to the creamery. Afterwards, Arne and Christopher had to hurry back
to the farm because there was work to do there, too. The men needed
Christopher in the fields, and Arne, too. There never was any time to
idle along the road. It seemed to Arne that work never ended. He wanted
some fun--that’s what he wanted. The other boys didn’t have to work all
the time in summer--but then, it wasn’t all of them that owned thrift
cards. Arne did. He already had earned ten stamps. When he thought of
that, then he was rather glad he had the work to do for his father.
His father gave him a thrift stamp every week that work was well and
satisfactorily done--and without shirking. So far, Arne had only missed
getting his stamp once. That was when he slipped off one day to go to
the swimming-hole with Jimmy Smith when he was supposed to be working
in the hay-field, raking. That was last week.
As Arne reflected upon these things and Christopher jogged into
Danville that day that was the very last day of June, he slapped the
reins and decided that he would lose no more thrift stamps. He wore his
knot of red, white and blue ribbon pinned on his blue shirt and he was
“doing his bit” quite as much as anybody, even though the other boys
did have more chance to have fun. Then he looked up and saw--the circus
poster!
Right then and there, he stopped Christopher and sat gazing at it. The
circus was coming to Danville on the Fourth of July--twenty-five cents
admission. The picture showed all manner of lovely ladies dancing on
the backs of black horses. It showed elephants that played hoop; it
pictured funny clowns and monkeys riding dogs--in short, everything
that a circus ought to be seemed suggested by the big circus poster.
“I’m a-goin’,” Arne resolved aloud. “Sure, I’m a-goin’ to it, somehow!”
Then he clucked to Christopher and the wagon rattled onward toward
the creamery. Just that one afternoon was the circus coming. It was a
splendid kind of Fourth of July treat. “I guess my father’ll let me
go,” he mused. “I guess so.”
When he reached Danville, all the lads who were waiting for cans to be
emptied had gathered in a knot near the creamery door. Everybody was
talking about the circus. Everybody was going.
Harold Sniffin’s cans were ready first. He and Arne came the same road
so he waited to go home with him. They tied Christopher to the back of
Harold’s cart and the two sat together and talked as they rode home
over the Prairie Road. Harold’s father let _him_ buy his own thrift
stamps. Harold was going without his weekly stamp and was going to buy
his circus ticket with the twenty-five cents. As Arne had no money,
Harold suggested this method of getting a ticket. Fourth of July did
not always bring a circus. This year there had been no spring circus at
all. Circuses couldn’t travel well on account of the railroads needing
the cars now. This circus, it seemed, had gone from town to town upon
its own feet and in its own circus wagons.
They had decided to go together and start early when the road of
Harold’s turning came. Then they unhitched Christopher and Arne whipped
up and came clattering into the red barn at home. “There’s a circus
coming to Danville on the Fourth,” he laughed. “Guess that’s a fine
way to celebrate a _Safe an’ Sane_ day!”
Only four more days to wait! Hooray! All that afternoon, Arne sang
happily as he ran around the farm doing chores. He reflected, as
he hoed his patch late in the afternoon, that farm work was really
patriotic work and that he, right there hoeing, was doing his bit as
much as if he were buying a thrift stamp. Of course he was!
That night when he was coming from the barn, after having fed the
calves their bran mixture, he met his father. He explained about the
circus. He wanted the money instead of the stamp, he said.
“All right,” said father. There the matter dropped. He did not ask
about the circus at all.
But Arne talked a great deal about it to his mother. He talked about it
to Lyman and Leslie, who were helpers at the farm. When it was dark and
chores were done, he sat on the flat stone at the doorstep and watched
the stars come out while he thought about it some more--only four more
days!
The morning of the first of July, Christopher trotted into Danville at
a pretty rapid pace. Indeed, he was rather white around the collar
when they at last reached the circus poster on the road to Danville.
But he earned his rest, for there Arne stopped and gazed at all the
wonderful things. The circus poster promised many, many more than were
pictured there. It said a thousand thrills would be felt by everyone
who witnessed the daring tight-rope walking. It spoke of the Wild West
and Indians that were a feature of the performance. It was only a big
poster but one felt after looking at it, that one could hardly wait
three days more before the Fourth should come! And going home from
Danville, Arne again sat beside Harold while Christopher jogged behind.
