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  AT THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

  BY RUTH ALBERTA BROWN

  Author of "Tabitha at Ivy Hall," "Tabitha's Glory," "Tabitha'sVacation," etc., etc.

  THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANYCHICAGO AKRON, OHIO NEW YORK_MADE IN U.S.A._

  COPYRIGHT, MCMXIIIBy THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY

  "I should say it sounded like a plain robber story," saidFaith bitterly, while Gail sat white-faced and silent with despair.]

  CONTENTS

  I. A MORNING CALLER

  II. THE MINISTER'S RECEPTION

  III. SHOES AND STRAWBERRIES

  IV. LITTLE FLOWER GIRLS

  V. SACKCLOTH AND ASHES

  VI. THANKSGIVING DAY AT THE BROWN HOUSE

  VII. PEACE SURPRISES THE LADIES' AID

  VIII. A MYSTERIOUS SANTA CLAUS

  IX. FAITH'S AWAKENING

  X. COMPANY FOR SUPPER

  XI. GARDENS AND GOPHERS

  XII. THE RASPBERRY PATCH

  XIII. PEACE GETS EVEN

  XIV. PEACE, THE GOOD SAMARITAN

  XV. PEACE COLLECTS DAMAGES

  XVI. THE STATE FAIR CAKE

  XVII. THE CIRCUS AND THE MISSIONARY

  XVIII. THE HAND-ORGAN MAN

  XIX. HEARTBREAK

  XX. AT THE BROKER'S OFFICE

  XXI. SURPRISES

  AT THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

  CHAPTER I

  A MORNING CALLER

  It was a glorious morning in early June; the dew still hung heavy oneach grass blade and leaf, making rainbow tapestries that defydescription, as the waking sunbeams stole into the heart of each rounddrop and nestled there; the fresh, cool air was sweet with the breath ofa thousand flowers; a beautiful bird chorus filled the earth withriotous melody as the happy-hearted songsters flitted from tree to treesaying, "Good morning," to their neighbors. Through a mass of rosyclouds in the east, the sun struggled up over the hilltop and smileddown on the sleeping village of Parker as if trying to coax the dreamersto arise and behold the beauties of the dawning day. In the barn-yardsof the little farms scattered around about the town roosters werecrowing, hens were clucking, cattle lowing, and horses stamping andneighing, eager for their breakfast.

  Old Towzer, from his bed on the porch of the little brown house, almostbidden by tall maples and wide-spreading elms, stretched and yawned,perked up his ears, listened intently, then rose stiffly, shook hisheavy coat and leisurely descending the steps, circled around the placeto see whether anyone was yet astir. The door slammed at the green houseon the farm adjoining, from the little red cottage across the fieldscame the sound of a busy ax, and down by the creek some early riserwhistled merrily as he went about his morning work. All this old Towzerheard, and strolling back to his place on the porch, he looked up at thechamber window above him and barked sharply. The drawn curtain flew upwith a flirt, a small, tousled head appeared behind the screen, and achildish voice in a loud whisper commanded, "Keep still, you old Towzer!It isn't time to wake Gail yet. We've got to get those flowers and shewouldn't let us if she knew."

  A second small face joined the first at the window, followed by stillanother, all blinking sleepily, but eager with excitement. "Oh, Peace,"whispered the oldest of the trio, in an awestruck voice, "isn't it abeau--ti--ful day? I've a notion to call--"

  "Don't you dast!" quickly interposed the first speaker. "You know Gailnever'd let us go. Just see how wet everything is!"

  "Did it rain?" asked the third child, the youngest of them all,critically examining the trees and porch-roof, and then lifting hergreat, blue eyes to the bluer sky above as if expecting to see heranswer there.

  "No, goosie, it's just dew, but it must have been awful heavy. Get yourclothes on, Allee, or Gail will wake before we are started. Aren't youready, Cherry?"

  "'Most," came the muffled reply from the corner where a strugglingtangle of clothes, hands and feet proclaimed that Cherry was hurrying.

