MAKING UP WITH JIMMIE
Daddy Morrison went to see Miss Putnam after the children had gone to
bed. The old lady was very sure that Brother and Sister had thrown the
tar and she was so positive in her assertions that finally he asked her
how she could be so sure.
"Well, one of the neighbors told me," Miss Putnam said reluctantly.
"No, I don't know your children from any of the others, but she does.
All children look pretty much alike to me--noisy, scuffling young ones!
No, I couldn't tell you the neighbor's name--I wouldn't want to get her
into any trouble."
When Daddy Morrison went away, she showed him the tar on her porch and
sidewalk.
"Somebody ought to be made to clear it off," said Miss Putnam severely.
The chief of police, at the town hall, was a little angry that a
complaint had been made merely on the word of a neighbor, who might
easily be mistaken about the children she had seen throwing tar.
However, as Brother and Sister said they had nothing to do with it, and
Miss Putnam refused to believe them, there was nothing to do but let
the complaint stand.
"Keep away from Miss Putnam's house and street," commanded Daddy
Morrison at the breakfast table the next morning. "Don't go past her
house except when it is absolutely necessary. We're not going to have
any more bickering over this matter. Your mother and I believe you and
that is all that is necessary. I shall be seriously displeased if I
find you are talking it over with outsiders, especially other children."
Ralph and Dick had already taken their way to the station and now Daddy
Morrison hurried to get his train.
"Why doesn't he want us to talk about it?" asked Sister, puzzled.
"Couldn't I tell Nellie Yarrow?"
"I wouldn't," counseled Mother Morrison. "You see, dear, you can't help
feeling that Miss Putnam has been unfair and every time you tell what
she has done you will make someone else think she is unfair, too. Your
friends will take your part, of course, and while you think Miss Putnam
is decidedly 'mean,' she is acting right, according to her own ideas.
It is never best to talk much about a quarrel of any kind."
Jimmie, who had been eating his breakfast in silence, rose and looked
toward his mother.
"I suppose I have to work in that old garden?" he said aggrievedly.
"You know what your father said," replied Mother Morrison.
Jimmie did not like to weed, and the Morrison garden, when it came his
turn, was often sadly neglected. He and Ralph and Dick were responsible
for the care of the garden two weeks at a time during the growing
season.
"Well, maybe if I stick at it this morning, I can go swimming this
afternoon," muttered Jimmie. "Dad didn't say the whole thing had to be
weeded today, did he?"
"He wants the new heads of lettuce transplanted, and all the onions
weeded," answered Mother Morrison. "You know you were asked to tend to
those a week ago, Jimmie."
Jimmie flung himself out of the house in rather a bad temper. He did
not like to transplant lettuce and the onions must be weeded by hand.
Other vegetables could be handled with a hoe, or the garden cultivator,
but the eight long rows of new onions must be carefully done down on
one's hands and knees.
"Jimmie!" said a little voice at his elbow as he got the trowel and the
wheelbarrow from the toolhouse. "Jimmie?"
"Well, what do you want?" demanded Jimmie shortly.
"I'll--I'll help you," offered Sister timidly.
"You can't," said Jimmie. "Last time you crammed the lettuce plants in
so hard they died over night."
"But I'll bring the water for 'em, in the watering-pot, and I can weed
onions--I know how to do that," insisted Sister humbly.
"I won't need the watering-pot," said Jimmie more graciously. "I'll use
the hose on them all tonight. I wonder if you could weed the onions?"
"Oh, yes!" Sister assured him eagerly. "You watch me, Jimmie."
She fell on her fat little knees, and began to pull the weeds from a
long row of onions.
The sun was hot and the row was very long. Before she reached the
middle of it, the perspiration was running down Sister's face, and her
hands were damp and grimy.
"Look here," Jimmie called to her anxiously, on his way back for more
lettuce plants, "don't you want to rest? And why don't you wear a
sunbonnet, or something?"
Sister stood up, straightening her aching little shoulders.
"Sunbonnets are hot," she explained carefully. "And I don't want to
rest, Jimmie. I'll go get a drink of water and then I'll weed some
more."
"Bring me a drink, too, will you?" Jimmie called after her.
When she brought it he forgot to say thank you because one of his
friends had ridden past on his bicycle and this reminded Jimmie that he
had meant to do something to his own wheel that morning. So he drank
the water Sister carried out to him without a word because he was
cross, and when we're cross we do not always remember to be polite.
Sister went steadily at the weeding again, and after a while Jimmie
finished the lettuce, and began to weed an onion row himself.
"You can stop if you want to now," he said to Sister presently. "Don't
you want to play? I can finish these."
"I'm not going to stop till they're all done," announced Sister. "Molly
says the only way to get anything finished is to use plenty of
per--perservance!"
Jimmie laughed and glanced at her curiously.
"I guess you mean PERSEVERANCE" he suggested, "Well, Sister, you are
certainly fine help. It begins to look as though I could go swimming
this afternoon after all."
Surely enough, when Mother Morrison called to them that lunch was
ready, they were weeding the last onion row.
"I can finish that in fifteen minutes," declared Jimmie gaily. "You're
a brick, Sister! When you want me to do something for you, just mention
it, will you?"
Sister beamed. She was hot and tired and she knew her face and hands
were streaked and dirty. Brother had spent the morning playing with
Nellie Yarrow and Ellis Carr, and Nellie's aunt had taken them to the
drug store for ice-cream soda. Yet Sister, far from being sorry for her
hot, busy morning in the garden, felt very happy.
"Now you don't mind, do you?" she asked Jimmie anxiously.
"Mind what?" he said, putting the wheelbarrow away in the toolhouse.
"About the butterflies," explained Sister.
"I'd forgotten all about them," declared Jimmie, hugging her.