Mehitable

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Mehitable and Barbara. 3

II. Other Cherryville Friends. 10

Chapter I Mehitable And Barbara

“Some day something will happen to me!”

“You say that so often, Mehitable—how can you know?”

Mehitable sneezed, wrinkling up her little freckled nose, as she answered her dear friend Barbara, whO' lay beside her in the dusty sweet-smelling straw of the barn loft.

“I don’t know that I really am sure. Barbie, it’s only hope, I suppose, imagining—and then hoping. It’s like looking forward to a picnic or a circus next month, only of course what will happen to me will be a hundred times more thrilling than a picnic or a circus.

Barbara’s brown eyes gazed rather wistfully out of the wide open space of the barn loft, at the vivid blue of a late August sky.

“I’d like to be in it too, if I could,” she said somewhat shyly.

Mehitable sat upright and shook her rather untidy brown hair out of her eyes.

“Of course you’ll be in it. Barb,” she exclaimed. “How selfish I must sound. It wouldn’t be anything if you weren’t part of it. Oh, as if it could be!”

Mehitable patted her friend’s arm with her thin sunburnt hand, and then began to shake the straw from her striped gingham dress.

“No,” Barbara insisted, “I don’t see how I could be in anything very wonderful that happened to you. It surely wouldn’t be here in Cherryville, Vermont. Nothing thrilling could happen here, and if it should be a long way off, I wouldn’t be there at all.”

“You might. If I should be a writer, or if someone left . me a fortune, you could be my secretary, we could have—”

“Mehitable! Hot soda biscuits! Come!”

A voice in the distance called shrilly. Both girls jumped up quickly, and both called out, “All right. Desire.”

There was a slight rustle behind them, and a striped black yellow and gray cat stood up in a dazed sort of way, yawned, and blinked up at the two friends.

“Oh, Patchwork, how funny you look with that piece of straw over your ear,” laughed Mehitable, as they all three ran down the steep rickety steps leading to the harness room below.

“They ran across the gravel path at the back of the house, through a dark, damp washroom, and into the large, sunny kitchen beyond. A tall, thin woman stood by the sink, rubbing the sleeve of her blue print dress with a damp cloth. She looked up at them over her gold rimmed spectacles, as they came in.

“I dipped my sleeve in the wild strawberry jam, just now. Shiftless thing to do. Now go right in to supper, both of you.

It got so much cooler I made some biscuits.”

“Good for you. Desire,” sang Barbara, as they washed their hands at the sink. “You’re the most comfortable person in the world,” she added.

“And the nicest,” said Mehitable, giving her a hug. “Now come and have your supper, Patchwork,” she went on, pour¬ ing some milk in a blue saucer as she spoke.

As she bent over with the saucer her braid of brown hair

M chit able and Barbara fell over her shoulder, and she saw that the ribbon was gone. Desire had picked it up in the doorway, and handed it to her.

'‘With all her fussing. Miss Webster hasn't made you the least bit careful about not losin’ all your belongin's, Mehitable, but I don’t know but I like you about as well as you be.”

Mehitable smiled at her as she called, “Patchwork P

There was no need to call, for the ever faithful animal was rubbing himself against her feet.

“Yes, Patchwork, have your milk, do,” sniffed Desire, “seein’ as how you swam in a whole pail of it, this morning.”

“What do you mean, Desire?” asked Mehitable.

“What I say. I left the cover off a pail of milk, and if that crazy cat didn’t dive right into it. I heard the splash and came a runnin’, fished him out and set him in the sun to dry. My, but he was a peaked lookin’ object. I gave the milk to the pigs. It’s a good thing your aunt’s away, Mehitable, it’ll be all over and forgot by the time she gits back.”

The girls laughed as they walked arm in arm into the next room.

“Supper’s laid on the side porch,” called Desire.

A great bowl of wild asters stood on the center table in the sitting room. Barbara picked out some and fastened them in her belt, and laughingly put one in her hair; Mehitable walked to the screen door, and gave a little cry of pleasure.

“Aunt Comfort’s best china! How Desire does spoil us! More asters, and cake with pink icing!”