  "Then come on; we will have to fly. I'll button your dress when we getoutside, Allee. Never mind your other shoe, Cherry; you can put it ondownstairs. Have you got your basket?" Giving her directions in sharp,imperative whispers, Peace led the way into the hall, leaped onto thebanisters, boy-fashion, and slid quickly, quietly to the floor below,where she waited in a fever of impatience for her less daring sisters tocreep backward down the creaking stairs. "Skip that one, it squeaks likefury--oh, Allee, what a racket! There, I knew you'd do it! Gail's awake.Sh! Girls!"

  They held their breath, huddled close in the darkest corner of the hall,and waited.

  "Peace!" again came the call from above.

  A happy inspiration seized the small culprit, and she snored vigorously.Cherry and Allee clapped both hands over their mouths to stifle theirgiggles, but Gail was evidently satisfied, for she did not repeat hersummons; and after another moment of hushed waiting, the half-dressed,dishevelled trio tiptoed down the hall, cautiously unlocked the kitchendoor and slipped out into the sweet freshness of the early day.

  There was a quick scampering of little feet down the walk, a subduedclick of the gate, and the three children, holding hands, raced madlyalong the dusty road until a thick hedge of sumac and hazel bushes hidthem from the little brown house. Then Peace slackened her gaitsomewhat, but did not cease running, and kept looking behind her as ifstill fearing pursuit or discovery.

  "Oh, Peace," gasped Allee at last, stumbling blindly over sticks andstones as her older sisters dragged her along between them, "my dress iscoming off, and my breath is all in chunks. Do we have to run the_whole_ way?"

  Peace looked back at the small, perspiring figure, saw the plumpshoulders from which the unbuttoned dress had slipped, caught a glimpseof flying shoestrings, rumpled stockings and naked legs, as the littlefeet were jerked unceremoniously over humps and hollows of the roughroad-way, and stopped so abruptly that her companions were thrownheadlong into the dust, creating such a commotion that a weary slumbereron the opposite side of the thicket was rudely startled out of his nap,thinking some great catastrophe had overtaken him. As he sat up andrubbed his eyes, looking around him in bewilderment for the cause of hissudden awakening, he heard an angry voice sputter shrilly, "Well, PeaceGreenfield, I must say--"

  "Don't stop to say it now," interrupted another childish voice. "I nevermeant to dump you over like that. You shouldn't have been running sofast. S'posing you had been a train and tumbled into the ditch! Reckonall your passengers would have got a good jolt. I stopped so's we couldfinish dressing. Cherry, where is your other shoe? You have run all theway down the road with only one on. Just look at your stockings!"

  "Where's yours? You haven't any stockings at all," retorted the firstvoice, still sharp with indignation.

  "In my pocket. I was afraid Gail would hear as 'fore we got gone. There,Allee, your dress is done. Fasten up your shoes while I put on mystockings. We'll have to hurry like mischief, 'cause I don't think Gailwill go back to sleep again."

  There was a subdued rustling for a moment or two beyond the dense hedge,and then the listening man heard the sound of hurrying footsteps in theroad, and the children vanished without his having caught a glimpse ofthem. But he was now thoroughly awake, and as soon as the steps diedaway in the distance, he rose from his bed among the leaves, shook outhis gray blankets, rolled and strapped them into a bundle, threw themunder the overhanging shrubbery, and slowly made way through the treesto a wide, sparkling creek, whose tumbling waters made sweet music inthe woods.

  "What a glorious sce
ne this is," he murmured aloud, gazing in raptadmiration at the wooded hills, the singing stream, the bright flowers."Why can't we be content to live in such places instead of buildinggreat, smoky, sooty cities? You little creek, you sang me to sleep lastnight. Wish I could take you back home with me. What a pretty flower!Little bird, you will split your throat if you try to pour out all yourmelody at once. Better give us a little at a time. Of course you arehappy! Who wouldn't be on such a wonderful day? Oh, what sentiments fora tramp! Campbell, have you forgotten what you are?"

  He was near the road now, and suddenly a baby voice piped shrilly, "Yes,here is the bridge and there is the sun. Oh, just look at the sun! It'sway up high now. Ain't it big and fiery?"

