Laddie: A True Blue Story

Ange

ther once-a

entleness, of

uiet joy,-ther

n upon h

ig brothers bought him for me in Fort Wayne, and sent him in a box, alone on the cars. Father and I drove to Groveville to meet him. The minute father pried off the lid, Bobby hopped on the edge of the box and crowed-the biggest crow you ever heard from such a mite of a body; he wasn't in the least afraid of us and we were pleased about it. You scarcely could see his beady black eyes for his bushy t

sed the scraps to dress him. His suit was done by the next forenoon, and father never laughed harder than when Hezekiah hopped down the walk to m

ks almost had spasms. They said he wouldn't like being dressed; that he would fly away

. Every one had been busy in the house, so I went to the cellar the outside way and ate all I wanted from the cupboard. Then I spread two big slices of bread the best I could with my finge

work in the

lay in the cree

until it bubbled and sang as it went; in it lived tiny fish coloured brightly as flowers, beside it ran killdeer, plover and solemn blue herons almost as tall as I was came from the r

wn with trailing grapevines, I offered the bread. Leon took a piece in each hand and began to eat as i

en you knew him, you understood he wouldn't forget it, and he'd be certain to do something nice for you before the day was over to pay

ow she wante

ne of a wild grape, catch the drippings and moisten

Shelley want with mo

so much she thinks people would s

vine, dry as could be, an

d to cut the vine in the spri

Leon, "and speak, ye voiceless pottery, and tes

he's going to b

ple liquid to bathe her streaming

arried it to the creek an

. "She'll know she never got

vine bled itself

n't tha

she?" asked Leon, spill

d as that.

" said Leon, pouring out more.

going to do no

he creek,"

! I'll wor

re in the dark place under the roots, where the water was deepest, huddled some of the cunningest little downy wild ducks you ever saw. We looked at each other and never said a word. Leon chased them out with the hoe and they swam down stream faster than old ones. I stood in the shallow water behind them and kept them from going back to the deep place, while Leon worked to catch them. Every time he got one he broug

ng be prettier t

ittle guine

uess all young things that have down are about as cunning as t

kill

me. Things

take g

y seem so innocent. Nothing

ese are

on. "Twelve of them. W

g hen on Mallard duck eggs, where she got the eggs, and what she paid for them. She said the ducks had found the creek that flowed beside Deams' barnyard before it entered our land, and they had swum away from the hen, and bot

e talked it over and decided that they would be much more comfortable swimming than in the basket, and it was more fun to wade than to walk, so we went above the deep place, I stood in the creek to keep them from going down, and Leon poured them on the water. Pigs couldn't have acted more co

ll Mrs. Deam. She had red hair and a hot temper, and we were not very anxious to see her, but we had to do it. While Leon was gone I was thinking pretty fast and I knew exactly how things would happen. First time mother saw Mrs. Deam she would ask her if the ducks were all right, and she would tell that four were gone. Mother would ask how many she had,

was hurt, and if it did, all you had to do was to suck the place, and it wouldn't amount to more than two little pricks as if pins had stuck you; but a big snake was a good excuse. I rolled from the floodgate among the ducks, and cried, "Snake!" They scattered everyw

r count them!

d Leon's jacket for anything, and set him down to think it over, he would pout a while, then he would look thoughtful, suddenly his face would light up and he would go away sparkling; and you could depend upon it he would do the same thing over, or something worse, inside an hour. When he wante

ny as she must have in her life, it was too funny. I don't think I could laugh harder, or Leon and Sammy. We enjoyed ourselves so much that at last she began to be angry. She quit dancing, and commenced h

e and Sammy can get them better ourselves, and if w

ngrily, but Leon smiled his most angelic smi

I should think you'd be ashamed to do it, after all the trouble we took to catch them before they swa

ter, leaned against each other and laughed. We just laughed ourselves almost sick. When Amanda's face go

ind all of them?