“Mehitable’s birthday ain’t till next week,” said a voice in the doorway. “But I thought you two might like to have a celebration by yourselves. Law, to think she’ll be sixteen. Why it seems as though t’warn’t but yesterday you two young ones was washin’ out your doll’s things, and beggin’ me for a bit o’ twine to hang ’em out across the branches of the white lilac tree. And now, both of you turned sixteen—it beats all, it beats all.”

Kindly blue eyes beamed at them and the two girls smiled back. Desire was so much a part of their lives, that they took her for granted, and yet were not without appreciation of her constant homely goodness. Patchwork had made a hasty supper and whined at the screen door to be let out.

“That cat ain’t ever going to be left out. He knows you’re havin’ somethin’ extra. Well go on if you want to,” said Desire, as she held open the door. She then disappeared into the kitchen and they heard her singing in a deep rather sweet alto, so different from her speaking voice:

The supper was a triumph: cold chicken, creamed potatoes, the hot biscuits with some of the fresh wild strawberry jam, cut up peaches with Curly Horn’s cream (Curly Horn was Mehitable’s own cow), and marble cake with pink icing. Patchwork jumped upon a green bench near the table, and watched the two with interest. He had done this for a long time, for he was eight years old. Silas, Aunt Comfort’s man of all work, had given him to Mehitable when he was a wee bundle of fur with his eyes just open. He had shared dolls’ tea parties, and had played various roles in their games, once being dressed as a ballet dancer in a full pink gauze skirt. Those days were over, but he still followed faithfully to the barn loft, and down to their cool retreat by the spring, through red pine needle wood paths. No distance was too great for him. The late sun flickered through the woodbine on the west porch where they were having supper. It touched the bright faces of the two friends. Mehitable glanced admiringly at the asters in Barbara’s hair. Suddenly she said, “I’m ugly like my name.”

M chit able and Barbara

“Why, Mehitable Webster, aren’t you ashamed! You’re not ugly. You have eyes like the picture of the fairy princess in our old ‘Red Fairy Tale Book,’ I’ve often told you so,” remonstrated Barbara.

Mehitable smiled and shook her head. When she said that she was ugly, she meant that her dull brown hair and freckled face were trials to her. She did not know that there was a charm about her very wide-open gray eyes, a wistfulness in their depths, and about her sensitive mouth, that would make an unconscious appeal for her throughout her life.

Barbara’s brown eyes smiled across at her friend, as they had done since they were babies of four, and Mehitable had come, a timid, pale, little child, an orphan, to live in the roomy old white farmhouse, with her father’s sister. Barbara lived next door, supposedly, but she lived mostly with Mehitable. Barbara, too, had no mother, and as her father taught school in a neighboring town, and was away all day, she was more or less alone. There was something very fascinating to Mehitable in her friend’s liberty. There was no one to see that she was prompt to meals, or that her stockings were darned. She could go and come as she pleased, but Barbara was a fairly sensible child, and a good little housekeeper for her father.

The two girls were very gay over their supper. They had so much to talk about always, their next year at High School, their picnics, the books they were reading together, for they read a great deal. They talked about Robin and Johnnie, and the funny Bentlys, and the fun they hoped to have, all of them together, for years to come. Mehitable loved to try to put her thoughts on paper, and she had written several stories that delighted her very uncritical audience. She was now trying to write a play.

“Oh, Barbie, Fm writing the play for you. You’ll be the heroine. While Fm writing it, I think of your hair, your shining golden hair,” said Mehitable, as she cut up some delicate slices of chicken for Patchwork.

“On your birthday let’s put up our hair,” suggested Barbara. “We are sixteen and Fm tired of having mine in a braid.”

“Aunt Comfort would never let me wear it up. I mean not all the time, but for that one day it would be fun.”

They pushed back their chairs and Barbara began to pile up the dishes and they carried them out to Desire in the kitchen, Patchwork winding about them affectionately, nearly causing Mehitable to break two of the best plates as she stumbled over him.

“We are going to do the dishes. Desire, we’d love to,” said Mehitable.

“No you ain’t, not with a sunset like the one we’re going to have to-night. You two get right along and take Patchwork with you. I don’t want him bothering round. When I get through I may set out for a spell. Now you two run right along.”

