Читать книгу: «The Corner House Girls in a Play», страница 6

CHAPTER XI
THE STRAWBERRY MARK

Agnes Kenway had never been so uncomfortable in her life as she was sitting at that pleasant tea-table, at which the invalid, Mrs. Buckham, presided. And for once her usually cheerful tongue was stilled.

"What's the matter with Aggie?" asked Neale O'Neil. "Lost your tongue?"

"I believe our pretty one is bashful," suggested Mrs. Buckham, smiling upon the next to the oldest Corner House girl.

"Well, if she is, it's the first time," murmured Neale. But he said no more. Neale suddenly guessed what was troubling his girl friend, and had tact enough to keep his lips closed.

Agnes was just as honest a girl at heart as ever breathed. She did not need the reminder of the farmer's old doggerel to keep her from touching that which was not hers.

At the time when she had led the raid of the basket ball team and their friends upon Mr. Buckham's strawberry patch, she had been inspired by mere thoughtlessness and high spirits. The idea that she was trespassing – actually stealing – never entered her helter-skelter thoughts until afterward.

The field was so large, there were so many berries, and she and her mates took so few, that it really did not seem like stealing to thoughtless Agnes – no, indeed! It was just a prank.

And now to hear Bob Buckham express his horror of a thief!

"And that's what I am!" thought the bitterly repentant Agnes. "No, not a thief now. But I was at the time I took those berries. I am awfully sorry that I did such a thing. I – I wish I could tell him so."

That thought took fast hold upon the girl's mind. Her appreciation of the enormity of her offence had not been so great before – not even when Mr. Marks, the principal of the Milton High School, was talking so seriously to the girls about their frolic.

Then she had felt mainly the keen disappointment the punishment for her wrong-doing had brought. Not to be allowed to take part in the play which she felt sure would be enacted by the pupils of the Milton schools for the benefit of the Women's and Children's Hospital was a bitter disappointment, and that thought filled her mind.

Now she felt a different pang – far different. Shame for her act, and sorrow for the wrong she had done, bore Agnes' spirit down. Little wonder that she was all but dumb, and that her flowerlike face was overcast.

Tea was over and Mr. Buckham drew his wife's wheel-chair back to its usual place by the window. The light was fading even there, and Ruth said that they must start for home.

"Don't run away, sis," said the old farmer. "Marm and me don't have many visitors like you; an' we're glad to have ye."

"I fear that Mrs. MacCall will be afraid for us if we remain away much after dark," Ruth said cheerfully. She had already explained about Mrs. MacCall and Aunt Sarah, and even about Uncle Rufus.

"But we all have had such a nice time," Ruth added. "I know we shall only be too glad to come again."

"That's a good word," declared the invalid. "You can't come too often."

"Thank you," said Ruth. "If Neale will get the ponies ready – "

"And while he's doin' so, I'll take a look at that dog's ear again," said Mr. Buckham, cheerfully. "Wouldn't want nothin' bad to happen to such a brave dog as Tom Jonah."

"He's layin' out behind my kitchen stove, and he behaves like a Christian," Posy declared.

"He's a gentleman, Tom Jonah is," said Tess, proudly. "It says so on his collar," and she proceeded to tell the good-natured maid-of-all-work Tom Jonah's history – how he had first come to the old Corner House, and all that he had done, and how his old master had once unsuccessfully tried to win him back.

"But he wouldn't leave us at all. Would he, Dot?" she concluded.

"Of course not," said the smallest girl. "Why should he? Aren't we just as nice to him as we can be? And he sleeps in the kitchen when it's cold, for Mrs. MacCall says he's too old to take his chances out of doors these sharp nights."

"That's very thoughtful of your Mrs. MacCall, I do allow," agreed the jolly invalid. "And do you suppose she will get your doll's cloak done in time for your call on Mrs. Eland?"

"My Alice-doll's cloak? I do hope so," said Dot, with a sigh of anxiety.

"Wouldn't you go to call on the lady without her, if the cloak shouldn't be done?" asked the farmer's wife, much amused.

"Oh, no! I couldn't do that," said Dot, gravely. "You see, I promised her."

"Who, Mrs. Eland?"

"No, ma'am. My Alice-doll. I told her she should go with us. You see," said the smallest Corner House girl, "she was with us when we made the acquaintance of Mrs. Eland – Tess and me. And my Alice-doll liked her just as well as Tess and me. So there you are!"

"I see," agreed Mrs. Buckham, quite seriously. "You couldn't disappoint the child."