Again they talked. Again they planned. Again they undid Christopher
from the rear of Harold’s cart. Again at the crossroads, they parted
till the morrow. And again on the morrow, the very same thing occurred.
Only one day more before the Fourth! In the country few have
firecrackers. Arne was thinking chiefly about that circus. He and
Harold planned to go in time to see the parade in the morning. Only one
day more--
Then the next day it rained. It rained unexpectedly in the afternoon
when the hay was all ready to pitch. They had to hurry out, even in
the rain, and stack it. Arne went with the others. He was wet through
when he came in but his spirits were undampened by the shower. Only
one night more--and then, Fourth of July and circus! Hooray! Hooray!
Hooray! Tomorrow! _Tomorrow!_
After he had fixed the bran mixture for the calves that night, Arne
hung around the barn where Lyman and Leslie were milking. He liked to
hear them talk and joke together. Tonight, he himself felt that there
was only one big subject of conversation and he broached this as he
came through with the empty pails that had held the calves’ supper.
“I’m goin’ to the Danville circus tomorrow,” he chirped. “Be you goin’
too?”
“You’re lucky, kid,” replied Leslie. “How’d you get the money?”
“My week’s wages,” answered Arne. “The thrift stamp money.” When
he said it, somehow, it sounded queer. It sounded--yes, it sounded
unpatriotic. But Arne felt it only a second. He lifted himself with a
jump to the side of the hay-cart that stood near-by and dangled his
bare feet from denim overalls, “I’m goin’ with Harold,” he amplified.
“We’re goin’ to hitch by the creamery an’ see the parade.” He swung his
legs and whistled. The tune was _The Star-Spangled Banner_.
“I used to think more of firecrackers an’ that kind of thing when I was
a kid,” said Leslie. “But I guess all them firecracker jiggers went
over the other side when the war come. ’Tain’t patriotic to spend money
for ’em now, these days. There’ll be bangin’ enough to suit everybody
this July Fourth, I reckon, without firecrackers. We’re fightin’ for
freedom in the same old way but our firecrackers are bigger’n they used
to be an’ it takes our boys in the trenches to handle ’em. Just as soon
as I’m old enough, I’m goin’ over there to help, I am!”
“Me too,” said Lyman. “It’s all right doin’ one’s bit here on a farm
but I’m goin’ to help ’em win the war!”
Leslie laughed. “Sounds as if you was goin’ to do the whole of it,” he
chuckled.
Arne laughed. “Wish I could go, too,” he smiled. “I’d like it--oh,
I’d like to be in a big battle an’ hear the noise an’ see the guns an’
get right at the enemy an’ plant a flag where it’d wave for victory!
_It’d be great!_ I’d rather fight in this war than any other that ever
was--more’n Bunker Hill or Lexington, I would.” He stopped. Across his
mind there flashed the phrase he had so often seen, “Help win the war.”
It was on so many posters that the government used, and weren’t the
thrift stamps helping to win the war? Surely they were!
Lyman broke in upon these thoughts. “You couldn’t go for a long time,
kid,” he teased. “You’re just a colt. You don’t have to work in the
field a-gettin’ that hay fixed tomorrow! There’s circuses for you yet.
It’s work for us men, though, double-time work, too. We’ll be doin’
our bit in the field on Fourth of July. It mayn’t seem glorious as a
celebration but it’s all we can do till we’re at camp for trainin’.”
No circus for Lyman and Leslie! Work in the field on Fourth of July!
Arne stopped swinging his feet and looked thoughtful. Maybe he wasn’t
living up to the colors, after all! How about the money for that thrift
stamp? Suppose every boy and girl should buy a circus ticket instead
of a thrift stamp--how about Uncle Sam’s helping to win the war with
that money?
Nobody knew that there was a battle going on. Nobody heard it. Nobody
saw it. The battle was between Uncle Sam’s need and Arne’s love of fun.
It was a hot battle. Sometimes it went a little in favor of Arne’s love
of fun and then, again, it came back to Uncle Sam’s need. Arne slid
down from the hay-wagon quietly and slipped off to the house. He was
quiet at supper time. At sunset, he went out to take in the flag. It
always waved from the white flag-pole in front of the house. As the
colors touched his hands, Arne knew which had won. It was Uncle Sam, of
course!