She flapped a towel at them fiercely, and they ran out laughing.

“Let’s take ‘Lorna Doone’ up on the hill and read it there for a while. It will be light for a half hour or more,” sug* gested Mehitable.

“All right. We left it in our tree. I’ll get it.”

Barbara ran over to a venerable apple tree near the well, ^ scrambled up easily into its low hanging branches, and from a deep hollow drew out a big dark covered book. Down she! came again and arm in arm the two walked past the well and! the old red barn, down a shady lane edged with dusty raspberry j bushes and on up a steep winding road.

Mehitahle and Barbara

Patchwork followed closely at their heels, arching his back and hissing once at his enemy, a black and tan terrier, who barked at him from a neighboring farm house.

''Aunt Comfort will be back to-morrow. Pm almost sure,” sighed Mehitable. "Oh, Fm wicked not to want her back again, but this week has been so happy—you and I together, reading and thinking, Oh, I so love to think, and there's no time when Auntie is home.”

They both laughed at this remark, and Mehitable added, "Aunt Comfort has given me my dear home and oh. Barb, she's so good. It's just that I'm a lazy foolish girl. I only want the sunshiny things of life.”

At last they reached the top, and for some minutes stood silent. Far and far away stretched the purple blue mountains, the blue valleys, and above them a sky of crimson rose.

Mehitable clasped her hands together and turned towards her friend. "It is all the dreams in the world come true,'' she said.

CHAPTER IL

Johnnie Grey whistled three times, paused a moment and whistled again. A curly brown sheep dog ran out from the barn and came up to him, wagging his tail vigorously. A moment later a voice called from the kitchen window. “The girls want you to go off for lunch with them, Johnnie. They’re both out on the north porch now, making sandwiches.”

The boy’s freckled face lightened suddenly, and he called back, “Goody! Tell ’em Fm game. Mother’s canning to-day, she’ll be glad to get rid of me.”

He patted Comrade, the sheep dog, and then settled back against a pillar of the porch, put his hand in his pocket, drew out a book and started to read. He read a page, yawned and then read it again.

*What saith the river to the rushes gray.

Rushes sadly heading,

River slowly wending,

Who can tell the whispered things they say?^*

There was a sudden loud barking and a rush. A stray dog who had wandered in from the road, was being unceremoni¬ ously put out by Comrade. Several chickens strutting aim¬ lessly about cackled loudly. Johnny glanced up for a moment, and then back at the page.

^^What saith the river to the rushes gray.

Rushes sadly bending.

River slowly wending,

It ts near the closing of the day.

Near the night,

Life and light

The boy let the book fall at his feet, clasped his hands about his knees, and drew his brows together in a frown. Just then the screen door banged loudly, and two glad voices hailed him.

‘'A picnic, Johnnie,” sang Mehitable. She sprang lightly down the steps, in spite of the heavy basket she carried, and stopped to pick up the book that Johnnie had let fall. “What a way to use my treasure,” she said reproachfully.

Johnnie took the basket from her and reached over for a tin pail that Barbara handed him from the porch. “I’m sorry, Mehitable. I was thinking about it, that’s why I dropped it. But isn’t it good to have a picnic ?”

“Only the third we’ve had this week,” sang Barbara happily, as the three crossed over to the path by the barn that led to the hill. Desire called after them. “Be back by five o’clock, Mehitable, won’t you, for your Aunt Comfort is sure to be home to-night.” They called back gaily that they would.

The sun was yellow and joyous and not yet too warm, and three very happy human beings made their way up the hill. Mehitable carried two books and a writing pad and pencil, Barbara a small work box. Johnny though heavily laden, kept up with them at a good pace. The three stopped to rest under the old apple tree, half way up the hill. Suddenly Johnnie laughed and called their attention to a small object rapidly making its way towards them.

“Patchwork! Bless his heart, he never fails. I forgot him when we started,” cried Mehitable.

They waited until he caught up with them, each one patting his funny striped head. Comrade frisked about him in wel¬ come, as they all started on again.

The scent of the clover swept over them. There were wild flowers all along the road, late ones, even wild roses, very wide awake and pink after their night's sleep. There was only one cloud in the sky, a downy white and gray one. Meadow larks sang and a saucy bob-o-link twittered at them from a nearby bush.