"Oh, no indeed!" said Dot. "I wouldn't want to! You see – she's not very strong. She hasn't been since that time she was buried alive."

"Buried alive!" gasped the lady in horror and surprise.

"Yes, ma'am. With the dried apples."

"Buried with dried apples?" repeated Mrs. Buckham, her wonder growing. "What for?"

"It was a most awful cat's-triumph," said Dot, shaking her head, and very, very solemn, "and it makes my Alice-doll very nervous even to hear it talked about. If she were here I wouldn't mention it – "

"What? What did you say, child?" gasped Mrs. Buckham. "About a cat, I mean, my dear?"

"She means 'catastrophe,'" said Tess, coming to the rescue. "I really wish, Dot Kenway, that you wouldn't use words that you can't use!"

Mrs. Buckham's mellow laughter rang out and she hugged the smallest Corner House girl close to her side.

"Never mind, honey," she said. "If you want to make up a new word, you shall – so there!"

Meanwhile Agnes had followed the farmer out into the big kitchen. The old man sat in a low chair and pulled Tom Jonah tenderly between his huge knees, till the dog laid his muzzle in his lap, looking up at the man confidingly out of his big, brown eyes.

Mr. Buckham had put on a pair of silver-bowed spectacles and had the salve-box in his hand. He laid the badly torn ear carefully upon his knee and began to apply the salve with a gentle, if calloused, forefinger.

"This'll take the pizen out, old feller," said the farmer, crooningly.

Tom Jonah whined, but did not move. The application of the salve hurt the dog, but he did not pull away from the man's hand.

"He sure is a gentleman, jest as the little gal says," chuckled Bob Buckham.

He looked so kindly and humorously up at Agnes standing before him, that the troubled Corner House girl almost broke out into weeping. She gripped her fingers into her palms until the nails almost cut the tender flesh. Her heart swelled and the tears stung her eyelids when she winked them back. Agnes was a passionate, stormy-tempered child. This was a crisis in her young life. She had always been open and frank, but nobody will ever know what it cost her to blurt out her first words to Mr. Bob Buckham.

"Oh, Mr. Buckham! do you hate anybody who steals from you?"

"Heh?" he said, startled by her vehemence. "Do I hate 'em?"

"Yes."

"Goodness me, gal! I hope not. I'm a communin' Christian in our church, an' I hope I don't have no hatred in my heart against none o' my fellermen. But I hate some things that poor, weak, human critters does – yes, ma'am! 'Specially some of the ornery things Bob Buckham's done."

"Oh, Mr. Buckham! you never stole," blurted out Agnes.

"Ya-as I have. That's why I hate stealin' so, I reckon," said the farmer, slowly.

"Not, really?" cried Agnes.

"Yep. 'Twas a-many year ago. Marm and me had jest come on this farm. She was young an' spry then, God bless her! And it was well she was. Bob Buckham wouldn't never have owned the place and stacked up the few dollars he has in bank, if it hadn't been for her spryness.

"I'd jest got my first strawberry patch inter bearin' – "

"Oh! Strawberries!" gasped Agnes.

"Ya-as'm. Them's what I've made most of my money on. I only had a small patch. They was fust-class berries – most on 'em. They packed well, and we had ter put 'em into round, covered, quart boxes to ship in them days. I got a repertation with the local shipper for havin' A-number-one fruit.

"Wal! Marm an' me was mighty hard up. We was dependin' on the re-turns from the strawberry crop to pay mortgage, int'rest and taxes. And one end of the strawberry patch – the late end – had the meachinest lookin' berries ye ever seen."

Old Bob chuckled at the remembrance. His gaze sought the firelight flashing through the bars of the grate of the big cookstove.

"Wal!" he said. "That was a bad time. We needin' the money so, and the berry crop likely to be short of what we figgered. Them little old barries at that last end of the patch began to ripen up fast; but I see they wouldn't bring me no price at all – not if the shipper seed 'em.

"'Course, he was buyin' from a score o' farmers ev'ry day. My boxes didn't have my name on 'em. They had his'n. He furnished the boxes and crates himself.

"The devil tempted me," said Bob Buckham, solemnly, "and I fell for him. 'Course we had always to 'deacon' the boxes – we was expected to. The top layer of berries had to be packed in careful, hulls down, so's to make a pretty showin'.

"But I put a lot of them meachin' little berries at the bottom of each box and covered 'em with big, harnsome fruit. They looked like the best o' the crop. I knew my man would never question 'em. And it made a difference of ten dollars to me on that one load.

