Some Little People Part 6

If they had been discontented they would have gone out of their mother's rooms into other rooms in the house, and then into the street, and into the gutter. Then they would have become soiled and spoiled, and changed altogether, but they were contented with their mother's rooms, and her chairs and tables, and frying pans, and brooms, and all the things which they found there; so they did not get soiled or spoiled or changed, but kept good and bright, pleasant little pictures as you would find in a day's walk.

'Lisbeth found, after she came to London, that there was a great deal to be done besides play; she had to learn to sew and help mother earn some money, but she was not very big and could not do much, only try.

At first 'Lisbeth believed she could make a great deal of money. She knew people must make money in London; she had heard so. Besides, people seemed to spend so much that there must be some way of getting it.

'Lisbeth was sure there was. She tried to make money in several ways.

This was a mistake; she should have been content with trying to help all she could at home, and then mother would have had more time, and so could have made more money, which would have helped them all. But this was not 'Lisbeth's way of doing. She tried to make a way of her own.

One day 'Lisbeth saw a little boy sweeping a street crossing; she had seen boys do this before, but had never thought anything about it. This time she thought about it because she saw some gentleman drop a little coin in the little boy's hand. This was a revelation to 'Lisbeth; it taught her something which she did not know before.

In another hour 'Lisbeth was sweeping a very dirty crossing, and she swept it and swept it over again; she swept until there really was not another speck to sweep, and the people, by the dozens and scores and hundreds walked over that crossing, and carried to it more mud for 'Lisbeth to sweep away, but n.o.body put an atom of anything in 'Lisbeth's hand for sweeping it, though she stood there the whole long day; and she found out still another time that money was hard to pick up even in London, and if she stopped that day, in pa.s.sing, as she generally did to look at the wax figure in the curled wig, at the corner of the street, she did not care a fig about it.

CHAPTER X.

'Lisbeth was quite down-hearted that day after sweeping the crossing; she was discouraged enough, especially as her mother was greatly grieved at her going away and staying so long, and reproved her very severely.

She felt very much discouraged indeed, but could not help believing in spite of it all that something would turn up, which would be bright and pleasant in such a fine city; she could not believe anything else.

As she came home that day she popped her head in the door of the room on the lower floor, to see how matters were getting on there. She shut the door again carefully, without saying a word. On the floor were scattered many things, and in the corner, like so many leaves blown together, were the three little boys fast asleep.

How tired they must have been; how hard they had played; indeed they had played too hard, for near them on the floor lay the remnants of mother's good sweeping brush which they had played quite to destruction. They were tired completely, and never knew that 'Lisbeth had looked in upon them to find out how they were getting along.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

I wonder what they were dreaming of as they slept; I believe they must have been pleasant dreams, unless they were dreaming about the broken brush--they were such comfortable-looking little faces, and they had such comfortable hearts, because they were good, and comfortable hearts help bring bright dreams.

When the mother came home I think she must have smiled to see them heaped in the corner fast asleep, but I suppose she had found them heaped in a corner asleep many a time. I hope she did not scold very hard about the broken brush, and I am almost sure she did not.

'Lisbeth, as I said before, felt very much discouraged that evening. She even felt dull the next morning, and the next afternoon. The mother had gone out that afternoon to take home some sewing; the boys were playing outside. 'Lisbeth had n.o.body to talk to. She concluded to talk to herself.

She got up on a high three-legged stool in the corner, and sat with her face to the wall; she wanted to think. She could not think if she was looking out of the window, or around the room, or if she sat in every-day fas.h.i.+on on a chair or on the floor. She sat in the darkest corner she could find.

"'Lisbeth Lillibun," she said to herself, "you have done nothing for yourself yet by coming to London; you have done nothing for yourself yet;" and it seemed that all the gla.s.ses and crockery on the table, and on the shelf, and even the coffee pot turned up on the stove to dry, jingled and rattled and laughed; but, of course, they did not.

"You must be up and a-doing, 'Lisbeth; it is time;" then the tin tea pot, and the coffee pot, and the candlestick turned up on the stove to melt the old candle out, and the spider and the skillet and the dipper seemed, every one of them, to be giggling, and 'Lisbeth looked around at them; but of course it was only a fancy.

"You have been making a goose of yourself, and most of all in sweeping a crossing dry for people to spatter with mud; you should be ashamed of yourself to be such a silly, and sitting where you are instead of being sitting somewhere else," and the tongs did clap together, and the poker did roll over, and the gridiron did give a clink against the wall, but I think the wind must have blown down the chimney.