He jogged into Danville creamery on the morning of the Fourth of July
with Christopher’s reins flapping hard as they passed by the big
poster. He met Harold. He told him. “I guess this year I won’t go to
the circus, after all,” he explained. “I want to help Uncle Sam win
this war--’tain’t much I can do but I _can_ give the money for the
stamp.”
And when he rattled into the big red barn afterwards, he was whistling
_The Star Spangled Banner_. “I’ll bet we win this war!” he shouted to
Lyman who was bringing in a load of hay. “I’m goin’ to work with you
men today--I’m not a-goin’ to any kid circus, I ain’t!”
_The Blackberry Adventure_
_THE AUGUST SURPRISE_
_Ever since the Surprise Book had come to Marjorie, she had been
wondering what was in that first very lumpy big pocket that was marked
for August first. She had felt of it repeatedly and guessed all manner
of things that Dotty said weren’t at all right. Indeed, it would have
been hard to guess for Dotty had put the first August surprise into a
flat box. When the box was opened, there lay a bright penny. Whoever
would have guessed it! That was a splendid surprise! The August story
was directed to be opened_
“_On a warm summer afternoon._”
_As there were no other directions, Marjorie opened it upon the first
of August. That truly was a hot day--a day to make one wish to sit
still and read of the happy adventures of the little girls who went
berrying in “The Blackberry Adventure.”_
_X_
_The Blackberry Adventure_
They came upon the old house one day when they were out blackberrying
in vacation time. It was the kind of house that people used to build
long ago. It had a long, sloping roof behind and the roof ran down
almost to the ground. The house was very weather-beaten and out of
repair. It looked battered and forlorn. Of course, it had long been
deserted. Weeds grew rank in its front yard. It was far away from any
neighbors. Solita and Sue had wandered far from the village. They
hardly knew just how they had reached the place where so many berries
grew, but they knew it was far from where they were boarding that
summer.
Nobody seemed to have lived in the house for ever so long. Creepers
covered the fence and what was once a roadway, leading toward the
rear, was all overgrown. There were blackberry bushes thick everywhere.
At first Solita and Sue didn’t think much about the house, though it
was rather a surprise to have come upon it suddenly. They had explored
the different roads in the country near White Farm but never a deserted
house had they found yet. At first both Solita and Sue did not observe
it because they were all-absorbed in berry-picking. It was wonderful
how fast the pails filled up with big, juicy, ripe fruit!
Solita had her pail full and was picking more berries to fill her
white canvas hat. She didn’t stop to think that the berries would ruin
it--she just wanted to get as many berries as possible! The hat was all
she had to use. Sue was racing with her and her basket was nearly full.
There must have been at least three quarts. It was much more roomy than
the tin pail or Solita’s hat.
The rest of the children who had started from White Farm with Sue
and Solita were lagging along the roadside in the rear. Just how far
away they were, the two leaders did not bother to consider. There was
Albert, the baby, and he was bound to go slowly with Matilda. Probably
some of the children were just fooling in the brook or sitting by the
wayside. It was not everybody who was as energetic as Sue and Solita
that hot day!
So Solita and Sue, proud to outdo all the others, picked fast and
furiously and did not stop. Step by step they had progressed to this
wonderful, wonderful berry patch beside the old house. All of a sudden,
Solita shouted, “I’ve won!” She made her way with difficulty through
the tangle, holding her hat, piled high. The tin pail hung upon her arm
and dropped berries at every step.
“Let’s see?” Sue questioned. “I don’t believe it; you come here an’
we’ll compare.”
So the two floundered around in the high growth of weeds and made for
the first clear space that there seemed to be. They met at the stone
doorstep of the old house and put their load of berries down there upon
its broad, flat tableland.
My! But they were a sight! Solita’s pink gingham dress was torn in
several places and her arms were a sight to behold--all red scratches.
Her fingers were stained and grimy and her cap, too, was a sight. As
for Sue, her green chambray was purple with berry juice, although she
seemed to have escaped the rents from thorny creepers. But the two were
happy and they didn’t care much how they looked. They simply dumped all
the berries on the doorstep and compared the two piles. These seemed
even, so the two thought they would rest for a while and then start
back to tell the lagging children behind and urge them to hurry up.
But Solita decided that it was no use to go away back on the road to
call the others. They might be a mile or more back, she said. “No,
don’t let’s do that! Let’s try to pick all there are and then go home
and surprise everybody.”