"I done it," said the farmer, blowing a big sigh. "I done it with as little compunction as I ever done anything in my whole endurin' life."

"Oh, Mr. Buckham! Didn't you think it was wicked?"

"If I did," he said, with a grin, "it didn't spile my appetite. Not then. Not that day. I seen the carload shipped and never said a word. I went home. I eat my dinner just as hearty as ever and made preparations to work the next day's load the same way. Ye see, marm, she didn't know a thing about it.

"Wal!" continued the old man, "it come bed-time and we went to bed. I was allus a sound sleeper. Minute my head touched the husk piller, that minute I begun ter snore. I worked hard and I slept hard.

"But – funny thing – I didn't git to sleep. No reason – 'parently. Wasn't worried. I was kinder tickled at what I'd done, and the slick way I'd done it. I never had cheated before to my knowledge; but I was happy at the thought of that extry ten dollars, and the other extry money that was ter foller."

"And – and didn't your conscience trouble you?" asked Agnes, wonderingly.

"Nope, not a mite. I was jest as quiet and contented as though they'd left a conscience out o' me when I was built," and the old man chuckled again, heartily.

"Marm says she believes more folks lay awake at night because of empty stomachs than from guilty consciences, an' so she always has a plate of crackers by her side o' the bed. Wal! I lay as calm as a spring mornin'; but after a while I gotter countin' sheep jumpin' through a gap in a stone-fence, and had jest about lulled myself ter sleep, when seems ter me there was a hand writin' on the wall opposite the foot of our bed. I didn't see the hand, mind you; but I seen the writin'. It was in good, big print-text, too, or I couldn't have read it at all – for you know I never had no schoolin', an' I kin jest barely write my name to this day.

"But that print showed up plain as plain! And it was jest one word – kinder 'luminated on the wall. It was strawberry. That's all, jest strawberry. You'd think it would ha' been somethin' like thief or cheat. Nope. It was jest strawberry. But I had to lay there all night with my eyes propped open, seeing that word on the wall.

"When daylight come it was still there. I seen it when I was dressin'. I carried it with me out to the stable. Everywhere I looked against a wall, I seed that word. If I hung my head and looked at the ground, it was there.

"I knowed if what I'd done about those meachin' little berries was ever knowed in the community, like enough I'd never be called by my right name any more. They'd call me 'Strawberry Bob.' I knowed it. That was goin' to be my punishment fur stealin'."

"Oh, Mr. Bob!" groaned Agnes, much moved by his earnestness.

"It's my belief," said old Bob Buckham, "that we don't hafter wait till the hereafter ter git our punishment for wrong-doin' here. I reckon most times we git it right here and now.

"Wal! I went erbout all that forenoon seein' strawberry marked up everywhere. I snum! it was right acrosst marm's forehead when I looked at her – and there warn't no other mark there in them days, you may be sure.

"I started in to pack berries jest the same as I did the day before. Then, of a sudden, I says to myself, 'Bob Buckham, you derned thief! Stop it! Ten dollars a day won't pay you for bein' called "Strawberry Bob"!'

"So I boxed them poor berries separate and I told the shipper what I'd done the day before. I told him to take ten dollars off my order. He grinned at me.

"'There was a railroad wreck yesterday, Bob, and our car went to pot. I'll git full damages from the railroad company.'

"'Not for them berries of mine, Silas,' I told him. He was Silas Wales. 'You de-duct what my berries cost you in full, and I'll turn back my hull order to ye!'

"He hummed and hawed; but he done it. He axed me was I havin' a hard time meetin' the int'rest on my mortgage, an' I told him the trewth. When the mortgage come due that year he come 'round and offered to let me have the money at a cheaper rate than I'd been payin', an' all the time I wanted. Ye see, that was a cheap way of gittin' a reperation for bein' honest, after all."

"And didn't you see the strawberry mark after that?" sighed Agnes.

"Nope. Nor they never called me 'Strawberry Bob,' though I've been raisin' more berries than most folks in this locality, ever since," said Bob Buckham.

"Oh, Mr. Buckham!" exclaimed Agnes. "I ought to be called 'Strawberry Agnes'!"

"Heh? What for?" asked the startled farmer.

"Because I stole berries! I stole them from you! Last May!" gulped the girl. "You know when those girls raided your field? I was one of them. I was the first one over the fence and picked the first berry. I – I'm awfully sorry; but I really didn't think how wrong it was at the time. And I wish I'd come to you and told you before, instead of waiting until the principal of our school – Mr. Marks – and everybody, knew about it."

