IV

All their lives the children had acted in unison. When they had been

tiny creatures they had played the same games and used the same toys. It

had seemed of little importance that their belongings were those of a

boy and girl. When Robin had played with tops and marbles, Meg had

played with them too. When Meg had been in a domestic and maternal mood,

and had turned to dolls and dolls’ housekeeping, Robin had assumed some

masculine rôle connected with the amusement. It had entertained him as

much at times to be the dolls’ doctor, or the carpenter who repaired the

dolls’ furniture or made plans for the enlargement of the dolls’ house,

as it had entertained Meg to sew the flags and dress the sailors who

manned his miniature ships, and assist him with the tails of his kites.

They had had few playmates, and had pleased each other far better than

outsiders could have done.

“It’s because we are twins,” Meg said. “Twins are made alike, and so

they like the same things. I’m glad I’m a twin. If I had to be born

again and be an _un_-twin I’m sure I should be lonely.”

“I don’t think it matters whether you are a boy or a girl, if you are a

twin,” said Robin. “You are part of the other one, and so it’s as if you

were both.”

They had never had secrets from each other. They had read the same books

as they grew older, been thrilled by the same stories, and shared in

each other’s plans and imaginings or depressions. So it was a curious

thing that at this special time, when they were drawn nearest to one

another by an unusual interest and sympathy, there should have arrived a

morning when each rose with a thought unshared by the other.

Aunt Matilda was very busy that day. She was always busy, but this

morning seemed more actively occupied than usual. She never appeared to

sit down, unless to dispose of a hurried meal or go over some accounts.

She was a wonderful woman, and the twins knew that the most

objectionable thing they could do was not to remove themselves after a

repast was over; but this morning Meg walked over to a chair and firmly

sat down in it, and watched her as she vigorously moved things about,

rubbed dust off them, and put them in their right places.

Meg’s eyes were fixed on her very steadily. She wondered if it was true

that she and Robin were like her, and if they would be more like her

when they had reached her age, and what would have happened to them

before that time came. It was true that Aunt Matilda had a square jaw

also. It was not an encouraging thing to contemplate; in fact, as she

looked at her, Meg felt her heart begin a slow and steady thumping. But,

as it thumped, she was getting herself in hand with such determination

that when she at last spoke her chin looked very square indeed, and her

black-lashed eyes were as nearly stern as a child’s eyes can look.

“Aunt Matilda,” she said, suddenly.

“Well?” and a tablecloth was whisked off and shaken.

“I want to talk to you.”

“Talk in a hurry, then. I’ve no time to waste in talk.”

“How old were you when you began to work and make money?”

Aunt Matilda smiled grimly.

“I worked out for my board when I was ten years old,” she said. “Me and

your father were left orphans, and we had to work, or starve. When I was

twelve I got a place to wash dishes and look after children and run

errands, and I got a dollar a week because it was out in the country,

and girls wouldn’t stay there.”

“Do you know how old _I_ am?” asked Meg.

“I’ve forgotten.”

“I’m twelve years old.” She got up from her chair and walked across the

room and stood looking up at Aunt Matilda. “I’m an orphan too, and so is

Robin,” she said, “and we have to work. You give us a place to stay in;

but—there are other things. We have no one, and we have to do things

ourselves; and we are twelve, and twelve is a good age for people who

have to do things for themselves. Is there anything in this house or in

the dairy or on the farm that would be worth wages, that I could do? I

don’t care how hard it is if I can do it.”

If Aunt Matilda had been a woman of sentiment she might have been moved

by the odd, unchildish tenseness and sternness of the little figure, and

the straight-gazing eyes, which looked up at her from under the thick

black hair tumbling in short locks over the forehead. Twelve years old

was very young to stand and stare the world in the face with such eyes.

But she was not a woman of sentiment, and her life had been spent among

people who knew their right to live could only be won by hard work, and

who began the fight early. So she looked at the child without any

emotion whatever.

“Do you suppose you could more than earn your bread if I put you in the

dairy and let you help there?” she said.

“Yes,” answered Meg, unflinchingly, “I know I could. I’m strong for my

age, and I’ve watched them doing things there. I can wash pans and bowls

and cloths, and carry things about, and go anywhere I’m told. I know how

clean things have to be kept.”

[Illustration: “AUNT MATILDA,” SHE SAID, SUDDENLY.]

“Well,” said Aunt Matilda, looking her over sharply, “they’ve been

complaining about the work being too much for them, lately. You go in

there this morning and see what you can do. You shall have a dollar a

week if you’re worth it. You’re right about its being time that you

should begin earning something.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” said Meg, and she turned round and walked away in

the direction of the dairy, with two deep red spots on her cheeks and

her heart thumping again—though this time it thumped quickly.

