Chapter 11

Friday morning he awoke with the thought, "this is the last day." However, Willy was a child, and, in the morning, a day still looked interminable to him, especially when there were good times looming up in it. To-day he expected to take a very long ride with uncle Frank, who was going to Keene to buy a new horse.

"I want Willy to go with me, to help pick him out," he told Grandma Stockton, and Willy took it in serious earnest. They were going to carry lunch and be gone all day. This promised pleasure looked so big to the boy, as he became wider awake, that he could see nothing at all beyond it, not even the sad departure and end of this delightful visit on the morrow. So he went down to breakfast as happy as ever.

"That boy certainly looks better," Grandpa Stockton remarked, as the coffee was being poured.

"We must have him weighed before he goes home," Grandma said, beaming at him.

"That's one thing I thought of, 'bout stayin' a week longer," Grandpa went on. "It seems to be doin' Sonny, here, so much good." Grandpa had a very slow, deliberate way of speaking.

Willy laid down his spoon and stared at him, but he said nothing.

"I don't see what you were thinking of not to plan to stay longer in the first place," said aunt Annie. "I don't like it much." She made believe to pout her pretty lips.

"Well," said uncle Frank, "I'll send for that coat right away this morning, so you'll be sure to get it to-morrow night."

"Yes," said Grandpa, "I'd like to hev it to wear to meetin'. Mother thinks my old one ain't just fit."

"No, it ain't," spoke up Grandma. "It does well enough when you're at home, where folks know you, but it's different among strangers. An' you've got to have it next week, anyhow."

Willy looked up at his grandmother. "Grandma," said he tremblingly, "ain't we going home to-morrow?"

"Why, bless the child!" said she. "I forgot he didn't know. We talked about it last night after he'd gone to bed."

Then she explained. They were going to stay another week. Next week Wednesday, Grandpa and Grandma Perry had been married twenty-five years, and they were going to have a silver wedding. So they were going to remain and be present at it, and Grandpa was going to send for his best coat to wear.

Willy looked so radiant that they all laughed, and uncle Frank said he was going to keep him always, and let him help him in the store.

Before they started off to buy the horse, uncle Frank telegraphed to Ashbury about the coat; he also mentioned Willy's shoes.

The two had a beautiful ride, and bought a handsome black horse. Uncle Frank consulted Willy a great deal about the purchase, and expatiated on his good judgment in the matter after they got home. One of Willy's chief charms was that he stood so much flattery of this kind, without being disagreeably elated by it. His frank, childish delight was always pretty to see.

The next afternoon he went berrying with a little boy who lived next door. At five o'clock aunt Annie ran over to the store to see if the coat had come.

"It has," she told her mother when she returned; "it came at one o'clock, and Mother Perry gave it to Willy to bring home."

"To Willy? Why, what did the child do with it?" Grandma said wonderingly. "He didn't bring it home."

"Maybe he carried it over to Josie Allen's and left it there." Josie Allen was the boy with whom Willy had gone berrying. His house stood very near uncle Frank's, and both were nearly across the road from the store.

"Well, maybe he did, he was in such a hurry to go berrying," said Grandma assentingly.

About six o'clock, when the family were all at the tea-table, Willy came clumping painfully in his big shoes into the yard. There were blisters on his small, delicate heels, but nobody knew it. His little fair face was red and tired, but radiant. His pail was heaped and rounded up with the most magnificent berries of the season.

"Just look here," said he, with his sweet voice all quivering with delight.

He stood outside on the piazza, and lifted the pail on to the window-sill. He could not wait until he came in to show these berries. He would have to walk way around through the kitchen in those irritating shoes.

They all exclaimed and admired them as much as he could wish, then Grandma said suddenly: "But what did you do with the coat, Willy?"

"The coat?" repeated Willy in a bewildered way.

"Yes; the coat. Did you take it over to Josie's an' leave it? If you did, you must go right back and get it. Did you?"

"No."

"Why, what did you do with it?"

"I didn't do anything with it."

"William Dexter Norton! what do you mean?"