They were passing a tree laden with very late cherries, and suddenly a loud whoop startled them. ‘‘It's Robin," called Johnnie.

“Stealing cherries again, Robin Ward? When will you ever grow up ?" demanded Barbara, at the same time catching a branch covered with very dark juicy ones, thrown down at her suddenly by an unseeen hand.

“Never," was the answer from somewhere deep within the leafy greenness. “And neither will you. Another picnic! Suppose I come along, too."

“Do," answered Mehitable. “And here,” she added, “here come the Bentlys; they will love to come, I know. There are so many of them at home, and one of the grown up sisters, Clara I think, has a college friend visiting her. They have all sorts of plans and don't want Sadie and Ruby to know about them at all, don't want them around."

“But there isn't enough lunch," objected Johnnie, at the same time waving a welcome to the approaching figures.

“Yes there is, greedy thing. We made a great many sand¬ wiches,” said Barbara, reproachfully.

“Here are cherries,” said Robin Ward, as he swung himself down from the tree, a big basket of dark, delicious fruit, on his arm.

“They would taste sweeter if they were stolen I know," he added. “But as it happens old Merriwether told me to pick all I wanted."

‘‘Old Merriwether!’' the girls exclaimed in surprise, and Johnnie whistled.

The Bendy girls had come up to them, and they too stared at Robin Ward. His dark laughing eyes danced at them mis¬ chievously. Merriwether was a cantankerous old man who had often chased the boys from his trees with a riding whip in their younger days.

“Why you see ids this way,^’ explained Robin, holding out a branch of cherries to each one of them. “Old Merriwether’s so afraid of ghosts.’'

“Ghosts!” exclaimed Sadie Bendy. “What do you mean?”

“Well, you see, I met the old man last night as I came along by the wood just above the graveyard. I’d seen him on his way to the village just after supper. He hardly ever goes alone he’s so afraid of ghosts. He makes his wife or his oneeyed daughter go for the mail evenings.”

“Silly old thing,” put in Johnnie.

“Well, last night he went to that meeting about the County Fair. It was a dark night and when he went by the graveyard he says he saw a white figure sort of bending over and moan¬ ing.”

“He’s a crazy old man,” exclaimed Ruby Bendy. “A ghost in our graveyard. He must have been drinking.”

“He never drinks,” said Johnnie. “He wears a temperance badge. Well, he was in a bad way from fright, shaking and trembling. I tried my best to calm him, and I walked all the way home with him, and all the time he was telling me about the awful figure he’d seen back there in the graveyard.”

By this time they were all walking up the hill together, and Robin went on with his story. “He held onto me till we came right up to the kitchen door. His wife opened the door and old man Merriwether began to tell her all about it right off.

I heard him all the way down the lane. He was so grateful to me for seeing him home, he said for me to pick all the cherries I wanted to.^’

‘‘They’re splendid ones,” said Mehitable, “and a fine addi¬ tion to our feast. Come with us, won’t you Sadie and Ruby, and we’ll all have a picnic together.”

“We’d love to,” answered Sadie delightedly. “Ma baked some little sponge cakes this morning. She’ll give us some I know. Where are you going, up in the hollow?”

“Yes,” answered Robin. “It’s the only place I know that really was made for a picnic. Mehitable says the fairies made it.”

“I’ll run and get the cakes, and I’ll bring anything else I can find,” and Sadie, the more energetic of the two Bentlys, ran ofif down a dusty lane toward a drab looking farmhouse, at the far end.

“I wonder what old man Merriwether really did see,” mused Mehitable, as they sauntered on very slowly, pausing often to wait for Sadie. Johnnie chuckled, and Barbara looked first at him and then at Robin. “Oh, Robin Ward, you dressed up as a ghost to frighten an old man. Aren’t you ashamed, and you nearly sixteen?”

Robin looked a little sheepish for a moment, and then smiled at her. This smile was a thing of sunshine. It had helped him over many a hard place. It had saved him an occasional whipping at school, and it shone now on Mehitable and Barbara. “It was only a joke, and I was so good to him afterwards. Somehow it was a kind of ghostly night, so cloudy and still—I couldn’t help it, scaring old Merriwether, I mean. Oh, it was fun watching for him to come along! I hid behind that tall thin slab—the one that has the angel with the hand broken off and has turned sort of green.”

