morning, such tender breaths of gusty air!

“It seems funny to be putting on one’s winter hat,” remarked Ernie, cheerfully, as she picked up her shabby gray beaver and shook out its matted pompon; while I sniffed suspiciously at my white gloves in the window, wondering if they really did whiff faintly of gasoline.

“Yes,” I admitted. “Hand me that whisk-broom, please. Everybody will be wearing new clothes but us to-day, and we haven’t got any. Do you care?”

“I should think myself pretty mean if I did,” returned Ernie, roundly. “Come on, Elizabeth. The bells are ringing. We have barely time to say good-bye to Bobs.”

The nursery windows were open. The sunshine fell in bright patches across Robin’s little white crib, where he lay among his pillows, literally embowered amid blossoming plants.

“See, Elizabeth,” he called. “Here’s another!—a crimson bramble rose. It hasn’t any card, ’cept just a happy Easter one. Mother can’t guess who sent it, so I think _maybe_ it was Mrs. _Bo_-gardus! That makes five flowers, and two rabbits, and three chickens, and a little red prayer-book, all for me! Here’s a pansy for you and Ernie, please; ’cause you want to look pretty Easter day.”

“Thank you, honey,” we answered. And, though the stems were very short, we managed to pin Robin’s pansies into our coats.

“They are playing ‘Welcome, happy morning!’” said Ernestine, as the front door closed behind us, and the jubilant music of the chimes rang more clearly to our ears. “Oh, Elizabeth, we _are_ happy, aren’t we?”

“Indeed we are, Ernie dear,” I returned. And then we had to hurry, since it was already late.

“See, there are Aunt Adelaide and Meta,” I cried, presently, as we neared the church porch. “They are going in just ahead of us. How stunningly they are gotten up! Meta’s suit is charming, and what a love of a hat!”

“But we look nice, too,” returned Ernie, with an irrepressible little skip, and a downward glance at the bright flower in her button-hole. “We can’t help it, Elizabeth,—because, we are _so glad_!”

The swelling notes of the organ, the youthful, soaring voices of the choristers, in exultant anthem and hymn, the collect, and short, strong sermon, seemed all a wonderful expression of our own inward thanksgiving and gratitude. Never before has an Easter service meant so much to me, and I know it was the same with Ernie.

Our shabby gloves met in sympathetic clasp. We squeezed one another’s hands, and thought of that other morning when we sat side by side on the dark attic stairs, waiting for news of Robin. Oh, to have made up one’s mind to renunciation, only to have one’s treasure given back double-fold! For we have great hopes of Bobsie now; Dr. Porter is more than satisfied with the progress he is making; and only listen,—there’s more good news to tell!

For after service Aunt Adelaide and Meta waited for us in the church-porch, and we walked a couple of blocks together.

“Geof is very anxious to see you, Ernie,” said Aunt Adelaide. “Can you manage to get around for a little visit this afternoon? Dr. Porter has given his permission.”

“Oh!” cried Ernie, with an ecstatic little prance. “May I truly come? That’s the one thing needed to make the day perfect!”

“Ask your mamma to come with you,” smiled Aunt Adelaide;—for the old breach seems really healed at last. Our mutual anxiety over Geof and Robin has brought us closer together than anything else could ever have done. “Tell her please that there is a little matter Uncle George and I want to talk over with her.”

“Yes; certainly I will,” returned Ernie; while Meta asked, with a glance at the posy in my button-hole:

“Did Robin get many flowers for Easter?”

“Indeed he did,” I returned; “a pot of pansies, a lily, a purple hyacinth, and a beautiful crimson rambler. It is one mass of bloom. It came just before church, and there was no card, so we have been guessing ever since.”

Meta nodded her head in a satisfied way. “He and Geof ought to have something pretty,” she said. “They have been sick so long, and it must be horrid to lie in bed with nothing but the wallpaper to look at. I think it’s rather nice to send Easter cards with Easter flowers, instead of your name, don’t you?”

Then we separated, and I thought no more of Meta’s remark; but this afternoon when Ernie stole on tiptoe into Geof’s room, the first thing she noticed, after the patient, of course, was a second crimson rambler rose, the exact duplicate of Robin’s.

“Where did it come from, Geof?” asked Ernie, hoping to clear up the mystery of Bobsie’s plant. “Was there any card?”

“Why, no,” answered Geof. His poor hands were those of a skeleton; his voice was a whisper; his eyes seemed the only living thing left. When Ernie looked at him, she wanted to kiss him and cry;—but that would not have been cheering, so she asked about the crimson rambler, instead.

