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Once upon a time there was a dear little naughty girl, not _bad_, she
would not have been so dear had she been really bad, but just naughty
sometimes, and I must confess "sometimes" came pretty often. She had all
sorts of loving scolding names, such as "precious torment," "darling
bother," and she kept her poor dear grandmother on a continuous trot to
see what mischief she was in, and frightened her mother (who thought
everybody must want to steal Zay) by hiding behind the Missouri currant
bush until every nook and corner had been searched; and she made her
uncle shake his head gravely because she never could get beyond the
first question in the Catechism, "what is your name?" and even then
would answer _Zay_, although he had told her that "that was not her name
at all; she had been baptized Salome; and Zay was a name she had no
right to whatever." Nor can I begin to tell you the times I have
exhausted all my strength putting her sturdy little self into the
closet, and then standing first on one foot, then on the other, until I
was ready to drop, listening at the keyhole for the first small sob of
repentance.
Things had gone wrong with our naughty little Zay this morning. Mary,
the good old cook, who had been in the house years before Zay was born,
had actually refused to let her make any more mud-pies on her kitchen
window; and mamma and grandma had sided with the enemy.
Zay was a little dumpling of a girl, with hard round cheeks like red
apples, fat dimpled arms, and such wide-open eyes, and she looked very
funny now as she drew herself up to her fullest height, which was not
much of a height after all, brushed off her pretty blue dress, shook
down her clean ruffled apron, and addressed us all in very solemn
tones:
"I jes' want to tell you, I've been _resulted_, and I am never going to
live here anymore! I'll go 'way; clear off in the woods! And then I
guess you'll all be sorry! Mary need never make any more scrambled eggs
for breakfast, cause" (she almost broke down at the bare thought of so
direful a catastrophe), "cause there'll never be any chil'en to eat 'em
anymore! And _then_ I guess grandpa will be sorry when he comes home
tired, and doesn't have his s'ippers all yeddy!"
"O," said her mamma, gravely, "you are going right off, are you, before
dinner?"
"Yes, wight st'ait away, _now_! I'll go get my hat."
Down stairs the quick feet pattered to the hall-closet where the little
sun hat hung, always ready for the garden. Soon she was back, and held
her chin up with great composure for grandma to tie the strings.
The dear grandmother quietly laid her fine sewing down beside her on the
sofa. "_Is_ my little girl going away off by herself in the woods?"
"Yes, miles and _mileses_!"
"And what will you do when you get hungry?"
"Why, I'm going to take all my money," forthwith going to a drawer in
the old-fashioned book-case, and taking out a diminutive porte-monnaie,
which contained her whole fortune, three silver three-cent pieces, and
hanging it on her fat little hand, "and I can go to some g'ocery in the
woods, and buy lots of butter crackers."
I, sitting in an easy chair, just recovered from a long illness,
suggested, "But, Zay, you might want something besides crackers. I know
a little girl who is very fond of 'drum-sticks' and 'wish-bones'!"
"I can eat bears and wolves. I can make gravy, and," she added, "I'm
going to take grandpa's gun wif me."
"Very well," answered her mamma, going to grandfather's closet and
bringing out the gun, which was twice as large as the child.
There she stood before us--a little blue-eyed girl with a demure sun-hat
shading a very resolute and, as yet, untroubled face, the gun held up
tight against her with one fat dimpled hand, while from the other
dangled the little purse.
"I'm all yeddy now, so good-bye ev'ybody," she said at last.
"Good-bye," said gentle grandma, holding up the little face to kiss the
firm red lips. "I am afraid I shall miss my little girl to-night when I
want the red stand drawn out for the drop light; and I'm sure grandpa
will need his slippers."
Zay looked somewhat irresolute; but her mamma here spoke:
"I think," said she, "if you intend to reach the woods before dark you
should start at once, for it is almost two o'clock now."
"Good-bye ev'ybody," said Zay again.
"And," said Lita, "I'll carry the gun down and open the front gate for
you."
Bravely the child marched out of the room, out of the front door and
gate. There Lita handed her the gun; but after trying several times to
walk with it, she told Lita that she didn't know as she should care for
any wolf wish-bone with her butter crackers, and asked her to take the
gun back in the house, and then she banged the gate, hoping Mary saw
her, with an air of importance, and pattered off on a fast little
dog-trot down the street.
Meanwhile we were all watching her behind the blinds.
"Don't lose sight of her," said mamma, "but don't let her see you!"
This is what Lita saw. A sturdy little figure walking steadily onward,
never looking back. At length it stops, opens the little purse, counts
its money, but never noting that in the trouble with the clasps the
three little coins fall, like three silver rain drops, to the pavement.
It goes on and on, till Lita fears it will really go out of sight. Then
the little figure "slows up" again, opens the little purse, and stops
short!
Ah, the horrors of poverty! Lita understands the poor little irresolute
figure. No money means no butter crackers, and no butter crackers means
despair. The little steps come homeward. The blue eyes are bent on the
ground. She does not know that grandpa has come quietly up behind her,
and found each little silver piece.
The little rebel appeared in the hall just as dinner was carried in.
There was a most savory odor of fricassee. Grandma and mamma and Lita
were just entering the dining room.
"Well," Zay calmly announced, "I 'cluded not to go till after dinner."
"Is that so?" quietly replied her mother. "But you might better have
gone on. Any little girl who wants to leave a nice home because she
can't have her own way, needn't look for any dinner here! I expected you
to dine on butter crackers and bears."
"I like chicken, I do," said proud little Zay with appealing eyes, but
no tears; "and then I lost all my pennies!"
In vain did the tender hearted grandma pull mamma's dress,--mamma
entered the dining room and shut the door; and up came poor Zay to the
room where I awaited my dinner, for she had seen a tray borne hither.
But she did not know that her mamma's parting injunction had been, "you
must not give her anything! I must--indeed, I _wish_ to teach my child a
lesson."
Little sun-hat and empty porte-monnaie put away, quietly she seated
herself on the sofa opposite me, with two little fat feet hanging
dangling down. Dignity kept her silent, and amusement mingled with pity
made me so.
This state of things lasted for some moments, while the dainties were
diminishing from my plate. Every mouthful was wistfully watched. At
length with grave old-fashioned face, she asked, "Are you sorry for
beggar chil'en, Aunty?"
"Very sorry indeed," I replied with composure.
Then with a tremor in the voice:
"Aunty, if you saw a little child in the street a starvin' to death for
some bread and butter wif jelly on it, wouldn't you give her some?"
I shook my head. Another pause, and then with little fat hands clasped,
and voice full of sobs, poor little Zay cried out, "Oh, Aunty, if you
saw a little girl starvin' to death for sponge cake, wouldn't you give
her some?"
"How could I, Zay, if the little girl's mamma had forbidden it?"
All her fortitude was gone. She burst into tears. She laid her head down
on the sofa and sobbed.
"Oh, oh! and they had fricasseed chicken, with Mary's nice toast under
it; and you have sponge-cake and wine-jelly; and I haven't nuffin; there
isn't one single butter cracker in the house!"
At this climax of misery the house resounded with her lamentations, in
which my tears would mingle; but fortunately the dear grand-parents soon
appeared to comfort their darling. And so, somehow, up on grandpa's lap
it became easier to see how naughty it was to annoy good old Mary, and
how ungrateful it was to wish to run away from home. And pardons were
begged and kisses were given, and the three little silver pieces crept
back into the tiny porte-monnaie, and Zay had some of Mary's nice toast
with lots of gravy, and a drum-stick and a wish-bone.
Zay is a young lady now, and I presume when she reads this story she
will pout and blush, and the more because it is every word true.