Everybody had stopped eating, and was staring out at Willy, who was staring in. His happy little red face had suddenly turned sober.

"Come in, Sonny, an' we'll see what all the trouble's about, an' straighten it out in a jiffy," spoke up Grandpa. The contrast between Grandpa's slow tones and the "jiffy" was very funny.

Willy crept slowly down the long piazza, through the big kitchen into the dining-room.

"Now, Sonny, come right here," said his grandfather, "an' we'll have it all fixed up nice."

The boy kept looking from one face to another in a wondering frightened way. He went hesitatingly up to his grandfather, and stood still, his poor little smarting feet toeing in, after a fashion they had, when tired, the pail full of berries dangling heavily on his slight arm.

"Now, Sonny, look up here, an' tell us all about it. What did you do with Grandpa's coat, boy?"

"I--didn't do anything with it."

"William," began his grandmother, but Grandpa interrupted her. "Just wait a minute, mother," said he. "Sonny an' I air goin' to settle this. Now, Sonny, don't you get scared. You jest think a minute. Think real hard, don't hurry--now, can't you tell what you did with Grandpa's coat?"

"I--didn't--do anything with it," said Willy.

"My sakes!" said his grandmother. "What has come to the child?" She was very pale. Aunt Annie and uncle Frank looked as if they did not know what to think. Grandpa himself settled back in his chair, and stared helplessly at Willy.

Finally aunt Annie tried her hand. "See here, Willy dear," said she, "you are tired and hungry and want your supper; just tell us what you did with the coat after Grandma Perry gave it to you"--

"She didn't," said Willy.

That was dreadful. They all looked aghast at one another. Was Willy lying--Willy!

"Didn't--give--it--to you--Sonny!" said Grandpa, feebly, and more slowly than ever.

"No, sir."

Grandma Stockton had been called quick-tempered when she was a girl, and she gave proof of it sometimes, even now in her gentle old age. She spoke very sternly and quickly: "Willy, we have had all of this nonsense that we want. Now you just speak right up an' tell the truth. What did you do with your grandfather's coat?"

"I didn't do anything with it," faltered Willy again. His lip was quivering.

"What?"

"I--didn't"--began the child again, then his sobs checked him. He crooked his little free arm, hid his face in the welcome curve, and cried in good earnest.

"Stop crying and tell me the truth," said Grandma pitilessly.

Willy again gasped out his one reply; he shook so that he could scarcely hold his berry pail. Aunt Annie took it out of his hand and set it on the table. Uncle Frank rose with a jerk. "I'll run over and get mother," said he, with an air that implied, "I'll soon settle this matter."

But the matter was very far from settled by Mrs. Perry's testimony. She only repeated what she had already told her daughter-in-law.

"The bundle came on the noon express," said she, "and I told Mr. Perry to set it down in the kitchen, and I would see that it got over to you. He didn't know how to stop just then. It laid there on one of the kitchen-chairs while I was clearing away the dinner-dishes. Then about two o'clock I was changing my dress, when I heard Willy whistling out in the yard, and I ran into the kitchen and got the bundle, and called him to take it. I opened the south door and gave it to him, and told him to take it right home to his grandpa. He said he guessed he'd open it and see if his shoes had come, and I told him 'no,' he must go straight home with it."

That was Mrs. Perry's testimony. Willy heard in the presence of all the family; then when the question as to the whereabouts of the coat was put to him, he made the same answer. He also repeated that Grandma Perry had not given it to him.

"Don't you let me hear you tell that wicked lie again," said his Grandma Stockton. She was nearly as much agitated as the boy. She did not know what to do, and nobody else did.

Grandpa Perry came over with three sticks of twisted red and white peppermint candy, and three of barley. He caught hold of Willy and swung him on to his knee. He was a fleshy, jolly man.

"Now, sir," said he, "let's strike a bargain--I'll give you these six whole sticks of candy for your supper, and you tell me what you did with Grandpa's coat."

"I--didn't do--any"--Willy commenced between his painful sobs, but his grandmother interrupted--"Hush! don't you ever say that again," said she. "You did do something with it."