“Oh, Robin, hush, how can you! It makes it all seem so dreary,'' exclaimed Mehitable.

“Sadie’s coming, I'd better go and help her with the basket,” and like a flash Robin was off down the road.

“Ma gave me some potatoes to roast,” said Sadie as soon as the two caught up with the others.

“Splendid. We're nearly there,” called back Barbara over her shoulder.

“We'll build a fire; what fun! There is no place like the hollow for a picnic. Think of finding those fine rocks there, so we can have a fire without being afraid of burning up the flowers and ferns,” said Mehitable happily.

They had left the road, and were treading a rosy pine path which led into the wood. Pine and birch trees murmured in the summer breeze. Mehitable was very quiet as they went farther into the wood, the same look touched her eyes that had been there when she and Barbara watched the sunset. Robin walked beside her carrying Sadie’s basket with one hand and the cherry basket with the other.

“Will you ever grow up, Robin?” asked Mehitable, as Barbara had done.

Robin glanced at her half mischievously—half pleadingly. He and Mehitable had been friends since the doll days when he and Johnnie had tried to lure the girls away to play Indian. Robin had always been the Indian Chief.

“Do you want to grow up? he demanded. “Do you want to stay in and sew all day with your Aunt Comfort and grow thin and pinched like Miss Prince, the dressmaker?”

Mehitable laughed, as they came up to the others. “Oh, Robin, I’ll never, never grow up in such an unhappy way.

How can you make growing old such a sad picture! But come, all of us, gather wood for a big fire.”

They had come up with the’ others. Robin threw down his basket and they all began to look about for brush and twigs. Their picnic place was a deep hollow in the forest, full of ferns and wild clematis. The deep woods were all about them, silent except for the singing of the wind, and the occasional flutter of a wild bird. They began to pile up the brush in the center of two big rocks, blackened by their many fires. Robin and Johnnie gathered great armsfull of wood and soon the orange and red flames were leaping high. They were all very hungry, and as soon as the fire had died down a little, they put in the potatoes, placing them as much as possible between the stones and in the crevices of the rocks. Johnny and Mehitable watched them carefully, pushing them about, and nearly burning themselves in their desire to have them just right. Barbara and the Bentlys unpacked the sand¬ wiches and the cakes and Robin piled the cherries in a glow¬ ing scarlet heap on some green leaves, in the center of another big rock nearby, which they called the table. Soon they were laughing over the hot potatoes. They sat about in a circle. The faint rays of the sun, shining through the dense trees, touched their happy faces. The sweetness of the pines, and the mysterious coolness of the deep wood, came tO' them on the wind. To Mehitable it was an enchanting day. How good the food tasted! What happy times they had, all of them together.

"'We haven’t any butter for the potatoes,” said Sadie Bently.

“Who wants butter!” answered Robin. “Why this is a wonderful meal. It’s just the sort of a meal I’d choose always, hot potatoes and ripe cherries.”

“It’s the sort of meal I’d choose if a fairy should appear suddenly in a wood when I was very hungry, and should tell me I could have anything I liked to eat.’^ This from Johnnie.

"‘Oh, no, Johnnie—not if you really had a fairy wish,” remonstrated Mehitable. “If I had a fairy meal to choose, it would be—it would be—let me see,” she went on dreamily. “Chestnuts and whipped cream frozen together. I read about it somewhere. And a salad of iced fruits and something to drink in a tall green glass.”

“Fd chose apple dumplings,” said Sadie Bently, unex¬ pectedly.

They all laughed at this, and then Robin remarked to Mehitable. “The play, Mehitable, what about the play? You know you’re going to write one for us. We’ve had so many plays we’ve made up out of books, and now we want a real one, one you’ve made up yourself.”

Mehitable clasped her hands about her knees, and looked rather serious, as she answered him. “I’ve been thinking and thinking,” she said, “and all the time it’s a winter play I want to write. Oh, it’s foolish to try to do it at all. I suppose I don’t know how at all, you know, only it’s such fun to try.” She looked around at them all, smiling a little shyly.