  "S'posing it was a frying-pan," spoke up a second voice, which thestartled tramp recognized as belonging to Peace; "and we could have allthe buckwheat cakes it would cook. My! wouldn't that be nice?"

  They came slowly into view through the shrubbery,--three queer, drippinglittle figures, with hair flying, dresses wet and rumpled, shoes soakedand muddy, but literally loaded down with masses of late columbine andsweet wood violets. And they made a pretty picture with their bright,rosy faces and excited, sparkling eyes.

  The tramp, in the shadow of the trees, caught his breath sharply, thenlaughed to himself at Peace's supposition and Cherry's horrifiedexclamation, "Why, Peace Greenfield, what ever put such a crazy ideainto your head?--supposing the sun was a frying pan?"

  "I bet it would make a good one, and I'll bet the cakes would be dandy,too! Um--m--m! I can smell 'em now. I am starving hungry, and it doestake so long for the girls to cook pancakes in our little frying pan.Hurry up! It must be breakfast time already. I wish I had wings to flyhome with. S'posing we were birds, we would be there in a jiffy."

  "Let's play we were," suggested Allee. "That will make the way seemshorter."

  "All right," the sisters assented; and with their great bouquetsflapping wildly in the wind, the trio sped swiftly out of sight up theroad, leaving the tramp again to his thoughts.

  "Pancakes! Makes me hungry, too. Guess I better wash and be moving on insearch of a breakfast. I wonder if those youngsters live near here."

  He knelt beside the clear stream and ducked his head again and again inthe cool water, finally drying his face on a clean handkerchief, andrunning his fingers through his bushy gray hair in place of a comb. Histoilet done, he set out briskly down road the children had taken,whistling under his breath, and keeping a careful lookout forfarmhouses on the way.

  At the first place he approached, the watchful housewife had loosed avicious-looking bulldog, and the tramp wisely passed by withoutstopping. The next house was deserted, the door of the third place wasslammed in his face before he could even make known his wants, and hewas beginning to wonder if he must go breakfastless when a shrill,childish treble rang out clearly on the still morning air:

  "'The Campbells are comin' Oho, Oho, The Campbells are comin', Oho, Oho.'"

  So sudden was the discordant burst of song, and so close by, that thetramp stopped in his tracks and stared in the direction of the voice.

  "Well, of all things! That announcement quite took my breath away!" heejaculated, hurrying forward once more. "The voice sounds like 'S'posingPeace.' I wonder if it can be she."

  It was, indeed. Another rod and he found himself in front of a gate, onthe high post of which was perched a diminutive, bare-legged girl ina soiled, damp frock, superintending the drying of three pair ofmud-covered shoes arranged in a row on the picket fence, while sheissued orders to the two sisters sitting in the middle of the gravelwalk busily sorting flowers.

  "As true as you live, I don't believe these shoes will ever be dry byschool time. S'posing we have to go barefooted, and this the last day ofthe term! Cherry, you've got too many columbines in that horn. They lookpinched. Put some in Allee's boat."

  "Allee's boat?"

  "Well, she is fixing it for Miss Truesdale, even if she ain't asure-enough scholar yet. Don't make such little, stingy bunches ofviolets. We picked plenty. I can't coax your toes to shine, Cherry. I'mscared that the blacking won't do any good. You shouldn't have worn yourbest ones."

  "I haven't any others. My old pair is all worn out, and--Why, who--"

  Cherry had caught sight of the shabby figure at the gate, but before shecould finish her sentence, Peace, following the direction of her eyes,wheeled about on her perch, surveyed the man with big, almost somber,brown eyes, and poured forth an avalanche of questions: "Are you atramp? Do you want some work, or are you just begging? Can you chopwood? Do you know how to hoe? Are you hungry--"

  "Yes, miss, I'm hungry," the tramp managed to stammer. "Could you giveme a bite to eat?"

  "Not unless you will work for it," was the firm reply. "We don't b'lievein feeding beggars, but we are always glad to help the deserving poor."