"I'll throw in a handful of raisins," said Mr. Perry. But it was of no use.

"Well, if the little chap was mine," said Mrs. Perry finally, "I should give him his supper and put him to bed, and see how he would look at it in the morning."

"I think that would be the best way," chimed in aunt Annie eagerly. "He's all tired out and hungry, and doesn't know what he does know--do you, dear?"

So she poured out some milk, and cut off a big slice of cake, but Willy did not want any supper. It was hard work to induce him to swallow a little milk before he went upstairs. His grandmother heaved a desperate sigh after he was gone.

"If it was in the days of the Salem witches," said she, "I'd know just what to think; as 'tis, I don't."

"That boy was never known to tell a lie before in his whole life--his mother said so. He never pestered her the way some children do, lyin'; an' as for stealin'--why, I'd trusted him with every cent I've got in the world." That was Grandpa Stockton.

During the next two or three days every inducement was brought to bear upon Willy. He was scolded and coaxed, he was promised a reward if he would tell the truth, he was assured that he should not be punished. Monday he was kept in his room all day, and was given nothing but bread and milk to eat. Severer measures were hinted at, but Grandpa Stockton put his foot down peremptorily. "That boy has never been whipped in his whole life," said he, "an' his own folks have got to begin it, if anybody does."

All the premises were searched for the missing coat, but no trace of it was found. The mystery thickened and deepened. How could a boy lose a coat going across a road in broad daylight? Why would he not confess that he had lost it?

Finally it was decided to take him home. He was becoming all worn out with excitement and distress. He was too delicate a child to long endure such a strain. They thought that once at home his mother might be able to do what none of the rest had.

All the others were getting worn out also. A good many tears had been shed by the older members of the company. Poor Mrs. Perry took much blame to herself for giving the coat to the boy, and so opening the way for the difficulty.

"Mr. Perry says he thinks I ought not to have given the coat to him, he's nothing but a child, any way," she said tearfully once.

It was Monday afternoon when Willy was shut up in his room, and all the others were talking the matter over downstairs.

Tears stood in aunt Annie's blue eyes. "He's nothing but a baby," said she, "and if I had my way I'd call him downstairs and give him a cookie and never speak of the old coat again."

"You talk very silly, Annie," said Grandmother Stockton. "I hope you don't want to have the child to grow up a wicked, deceitful man."

Willy's grandparents gave up going to the silver wedding. Grandpa had no good coat to wear, and indeed neither of them had any heart to go.

So the morning of the wedding-day they started sadly to return to Ashbury. Willy's face looked thin and tear-stained. Somebody had packed his little bag for him, but he forgot his little cane.

When he was seated in the cars beside his grandmother, he began to cry. She looked at him a moment, then she put her arm around him, and drew his head down on her black cashmere shoulder.

"Tell Grandma, can't you," she whispered, "what you did with Grandpa's coat?"

"I didn't--do--any"--

"Hush," said she, "don't you say that again, Willy!" But she kept her arm around him.

Willy's mother came running to the door to meet them when they arrived. She had heard nothing of the trouble. She had only had a hurried message that they were coming to-day.

She threw her arms around Willy, then she held him back and looked at him. "Why, what is the matter with my precious boy!" she cried.

"O, mamma, mamma, I didn't, I didn't do anything with it!" he sobbed, and clung to her so frantically that she was alarmed.

"What does he mean, mother?" she asked.

Her mother motioned her to be quiet. "Oh! it isn't anything," said she. "You'd better give him his supper, and get him to bed; he's all tired out. I'll tell you by and by," she motioned with her lips.

So Willy's mother soothed him all she could. "Of course you didn't, dear," said she. "Mamma knows you didn't. Don't you worry any more about it."

It was early, but she got some supper for him, and put him to bed, and sat beside him until he went to sleep. She told him over and over that she knew he "didn't," in reply to his piteous assertions, and all the time she had not the least idea what it was all about.

After he had fallen asleep she went downstairs, and Grandma Stockton told her. Willy's father had come, and he also heard the story.

