The Dark Secret
THE four Cottagers sat in solemn conclave round the dining-room table
next morning. Rosa Marie, flat on her stomach on the floor, lapped milk
like a cat and licked the bowl afterwards; but now no one paid the
slightest attention.
"I think," said Jean, removing her elbows from the table, "that we'd
better tell our mothers and Aunty Jane all about it at once. They'll
know what to do."
"So do I," said Marjory.
"So do I," echoed Bettie.
"_I_ don't," protested Mabel, whose hitherto serene countenance now
showed signs of great anxiety. "If you ever tell _anybody_, I'll--I'll
never speak to you again. This joke--if it _is_ a joke--is on _me_. I
got into this scrape and it's _my_ scrape."
"But," objected Jean, "we always do tell our mothers everything. That's
why they trust us to play all by ourselves in Dandelion Cottage."
"Give me just a few days," pleaded Mabel. "Perhaps that woman got kept
away by some accident. I'm sure Rosa Marie's mother has mother feelings
inside of her, _some_ place--I saw 'em in her face when I was leading
Rosa Marie away. I _know_ she'll come back. Until she does, I'll take
care of that poor deserted child myself."
"It's a blessing she never cries, anyway," observed Bettie. "If she
were a howling child I don't know _what_ we'd do. As it is, she's not
_much_ more trouble than a Teddy bear."
If Mrs. Mapes hadn't had a missionary box in her cellar to pack for
Reservation Indians of assorted sizes and shapes with the cast-off
garments of all Lakeville; if Mrs. Bennett had not been exceedingly
busy with a seamstress getting ready to go out of town for an
important visit; if Aunty Jane had not been even busier trying to make
green tomato pickles out of ripe tomatoes; if Mrs. Tucker had not been
too anxious about the throats of the youngest three Tuckers to give
heed to the doings of the larger members of her family, these four good
women would surely have discovered that something unusual was taking
place under the Cottage roof. As it was, not one of the mothers, not
even sharp Aunty Jane, discovered that the Cottagers were borrowing an
amazing amount of milk from their respective refrigerators.
The novelty worn off, Rosa Marie became a heavy burden to at least
three of the Cottagers' tender consciences. Mabel's conscience may have
troubled her, but not enough to be noticed by a pair of moderately
careless parents. Mabel, however, grew more and more attached to Rosa
Marie; the others did not. To tell the truth, the borrowed infant was
not an attractive child. Many small Indians are decidedly pretty, but
Rosa Marie was not. Her small eyes were too close together, her upper
lip was much too long for the rest of her countenance and her large
mouth turned sharply down at the corners. But loyal Mabel was blind
to these defects. She saw only the babyish roundness of Rosa Marie's
body, the cunning dimples in her elbows and the affectionate gleam that
sometimes showed in the small black eyes. But then, it was always Mabel
who found beauty in the stray dogs and cats that no one else would
have on the premises. During these trying days the Cottagers _almost_
quarreled.
"That child is all cheeks," complained Marjory, petulantly. "They
positively hang down. Do you suppose we're giving her too much milk?
She's disgustingly fat, and she hasn't any figure."
"She has altogether too much figure," declared Jean, almost crossly. "I
fastened this little petticoat around what I _thought_ was her waist
and it slid right off. So now I've got to make buttonholes. Such a
nuisance!"
"Pity you can't use tacks and a hammer," giggled Marjory.
The clothing of Rosa Marie had presented another distressing problem.
She owned absolutely nothing in the way of a wardrobe. The single,
unattractive garment she had worn on her arrival had not survived the
girls' attempts to wash it. They had left it boiling on the stove, the
water had cooked off and the faded gingham had cooked also.
To make up for this accident, all four of the Cottagers had contributed
all they could find of their own cast-off garments; but these of course
were much too large without considerable making over.
"If," said Jean, reproachfully, as she took a large tuck in the
grown-up stocking that she was trying to re-model for Rosa Marie,
"you'd only let me tell my mother, she'd give us every blessed thing
we need. One live little Indian in the hand ought to be worth more to
her than a whole dozen invisible ones on a way-off Reservation; and you
know she's always doing things for _them_."
"Jeanie Mapes!" threatened Mabel, "if you tell her, that's the very
last breath I'll ever speak to you."
"I'll be good," sighed Jean, "but I just hate _not_ telling her. And
this horrid stocking is _still_ too long."
"Button it about her neck," giggled Marjory, who flatly declined to do
any sewing for Rosa Marie. "That'll take up the slack and save making
her a shirt."
"Don't bother about stockings," said Bettie, fishing a round lump from
her blouse. "Here's a pair of old ones that I found in the rag bag.
One's black and the other's tan; but they're exactly the right size and
that's _something_."
"What's the use," demurred Marjory. "She won't wear them."
"If Rosa Marie were about eight shades slimmer," said Jean, "I could
easily get some of Anne Halliday's dear little dresses--her mother gave
my mother a lot day before yesterday for that Reservation box; but
goodness! You'd have to sew two of them together sideways to get them
around _that_ child."
"She _is_ awfully thick," admitted Mabel.
Yet, after all, dressing Rosa Marie was not exactly a hardship. Indeed,
it is probable that the difficulties that stood in the way made the
task only so much the more interesting; then, of course, dressing a
real child was much more exciting than making garments for a mere doll.
Whenever the Cottagers spoke of Rosa Marie outside the Cottage they
referred to her as the D. S. D. S. stood for "Dark Secret." This seemed
singularly appropriate, for Rosa Marie was certainly dark and quite as
certainly a most tremendous secret--a far larger and darker secret than
the troubled girls cared to keep, but there seemed to be no immediate
way out of it.
Fortunately, the stolid little "D. S." was amiable to an astonishing
degree. She never cried. Also, she "stayed put." If Mabel stood her in
the corner she stayed there. If she were tucked into bed, there she
remained until some one dragged her out. She spent her days rolling
contentedly about the Cottage floor, her nights in deep, calm slumber.
Never was there a youngster with fewer wants. Teaching Rosa Marie to
talk furnished the Cottagers with great amusement. The round brown
damsel very evidently preferred grunts to words; but she was always
willing to grunt obligingly when Mabel or the others insisted.
"Say, 'This little pig went to market,'" Mabel would prompt.
"Eigh, ugh, ugh, ee, ee, _ee_, hee!" Rosa Marie would grunt.
Then, when everybody else laughed her very hardest, Rosa Marie's grim
little mouth would relax to show for an instant the row of white teeth
that Mabel scrubbed industriously many times a day. This rare smile
made the borrowed baby almost attractive. But not to Marjory. From the
first, Marjory regarded her with strong disapproval.
Fortunately for Mabel's secret, little Anne Halliday, the Marcotte
twins and the two Tucker babies were too small to tell tales out of
school, so in spite of sundry narrow escapes, Rosa Marie remained as
dark a secret as one's heart could desire.