She reached the scene of action in the midst of a rush of work, and

after their first rather exasperated surprise at so immature and

inexperienced a creature being supposed to be able to help them, the

women found plenty for her to do. She said so few words and looked so

little afraid that she made a sort of impression on them.

“See,” she said to the head woman, “Aunt Matilda didn’t send me to do

things that need teaching. Just tell me the little things, it does not

matter what, and I’ll do them. I can.”

How she worked that morning—how she ran on errands—how she carried this

and that—how she washed and scrubbed milk-pans—and how all her tasks

were menial and apparently trivial, though entirely necessary, and how

the activity and rapidity and unceasingness of them tried her

unaccustomed young body, and finally made her limbs ache and her back

feel as if it might break at some unexpected moment, Meg never forgot.

But such was the desperation of her indomitable little spirit and the

unconquerable will she had been born with, that when it was over she was

no more in the mood for giving up than she had been when she walked in

among the workers after her interview with Aunt Matilda.

When dinner-time came she walked up to Mrs. Macartney, the manager of

the dairy work, and asked her a question.

“Have I helped you?” she said.

“Yes, you have,” said the woman, who was by no means an ill-natured

creature for a hard-driven woman. “You’ve done first-rate.”

“Will you tell Aunt Matilda that?” said Meg.

“Yes,” was the answer.

Meg was standing with her hands clasped tightly behind her back, and she

looked at Mrs. Macartney very straight and hard from under her black

brows.

“Mrs. Macartney,” she said, “if I’m worth it, Aunt Matilda will give me

a dollar a week; and it’s time I began to work for my living. Am I worth

that much?”

“Yes, you are,” said Mrs. Macartney, “if you go on as you’ve begun.”

“I shall go on as I’ve begun,” said Meg. “Thank you, ma’am,” and she

walked back to the house.

After dinner she waited to speak to Aunt Matilda again.

“I went to the dairy,” she said.

“I know you did,” Aunt Matilda answered. “Mrs. Macartney told me about

it. You can go on. I’ll give you the dollar a week.”

She looked the child over again, as she had done in the morning, but

with a shade of expression which might have meant a touch of added

interest. Perhaps her mind paused just long enough to bring back to her

the time when she had been a worker at twelve years old, and also had

belonged to no one.

“She’ll make her living,” she said, as she watched Meg out of the room.

“She’s more like me than she is like her father. Robert wasn’t

worthless, but he had no push.”

Having made quite sure that she was not wanted in the dairy for the time

being, Meg made her way to the barn. She was glad to find it empty, so

that she could climb the ladder without waiting. When she reached the

top and clambered over the straw the scent of it seemed delightful to

her. It was like something welcoming her home. She threw herself down

full length in the Straw Parlor. Robin had not been at dinner. He had

gone out early and had not returned. As she lay, stretching her tired

limbs, and staring up at the nest in the dark, tent-like roof above her,

she hoped he would come. And he did. In about ten minutes she heard the

signal from the barn floor, and answered it. Robin came up the ladder

rather slowly. When he made his way over the straw to her corner, and

threw himself down beside her, she saw that he was tired too. They

talked a few minutes about ordinary things, and then Meg thought she

would tell him about the dairy. But it appeared that he had something to

tell himself, and he began first.

“I’ve been making a plan, Meg,” he said.

“Have you?” said Meg. “What is it?”

“I’ve been thinking about it for two or three days,” he went on, “but I

thought I wouldn’t say anything about it until—till I tried how it would

work.”

Meg raised herself on her elbow and looked at him curiously. It seemed

so queer that he should have had a plan too.

“Have you—tried?” she said.

“Yes,” he answered, “I have been working for Jones this morning, and I

did quite a lot. I worked hard. I wanted him to see what I could do. And

then, Meg, I asked him if he would take me on—like the rest of the

hands—and pay me what I was worth.”

“And what did he say?” breathlessly.

“He looked at me a minute—all over—and half laughed, and I thought he

was going to say I wasn’t worth anything. It wouldn’t have been true,

but I thought he might, because I’m only twelve years old. It’s pretty

hard to be only twelve when you want to get work. But he didn’t, he

said, ‘Well, I’m darned if I won’t give you a show;’ and I’m to have a

dollar a week.”

“Robin,” Meg cried, with a little gasp of excitement, “so am I!”

“So are you!” cried Robin, and sat bolt upright. “_You!_”

“It’s—it’s because we are twins,” said Meg, her eyes shining like lamps.