"There's some mistake about it," said he. "I'll make Willy tell me about it, to-morrow. Nothing is going to make me believe that he is persisting in a deliberate lie in this way."

Willy's mother was crying herself, now. "He never--told me a lie in his whole dear little life," she sobbed, "and I don't believe he has now. Nothing will ever--make me believe so."

"Don't cry, Ellen," said her husband. "There's something about this that we don't understand."

It was all talked over and over that night, but they were no nearer understanding the case.

"I'll see what I can do with Willy in the morning," his father said again, when the discussion was ended for the night.

Willy was not awake at the breakfast hour next morning, so the family sat down without him. They were not half through the meal when there were some quick steps on the path outside; the door was jerked open, and there was aunt Annie and uncle Frank.

She had Willy's little yellow cane in her hand, and she looked as if she did not know whether to laugh or cry.

"It's found!" she cried out, "it's found! Oh! where is he? He left his cane, poor little boy!"

Then she really sank into a chair and began to cry. There were exclamations and questions and finally they arrived at the solution of the mystery.

Poor little Willy had not done anything with Grandpa's coat. Mrs. Perry had not given it to him. She had--given it to another boy.

"Last night about seven o'clock," said uncle Frank. "Mr. Gilbert Hammond brought it into the store. It seems he sent his boy, who is just about Willy's age, and really looks some like him, for a bundle he expected to come by express. The boy was to have some shoes in it.

"I suppose mother caught a glimpse of him, and very likely she didn't have on her glasses, and can't see very well without them, and she thought he was Willy. She was changing her dress, too, and I dare say only opened the door a little way. Then the Hammond boy's got a grandfather, and the shoes and the whole thing hung together.

"Mr. Hammond said he meant to have brought the bundle back before, but they had company come the next day, and it was overlooked.

"Father and mother both came running over the minute they heard of it, and nothing would suit Annie but we should start right off on the night train, and come down here and explain. And, to tell the truth, I wanted to come myself--I felt as if we owed it to the poor little chappie."

Uncle Frank's own voice sounded husky. The thought of all the suffering that poor little innocent boy had borne was not a pleasant one.

Everything that could be done to atone to Willy was done. He was loved and praised and petted, as he had never been before; in a little while he seemed as well and happy as ever.

The next Christmas Grandpa Perry sent a beautiful little gold watch to him, and he was so delighted with it that his father said, "He doesn't worry a bit now about the trouble he had in Exeter. That watch doesn't seem to bring it to mind at all. How quickly children get over things. He has forgotten all about it."

But Willy Norton had not forgotten all about it. He was just as happy as ever. He had entirely forgiven Grandma Perry for her mistake. Next summer he was going to Exeter again and have a beautiful time; but a good many years would pass, and whenever he looked at that little gold watch, he would see double. It would have for him a background of his grandfather's best coat.

Innocence and truth can feel the shadow of unjust suspicion when others can no longer see it.

THE STRANGER IN THE VILLAGE.

"Margary," said her mother, "take the pitcher now, and fetch me some fresh, cool water from the well, and I will cook the porridge for supper."

"Yes, mother," said Margary. Then she put on her little white dimity hood, and got the pitcher, which was charmingly shaped, from the cupboard shelf. The cupboard was a three-cornered one beside the chimney. The cottage which Margary and her mother lived in, was very humble, to be sure, but it was very pretty. Vines grew all over it, and flowering bushes crowded close to the diamond-paned windows. There was a little garden at one side, with beds of pinks and violets in it, and a straw-covered beehive, and some raspberry bushes all yellow with fruit.

Inside the cottage, the floor was sanded with the whitest sand; lovely old straight-backed chairs stood about; there was an oaken table, and a spinning-wheel. A wicker cage, with a lark in it, hung in the window.

Margary with her pitcher, tripped along to the village well. On the way she met two of her little mates--Rosamond and Barbara. They were flying along, their cheeks very rosy and their eyes shining.