  The man's shrewd, deep-set eyes twinkled with amusement at her grown-uptone and manner, but he answered with seeming meekness, "I will be onlytoo glad to do anything I can for a breakfast--"

  "There's wood to be chopped. Gail ain't strong enough to do such work,and our man is lazy. Reckon we'll let him go as soon as the garden is inshape. There's a heap of vines to be trained up on strings 'round theporches, and there are all the flower beds to be weeded, this grassneeds cutting, and the roof of the hen house has to be fixed so's itwon't leak, the hoop has come off the rain-barrel, the back step isbroken, and--oh, yes, there are three screens that we can't get on thewindows, and Mike never finds time for them."

  Peace stopped for breath, and the tramp took advantage of the pause tosay, "Which one of those jobs will you have me do?"

  "Which one?" echoed the child in round-eyed amazement. "Why, all ofthem, of course! You don't expect us to give you breakfast unless you dosomething to earn it, do you, after I've told you we never feedbeggars?"

  "No, miss. I am willing to work. But you better find out what your mawants me to do first, so I can begin."

  "Mamma's a ninvalid," Peace responded promptly. "But I will ask Gail.She will know, and, besides, she is cook here."

  She leaped nimbly to the ground and disappeared within doors, where somesort of an argument evidently waged warm and furious for a time, judgingfrom the sound of voices heard in the garden. Finally Peace put inappearance again; not the jaunty, self-reliant young lady who hadinterviewed the tramp a few moments before, but a very sober-faced,dejected-looking child, who twisted her dress into knots with nervousfingers, and at length stammered in embarrassed tones, "Gail says youcan have some breakfast if you will split a little wood for her first,but she says it is a nimposition to expect you to do all I said youshould. I don't see why. There's a heap of work around here to be doneand no one but Mike to do it. There! Faith told me not to say anythingabout not having any men on the place. Mike is only a boy, you know, andhe doesn't b'long here. We haven't got any--"

  "Peace Greenfield!" The voice was sharp with exasperation, and Peaceretired hastily indoors once more, calling back over her shoulder,"You'll find the ax by the woodpile, if Mike hasn't got it in themeadow, or it isn't in the shed or the barn. I'll come out and tell youwhen to quit. Yes, Faith I _am_ hurrying! Be sure you cut a lot,'cause--" The voice trailed away into indistinctness, and the tramp,with a smile on his lips, went to hunt up the missing ax; and soonsharp, ringing blows told the occupants of the house that he was hard atwork.

  Rapidly the huge pile of heavy knots diminished in size, and just asrapidly the heap of split stove-wood grew, while the perspiration rolledin great beads down the worker's crimson face. At last he paused amoment to rest his back and wipe the moisture from his hot forehead, andas he drew his handkerchief down from his eyes he saw Peace standingbefore him, holding a platter in her extended arms while she surveyedthe result of his labor with approving eyes.

  "You've done splendid!" she breathed, enthusiastically. "The last trampwho cut wood for us piled it up so it looked like there was an awfullot, but after he was gone we found he had heaped it ar
ound a big holein the middle and there wasn't hardly any split. Faith said she bet youwould do the same way, but I watched you from the window, while Cherryand me were washing the dishes, and you never tried to hide a hole inthe middle at all. Here is your breakfast. Gail cooked it, else youwouldn't have got much. It is Faith's turn to get the meals today, butshe is baking a cake for the minister's reception tonight, and iscrosser'n two sticks, so Gail fixed it.

  "You see, we were all through breakfast when you got here, or you mighthave had more. I don't know, though,--Faith says if she had her wayabout it, she'd send every single tramp who comes here marching down thestreet with the enemy in pursuit. That means Towzer, but he wouldn'tbite anyone. Faith is cross every time she makes a cake. You might haveeaten in the kitchen if it hadn't been for that. She sends us allout-doors when she is baking, so's we won't make her cakes fall. Shedoes make fine things, though! Um! but they are good! Never mind, thekitchen is hot anyway, but it's nice and cool out here under this maple.This is my maple. Papa built that bench for me and Allee before he wentto heaven. You can sit on the ground and play the seat was your table,or you can sit in the seat and hold this platter in your lap. Which'llyou do?"