"Sho, honey!" exclaimed Mr. Buckham, softly. "Was you one o' them gals? I'd no idee. Wal! say no more about it. What you took didn't break me," and he laughed. "And I won't tell nobody," he added, patting Agnes' shoulder.

As Agnes dried her eyes before joining her sisters and Neale O'Neil at the door, she thought that it was rather unnecessary for the farmer to make that promise. When he had caused the list of girls' names to be sent to the school principal, he had assured her punishment.

While Bob Buckham was saying to himself: "Now, that's a leetle gal after my own heart. She's a hull sight nicer than that other one. And she's truly repentant, too."

CHAPTER XII
TEA WITH MRS. ELAND

Neale was right. At the supper table at the old Corner House that night (the Saturday night supper was always a gala affair) Mrs. MacCall asked, anxiously:

"What's the matter with you, boy? Are you sick?"

"Oh, no, Mrs. MacCall. Do I look sick?" responded the white-haired boy, startled.

"Must be somethin' the matter with you," said the housekeeper, with conviction. "Otherwise you wouldn't stop at only two helpings of beans and only four fishcakes. I'll have to speak to Mr. Con Murphy," she added grimly. "He'd better see that you have a good course of jalap. You're getting puny."

Uncle Rufus chuckled unctiously from the background. "Dat boy," he murmured, "ain't sickenin' none. He done et a peck o' chestnuts, I reckon, already."

In spite of Neale's "puny" appetite, they had a great chestnut roast that evening. Eva Larry and Myra Stetson came in unexpectedly, and the Corner House girls had a very hilarious time. Neale was the only boy present; but he was rather used, by this time, to playing squire to "a whole raft of girls."

"And, oh, girls," cried the news-bearer, Eva, "what do you think? The School Board has voted to let us give The Carnation Countess. I heard it to-day. It's straight. The parts will be given out this next week. And, oh! poor us!"

"Miss Lederer said we would have quite important parts in the play," Ruth said complacently.

"And we can only look on," wailed Myra Stetson, quite as lugubriously as Eva.

"And I'm going to be a bee – I'm going to be a bee!" Dot danced around the table singing this refrain.

"I hope you won't be such a noisy one," Tess said admonishingly. "You're worse than a bumblebee, Dot Kenway."

Agnes really felt too bad to say anything for a minute or two. It was true she felt better in her heart since she had confessed to Mr. Bob Buckham; but the fact that she could not act in the musical play was as keen a disappointment as lively, ambitious Agnes Kenway had ever suffered.

For once Eva Larry's news was exact. It was announced to all grades of the Milton Public Schools on Monday morning that The Carnation Countess was to be produced at the Opera House, probably during the week preceding Christmas, and all classes were to have an opportunity of helping in the benefit performance.

A certain company of professional players, headed by a capable manager and musical director, were to take charge of the production, train the children when assembled, and arrange the stage setting. Half the proceeds of the entertainment were to go to the Milton Women's and Children's Hospital – an institution in which everybody seemed now to be interested.

The fact that a certain little girl named Tess Kenway, had really set the ball of interest in motion, was quite forgotten, save by a few. As for the next to the youngest Corner House girl, she never troubled her sweet-tempered little self about it. "Oh! I'm so glad!" she sighed, with satisfaction. "Now my Mrs. Eland can stay."

"What's that you say, Theresa?" Miss Pepperill's sharp voice demanded.

Tess repeated her expression of gratitude.

"Humph!" ejaculated the red-haired teacher. "So you are still interested in Mrs. Eland, are you? Have you seen her again?"

"I am going to take tea with her this afternoon," said Tess, eagerly. "So is my sister, Dot."

"You don't know if she has found her sister yet?" asked Miss Pepperill, but more to herself than as though she expected a reply. "No! of course not."

Tess hurried to meet Dot after school. She found her sister at the girls' gate of the primary department, hugging the Alice-doll (of course, in a brand new cloak) and listening with wide-eyed interest to the small, impish, black-haired boy who was talking earnestly to her.

"And then I shall run away and sail the rollin' billers," he declared. "I hope they won't find old Pepperpot after I tie her to her chair – not – not from Friday afternoon till Monday mornin', when they open school again. That's what I hope. And by that time I can sail clean around the Cape of Good Hope to the Cannibal Islands, I guess."