l comb the grass and strain the

o-h

cleaning up for Sunday. It was difficult to hurry, for after we had been soaped and scoured, we had to sit on the back steps and commit to memory verses from

h those and carry them back to her," said Leon. "But since she th

d fence. There we heard another call, but that was only two. We sat there, rested and looked at the green apples above our heads, wishing they were ripe, and talking about the ducks. We could

our land, and I always wondered why father didn't clean it out and make it look respectable. I said so to Leon as we crouched there watching down the hill where Mrs. Deam

with more mud in the morning than had been on it at night; and the horses would be splashed and tired. Once I was awake in the night and heard voices. It made me want a drink, so I went downstairs for it, and ran right into the biggest, blackest man who ever gr

ey have a bl

Father was a friend of the Governor. There were letters from him, and there was some good reason why father stayed at home, when he

black men were here some time, they would have

moved the brush, and sure as you live, we found an old door wi

er's voice, and that

Leon. "We better go as soo

urprising. There was a little room, dreadfully small, but a room. There was straw scattered over the floor, very deep on one side, where an old blanket showed that it had been a bed. Across the end th

w Leon pull some out and then shove it back, and he came to the door white as could be, shut it behind him and be

d for us, and if father finds it out, we are in for a good thrashing.

e gone to school two years ago, a

aid Leon. "I don't know but

e orchard path a

ake it sound far away. Must have made mother think w

found the Stati

about it!" s

ed the

do you supp

roaned Leon. "Do you think you'll be able to stand the swit

switched until it made me sick was too much for me. I shut my mouth tight and I never opened it about the Station place. As w

to run. Let me

oor, the boiler on the stove, soap, towels, and clean clothing on chairs. Leon had his tur

her ducks back?" she aske

Leon. "You'd have thought from the way she acted, that we'd been trying to

't have believed that of Amanda Deam. You tol

r they started right back down stream, and there was a big snake, and we had an aw

le eels. You should

we thought you would come a

ering. Of course if I had known you were having trouble wi

them home? Can't Sammy Deam

your bathing out of the way of supper. You

combed with a fine comb, oiled and rolled around strips of tin until Sunday morning. Mother did everything thoroughly. She raked that fine comb over our scalps until she almost raised the blood. She hadn't tim

curls hanging below our waists. Mother was using the fine comb, when she looked up,

at them?"

other as she told May to set a chair f

" she said. "I wanted

d mother. "Rest a whi

was so excited s

rand, an' like to be an aid to the soul's salvation. Nice as it seemed, an' convincin' as they talked, I couldn't get the consent of my mind to order, until I knowed if you was goin' to kiver your dead with the contraption. None of the rest of the neighbours see

p you all I can,

d.' Says I, 'Josiah, Miss Stanton knows how to get out of a cabin an' into a grand big palace, fit fur a queen woman. She's a ridin' in a shinin' kerridge, 'stid of a spring wagon. She goes abroad dressed so's you men all stand starin' like cabbage heads. All hern go to church, an' Sunday-school, an' college, an' come out on the top of the heap. She does jest what I'd like to if I knowed how. An' she ain't come-uppe

never met the woman; I know the man very slightly; he has been here on busine

rs. Freshett. "If she is, I won't open my head against he

t, Mrs. Freshet

kiver for to protect the graves of y

ad protected from the sun and the

ow how she'll feel about it, b

a sample? Wha

n' they are mighty stylish lookin' things. I have been savin' all I could skimp from butter, an' eggs, to get Samantha a organ; but says I to her: 'You are gettin' all I can do for you every day; there lays your poor brother 'at ain't had a finger lifted for him since he was took so sudden he was gone before I knowed he was goin'.' I never can get over Henr