“But, Solita,” Sue suggested, “we haven’t anything to put all the
berries in. How could we do that?”
“I could gather up my skirt,” Solita volunteered. “We could pick into
that. It’s already all ruined so I don’t mind using it--it’s an old
last year’s frock.”
“Mercy me, Solita! What would your mother say to that!” Sue exclaimed,
aghast. “The very idea! No, we’ll have to find something else.”
“Do you suppose there’d be anything to hold them if we were to look
around here?” questioned Solita. “Maybe we might find something--an old
pail or cooking pan that has been thrown away.”
“There might be something inside the house,” Sue mused. “That’s very
likely, but I don’t know if we could get in or not. We can try. I’m
going to push the door. Do you suppose we can get in?” They had prowled
around the house to what must have been the back door. But that back
door wouldn’t give at all. It was tight.
The windows seemed shut fast, too. Sue said it made her feel like a
burglar to try them, but since the house had been without a tenant for
so long, of course it was not burglaring, she said.
After they had investigated many nooks and found nothing in the near-by
shed, either, Solita suggested that they try the front door. “People
always leave things behind when they move,” she declared. “I’m sure,
if we could get in, we’d find a box or a pan or a basket. Even an old
sack might answer--anything that is like a bag could be used.”
But when the two came to the front doorstone where the two big piles of
berries lay, Solita sat down on one side and did not try the door.
“You open the door, Sue,” she said.
“No, _you_ try it!”
“You’re afraid something will jump out at you!”
“No I’m not!” retorted Sue. “What’s there to be afraid of, anyway?”
“I don’t know,” said Solita. “But it’s kind of spooky, I think. Let’s
go home.” But with that Solita rose and pretended to try the door. She
didn’t push it at all.
“Oh, I can get it open! You’re not pushing,” Sue exclaimed. “We’ll do
it together. You turn and I’ll push--what’s the use of backing down?
Let’s go in.” So the two together pushed and pulled and the door
suddenly yielded. Its latch must have been very old and rusty indeed!
The opening of the door came as a real surprise, and it swung back
against the wall inside the house with a loud bang that echoed through
all the lonely darkness of the hallway. There was only a little light
that came from the slats of broken blinds here and there in the open
room that was just off the hall.
Sue took the lead. Solita followed, ready to run back at any minute.
It was certainly an adventure, this entering in upon the solitude of
that deserted house, long closed. “I don’t think it’s at all nice to go
into people’s houses while they’re away,” she urged. “I’m going back.
I think we ought not to have come in here at all--it’s ever so dark. I
can’t see anything--Where’re you, Sue?”
“I’m not a scare-cat,” replied Sue. “You were the one who wanted to
find the basket for the berries. Come ahead! It isn’t dark--this is
lots of fun!”
“I’m going to use my dress, anyhow,” protested Solita. “I don’t want
any basket.” But for the sake of company chiefly, perhaps, she followed
Sue, who was investigating the empty house. Here and there she poked
under dusty furniture and into old, vacant closets. There seemed to be
no basket--not even an old box or tin pan, rusty from disuse. “Come
ahead, Solita,” she kept saying. “Nobody’s going to eat you up.
If anybody comes for such a purpose, they can begin and eat up the
blackberries that are on the doorstep.” So she kept on hunting. Really,
after a while, when they were used to the noise that their feet made
and to the echo of their voices in the dim, closed rooms, it was rather
interesting. All they found was a rusty hammer downstairs, so Sue
decided to go above and look some more.
Everything there was rickety and the stairs squeaked and frightened
Solita but she laughed--indeed, she was beginning to get over her
timidity and enjoy the quest.
The chambers opened into the hall upstairs so that it looked like one
big room except at one end of the rear room where the roof sloped.
There was a real little bit of a room that must have belonged to some
child. There were two little broken toy dishes in it on the floor.
They were all thick with dust, so Sue did not pick them up. Solita was
safely in the rear near the stairs. She declared from time to time that
there was no basket and that they’d better go home but Sue kept on. It
isn’t every day that one can have a real adventure. She enjoyed the
creepy feeling that came with exploring dim corners.
“When my great-great-grandfather was a little boy,” she mused, “he must
have lived in a house like this. Father told me a story about how he
used to slide down the roof and land on the grass below just for fun.
Fancy doing a thing like that!”
Solita didn’t appear much interested. But Sue went on, “It was during
the American Revolution that he and my great-great-grandmother lived.