'Lisbeth was insulted, however; she did not believe in the tins and tongs making fun of her. She got down from the stool, and put her bonnet on, and then changed it for her hat with a ribbon tied around it, and then she went out where there were no tongs to clap at her; but of course it was only a fancy of 'Lisbeth's about the tongs, for how could a tongs clap unless it was clapped? It was wrong for 'Lisbeth to go out; her place was in the house.

But she thought that it happened just as well that she did go out, for as she went down stairs she thought a thought, which she might never have thought had she remained sitting upon the stool.

She went down stairs and along the little street to the corner, and opened the door of the store in the window of which stood the wax figure with its wig, which was standing still just then, instead of turning gracefully from side to side. She opened the door and went in.

"What do you want, Sissy?" inquired a pleasant little man.

"I want to stay, sir, and make wigs."

"You want to stay and make wigs!"

"Yes, sir, I do," replied 'Lisbeth.

"Bless me!" exclaimed the pleasant little man, "this will not do."

"Oh, yes, it will, sir," replied 'Lisbeth, untying the knot in the strings of her hat, "it will do very well. I have not been able to think of any thing that would do before."

"But bless me!"

"Indeed I will, sir, if that is all," said 'Lisbeth, wondering how to do it, but taking off her hat.

"I don't want any wigs!"

"You don't?" replied 'Lisbeth, filled with astonishment.

"No, I don't; I really don't!"

'Lisbeth saw that he had plenty of hair, and as he rubbed his head she supposed he was remembering this.

"Other people do," said 'Lisbeth, rea.s.sured; "I see a good many of 'm every day who do; you can sell 'm."

"Sell 'm? I do sell 'm. I sell 'm when I can; but bless me!"

"Where shall I get the hair to make 'm of?" inquired 'Lisbeth, preparing to go to work.

"But I don't want 'm!"

"Oh!" replied 'Lisbeth, not a word else; but the pleasant little man snapped his fingers at her and beckoned her around the counter, and under the shelf of the beautiful big window, and made her screw herself up into a b.u.t.ton which n.o.body could see, and pulled a curtain down over her, and showed her, before he pulled the curtain down, how to pull a wire very gently and tenderly to make the wax figure in the curled wig turn from side to side, and she did it.

She pulled it this way, and she pulled it that way. She heard the people outside tramping up to the window and tramping away; she remembered how she had tramped up and tramped away. She laughed to hear them tramping, because she knew that a great many of them had their mouths open as well as their eyes, as they saw the wax figure, in a wig, turning from side to side. She would never open her mouth as well as her eyes again, when she saw a wax figure turning from side to side. She was certain she never would.

CHAPTER XI.

How long 'Lisbeth might have sat under the shelf, and under the curtain, earning pence and pulling wires, and forgetting that her mother was looking for her, had she not fallen into a doze, I cannot say. She might have been there till now; she might have been there ten years to come; but she did doze and she did wake up; she had swept the crossing hard enough the day before to be tired, and she was; she was tired, and it was coming night, and she did doze, and she did wake up, and she did wake up with a start which broke the wire, and twisted the head of the wax figure clear out of place, so that it looked in the shop instead of out of it, and made a confusion inside, and outside, and on all sides, seldom made by any wax figure in any wig since the beginning of time.

'Lisbeth told the pleasant little man that she could not help it, and he told her that he could not help it, and 'Lisbeth went home--to be sure seven pence richer, but a good deal fl.u.s.tered and disappointed, and with the determination never again, while she lived and breathed, to have anything to do with, or even so much as to look at any wax figures or any wigs.

'Lisbeth's mother told her that had she waited, and asked her advice, instead of leaving her to such distress in looking for her, she would have told her, in the beginning, to have nothing to do in the matter of wigs, with which she was not acquainted, and reproved her for staying away till the candle was lighted on the shelf; and 'Lisbeth, if she was no more unhappy than she had been when she stood by the mile-stone, was certainly no more happy.

To be sure she was richer. Though she had broken the wire, the pleasant little man had given her seven pence, though she had gained nothing more; but the bother, now, was to know what to do with it. Had it been seven thousand pence she might, perhaps, have known better what to do with it; but seven pence were of so much more consequence; being a little it had to go a great way. There was no trifling to be done about it. She knew the importance of it. She was awake half the night considering how to spend it, and the other half she was dreaming of losing and finding it, until by morning her head was almost split in two.

Had 'Lisbeth run home and given the seven pence to her mother to buy a nice platted loaf or a piece of bacon, her head had not almost split in two; but 'Lisbeth was always making trouble for herself. Though the thoughts and worry about the pence almost split her head, she was not in a condition in the morning to know what to do with the pence. She had her own pence and her own plan, had she had less of her own she would have been more comfortable. But 'Lisbeth was 'Lisbeth, and if her mother sighed about it, she could not see any way of making her anybody else.