The Fugitive Soldier
THE Cottage door closed behind the three excited parents and Aunty
Jane. The four Cottagers, all decidedly pale and subdued, looked at one
another in silence. It is one thing to confess a fault; it is quite
another to be ignominiously found out. Jean and Bettie and Marjory
were feeling this very keenly; but Mabel was far more troubled at the
prospect of losing Rosa Marie.
"The orphan asylum!" breathed Bettie, at length.
"It's wicked," blazed Mabel, "to make an orphan of a person that isn't."
"I've heard," said Marjory, reflectively, "that orphans have to eat
fried liver."
"Horrors!" gasped Mabel.
"And codfish."
"Oh _horrors_!" moaned Mabel, who detested both liver and codfish.
"And prunes," pursued teasing Marjory, wickedly remembering Mabel's
dislike for that wholesome but insipid fruit. The prunes proved
entirely too much for Mabel.
"Pup--pup--prunes!" she sobbed. "And you stand there and don't do a
thing to save her! I guess if I were Eliza escaping with my baby on
cakes of ice----"
"Rosa Marie's about the right color," giggled Marjory, who could not
resist so fine an opportunity to tease excitable Mabel.
"You'd all be glad enough to help, but when it's just me----"
"Oh, we'll help," soothed Jean, slipping an arm about Mabel. "You know
we always do stand by you."
"Yes, we'll all help," promised Bettie, "if you'll just tell us what to
do. Only _please_ don't get us into any more trouble with our mothers."
"There's the cellar," suggested Mabel, doubtfully, yet with
glimmerings of hope. "I read a story once about a lady who sat on a
cellar door, knitting stockings."
"Why in the world," demanded Marjory, "did she sit on the door?"
"Some soldiers were hunting for an escaped prisoner and she had him
hidden there."
"Was the cellar all horrid with old papers and rats and mice and
spiders and crawly things with legs?" asked Bettie, with interest.
"I hope not," shuddered Mabel, "but a soldier wouldn't mind. Dear me, I
wish we'd cleaned that cellar when we first came into the Cottage. If
we had, it'd be just the place to hide Rosa Marie in."
"Perhaps it isn't too late, now," said Marjory, stooping to loosen the
ring in the kitchen floor. "Let's look down there, anyway."
"Let's," agreed Bettie. "It'll be something to do, at least."
Everybody helped with the door. When it was open and propped against
the kitchen stove, the four girls crouched down to peer into the depths
below. Even Rosa Marie, who had been released from the table-leg, crept
to the edge to look.
They were not very deep depths. The place was filled with rubbish,
mostly old papers and broken pasteboard boxes; but it was perfectly
dry, and clean except for a thick layer of dust.
"Let's clean it out," said Mabel, recklessly grasping an armful of
dusty papers and dragging them forth.
"Phew!" exclaimed Jean, tumbling back from the hole. "Er--er--er hash!"
"Oh, ki--_hash_! Hoo!" blubbered Bettie, likewise tumbling backwards.
"Who-is-she, who-is-she," sneezed Marjory.
"Kerchoo, kerchoo, kerchoo!" sneezed Rosa Marie, her head bobbing with
each sneeze. "Kerchoo, kerchoo!"
"It's pepper," explained Mabel, when she had finished _her_ sneeze. "I
spilled a lot of it the day of Mr. Black's dinner party. I didn't know
what else to do with it, so I swept it down that biggest crack."
"Goodness! What a housekeeper!" rebuked Jean, wiping her eyes.
"It's good for moths," consoled Bettie. "At any rate, Rosa Marie won't
get moth-eaten."
"Perhaps," suggested Mabel, hopefully, "it's driven away all the rats
and crawly things."
Working more cautiously, the girls drew forth the yellowed papers and
pasteboard left by some former untidy occupant of the Cottage. They
burned most of the rubbish in the kitchen stove, Jean standing guard
lest burning pieces should escape to set fire to the Cottage. The work
of clearing the cellar, indeed, was precisely what the girls needed,
after the humiliating events of the day. All four were growing more
cheerful; but they worked as swiftly as they dared, for they felt
certain that the cellar, as a place of concealment for Rosa Marie,
would be speedily needed.
The cellar proved to be a square hole about three feet deep. When
Mabel, who for once was doing the lion's share of the work, had swept
the boarded floor and sides perfectly clean, it was really a very tidy,
inviting little shelter; as neat a shelter as fugitive soldier could
desire.
"Now," said Mabel, "we'll put a piece of carpet and an old quilt in the
bottom, tack clean papers around the sides----"
"Papers rattle," offered Marjory, sagely.
"Then we'll use cloth," declared Mabel, snatching an apron from the
hook behind the door. "We'll begin right away to practise with Rosa
Marie, so she'll get used to it. Then we must rehearse our parts, too."
The retreat ready, Rosa Marie went without a murmur into the
underground babytender--Marjory gave it that name. Rosa Marie, at
least, would do her part successfully. But it was different above
ground.
"Who," demanded Jean, "is to sit on the door and knit? _I_
couldn't--I'd fly to pieces."
"It's my child," said Mabel, "_I'm_ going to."
"But," objected Marjory, "you _can't_ knit. You don't know how."
"I can crochet," triumphed Mabel, "and I guess that's every bit as
good."
"Where," asked Bettie, "is your crochet hook?"
But that, of course, was a question that Mabel could not answer,
because Mabel never did know where any of her belongings were.
Thereupon, Jean, Marjory and Mabel began a frantic search for the
missing article. Mabel had used it the week previously; but could
remember nothing more about it.
"Goodness!" groaned Mabel, groveling under the spare-room bed in hopes
that the hook might be there. "If I'd dreamed that my child's life was
going to depend on that hook, I'd have kept it locked up in father's
fire-proof safe."
"That's what you get," said Marjory, with one eye glued to the top of a
very tall vase, "for being so careless. It isn't in here, anyway."
"Here's one," announced Bettie, scrambling in hastily and locking the
door behind her. "I skipped home for it. But there's no time to lose.
All our mothers and Aunty Jane are going out of Mrs. Mapes's gate with
their best hats and gloves on. There's something doing!"
In another moment, the cellar door was closed, a rocking chair was
placed upon it, and Mabel, with ball of yarn and crochet hook in hand,
was nervously twitching in the chair. Her fingers were stiff with
dust--there had been no time to wash them--so the loop that she tied
in the end of the white yarn was most decidedly black; but Mabel was
thankful to achieve a loop of any color, with her whole body quivering
with excitement and suspense.
"Goodness!" she quavered. "That soldier lady was a wonder! Think of
her looking calm outside with her heart going like a Dover egg-beater.
Do--do _I_ look calm?"
"Here," said Bettie, extending a basin of warm water. "Soak your hands
in this. Warm water is said to be soothing."
"Also cleansing," giggled Marjory.
"Hurry!" gasped quick-eared Jean, snatching the basin and hurling a
towel in Mabel's direction. "I heard our gate click. There's somebody
coming."
"Don't let 'em in," breathed Mabel, defiantly.
"I'm afraid," said Jean, "we'll have to."
"Anyway," soothed Bettie, "we'll peek first--there's the door-bell!"