“I told you twins did things alike because they couldn’t help it. We

have both thought of the same thing. I went to Aunt Matilda, asked her

to let me work somewhere and pay me, and she let me go into the dairy

and try, and Mrs. Macartney said I was a help, and I am to have a dollar

a week, if I go on as I’ve begun.”

Robin’s hand gave hers a clutch, just as it had done before, that day

when he had not known why.

“Meg, I believe,” he said, “I believe that we two will always go on as

we begin. I believe we were born that way. We have to, we can’t help it.

And two dollars a week, if they keep us, and we save it all—we could go

almost anywhere—sometime.”

Meg’s eyes were fixed on him with a searching, but half frightened

expression.

“Almost anywhere,” she said, quite in a whisper. “Anywhere not more than

a hundred miles away.”

V

They did not tell each other of the strange and bold thought which had

leaped up in their minds that day. Each felt an unwonted shyness about

it, perhaps because it had been so bold; but it had been in each mind,

and hidden though it was, it remained furtively in both.

They went on exactly as they had begun. Each morning Meg went to her

drudgery in the dairy and Robin followed Jones whithersoever duty led.

If the elder people had imagined they would get tired and give up they

found out their mistake. That they were often tired was true, but that

in either there arose once the thought of giving up, never! And they

worked hard. The things they did to earn their weekly stipend would have

touched the heart of a mother of cared-for children, but on Mrs.

Jennings’s model farm people knew how much work a human being could do

when necessity drove. They were all driven by necessity, and it was

nothing new to know that muscles ached and feet swelled and burned. In

fact, they knew no one who did not suffer, as a rule, from these small

inconveniences. And these children, with their set little faces and

mature intelligence, were somehow so unsuggestive of the weakness and

limitations of childhood that they were often given work which was

usually intrusted only to elder people. Mrs. Macartney found that Meg

never slighted anything, never failed in a task, and never forgot one,

so she gave her plenty to do. Scrubbing and scouring that others were

glad to shirk fell to her share. She lifted and dragged things about

that grown-up girls grumbled over. What she lacked in muscle and size

she made up in indomitable will power that made her small face set

itself and her small body become rigid as iron. Her work ended by not

confining itself to the dairy, but extended to the house, the

kitchen—anywhere there were tiresome things to be done.

With Robin it was the same story. Jones was not afraid to give him any

order. He was of use in all quarters—in the huge fields, in the barn, in

the stables, and as a messenger to be trusted to trudge any distance

when transport was not available.

They both grew thin but sinewy looking, and their faces had a rather

strained look. Their always large black eyes seemed to grow bigger, and

their little square jaws looked more square every day; but on Saturday

nights they each were paid their dollar, and climbed to the Straw Parlor

and unburied the Treasure and added to it.

Those Saturday nights were wonderful things. To the end of life they

would never forget them. Through all the tired hours of labor they were

looked forward to. Then they lay in their nest of straw and talked

things over—there it seemed that they could relax and rest their limbs

as they could do it nowhere else. Mrs. Jennings was not given to sofas

and easy-chairs, and it is not safe to change position often when one

has a grown-up bedfellow. But in the straw they could roll at full

length, curl up or stretch out just as they pleased, and there they

could enlarge upon the one subject that filled their minds, and

fascinated and enraptured them.

Who could wonder that it was so! The City Beautiful was growing day by

day, and the development of its glories was the one thing they heard

talked of. Robin had established the habit of collecting every scrap of

newspaper referring to it. He cut them out of Aunt Matilda’s old papers,

he begged them from every one, neighbors, store-keepers, work hands.

When he was sent on errands he cast an all-embracing glance ’round every

place his orders took him to. The postmaster of the nearest village

discovered his weakness and saved paragraphs and whole papers for him.

Before very long there was buried near the Treasure a treasure even more

valuable of newspaper cuttings, and on the wonderful Saturday nights

they gave themselves up to revelling in them.

How they watched it and followed it and lived with it—this great human

scheme which somehow seemed to their young minds more like the scheme of

giants and genii! How they seized upon every new story of its wonders

and felt that there could be no limit to them! They knew every purpose

and plan connected with it—every arch and tower and hall and stone they

pleased themselves by fancying. Newspapers were liberal with

information, people talked of it, they heard of it on every side. To

them it seemed that the whole world must be thinking of nothing else.

“While we are lying here,” Meg said—“while you are doing chores, and I

am scouring pans and scrubbing things, it is all going on. People in

France and in England and in Italy are doing work to send to it—artists

are painting pictures, and machinery is whirling and making things, and

everything is pouring into that one wonderful place. And men and women

planned it, you know—just men and women. And if we live a few years we

shall be men and women, and they were once children like us—only, if

they had been quite like us they would never have known enough to do

anything.”