“Oh, Mehitable, of course you can write a splendid play for us,” said Barbara encouragingly. “Think of all the things you’ve always made up for us to do.”

“Yes, no one could ever think of as many lovely things for the dolls to do, as Mehitable could,” put in Sadie Bently.

Mehitable looked at her for a moment. Sadie had been more interesting in those days. She had been a real mother to her dolls.

“It’s a winter play I’m thinking of,,” said Mehitable slowly, “I can’t quite tell you about it, yet, but I think I can very soon.”

‘‘Winter seems such a long way off, and yet school will begin so soon and only Saturday afternoons to play in,” said Barbara.

“What if the thing should happen to you this winter, Mehitable? You know, the wonderful thing that’s going to happen sometime. What if your mother’s friend, Mrs. Lind¬ say, should send for you to come to Japan?”

“Oh, Barbie, that could never, never be,” laughed Mehit¬ able.

It was growing late and they gathered their baskets to¬ gether, and started slowly homeward.

Miss Comfort Webster had driven ten miles in the August sun, and as she turned in at her own driveway she gave a sigh of relief. It was good to be home again. She peered out at the side of the buggy just as Desire opened the kitchen door and came down the steps.

“So you’re home again. Miss Webster. Seems as if you’ve been gone quite a spell.”

The horse stopped mechanically in front of the steps, and Miss Webster handed out several packages as Desire came up to her.

“Here’s some of Rose Biddle’s sugared doughnuts, she sent them to Mehitable. Where is she ?”

“We didn’t expect you until to-night. Miss Webster, and the two girls have gone off on a picnic. Johnnie Grey went, too. I just fixed ’em up some cold lunch and let them go off for the day.”

“Has Mehitable helped you with the jam?” demanded Miss Comfort, as she climbed rather stiffly out of the buggy, old Silas having come up to take the horse.

“All I’d let her. Yes, she helped real well.”

‘‘Hump! ril warrant she wasn’t in the house except to sleep for more than an hour a day. You spoil her, Desire. Well, Si,” turning to the old man. “How does everything go?”

“Fine, fine, I was just out back of the barn feeding the pigs when you came drivin’ up. Miss Webster. Fve worked real hard these days. Well, here come the young folks. They do seem to git the best out o’ life, now don’t they?”

The little picnic party had just appeared around the comer of the barn, Robin and Johnnie carrying the baskets. Mehitable came up to her aunt and kissed her timidly.

“I didn’t know you’d be home so early. Auntie. Oh, we’ve had such a happy time.”

“It’s been the best of all our good days. Miss Comfort,” said Robin, smiling upon her.

“Hump! You’d like your days all sunshine, Robin Ward, but that isn’t life. What about all the jam Desire has been making this week. How much have you helped?” she asked her niece.

Mehitable colored but looked at her bravely. “Oh, Aunt Comfort,” she said in a whisper, “I’ve hardly helped at all. I’ve just been playing.”

Chapter III

Mehitable awoke early on her birthday morning'. The first thing that met her eyes was a sky of rose and gold. The night before she had rolled up the dark green window shade so that she could watch the stars and the new golden hoop of the moon.

Mehitable loved to make up poems about the stars, and stories about the moon. She had been used to telling them to her two favorite dolls, who always had slept with her at night. She secretly missed her dolls more than she could ever tell, even Barbara did not know how much.

They were laid away now, covered with an old red silk shawl upstairs in the attic. She felt ashamed that she missed them so much, especially this birthday morning. They had always somehow seemed to know of happy events such as Christmases and fourth of Julys and birthdays. Most of all, she missed her favorite doll, Madeline, her dearest.

She lay quite still, looking out at the dawn with sleepy gray eyes. She was sixteen years old that morning. She must forget her dolls and all the quaint happy plays that she and Barbara had had together. As she lay back on her pillows she smiled to herself, old remembrances came to her, especially doll memories, the hours in the hot gloomy attic upstairs, rum¬ maging in old trunks for scraps of cloth and silk with which to make wardrobes for their large families, hers and Barbara’s.