He fought in it--I mean his father, I guess,” rambled Sue. She hardly
knew what she was saying but she was chiefly trying to keep Solita
from deserting the quest. “We might find a treasure in one of these
closets,” she suggested. “Wouldn’t that be fine?”
“Nobody goes off and leaves a treasure in an old house,” Solita snapped.
“But it might have been hidden here by somebody and left till we came--”
“I don’t think so.”
“Oh, yes, it might!”
“Where--not up here!”
“Oh, maybe down cellar,” replied Sue, who had about finished her
explorations upstairs. She had been peeping out of the window of the
wee little room at the back of the house and had opened its window wide
to let in the sunlight and fresh air. It was only a little window.
“You’re not going to get me to go down cellar with you,” declared
Solita. “I’m going home. There wouldn’t be any baskets or treasure
there at all and there might be rats and mice or other things--and I
won’t go!”
“Then the treasure would be all my own, if I found it,” returned Sue.
“Suppose it was a thousand dollars tied up in a bag!”
“If you go a step down cellar, I’m going home,” said Solita stoutly.
“I’m going this minute anyhow--good-bye!” She started toward the stairs.
Sue felt rather obstinate. She decided that she _would_ go down cellar
even if Solita left her. She tried to close the little window that
looked down the long slope of the roof but it was hard to get it
closed again. She looked down the long slope and was half determined
to slide down it and see how it felt. If her great-great-grandfather
had done it, she could, too! Why not! It would be fun to creep out of
the window and not follow Solita--just slide down over the shingles
to the ground and run around to the front door and hide till Solita
came and then jump out and call, _boo!_ But at this minute, she heard
Solita scream and the scream was so terrified that Sue jumped toward
the stairs. Solita was running toward her. “You can’t go down the
stairs--Oh, don’t go that way!” she screamed. “A bear is sitting in the
doorway. He growled when he heard me come down the stairs. He is on the
doorstone--a big, big bear! What shall we do! We can’t get out! Oh,
dear! Oh, _dear_! Why did we ever come into this house!”
“A real bear?” questioned Sue, grabbing fast to Solita’s torn frock.
“Tell me--you just imagined it--you couldn’t have seen one! There
aren’t any bears here!”
But Solita struggled to free herself. “Oh, I _saw_ him,” she insisted
in a frightened wail. “He may be up here any moment. He’s so big he
could push any door in and we’re caught! We’re caught!”
Sue, half believing and against all entreaty, peeped over the winding
balustrade rail. Yes. There _was_ a bear! Her heart went pat-pat-pat.
A shiver ran down her back. She felt cold all over and ready to sink
down in a limp heap upon the floor. But she put a warning finger to her
lips and motioned Solita to stop crying. The first thing she thought of
was to get Solita quietly into that little back room that had the open
window that gave upon the long sloping roof--that was it! They could
creep out quietly and then dash off over the back yard and into the
woods. Then, perhaps, they could turn down and find the road and warn
the other children!
Solita stood there shivering, but Sue dragged her toward the little
room and closed the door. Solita was stupefied with the fear of that
bear’s coming upstairs after them. At first she did not understand
about the window, but Sue made her crawl through it first and told her
to run toward the woods when she got down off the roof. “I’ll come
right after you,” she urged. “Go right on and I’ll follow. He won’t see
us!”
Poor Solita gathered her pink skirt about her and slid miserably and
cautiously down. She was almost as afraid of falling suddenly as she
was of the bear. Sue, however, made quick work of it, even as the
great-great-grandfather must have done, though there were no bears
after him. At the very end of the slope, she landed in a blackberry
bush tangle, but she pulled herself free and helped Solita. Then the
two of them darted toward the woods at the rear without a look back
to see if the big bear were following or not. Solita was sure he was
coming but Sue denied it. At last, badly out of breath, they reached
the road, after plunging through thickets and being badly torn and
scratched, after one or two excited tumbles over dead logs and much
worry about the bear.
As they turned the corner of the road near the brook, they came upon
the children with little Albert. “Run, run!” they screamed, “run, run
quick! There’s a bear coming!”
Then, all in a crowd, they hurried on toward the road that led to White
Farm. They had not gone very far when there appeared two men coming
toward them. They were talking together in excited French. They stopped
and asked if anybody had seen a big bear.