Children's Book Classics - Kate Douglas Wiggin Edition: 11 Novels & 120+ Short Stories for Children. Kate Douglas Wiggin
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em right in her head,” thought Simpson…. “If I ever seen a young one like that lyin; on anybody’s doorstep I’d hook her quicker’n a wink, though I’ve got plenty to home, the Lord knows! And I wouldn’t swap her off neither…. Spunky little creeter, too; settin; up in the wagon lookin’ bout’s big as a pint o’ cider, but keepin’ right after the goods!… I vow I’m bout sick o’ my job! Never WITH the crowd, allers JEST on the outside, s if I wa’n’t as good’s they be! If it paid well, mebbe I wouldn’t mind, but they’re so thunderin’ stingy round here, they don’t leave anything decent out for you to take from em, yet you’re reskin’ your liberty n’ reputation jest the same!… Countin’ the poor pickin’s n’ the time I lose in jail I might most’s well be done with it n’ work out by the day, as the folks want me to; I’d make bout’s much n’ I don’t know’s it would be any harder!”
He could see Rebecca stepping down from the platform, while his own red-headed little girl stood up on her bench, waving her hat with one hand, her handkerchief with the other, and stamping with both feet.
Now a man sitting beside the mayor rose from his chair and Abner heard him call:
“Three cheers for the women who made the flag!”
“HIP, HIP, HURRAH!”
“Three cheers for the State of Maine!”
“HIP, HIP, HURRAH!”
“Three cheers for the girl that saved the flag from the hands of the enemy!”
“HIP, HIP, HURRAH! HIP, HIP, HURRAH!”
It was the Edgewood minister, whose full, vibrant voice was of the sort to move a crowd. His words rang out into the clear air and were carried from lip to lip. Hands clapped, feet stamped, hats swung, while the loud huzzahs might almost have wakened the echoes on old Mount Ossipee.
The tall, loose-jointed man sat down in the wagon suddenly and took up the reins.
“They’re gettin’ a little mite personal, and I guess it’s bout time for you to be goin’, Simpson!”
The tone was jocular, but the red mustaches drooped, and the half-hearted cut he gave to start the white mare on her homeward journey showed that he was not in his usual devil-may-care mood.
“Durn his skin!” he burst out in a vindictive undertone, as the mare swung into her long gait. “It’s a lie! I thought twas somebody’s wash! I hain’t an enemy!”
While the crowd at the raising dispersed in happy family groups to their picnics in the woods; while the Goddess of Liberty, Uncle Sam, Columbia, and the proud States lunched grandly in the Grange hall with distinguished guests and scarred veterans of two wars, the lonely man drove, and drove, and drove through silent woods and dull, sleepy villages, never alighting to replenish his wardrobe or his stock of swapping material.
At dusk he reached a miserable tumble-down house on the edge of a pond.
The faithful wife with the sad mouth and the habitual look of anxiety in her faded eyes came to the door at the sound of wheels and went doggedly to the horse-shed to help him unharness.
“You didn’t expect to see me back tonight, did ye?” he asked satirically; “leastwise not with this same horse? Well, I’m here! You needn’t be scairt to look under the wagon seat, there hain’t nothin’ there, not even my supper, so I hope you’re suited for once! No, I guess I hain’t goin’ to be an angel right away, neither. There wa’n’t nothin’ but flags layin’ roun’ loose down Riverboro way, n’ whatever they say, I hain’t sech a hound as to steal a flag!”
It was natural that young Riverboro should have red, white, and blue dreams on the night after the new flag was raised. A stranger thing, perhaps, is the fact that Abner Simpson should lie down on his hard bed with the flutter of bunting before his eyes, and a whirl of unaccustomed words in his mind.
“For it’s your star, my star, all our stars together.”
“I’m sick of goin’ it alone,” he thought; “I guess I’ll try the other road for a spell;” and with that he fell asleep.
Seventh Chronicle.
The Little Prophet
I
“I guess York County will never get red of that Simpson crew!” exclaimed Miranda Sawyer to Jane. “I thought when the family moved to Acreville we’d seen the last of em, but we ain’t! The big, cross-eyed, stutterin’ boy has got a place at the mills in Maplewood; that’s near enough to come over to Riverboro once in a while of a Sunday mornin’ and set in the meetin’ house starin’ at Rebecca same as he used to do, only it’s reskier now both of em are older. Then Mrs. Fogg must go and bring back the biggest girl to help her take care of her baby,—as if there wa’n’t plenty of help nearer home! Now I hear say that the youngest twin has come to stop the summer with the Cames up to Edgewood Lower Corner.”
“I thought two twins were always the same age,” said Rebecca, reflectively, as she came into the kitchen with the milk pail.
“So they be,” snapped Miranda, flushing and correcting herself. “But that pasty-faced Simpson twin looks younger and is smaller than the other one. He’s meek as Moses and the other one is as bold as a brass kettle; I don’t see how they come to be twins; they ain’t a mite alike.”
“Elijah was always called the fighting twin’ at school,” said Rebecca, “and Elisha’s other name was Nimbi-Pamby; but I think he’s a nice little boy, and I’m glad he has come back. He won’t like living with Mr. Came, but he’ll be almost next door to the minister’s, and Mrs. Baxter is sure to let him play in her garden.”
“I wonder why the boy’s stayin’ with Cassius Came,” said Jane. “To be sure they haven’t got any of their own, but the child’s too young to be much use.”
“I know why,” remarked Rebecca promptly, “for I heard all about it over to Watson’s when I was getting the milk. Mr. Came traded something with Mr. Simpson two years ago and got the best of the bargain, and Uncle Jerry says he’s the only man that ever did, and he ought to have a monument put up to him. So Mr. Came owes Mr. Simpson money and won’t pay it, and Mr. Simpson said he’d send over a child and board part of it out, and take the rest in stock—a pig or a calf or something.”
“That’s all stuff and nonsense,” exclaimed Miranda; “nothin’ in the world but store-talk. You git a clump o’ men-folks settin’ round Watson’s stove, or out on the bench at the door, an’ they’ll make up stories as fast as their tongues can wag. The man don’t live that’s smart enough to cheat Abner Simpson in a trade, and who ever heard of anybody’s owin’ him money? Tain’t supposable that a woman like Mrs. Came would allow her husband to be in debt to a man like Abner Simpson. It’s a sight likelier that she heard that Mrs. Simpson was ailin’ and sent for the boy so as to help the family along. She always had Mrs. Simpson to wash for her once a month, if you remember Jane?”
There are some facts so shrouded in obscurity that the most skillful and patient investigator cannot drag them into the light of day. There are also (but only occasionally) certain motives, acts, speeches, lines of conduct, that can never be wholly and satisfactorily explained, even in a village post-office or on the loafers’ bench outside the tavern door.
Cassius Came was a close man, close of mouth and close of purse; and all that Riverboro ever knew as to the three months’ visit of the Simpson twin was that it actually occurred. Elisha, otherwise Nimbi-Pamby, came; Nimbi-Pamby stayed; and Nimbi-Pamby,