  The tramp smiled broadly, relieved the small maid of her heavy load, anddropped wearily onto the wide bench, saying gratefully, "This will donicely, thank you. What a fine breakfast you have brought me! Gail mustbe a good cook. Is she your sister?" As he spoke, he picked up an eggand carefully broke it on the edge of his plate.

  "Yes, Gail's the oldest of us--Oh, Mr. Tramp, just see what you havedone! I was afraid Gail hadn't given you breakfast enough and that youmight get hungry before noon, so when she wasn't looking I put on awhole lot of extra toast and four eggs and some matches to cook themwith, and you've gone and smashed a _raw_ egg all over everything!"

  He stared in dismay at the broken yolk streaming over his creamedpotatoes, and then, seeing the consternation in the big, brown eyes ofhis small hostess, he laughed heartily and said, "Never mind, littlegirl! I'm hungry enough for even raw eggs this morning. Doctors oftenmake their patients eat such things. Here goes!"

  Peace watched him in silence a moment and then observed, "You don't looklike any tramps we ever had here before. They always shovel in theirfood with their knives, but you use your fork. You can work, too. Whydon't you get a job somewhere and earn some money instead of loafingaround begging for your meals?"

  The man paused, with his fork half way to his mouth, surprised at thechild's keen observations. Then he answered, lightly, "I do sometimes,but a feller can't work all the time, can he?"

  "Well, most folks have to, though I never could see why they all can'thave vacations like we do at school. This is our last day until nextfall."

  "Is that what you and the kids gathered the flowers for?"

  "Yes, and for the minister's reception tonight. We went early thismorning 'fore the rest of the folks were up; and mercy, but didn't Faithscold when we got back! She said we ought all of us to be whipped andsent to bed. Faith is real ugly when she's making cakes. We did getawfully wet,--I had no notion it would be so bad. But we got the flowersanyway. We made some baskets yesterday out of birch bark and moss. Herecomes Allee with them now. She doesn't go to school yet, but sometimesshe visits with Cherry and me, and today is one of the times. Ain't thebaskets pretty?"

  "Scrumptious!" was the admiring answer, as the man clumsily lifted oneof the dainty boats filled with dog-tooth violets and drank in itsperfume with the delight of a child. "What wouldn't city people give forthese little nosegays from the woods! They would go like hot cakes."

  "What do you mean?" asked mystified Peace, failing to understand whatconnection her beloved flowers could have with hot cakes.

  "Why, in big cities, at almost any of the important business corners,you will see little boys and girls selling sweet peas and daisiesand--yes, they sometimes sell cowslips and wood violets, but only inbunches--never in such cunning little baskets. Why, tucked down in thatdamp moss, your flowers will keep fresh for hours; while a bunch from acity flower-seller's stock withers as soon as it is taken out of water."

  "Would folks in Martindale buy them?"

  "Yes, indeed! They are a breath from the woods, and lots of people wouldbe glad to get them. You see--"

  "Peace Greenfield, it's time to start! Do you want to be late the lastday of school?"

  "That's Cherry. I must go. I wish I could stop and talk some more. Whenyou finish your breakfast, just take the dishes around to the kitchensteps, and--if you have time and want to do it--you might weed thoseflower gardens in the front yard and the onion patch behind the shed. Ifyou don't, I'll have to, and you 'member I gave you some extra lunchthat you wouldn't have got if it hadn't been for me--and a few matches.Promise you won't light a fire till you get a long way from our house,will you? Gail won't give tramps matches for fear they will set thebuildings on fire. And say, the lawn-mower is right beside the frontporch, if you should happen to want to cut the grass--just the littlepiece fenced in, you know. The rest is for hay. And the ball of twinefor stringing up Hope's vines is stuck in the hole of the porch railingnearest the door--you can find it easy enough. The rain barrel is behindthe house, and--yes, yes, Cherry, I am coming this very minute! I hopeyou have liked your nice breakfast, and will come some other time andsplit more wood for us. Good-bye, Mr. Tramp, I've _got_ to go."