"O, Margary," they cried, "come up to the tavern, quick, and see! The most beautiful coach-and-four is drawn up there. There are lackeys in green and gold, with cocked hats, and the coach hath a crest on the side--O, Margary!"

Margary's eyes grew large too, and she turned about with her empty pitcher and followed her friends. They had almost reached the tavern, and were in full sight of the coach-and-four, when some one coming toward them caused them to draw up on one side of the way and stare with new wonder. It was a most beautiful little boy. His golden curls hung to his shoulders, his sweet face had an expression at once gentle and noble, and his dress was of the richest material. He led a little flossy white dog by a ribbon.

After he had passed by, the three little girls looked at each other.

"Oh!" cried Rosamond, "did you see his hat and feather?"

"And his lace Vandyke, and the fluffy white dog!" cried Barbara. But Margary said nothing. In her heart, she thought she had never seen any one so lovely.

Then she went on to the well with her pitcher, and Rosamond and Barbara went home, telling every one they met about the beautiful little stranger.

Margary, after she had filled her pitcher, went home also; and was beginning to talk about the stranger to her mother, when a shadow fell across the floor from the doorway. Margary looked up. "There he is now!" cried she in a joyful whisper.

The pretty boy stood there indeed, looking in modestly and wishfully. Margary's mother arose at once from her spinning-wheel, and came forward; she was a very courteous woman. "Wilt thou enter, and rest thyself," said she, "and have a cup of our porridge, and a slice of our wheaten bread, and a bit of honeycomb?"

The little boy sniffed hungrily at the porridge which was just beginning to boil; he hesitated a moment, but finally thanked the good woman very softly and sweetly and entered.

Then Margary and her mother set a bottle of cowslip wine on the table, slices of wheaten bread, and a plate of honeycomb, a bowl of ripe raspberries, and a little jug of yellow cream, and another little bowl with a garland of roses around the rim, for the porridge. Just as soon as that was cooked, the stranger sat down, and ate a supper fit for a prince. Margary and her mother half supposed he was one; he had such a courtly, yet modest air.

When he had eaten his fill, and his little dog had been fed too, he offered his entertainers some gold out of a little silk purse, but they would not take it.

So he took hold of his dog's ribbon, and went away with many thanks. "We shall never see him again," said Margary sorrowfully.

"The memory of a stranger one has fed, is a pleasant one," said her mother.

"I am glad the lark sang so beautifully all the while he was eating," said Margary.

While they were eating their own supper, the oldest woman in the village came in. She was one hundred and twenty years old, and, by reason of her great age, was considered very wise.

"Have you seen the stranger?" asked she in her piping voice, seating herself stiffly.

"Yes," replied Margary's mother. "He hath supped with us."

The oldest woman twinkled her eyes behind her iron-bowed spectacles. "Lawks!" said she. But she did not wish to appear surprised, so she went on to say she had met him on the way, and knew who he was.

"He's a Lindsay," said the oldest woman, with a nod of her white-capped head. "I tried him wi' a buttercup. I held it under his chin, and he loves butter. So he's a Lindsay; all the Lindsays love butter. I know, for I was nurse in the family a hundred years ago."

This, of course, was conclusive evidence. Margary and her mother had faith in the oldest woman's opinion; and so did all the other villagers. She told a good many people how the little stranger was a Lindsay, before she went to bed that night. And he really was a Lindsay, too; though it was singular how the oldest woman divined it with a buttercup.

The pretty child had straightway driven off in his coach-and-four as soon as he had left Margary's mother's cottage; he had only stopped to have some defect in the wheels remedied. But there had been time enough for a great excitement to be stirred up in the village.

All any one talked about the next day, was the stranger. Every one who had seen him, had some new and more marvelous item; till charming as the child really was, he became, in the popular estimation, a real fairy prince.

When Margary and the other children went to school, with their horn-books hanging at their sides, they found the schoolmaster greatly excited over it. He was a verse-maker, and though he had not seen the stranger himself, his imagination more than made amends for that. So the scholars were not under a very strict rule that day, for the master was busy composing a poem about the stranger. Every now and then a line of the poem got mixed in with the lessons.