"Well! you said I could come, Aggie Kenway--so there!"
This was Sammy's initial statement when Neale dragged him off his perch
and brought him around to the side of the car where all could see him.
"Why! you awful boy! I never!" declared Agnes, shaking her head at him
angrily.
"Yes, you did," repeated Sammy.
"Don't add to your wickedness by telling such a story, Sammy Pinkney,"
admonished Ruth.
"Oh, Sammy!" gasped Tess, dolefully.
"I don't believe even pirates tell stories," added Dot, with grave
conviction.
"I ain't! I ain't telling a story," repeated the small boy, with
earnestness. "She did! she did!"
"I never! I never!" responded Agnes.
"Wait!" put in Ruth, firmly. "We are getting nowhere. Of course you did
not tell him he could come, Aggie; but he must have thought you said
something like that. What _did_ she say, Sammy Pinkney?"
"She said--she said," choked the now much-abused-sounding Sammy. "She
said she'd like to see me find room aboard the car--_and I did!_" and he
concluded with something like triumph.
"Oh!" gasped Agnes.
"Well, I never!" exclaimed Mrs. Heard, and it must be confessed she was
immensely amused. "What a boy!"
"Did you ever hear the like of that?" repeated Ruth, using one of Mrs.
MacCall's favorite expressions of amazement.
"I'm sure I didn't mean----" began Agnes, but her older sister said,
quickly:
"Of course you didn't, deary! And that boy should have known better."
"She _did_ tell me so--she did!" wailed Sammy. "And I'm going. My mother
said I could--and that you girls was awful nice to take me."
"Cricky!" murmured Neale, all of a broad grin now. "You got a reputation
that time, Aggie, for goodness, without meaning it."
"I don't care----"
"The thing is now," interrupted Ruth, decidedly, "how to send him home."
At that Sammy lifted up his voice in a wail that might have touched a
heart of stone. And really, after all, there was not a heart of stone in
the whole party of tourists from the old Corner House--not even in Tom
Jonah's breast. The old dog went up to Sammy and tried to lap his tears
away.
"Oh, see here, kid! don't yell like that," begged Neale. "Turn off the
sprinkler. That won't get you anywhere."
"Will you tell me what we are to do with him, then?" demanded Ruth,
quite put out. "There is no room for him in the car."
"I can stay where I was. I don't mind," gulped Sammy.
"Never!" declared Agnes. "You made a show out of us all the way through
town. We'll never hear the last of it."
"We were boarded by a pirate, sure enough," chuckled Neale.
"He's worse than any pirate," sighed Ruth. "We'd know what to do with a
real pirate."
"I wonder?" murmured Neale, his eyes twinkling.
But Ruth ignored him. She thought she saw her duty, and was determined
to do it. "I suppose we shall have to go back," she hesitated.
"Oh, no, Ruthie!" begged the two little girls in chorus.
"I wouldn't go back for that horrid little scamp!" snapped Agnes, her
face flushing. "Sammy Pinkney, you are the worst boy!"
Sammy sniffed and looked at her. "I found that ring you lost that time,
Aggie Kenway. 'Member?" he asked.
"But you _are_ an awful nuisance," pronounced Ruth, with conviction.
"You never would have knowed your hens was layin' in Mr. Benjamin's lot
last week if I hadn't ha' told you, Ruthie Kenway--so there," responded
the youngster.
"And you told me that--that sick man was carrying a brick in his hat--and
he wasn't," Dot put in faintly.
Sammy grinned at that; but he was prompt to say, too: "Well, who found
all your dolls out on the grass where you'd played lawn party, and
brought 'em in just before the thunder shower the other day? Heh?"
"Cricky!" exclaimed Neale, under his breath, and with some admiration,
"the kid's making out a case."
Tess, the kind-hearted, would make no accusation; but Ruth, despite the
boy's rejoinders, remained firm.
"No," she said. "He must go home. Is there a railroad station near from
which we can send him, Neale? We'll telephone to his mother. We are a
long way from town."
At that Sammy Pinkney, who prided himself on being "tough" and who was
in training for a piratical future, broke down completely.
"Ow! ow! ow!" he howled, digging his grimy fist first into one eye and
then into the other. "I don't wanter! I don't wanter! I don't wanter go
back. I ain't got nobody to play with. And ma'll lick me 'cause I said
you'd 'vited me to go--an' now Aggie s-s-says she didn't. And I been
sick, anyway, and I can't play with the fellers, 'cause it tires me so.
"I--I--I never git to go nowheres," pursued Sammy, using the most
atrocious English, but utterly abandoned in his grief. "You Corner House
girls git all the go--go--good times, and _I_ ain't got even a s-s-sister
to play with----"
At this point a most astonishing thing overtook Agnes Kenway. She had
begun by glaring at Sammy in anger; but as he went on to bewail his hard
state, her pretty face flushed, then paled; her blue eyes filled with
tears which soon began to spill over. She drew nearer to the miserable
little chap, standing, dirty and forlorn, in the middle of the road.
"Now, stop that, Sammy!" she suddenly blurted out. "Just stop. Don't cry
any more."
"He can't go. There isn't room," Ruth was repeating.
Agnes turned toward the eldest Corner House girl sharply and stamped her
foot.
"He shall go, Ruth Kenway--so there! He can squeeze in on the seat
between Neale and me. Here! take that bag up, Neale O'Neil. There's room
for it right in here," and she pointed. "Now! stop your crying, Sammy.
You shall go; but you'll have to be good."
"Oh, Aggie," cried the happy youngster, "I'll be as good as gold. You'll
see."
"Well!" gasped Ruth, yet not sorry that for once Agnes had usurped
authority.
Mrs. Heard laughed. Dot said:
"Well, it's true. He _hasn't_ any sister."
"And I'm sure he _can_ be good," put in Tess, the optimist.
Neale was chuckling to himself as he put Sammy's suitcase in the place
indicated.
"What is the matter with _you_, Neale O'Neil?" demanded Agnes, hotly,
brushing the tears out of her eyes.
"I was just thinking that this party has assumed a good deal of a
contract," said the light-haired boy.
"What for?"
"For reforming a pirate," said Neale.