“But when they were children like us,” said Robin, “they did not know

what they would have learned by this time—and they never dreamed about

this.”

“That shows how wonderful men and women are,” said Meg. “I believe they

can do _anything_ if they set their minds to it.” And she said it

stubbornly.

“Perhaps they can,” said Robin, slowly. “Perhaps _we_ could do anything

we set our minds to.”

There was the suggestive tone in his voice which Meg had been thrilled

by more than once before. She had been thrilled by it most strongly when

he had said that if they saved their two dollars a week they might be

able to go almost anywhere. Unconsciously she responded to it now.

“If I could do anything I set my mind to,” she said, “do you know what I

would set my mind to first?”

“What?”

“I would set my mind to going to that wonderful place. I would set it to

seeing everything there, and remembering all I could hold, and learning

all there was to be learned—and I would _set it hard_.”

“So would I,” said Robin.

It was a more suggestive voice than before that he said the words in;

and suddenly he got up, and went and tore away the straw from the

burying-place of the Treasure. He took out the old iron bank, and

brought it back to their corner.

He did it so suddenly, and with such a determined air, that Meg rather

lost her breath.

“What are you going to do with the Treasure?” she asked.

“I am going to count it.”

“Why?”

He was opening the box, using the blade of a stout pocket-knife as a

screwdriver.

“A return ticket to Chicago costs fourteen dollars,” he said. “I asked

at the dépôt. That would be twenty-eight dollars for two people. Any one

who is careful can live on a very little for a while. I want to see if

we shall have money enough to _go_.”

“To _go_!” Meg cried out. “To the Fair, Robin?”

She could not believe the evidence of her ears—it sounded so daring.

“Nobody would take us!” she said. “Even if we had money enough to pay

for ourselves, nobody would take us.”

“Take!” answered Robin, working at his screws. “No, nobody would. What’s

the matter with taking ourselves?”

Meg sat up in the straw, conscious of a sort of shock.

“To go by ourselves, like grown-up people! To buy our tickets ourselves,

and get on the train, and go all the way—alone! And walk about the Fair

alone, Robin?”

“Who takes care of us here?” answered Robin. “Who has looked after us

ever since father and mother died? Ourselves! Just ourselves! Whose

business are we but our own? Who thinks of us, or asks if we are happy

or unhappy?”

“Nobody,” said Meg. And she hid her face in her arms on her knees.

Robin went on stubbornly.

“Nobody is ever going to do it,” he said, “if we live to be hundreds of

years old. I’ve thought of it when I’ve been working in the fields with

Jones, and I’ve thought of it when I’ve been lying awake at night. It’s

kept me awake many and many a time.”

“So it has me,” said Meg.

“And since this thing began to be talked about everywhere, I’ve thought

of it more and more,” said Rob. “It means more to people like us than it

does to any one else. It’s the people who never see things, who have no

chances, it means the most to. And the more I think of it, the more I—I

won’t let it go by me!” And all at once he threw himself face downward

on the straw, and hid his face in his arms.

Meg lifted hers. There was something in the woful desperation of his

movement that struck her to the heart. She had never known him do such a

thing in their lives before. That was not his way. Whatsoever hard thing

had happened—howsoever lonely and desolate they had felt—he had never

shown his feeling in this way. She put out her hand and touched his

shoulder.

“Robin!” she said. “Oh, Robin!”

“I don’t care,” he said, from the refuge of his sleeves. “We _are_

little when we are compared with grown-up people. They would call us

children; and children usually have some one to help them and tell them

what to do. I’m only like this because I’ve been thinking so much and

working so hard—and it does seem like an Enchanted City—but no one ever

thinks we could care about anything more than if we were cats and dogs.

It was not like that at home, even if we were poor.”

Then he sat up with as little warning as he had thrown himself down, and

gave his eyes a fierce rub. He returned to the Treasure again.

“I’ve been making up my mind to it for days,” he said. “If we have the

money we can buy our tickets and go some night without saying anything

to any one. We can leave a note for Aunt Matilda, and tell her we are

all right and we are coming back. She’ll be too busy to mind.”

“Do you remember that book of father’s we read?” said Meg. “That one

called ‘David Copperfield.’ David ran away from the bottle place when he

was younger than we are, and he had to walk all the way to Dover.”

“We shall not have to walk; and we won’t let any one take our money away

from us,” said Robin.

“Are we going, really?” said Meg. “You speak as if we were truly going;

and it _can’t_ be.”

“Do you know what you said just now about believing human beings could

do _anything_, if they set their minds to it? Let’s set our minds to

it.”

“Well,” Meg answered, rather slowly, as if weighing the matter, “let’s!”

And she fell to helping to count the Treasure.