“It came this morning, just before church. Meta brought it up. There wasn’t any visiting card, but there was this Easter affair with the moulting angel. I told Meta he’d make a big mistake if he tried to fly with _those_ wings; and she didn’t seem to like it much, though she said, ‘I was undoubtedly an authority on the subject!’ It’s the first _natural_ remark she’s made to me since I’ve been sick,” added Geof, with a weak little chuckle. “I,—I rather think I liked it.”

“Well,” says Ernie, in a burst of really unusual perspicacity, “I don’t wonder Meta didn’t enjoy your criticism! I’m willing to bet my hat (it’s the old one with the frozen pompon, you know) that she alone is responsible for the angel and the rose, too. Robin received duplicates this morning, just about the same time; only his angel has a drum instead of a trumpet, and from something Meta said to Elizabeth I am almost sure that she chose them!”

Geof’s pale cheeks flushed and he lay quiet for a moment. “I never suspected it,” he said, at last; “but I guess perhaps you’re right. Certainly Meta has been treating me pretty white, lately, and the mater, too. I,—I wouldn’t wonder a bit, Bunnie, if things were going to be different.”

Meantime mother, Aunt Adelaide, and Uncle George were holding an equally interesting conversation in the library downstairs.

It seems that Dr. Porter wants Geof to go away for a couple of weeks; and he also remarked, in an apparently casual aside (though we are tempted to suspect it was premeditated), that a change would be an excellent thing for Robin; but that he did not feel at liberty to prescribe it when he thought of the heavy expenses we had been under for the operation. The two remarks worked together in Aunt Adelaide’s mind,—as perhaps they were intended to do,—and the result is that she has asked mother to take Geof and Robin, too, to Atlantic City for a fortnight, with Maria to help care for them, and Uncle George to foot the bills. And mother did not hesitate to accept, since Aunt Adelaide stated quite frankly that the obligation will be mutual. She does not want to leave the city just at present, and she quite shrinks from the responsibility of overseeing Geoffrey’s convalescence. Could anything be more splendid!

Just think of our dear little Bobsie enjoying a holiday by the sea!—growing fat and rosy playing about on the beach, picking up clam-shells, and——

But that reminds me. I must interrupt my jubilations to tell of the sad end of Abraham Lincoln! Ernie and I have suspected for a couple of days past that all was not well in the little glass globe. Since Thursday, A. L. has refused to snatch at a straw, no matter how persistently he has been “tickled.” Yesterday “he opened his mouth,” as Bobsie explained, and he has not closed it since;—till, this afternoon, when I was talking to Robin about his little red prayer-book,—which I had just rescued from forming a tent for one of the white mice,—my olfactory organ began to misgive me.

“It isn’t like your other books, Bobsie dear,” I was explaining. “You must never use it to play with, or be careless of it. You may keep it under your pillow with your handkerchief, if you want; and when you are older and can understand better, you will find it full of the most comfortable words. Whatever your sorrow, you will always find something to help. But, bless me! What a smell! Where _does_ it come from?”

“Abraham Lincoln,” answered Robin, in solemn accents.

“So it does!” I returned, sniffing suspiciously into the little globe. “This will never do, Bobs. He’s stark dead, child! I must take it down and throw it into the back-yard.”

“You _shan’t_!” howled Bobsie, in a sudden outburst of uncontrollable woe. “I ’spected maybe he was sick; so I gave him some of my medicine and a teaspoonful of beef tea! You mustn’t throw him into the back-yard, Elizabeth! He’s been too _good_, I tell you!”

“But what is to be done about it then, dear?” I asked; for such violence of anguish was unusual on the part of Robin. “We can’t keep him here any longer. You can see that for yourself.”

“Then let’s have a nice little funeral,” sniffed Robin, pathetically. “We’ll b-bury him beneath the crimson bramble rose, and you can read some of the com-comfortable words out of my little red prayer-book.”

“But, Bobsie,” I remonstrated; “prayer-books weren’t written about _clams_! I don’t think there is anything here.”

“You said I would always f-find something to c-comfort me,” sobbed Bobsie. “And now, when I need it most,—you won’t even look!”

What was to be done? Robin’s faith was really touching. I could not bear to disappoint him, if it could be helped.

“Well, honey,” I said, at last, “don’t cry any more. We will bury Abraham Lincoln under the crimson bramble rose. Come,—you shall dig the grave with this silver teaspoon, and then if there is anything about clams in the prayer-book, I’ll read it to you.”