son," said mother, feeling so badly

so full o' Grant, it was runnin' out of his ears. Come the second run the Gin'ral made, peered like Henry set out to 'lect him all by hisself. He wore every horse on the place out, ridin' to rallies. Sometimes he was gone three days at a stretch. He'd git one place an' hear of a rally on ten miles or so furder, an' blest if he didn't ride plum acrost the state 'fore he got through with one trip. He set out in July, and he rid right straight through to November, nigh onto every day

would have nothing to do with her. But mother said Mrs. Freshett was doing the very best she knew, and for the sake of that, and of her children, anyone who wouldn't help her was not a Christian, and not to be a Christian was the very worst thing that could happen to you. I stared at her steadily. She talked straight along, so rapidly you scarcely could keep up with the words; you couldn'

beat anythin' you ever heard. His pa said he was repeatin' what he'd heard said by every big stump speaker from Greeley to Logan. When he got so hoarse we couldn't tell what he

apron, covered her face and sobb

said my mother. "I

ld jest lay me out. I couldn't 'a' stood it at all if I hadn't 'a' knowed he was saved. I well know my Henry went straight

he would pull out a lot, and I could feel her knees stiffe

was a slam. "What in the wor

ht on the soap, and it thre

areful!" said my moth

re the knob turned and

, but at last she said softly: "You wer

et fever was ragin' an' I'm goin' to do jest what you do. If you have kivers, I will. If

want any cover for the graves of my dead but grass and flowers, and sky and clouds. I like the rain to fall on them, and the sun to shine, so that the grass and flowers will grow. If you are satisfied that the soul of Henry

Grant. I was kind o' took with the idea; the things was so shiny and scilloped at the edg

the roots, and all that fell on the slab would run off and make it that much wetter at the edges. The iron would soon rust and grow dreadfully ugly lying under winter snow.

r Henry all I could, but with my bulk, I'd hev all I could do, come Jedgment Day, to bust my b

ouldn't take the time when she had company, so she asked if he weren't big enough to pick out ten proper verses and learn them by himself, and he said of course he was. He took his Bible and he and May and I sat on the back steps and studied our verse

ence with his book and studied as I never before had seen him. Mrs. Freshett stayed so long mother had

er, Shelley, and I rode on the front seat, mother, May, and

Mother opened the gate and knelt beside two small graves covered with grass, shaded by yellow rose bushes, and marked with little white stones. She laid some flowers on each and wiped the dust from the carved letters with

eyes were bright and she smiled as she put he

Sally. "Look at that saddle and

she come?" a

e clothes and qu

use of worship. The Lord may be drawing her in His own way. I

ap to me to twist my hair when it was straight as a shingle, and cut my head on tin. If the Lord had wanted me to have curls, my hair would have been like Sally's. Seemed to me hers tried to see into what big soft

mething funny: it was about what the Princess had said of other people, and whether hers were worse. I looked at my father sitting in calm dignity in his Sunday suit and thought him quite as fine and handsome as mother did. Every Sabbath he wore the same suit, he sat in the same spot, he worshipped the Lord in his calm, earnest way. The ministers changed, but father was as much a part of the service as the Bible on the desk or the communion table. I wondered if people said things about him, and if they did, what they were. I never had heard. Twisting in my seat, one by one I studied the faces on the men's side, and then the women. It

tty face and dresses and manners, and so did Hannah Dover, only she talked too much. So I studied them and remembered what the Princess had said, and I wondered if she heard some one say that Peter Justice beat his wife, or if she showed it in her face and manner. She reminded me of a sca

aid. She had brown eyes, hair like silk, and she always had three best dresses. There was one of alpaca or woollen, of black, gray or brown, and two silks. Always there was a fine rustly black one with a bonnet and mantle to match, and then a softer, finer one of eithe

gathered the pennies, and each teacher took a class and talked over the lesson a few minutes. Then we repeated the verses we had committed to memory to our teachers; the member of each class who had learned the nicest texts, and knew them best, was selected to recite before the school. Beginning with the littlest people, we came

e, you almost had to hold him to keep him from it. Father said he was born for a politician or a

