TWINS AND A SISSY
Mrs. Hamilton and Mrs. Black were sitting on Miss Minerva's veranda
talking to her, and Lira and Frances were in the swing with Billy.
The attraction proved too great for Jimmy; he impolitely left a
disconsolate little visitor sitting on his own porch while he jumped the
fence and joined the other children.
“Don't you all wish you could see Mrs. Brown's new twinses?” was his
greeting as he took his seat by Billy.
“Where'd she get 'em?” asked Frances.
“Doctor Sanford tooken 'em to her last night.”
“He muster found 'em in a holler stump,” remarked Billy. “I knows,
'cause that's where Doctor Shacklefoot finds aller of Aunt Blue-Gum
Tempy's Peruny Pearline's, an' me an' Wilkes Booth Lincoln been lookin'
in evy holler stump we see ever sence we's born, an' we ain't never
foun' no baby 't all, 'cause can't nobody but jes' doctors fin' 'em. I
wish he'd a-give 'em to Aunt Minerva 'stidder Mrs. Brown.”
“I wish he'd bringed 'em to my mama,” said Frances.
“I certainly do think he might have given them to us,” declared Lina,
“and I'm going to tell him so, too. As much money as father has paid him
for doctor's bills and as much old, mean medicine as I have taken just
to 'commodate him; then he gives babies to everybody but us.”
“I'm awful glad he never give 'em to my mama,” said Jimmy, “'cause I
never could had no more fun; they'd be stuck right under my nose all
time, and all time put their mouth in everything you want to do, and all
time meddling. You can't fool me 'bout twinses. But I wish I could see
'em! They so weakly they got to be hatched in a nincubator.”
“What's that?” questioned Frances.
“That's a someping what you hatches chickens and babies in when they's
delicate, and ain't got 'nough breath and ain't got they eyes open and
ain't got no feathers on,” explained Jimmy.
“Reckon we can see 'em?” she asked.
“See nothing!” sniffed the little boy. “Ever sence Billy let Mr.
Algernon Jones whack Miss Minerva's beau we can't do nothing at all
'thout grown folks 'r' stuck right under your nose. I'm jes' cramped to
death.”
“When I'm a mama,” mused Frances, “I hope Doctor Sanford'll bring me
three little twinses, and two Maltese kittens, and a little Japanee, and
a monkey, and a parrit.”
“When I'm a papa,” said Jimmy, “I don' want no babies at all, all they's
good for is jus' to set 'round and yell.”
“Look like God 'd sho' be busy a-makin' so many babies,” remarked Billy.
“Why, God don' have none 'a the trouble,” explained Jimmy. “He's just
got Him a baby factory in Heaven like the chair factory and the canning
factory down by the railroad, and angels jus' all time make they arms
and legs, like niggers do at the chair factory, and all God got to do
is jus' glue 'em together, and stick in their souls. God's got 'bout the
easiest job they is.”
“I thought angels jes' clam' the golden stair and play they harps,” said
Billy.
“Ain't we going to look sweet at Miss Cecilia's wedding,” said Frances,
after a short silence.
“I'll betcher I'll be the cutest kid in that church,” boasted Jimmy
conceitedly. “You coming, ain't you, Billy?”
“I gotter go,” answered that jilted swain, gloomily, “Aunt Minerva ain't
got nobody to leave me with at home. I jes' wish she'd git married.”
“Why wouldn't you be a page, Billy?” asked Lina.
“'Cause I didn't hafto,” was the snappish reply.
“I bet my mama give her the finest present they is,” bragged the smaller
boy; “I reckon it cost 'bout a million dollars.”
“Mother gave her a handsome cut-glass vase,” said Lina.
“It looks like Doctor Sanford would've give Miss Cecilia those twinses
for a wedding present,” said Frances.
“Who is that little boy sitting on your porch, Jimmy?” asked Lina,
noticing for the first time a lonely-looking child.
“That's Leon Tipton, Aunt Ella's little boy. He just come out from
Memphis to spend the day with me and I'll be awful glad when he goes
home; he's 'bout the stuck-up-est kid they is, and skeery? He's 'bout
the 'fraidest young un ever you see. And look at him now? Wears long
curls like a girl and don't want to never get his clean clo'es dirty.”
“I think he's a beautiful little boy,” championed Lina. “Call him over
here, Jimmy.”
“Naw, I don't want to. You all'll like him a heap better over there;
he's one o' these-here kids what the furder you get 'way from 'em, the
better you like 'em.”
“He sho' do look lonesome,” said Billy; “'vite him over, Jimmy.”
“Leon!” screamed his cousin, “you can come over here if you wantta.”
The lonesome-looking little boy promptly accepted the invitation, and
came primly through the two gates. He walked proudly to the swing and
stood, cap in hand, waiting for an introduction.
“Why didn't you clam' the fence, 'stead of coming th'oo the gates?”
growled Jimmy. “You 'bout the prissiest boy they is. Well, why don't you
set down?”
“Introduce me, please,” said the elegant little city boy.
“Interduce your grandma's pussy cats,” mocked Jimmy. “Set down, I tell
you.”
Frances and Lina made room for him between them and soon gave him their
undivided attention, to the intense envy and disgust of the other two
little boys.
“I am Lina Hamilton,” said the little girl on his right.
“And I'm Frances Black, and Jimmy ought to be 'shamed to treat you like
he does.”
“I knows a turrible skeery tale,” remarked a malicious Billy, looking at
Lina and Frances. “If y' all wa'n't girls I 'd tell it to you.”
“We aren't any more scared 'n you, William Hill,” cried Frances, her
interest at once aroused; “I already know 'bout 'raw meat and bloody
bones' and nothing's scarier 'n that.”
“And I know 'Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be
he alive or be he dead, I'll ground his bones to make me bread,”' said
Lina.
“This-here tale,” continued Billy, glueing his big eyes to those of the
little stranger, “is one Tabernicle learnt fer a speech at school. It's
all 'bout a 'oman what was buriet in a graveyard with a diamant ring on
her finger, an' a robber come in the night--”
The child's tones were guttural, thrilling, and hair-raising as he
glared into the eyes of the effeminate Leon, “an' a robber come in the
night an' try to cut it off, an' ha'nts was groanin' an' the win' moan
'oo-oo' an--”
Leon could stand it no longer.
“I am going right back,” he cried rising with round, frightened eyes,
“I am not going to sit here and listen to you, scaring little girls to
death. You are a bad boy to scare Lina and Frances and I am not going
to associate with you;” and this champion of the fair sex stalked with
dignity across the yard to the gate.
“I'm no more scared 'n nothing,” and indignant Frances hurled at his
back, “you're just scared yourself.”
Jimmy giggled happily. “What'd I tell you all,” he cried, gleefully.
“Lina and Frances got to all time set little 'fraid cats 'tween 'em,” he
snorted. “It's just like I tell you, he's the sissyest boy they is; and
he don't care who kiss him neither; he'll let any woman kiss him what
wants to. Can't no woman at all 'cepting my mama and Miss Cecilia kiss
me. But Leon is 'bout the kissingest kid they is; why, he'd just as
soon's not let Frances and Lina kiss him; he ain't got no better sense.
'Course I gotta let Miss Cecilia kiss me 'cause she's 'bout the plumpest
Sunday-School teacher they is and the Bible say 'If your Sunday-School
teacher kiss you on one cheek turn the other cheek and let her kiss you
on that, too,' and I all time bound to do what the Bible say. You 'd
better call him back, Frances, and kiss him, you and Lina 're so stuck
on him.”
“I wouldn't kiss him to save his life,” declared Frances; “he's got the
spindliest legs I ever saw.”