So Abraham Lincoln was neatly interred; and as Robin patted down the earth with the bowl of his silver spoon, I began in a grave voice from the Benedicite:

“O ye Whales, and all that move in the waters, bless ye the Lord: praise Him, and magnify Him for ever.”

It was the best I could do, after a vain flutter of pages, and though a clam isn’t exactly the same as a whale, Robin was more than satisfied.

“What did I tell you?” he asked. “I knew there’d be something if only you would look! And I s’pose Abraham Lincoln _moved_, Elizabeth, when he came from the fishman’s at Christmas to this little globe.”

Later, when I told Ernie of the tragedy, she took it almost as seriously as Robin. “Of course we had to expect that he would die sometime,” she admitted, with a little sigh. “And I’m glad he waited till we had the crimson rambler under which to bury him. It must have been a great comfort to Bobsie! Abraham Lincoln was always such a _tactful clam_!”

Saturday, April 18.

The most wonderful thing has happened. I shall be able to fill the last two pages of my diary with such news,—and all because Ernie and I determined to clean house!

“It’s absurd to miss them so,” said Ernie, as she set Bobsie’s books straight in the nursery book-shelf yesterday afternoon. “But, somehow, I can’t get used to seeing this room so tidy!”

“And how queer it is not having any trays to carry,” I answered. “Mother and Bobs have never been away from us before. I wonder if there will be another letter this evening.”

“Mother writes such lovely letters, and Geof’s postscripts are so funny,” chuckled Ernie, with a slap at the front of her sailor blouse, where the last family epistle reposed. “Fancy Robin refusing clam-fritters, and telling the head waiter all about Abraham Lincoln in the hotel dining-room!”

“Well, I shall be glad when they are home again,” I admitted. “Perhaps that sounds selfish, since the change is doing them so much good; but I can’t help feeling lonely when you are at school, dear.”

“Elizabeth, don’t you think it would be nice to have a little surprise for mother?” asked Ernestine. “Something useful that would save her work or trouble, after she comes back? I’ll tell you what,—suppose we clean house! You, and Rose, and I could do it perfectly well; and this place hasn’t had a good raking out in ages!”

“That’s rather a sensible idea,” I agreed; “especially now, when the family is so small. We could manage the attic, the basement, and the parlour floor, perhaps; but we mustn’t disturb the boarders. Have you noticed, Ernie, that the Lysles have been receiving summer resort pamphlets in almost every mail this week? I am afraid it means they are planning to leave the city early,—and Miss Brown told me Monday that she had an invitation to spend July and August with her nieces in the Adirondacks. I try not to worry; but we have drawn our last money from the bank, and, oh, I do dread the summer!”

“Don’t think about it, then,” returned Ernie, stoutly. “We’ve weathered a good many storms, honey, and it would be pretty ungrateful for us to fret _now_. Perhaps something will turn up at the last moment. I wish we were going to the country, too!” she added, with an inconsistent little sigh.

“Robin has never seen a clover field,” I answered, “nor a live cow. And I haven’t tasted buttermilk since I was seven years old. Just think, the woods are full of violets this very minute,—and thrushes, and bluebirds!”

“I know it,” returned Ernie, glancing pensively out the window at the battered row of ash-cans that lined our dusty street. “I wish we could rent this old house,” she added, vindictively, “and go away, and start a chicken farm! I’m tired of boarders, Elizabeth;—even when they are as kind and considerate as Miss Brown and the Hippo family!”

“You can’t be as tired of them as I am,” I answered,—“because you don’t have to order their meals! But we would need the front stoop browned over, and the cellar concreted, before we could dream of letting; and such things cost money. It just seems as if our hands were tied.”

“Which needn’t prevent them from wielding a broom!” exclaimed Ernie, springing up with an energetic shake of her short skirts. “Come on, child,—I’m ashamed of us! A little hard work is the medicine we need. The idea of sitting here in opposite rocking-chairs, croakin’ at one another like a pair of discontented grannies, when Robin and Geof are growing fat in Atlantic City, and mother is having a really truly holiday for the first time in years! _I’m_ going up to begin on the attic this instant; and if we have to feel blue in June,—why, that’s nearly two months off, yet.”

“But it’s four o’clock, Ernie,” I protested. “Don’t you think we had better put off the house-cleaning till to-morrow?”

“No, I don’t,” returned Ernie, impetuously. “There is a pile of magazines in the workshop that hasn’t been looked over since the year 1, Tecpatl! Mother told me weeks ago that she wanted them sent to the Philippines. She asked me to go through them then. So, come on.”