"Oh-ee!" gasped Dot. "And suppose the cannibals eat you, Sammy Pinkney? What would your mother say?"

"She'd be sorry, I guess," said Sammy, darkly. "And so would my pop. But shucks!" he added quickly. "Pirates never get eat by cannibals. They're too smart."

"That's all you know about it, Sammy Pinkney!" said Tess, sternly, breaking in upon the boasting of the scapegrace, who dearly loved an audience. "We met a man this summer that knew all about pirates – or said he did; didn't we, Dot?"

"Oh, yes. The clam-man," the smallest Corner House girl agreed. "And he had a wooden leg."

"Did he get it bein' a pirate?" demanded Sammy.

"He got it fighting pirates," Tess said firmly. "But the pirates got it worse. They got their legs mowed off."

"We-ell. Huh! I guess it would be fun to have a wooden leg, at that," the boy stoutly declared. "Anyway, a feller with a wooden leg wouldn't have growin' pains in it; and I have 'em awful when I go to bed nights, in my legs."

As the little girls went on to the hospital, Dot suddenly felt some hesitancy about going, after all. "You know, Tess, they do such awful things to folks in horsepistols!"

"For pity's sake! stop calling it that," begged Tess. "And they don't do awful things in hospitals."

"Yes they do; they take off folkses legs and arms and pull their teeth and – "

"They don't!" denied Tess, flatly. "Not in this hospital, anyway. Here, they cure sick ladies and little children that are lame and sick. Oh! it's a be-a-utiful place!"

"How do you know?" asked Dot, doubtfully.

"Sadie Goronofsky's cousin was there," Tess said, with confidence. "Sadie went to see her – and she had jelly and oranges and farina puddings and all kinds of nice things to eat. Sadie knows, because she let her lick the tumblers and dishes. Besides, we're not going to be patients there," Tess declared. "We're only calling on Mrs. Eland."

"I hope she has some of that nice farina pudding for tea," sighed Dot. "I'm fond of that."

"Don't be a little gobbler, Dot, if she gives us anything good," said Tess, with her most elder-sisterly air. "Remember, we promised Ruth to be little ladies."

"But goodness!" gasped Dot, "that doesn't mean that we can's eat at all, does it? I'm dreadful hungry. I always am after school and you know Mrs. MacCall lets us have a bite. If being a lady means going hungry, I don't want to be one – so there, Tess Kenway!"

This frank statement, and Dot's vehemence, might have caused some friction between the sisters (for of course Tess felt her importance, being the older, and having been particularly charged by Ruth to look after her sister) had they not met Neale O'Neil coming from the clothing store on High Street. He had a big bundle under his arm.

"Oh, I know what you've got, Neale!" cried Tess. "Those are your new clothes."

"You're a good little guesser, Tess Kenway," laughed the boy. "And it's a Jim-dandy suit. Ought to be. It cost me eight dollars of my hard earned lucre."

"What's that?" demanded Dot, hearing something new.

"Lucre is wealth. But eight dollars isn't much wealth, is it?" responded Neale, and passed on, leaving the two little girls at the steps of the main entrance to the hospital.

There was no time now for discussing what Mrs. MacCall called "pros and cons," for the hall door was opened and a girl in a blue uniform and white cap beckoned the two little visitors up the steps.

"You are the two children Mrs. Eland is expecting, aren't you?" she asked.

"Oh, yes," said Tess, politely. "We have a 'pointment with her."

"That's right," laughed the nurse. "She's waiting for you in her room. And the tea smells good."

"Is – is there farina pudding?" asked Dot, hesitatingly. "Did you smell that, too?"

Tess tugged at the smaller girl's coat and scowled at her reprovingly; but the pretty nurse only laughed. "I shouldn't be surprised if it were farina pudding, little girl," she said.

And it was! Dot had two plates of it, besides her pretty cup of cambric tea. But Tess talked with Mrs. Eland in a really ladylike manner.

In the first place the matron of the hospital was very glad to see the two Corner House girls. She did not have on her gray cloak or little bonnet with the white ruche. Dot's Alice-doll's new cloak was a flattering imitation of the cut and color of the hospital matron's outdoor garment.

Mrs. Eland was just as pink-cheeked and pretty as ever indoors; but the children saw that her hair was almost white. Whether it was the white of age, or of trouble, it would have been hard to say. In either case Mrs. Eland had not allowed the cause of her whitening hair to spoil her temper or cheerfulness.

That her natural expression of countenance was sad, one must allow; but when she talked with her little visitors, and entertained them, her sprightliness chased the troubled lines from the lady's face.

