Dotty Dimple's Flyaway Part 17

Ruthie had no answer but a kiss and a smile.

"There, away with you into the nursery, both of you. I know Polly Whiting is lonesome without you."

Off went the children, Flyaway "with a heart for any fate," but Dotty still oppressed by the shadow of the ten-cent piece.

"If I don't give it to Prudy, will I be dishonest? Will I be as bad as Jennie Vance?"

When they entered the nursery, Miss Polly was standing before the mirror, arranging her black cap, and weaving into her collar a square black breast-pin, which aunt Louise said looked like a gravestone.

Flyaway peeped in too, placing her smooth pink cheek beside Miss Polly's wrinkled one.

"I don't look alike, Miss Polly," said she; "and you don't look alike too."

Certainly not; no more alike than a blush-rose bud and a dried apple.

"What makes the red go out of folks' cheeks when they grow old, and the wrinkles crease in, like the pork in baked beans?" queried Dotty.

"I couldn't tell you," replied the good lady, giving a pat to her cap, and settling the bows carefully; "but if you had asked how I happened to grow old before my time, I should say I'd had such a hard chance through life, and trouble always leaves its mark."

"Does it? O, dear! I have trouble,--ever so much; will it quirk my face all up, like yours?"

"You have trouble, Dotty Parlin? Haven't you found out yet that the lines have fallen to you in pleasant places?"

"I don't know what you mean by lines," said Dotty, thinking of fish-hooks; "but when it rains, and folks want me to do things that are real hard, then why, I'm blue, now truly."

"Then we're blue, now truly," added Flyaway by way of finish.

"What would you do, children, if you were driven about, as I used to be, from post to pillar, with no mother to care for you?"

"If I hadn't no mamma, I could go barefoot, like a dog," said Flyaway, brightening with the new idea; "I could paddle in the water too, and eat pepnits."

"O, child! But what if you had neither father nor mother?"

"Then," said Flyaway coolly, "I should go to some house where there _was_ a father'n mother."

"Why, you little heartless thing! But that is always the way with children; their parents set their lives by them, but not a 'thank you'

do they get for their love! Try a pinch," continued she, offering her snuff-box to the little folks, who both declined. This Polly thought was strange. They must like snuff if they followed the natural bent of their noses.

"Yes, Katie, as I was saying, you little know how your mother loves you."

"Yes um, I do. She loves me more 'n the river, and the sky, and the bridge. My papa loves me too, only but he don't _say_ nuffin' 'bout it."

"Yes, yes; just so," said Miss Polly, who talked to the simplest infants just as she did to grown people. "One of these days you will look back, and see how happy you are now, and be sorry you didn't prize your parents while you had them."

Flyaway rested her rosy cheek on Polly's knee, and watched the gray knitting-work as it came out of the basket. She did not understand the sad woman's words, but was attracted by her loving nature, and liked to sit near her, a minute at a time, and have her hair stroked.

"There, now," said Dotty, "you are knitting, Miss Polly; and it's so lonesome all round the house, with mother not coming till to-morrow, that I should think you might tell--well, tell an anecdote."

"I don't know where to begin, or what to say," replied Polly, falling into deep thought.

"I just believe she does sigh at the end of every needle," mused Dotty; "I'm going to keep 'count. That's once."

"Please, Miss Polly, tell a _nanny-goat_," said Flyaway, dancing around the room. "Please, Miss Polly, and I'll kiss you a pretty little kiss."

"Twice," whispered Dotty.

"Well, I'll tell you something that will pa.s.s for an anecdote, on condition that you call me _aunt_ Polly; that name warms my heart a great deal better than _Miss_ Polly."

"Three!" said Dotty aloud. "We will, honestly, if we can think of it, aunt Polly.--Four."

"Le'me gwout for the sidders, first," said busy Flyaway.

"There, aunt Polly, you forgot it that time! You sprang up quick to shut the door, and forgot it."

"Forgot what?"

"You didn't sigh at the end of your needle."

"Why, Dotty, how you do talk! Any one would suppose, by that, I was in the habit of sighing! I have a st.i.tch in my side, child, and it makes me draw a long breath now and then; that's all."

Flyaway was back again,

"With step-step light, and tip-tap slight Against the door."

"Come in," said Dotty, "and see if you can keep still two whole minutes; but I know you can't."

Miss Polly let her work fall in her lap, and drew up the left sleeve of her black alpaca dress. "Do you see that scar, children?"

It was just below the elbow,--an irregular, purple mark, about the size of a new cent.

"Why, Miss--why, aunt Polly!"

"I've got one on me too," said Flyaway, pulling at her ap.r.o.n sleeve; "Hollis did it with the tongs."

"It can't be; not a scar like mine."

"Bigger 'n' larger 'n' yours; only but I can't find it," said Flyaway, carefully twisting around her dainty white arm, which Polly kissed, and said was as sweet as a peach. "Bigger 'n' larger 'n' yours. Where's it gone to? O, I feegot--'twas on my _sleeve_, and I never put it on to-day."

"You're a droll child, not to know the difference between scars and dirt! When I was almost as young and quite as innocent, that wicked little boy bit me, and I shall carry the marks of his teeth to my grave." With another lingering glance at the purple mark, Polly drew down her sleeve, sighed, and began to knit again.

"Was it the woman's child that made you dig, that you told about last summer?"

"Yes; I was a bound girl."

"Bound to what?" Dotty was trying to drown the remembrance of Prudy's ten cents; so she wished to keep Miss Polly talking.

"Bound to Mrs. Potter till I was eighteen years old. Her husband kept public house. They made a perfect slave of me. When I was twelve years old I had to milk three cows, besides spinning my day's work on the flax-wheel. And very often all I had for supper was brown bread and skim milk. I didn't have any grandfather's house to go to, with a seat in the trees, and a boat on the water, and a swing, and a summer house, and a _crocky-set_ (croquet set). Not I!"

Flyaway was cutting paper dolls with all speed, but her sweet little face was drawn into curves of pity.