Georgina of the Rainbows

rlier

ve had a more seemly beginning; but, being a true record, it must start with that sneeze, becau

she kept kicking up and down on the step of her high-chair, wherefore the restraining hand which seized her ankles at intervals. It was Mrs. Triplett's firm hand which clutched her, and Mrs. Triplett's firm hand which fed her, so there was not the usual dilly-

med to like it. Being the working housekeeper, companion and everything else which occasion required, she had no time to make a game of Georgina's breakfast, even if she had known how. Not once did she stop to say, "Curly-locks, Curly-

en there was no garden work, Jeremy did everything about the house which required a man's hand. Although he must have been nearly eighty years old, he came

. His knitted "wrist-warmers" slipped down over his mottled, deeply-veined bands when he stooped to roll the log into the fire. He let go with a grunt. The next instant a mighty sneeze seized him, and Georgina, who had been gazing in fascination at the shower of sparks he was making, saw all of his teeth go flying into the fire. If his eyes had suddenly dropped from their

lett sprang to snatch her from the toppling chair, thinking the child was having a spasm. She did not connect it with old Jeremy's sneez

ongs. It was not the grinning teeth themselves, however, which frightened her. It was the awful knowledge, vague though it was to her infant mind, that a human body could fly apart in that way. And Tippy, not under

hich often haunted her as time wore on. She never knew at what moment she might fly apart herself. That it was a distressi

r from the floor and told her to look at the pretty bowl. The fall had put a dent into its side. And what would Georgina's great-great aunt have said could she have known what was going to happen to her handsome dish, poor lady! Surely she never would have left it to such a naught

the harbor, and dramatically bade her "hark!" Standing with her blue shoes on the window-sill, an

nt of the house in a waste of sand. So there was nothing to be seen but a fishing boat at anchor, and the waves crawling up the beach, and nothing to be heard but the jangle of a bell somewhere down the street. Th

l of her short life until these last few weeks. She did not even know whether what Mrs. Triplett said was coming along would be wearing a hat or horns. The cow that lowed at the pasture bars every night back in Kentucky jangled a bell.

auction. There's a big boat in this morning with a load

s ears. But there was such a happy twinkle in his faded blue eyes, such goodness of heart in every wrinkle of the weather-beaten old face, that even the grumpiest people smil

e window and beckon him to come in and wa

ion, but in her touchy frame of mind it was only an added grievance to have her knuckles knocked against the pane, and h

eavy for her to swing alone. But some dim picture of the kindly face puckered into smiles for her comforting, stayed on in her mind as an object seen through a fog, and thereafter she never saw the Towncrier go kling-k

rs. Triplett hurried for a cloth to wipe up the bread and milk. Kneeling on the floo

or she might have been screaming yet. I nev

eep such a heavy child as Georgina on the bounce. And in order that his words mi

ve been--some-

such--a hul

and halfway to the kitchen with the dripping floor cloth. But when she reappeared i

crock, Mr. Darcy, and if I don't get it mixed

he little lass out of mischief. Many's the time I have sat by this fire with her

rom one familiar object to another with the gentle wistfulness which creeps into old eyes

g her hands and clucking her tong

kitchen. "Her mother will be back from the post-office most any mi

a battered silver watch from the pocket of his velveteen waistcoat, holding it over her ear, she was charmed into a prolonged silence. The cla

ip end of Cape Cod. Georgina's grandfather, George Justin Huntingdon, a judge and a writer of dry law books, had been one of the first to open his home to him. They had been great friends, and little Justin, now Georgina's father, had been a still closer friend. Many a day they had spent together, these two, fishing or blueberrying or

eart thirty years ago. It was hard to think of the little lad as grown, or as filling the responsible position of a naval surgeon. Yet when he counted back he realized that the Judge had been dead several years, and

l station in the tropics. The next was the notice of his marriage to a Kentucky girl by the name of Barbara Shirley, and the last was a paragraph clipped from a newspaper dated only a few weeks back. It said that Mrs. Justin Huntingdon and

g about that time now, because it had something to do with his last visit to the Judge in this very room. She had happened to be present, too. And the gree