“Very well,” I answered, meekly. And a few moments later Ernie and I were seated on the workshop floor, each with our separate bunch of dusty literature.

“Here’s that nice story about the rogue elephant,” began Ernie, comfortably. “I don’t think we can let that go. And, oh! here’s the copy of _Scribbler’s_ with _The Magic Ring_. Do you remember, we read it aloud one Christmas? It is about the two little boys who went to the Circus.”

“I thought,” returned I, severely, “that we came up here to get these magazines ready to send to the Philippines?”

“So we did,” mumbled Ernie, “but if we don’t go through them, how are we to know which ones we ought to send?”

At that moment I came upon an odd instalment of _The Refugees_, a thrilling historical romance that had haunted my memory for years. “Of course,” I agreed, with suspicious alacrity; and after that we sat together on the workshop floor, and read and read; till the shadows began to steal out from the corners, the room grew dusk and gloomy, and I looked up with straining eyes to remark,—

“Ernestine, it is simply provoking! Why will editors always break off at the most exciting spot? The Indians are attacking the blockhouse, I can’t find the next instalment, and——”

“_Whoop-ee!_” rang the shrill war-cry. “_Whoop! Whoop! hurrah! hur-roo-o_!”

For a moment I glared about me in terror. Was I in the workshop or the Canadian backwoods? Was the wildly whirling figure that pranced and capered about me, now advancing, now retreating, my own little sister Ernie, or a bloodthirsty Iroquois savage?

“I’ve found it! I’ve found it!” shrilled the jubilant song. “After all my hunts, Elizabeth! In the cuckoo-clock, under Hazard’s bed!—And to think we _nearly_ sent it to Manila!”

“What are you talking about, Ernestine?” I demanded, severely. “No matter what you have found, you ought to be ashamed to shout so! You know that Miss Brown has a headache, and besides I quite mistook you for an Indian!”

Ernie dropped down beside me, and flung her arms about my neck. “Honey,” she breathed,—“it’s the _contract_,—the Dump-Cart Contract, at last! Stuck between the pages of an old copy of _Cayler’s Engineering Magazine_! And to think, we almost sent it _to Manila_!”

So! I understood. The room began to swim about me. My head sank limply to Ernie’s supporting shoulder.

“Don’t you dare go and faint on me!” threatened that unsympathetic young person. “If you do, I’ll spill water over your new rosebud stock. I mean it, Elizabeth!”

“You shan’t!” I retorted; and sat up, clutching my precious embroidered collar with one hand, while I extended the other for the contract.

Ernie picked up the yellow-backed magazine, which she had dropped in the window when she began her wild war-dance, and extracted a legal-looking document.

“Here it is,” she said; “and it was by the merest chance I found it. I knew there would be nothing in _Cayler’s_ to interest us, though some stray engineer in Manila might like it. And I was just about to put it with these other magazines we don’t want,—when I noticed the date, and that made me think of dear father. So I opened it, just to see what he had been reading, and the first thing I came on was the contract! Oh, Elizabeth, he must have slipped it in here on his way home from Mr. Perry’s office that very afternoon! How natural it seems! And Rose cleared it away later, and we never suspected! _Well!_”

By this time Ernie and I were reading the document through, our heads close together in the window, our hearts thumping. Despite the legal verbiage which we did not altogether understand, despite the fast-fading light, there could be no doubt. The Dump-Cart Contract was found! It was also dated, witnessed, and signed, with a pathetic little blot of ink under the dear familiar G stem in father’s name.

At first we could hardly believe our good fortune!

“Five per cent. of whatever profits the invention is making,” gasped Ernie,—“and perhaps some back money, too! Oh, Elizabeth, the boarders can leave whenever they like, now! The quicker the better—We can shut up this house, and go away to the country. Robin shall play in the clover fields, you shall drink buttermilk, and _I_ will start a chicken farm! What a lovely surprise for mother!”

And she threw her arms about my neck, and for a while we wept and laughed together.

“And to think how ungrateful we were this very afternoon! It makes one rather ashamed doesn’t it, dear?” I concluded, with a penitent sniff. “Haze and I will go and see Uncle George this evening. He will advise us.”

“About what?” asked Hazard’s voice, with a worried little accent, from the attic stairs. “Has anything happened? Is there bad news from mother?”

“No, indeed,” we answered. “Come in. Light the gas. We’ve something to show you.”