"And – and have you found your sister yet, Mrs. Eland?" Tess asked hesitatingly in the midst of the visit. "I – I wouldn't ask," she hastened to say, "but Miss Pepperill wanted to know. She asked twice."

"Miss Pepperill?" asked the matron, somewhat puzzled.

"Yes, ma'am. Don't you 'member? She's my teacher that wanted me to learn the sovereigns of England."

"Why, of course! I had forgotten," admitted Mrs. Eland. "Miss Pepperill."

"Yes. And she's much int'rested in you," said Tess, seriously. "Of course, everybody is. They are going to make a play, and we're going to be in it – "

"I'm going to be a bee," said Dot, in a muffled voice.

"And it's going to be played for money so's you can stay here in the hospital and be matron," went on Tess.

"Ah, yes, my dear! I know about that," said Mrs. Eland, with a very sweet smile. "And I know who to thank for it, too."

"Do you?" returned Tess, quite unconscious of the matron's meaning. "Well! you see, Miss Pepperill's interested, too. She only asked me for the second time to-day if I'd seen you again and if you had found your sister."

"No, no, my dear. I never can hope to find her now," said Mrs. Eland, shaking her head.

"She was lost in a fire," said Dot, suddenly.

"Why, yes! how did you know?" queried the lady, in surprise.

"The man that shot the eagle said so," Dot replied. "And he wanted to know if you were much related to Lem – Lemon – "

"Lem-u-el!" almost shrieked Tess. "Not Lemon, child. Lemuel Aden."

"Oh, yes!" agreed the smaller girl, quite calmly. "That's just as though I said Salmon for Samuel – like Sammy Pinkney. Well! It isn't such a great difference, is it?"

"Of course not, my dear," laughed Mrs. Eland. "And from what people tell me, my Uncle Lemuel must have been a good deal like a lemon."

"Then he was your uncle?" asked Tess.

"And – and was he real puckrative?" queried Dot. "For that's what Aunt Sarah says a lemon is."

"He was a pretty sour man, I guess," said Mrs. Eland, shaking her head. "I came East when I was a little girl, looking for him. That was after my dear father and mother died and they had taken my sister away from me," she added. "But what about the man that shot the eagle? Who was he?"

Tess told her about their adventures of the previous Saturday in the chestnut woods and the visit to the farmhouse afterward. Dot added:

"And that eagle man don't like your Uncle Lem-u-el, either."

"Why not?" asked Mrs. Eland, quickly, and flushing a little.

Before Tess could stop the little chatterbox – if she had thought to – Dot replied: "'Cause he says your uncle's brother stole. He told us so. So he did, Tess Kenway – now, didn't he?"

"You mustn't say such things," Tess admonished her.

But the mischief was done. The matron lost all her pretty color, and her lips looked blue and her face drawn.

"What do you suppose he meant by that?" she asked slowly, and almost whispering the question. "That my Uncle Lem's brother was a thief? Why, Uncle Lem only had one brother."

"He was the one," Dot said, in a most matter-of-fact tone. "It was five hundred dollars. And the eagle man said he and his mother suffered for that money and she died – his mother, you know – 'cause she had to work so hard when it was gone. Didn't she, Tess?"

The conversation had got beyond Tess Kenway's control. She felt, small as she was, that something wrong had been said. By the look on Mrs. Eland's pale face the kind-hearted child knew that she was hurt and confused – and Tess was the tenderest hearted child in the world.

"Oh, Mrs. Eland!" she crooned, coming close to the lady who sat before her little stove, with her face turned aside that the children should not see the tears gathering in her eyes. "Oh, Mrs. Eland! I guess Mr. Buckham didn't mean that. Of course, none of your folks could be thieves – of course not!"

In a little while the matron asked the children a few more questions, including Mr. Buckham's full name, and how he was to be reached. She had not been in the neighborhood of Ipswitch Curve since she had first come from the West – a newly made orphan and with the loss of her little sister a fresh wound in her poor heart. So she had forgotten the strawberry farmer, and most of the other people in the old neighborhood where her father had lived before going West.

Dot Kenway was quite unconscious of having involuntarily inflicted a wound in Mrs. Eland's mind and heart that she was doomed not to recover from for long weeks. As the sisters bade the matron good-bye, and started for the old Corner House, just as dusk was falling, Tess felt that her friend, Mrs. Eland, was really much sadder than she had been when they had begun their call.

Tess, however, could not understand the reason for this.