bbath, so I have thirteen

and ruffled the light hair where it was longest and wavy above his forehead. Such a perfect picture of innocence you never saw. There was one part of him that couldn't be described any better than the way Mr. Rienzi told about his brother in his "Address to the Romans," in McGuffey's Sixth. "The look of heaven on his face" stayed most of the time; again, there was a dealish twinkle that sparkled and

the recordin

" answered L

flies pass. Father looked down and laid his lower lip in folds with h

cretary after just

yes on Abram Saunders, the father of Absalom, and said reproving

and blinked in astonishment, wh

ed the secret

lton, who hadn't spoken to her n

," he told her softly, "bu

et it seemed as if

ou

o lazy to plow and sow land his father had left him. They were not so mild, and the voice

that s

it were over. Back came the eyes to the women's side

wine's snout, so is a fair

ooked appealingly at father, wh

looked directly at the man whom everybody i

ud of it, he worked so ha

igh: speak not with a stiff

door some o

led the secr

ced aroun

to dwell together in unity," he announced in del

retary with something l

oked so angelic, and he wa

love; there is no spo

d thrash hi

ht at Laddie: "I made a covenant with mine

one giggle

me almost

t it was a pretty serious thing he was doing. When he spoke he said these words in the most surpri

eve

repeated them, for he put a short pause after the first name, and he glanced t

e my mother's s

elv

forsaken. He surely shrank

will take me up," he announced, and looked as happy ov

irt

n do unto me?" inquired Leon of every one in the chur

at silence. "Let us kne

d his hands on the altar, closed h

ou knowest. Since we are reasoning creatures, it little matters in what form Thy truth comes to us; the essential thing is that we soften our hearts for its entrance, and grow in grace by

" and told about this sinful world and why He wept over it; then one at a time he took those other twelve verses and hammered them down where they belonged much harder than Leon ever could by merely looking at people.

heeks, and before him stood Leon. He was white

ne forgive me. I didn't mean to offend any one. It happened through hunting sh

s around Leon's shoulders, drew him to the seat, and with the tears still rolling, he laugh

He couldn't sing; he said so himself. Neither could half the people there, yet all of them were singing at the

they, who in the

ipley had been in the wa

ood amidst the

next line; her man was there, and maybe she w

ays, 'Come u

little

the blood o

of them rolled

the gates to the

eart, a grand old song like that. It is no right way to have to sit and keep still, and pay other people money to sing about Heaven to you. No matter if you can't sing by note, if you

s like a wood robin on a twig at twilight, and at the end of the chorus she cried "Glory!" right out loud, and turned and started down the aisle, shak

urs were better than she could make, or loan her a new pattern, or tell her first who had a baby, or was married, or dead, or anything like that. It was no wonder they felt glad. Mother came on, and as she passed me the verses were all finished and every one

eet from the Princess, and I thought of something. I had seen it done often enough, but I never had tried it myself, yet I wanted to so badly, there

. Mother must have been surpri

ss Pryor and you

d me her father was busy"-I thought she wouldn't want me to tell that he was plain CROSS, where every one could hear, so I said "busy"

to her seat, she had forgotten all about the "indisposed" word she disliked, and as you live! she invited the Princess to go home with us to dinner. She stood tall and straight, her eyes very bright, and her cheeks a little redder than usual, as she shook hands and said a few pleasant

cess came she was a little taller, and her hair was a trifle longer, and heavier, and blacker, and her eyes were a little larger and darker, and where Sally had pink skin and red lips, the Princess was dark as olive, and her lips and cheeks were like red velvet. Anyway, the Princess had said she would come over; mother a

ted more. That morning she was feeling so good she asked seventeen; and as she only had dressed six chickens-third table, backs and ham, for me as usual; but when the prospects were as now, I always managed to coax a few gizzards from Candace; she didn't dare give me

ell people about their meanness and gi