SAL SEGUIN
It was a week before Sal Seguin kept her promise, or threat, to bring
her baskets to Round Robin.
One hot afternoon Anne Poole had retired to the Fairy Ring,
presumably to write letters. Beverly, who tried to give Anne full
possession of the tent as often as she wished it, was swinging in the
Gloucester hammock on the piazza, with Nancy and Gilda. They were all
lazily watching Cicely who was arranging the flowers she had gathered
that morning in her daily “prowl.”
“You just ought to see the flowers in the South, Cicely,” said
Beverly. “The flower markets are the prettiest places! And our
flowers are big, bright luscious ones; not like these pale little
Yankee things. We have something blooming all the year round.”
“And further south are waxy magnolias, and Cherokee roses and azaleas
and trumpet-vines--oh, they are lovely!” said Nancy.
“But I think these twin-flowers are wonderful,” said Cicely, holding
up a spray of the creeper with a pair of tiny pink bells on the end.
“We don’t have this in England. I followed a delicious odor like
heliotrope in the woods, and came upon a whole pink rug of this
fairy-flower!”
“You are a real flower detective,” said Nancy. “A botanical Sherlock
Holmes.”
“I love flowers!” cried Gilda clasping her hands. “Everybody of Belge
loved ze flowers. In my city we had one great garden in ze middle
of ze railroad station, under ze glass roof. And along ze canals of
Bruges it was like one long garden, sliding down into ze wasser. But
war spoiled all ze gardens, and ze people who made zem.” Her face
grew sad.
It was then that they spied the figure of the old Indian woman
approaching, with a great bag slung over her shoulder and a basket
under one arm.
“How?” she grunted, coming up to the piazza and setting down her
burden. “You buy basket of old Sal? You promised.” Gilda was nearest
her.
“I haven’t money,” said Gilda. “I’m very poor.”
“I haven’t much, either,” laughed Nancy. “But I’ll see. And I’ll call
the other girls.” She disappeared to the Fairy Ring.
“Let me see the baskets,” said Beverly. “I like baskets. I am trying
to make one for my mother, but it is very hard.”
Sal looked sharply at her. “You Indian?” she asked. Beverly laughed.
“You haven’t forgotten, have you?” she said. “Pocahontas lived more
than two hundred years ago. I am her descendant; part Indian.”
Sal grunted. “Part Indian, all same Indian. I give you baskets
cheap.” And she began to spread out her wares on the floor; many hued
baskets, moccasins, birch-bark frames and knick-knacks.
“I will show you my basket,” said Beverly running into the cabin and
bringing out a rather unsymmetrical shape which she was making of
sweet-grass braid. Sal looked at it critically. “I show you better,”
she said. And with strong, deft fingers she taught Beverly how to
shape and strengthen the basket with a bit of willow to hold it firm.
Not contented with this, Sal began a new basket of sweet grass, and
showed Beverly how to start right.
“Oh, thank you!” drawled Beverly, with the pretty manner that made
everyone like her. “Now I must buy a nice basket of you, to show
Mother how it really should be done.” She had already chosen one of
the more expensive baskets, with some bows and arrows for the Twins,
and a little canoe for a small brother at home; when up came Nancy
with Norma and Anne. The latter was in a rather bad humor.
“I didn’t know you were dressing,” Nancy was apologizing. “I thought
you might like to get some baskets.”
“I don’t care about these baskets,” grumbled Anne, glancing
scornfully at the display on the piazza floor. “Idlewild is full of
them. They are quite ordinary; ugly colors. These traveling Indians
never have anything decent. We can get a better choice in the store
at home. Oh!”--she stooped and picked up a pair of moccasins in soft
natural-grey sealskin--“These are really quite pretty. How much are
they?”
The squaw eyed her sulkily, then snatched back the moccasins with
what would have been very bad manners in one who knew better. “Not
for sale!” she cried. “You live in the big house over there?” she
pointed towards the south, towards Idlewild.
“Yes; my father Mr. Poole’s house is there,” assented Anne, wondering
how the squaw knew.
“Land of my tribe!” muttered Sal Seguin. “Bad man stole it off my
people. Your father, bad man, got it off them. No luck to him! He
drove me off his place one time. Would not let his people buy!”
“Oh, I know,” Anne murmured aside to Norma. “We were having a party
last year. They said an Indian wanted to come in, but of course
Father would not let her bother everybody.”
“Your father bad man!” repeated Sal Seguin. “I not forget!”
Anne shrugged her shoulders airily. “Well, if that is all, I may as
well go back and finish dressing. _Thank_ you for calling me, Nancy!”
and she walked away with a disagreeable swing.
“Humph!” grunted the old Indian with a malicious leer.
Each of the girls bought something. Even Gilda, whose pocket-money
was very scarce indeed, purchased a tiny thimble-case for Tante.
Norma departed with a photograph frame. Beverly had piled up quite a
mound of souvenirs, saying they would make lovely Christmas presents.
Sal packed the remaining things back in her sack. Last of all she
took up the grey moccasins which Anne had liked. Then suddenly she
turned to Beverly. “I give them to you,” she said. “You speak kind.
You real Indian; big heart! Not like daughter of bad man.”
“Oh, thank you!” Beverly took the little moccasins. “They are very
pretty,” she said. “But I shall pay you.”
“No pay. Humph!” The old woman waved her hand in the air with a grand
gesture. “My fathers owned all the land beyond and behind, rich
Chiefs. My father big Chief. I am the last. But the white people go
on forever. And some are bad. Not you! Humph!”
Without another word she shouldered her pack and walked away. Down
the path she disappeared. But presently through the branches of the
trees they saw her paddling swiftly towards the South.
“I wonder where she lives?” mused Beverly. “Poor old thing!”
“Probably in the Indian Reservation at Oldtown,” said Nancy.
“Wasn’t she good to give me these moccasins?” said Beverly, stroking
the silvery skins thoughtfully. “I suppose it wouldn’t be fair to
give them to Anne? But I can loan them to her while I’m here. I don’t
want them. We don’t use such warm things in Virginia. They are meant
for you cold-blooded Northerners.”
“They have plenty of moccasins further south, if you don’t have them
in Virginia, Beverly,” said Nancy with a twinkle. “I’ve never been
in your famous State, but I know Florida a little. And I had a funny
time there once with a famous naturalist, about a moccasin. I don’t
think I ought to tell his name, he is so _very_ famous!”
“Let’s hear the story, and perhaps we can guess,” said Beverly.
“Was it when you were at that wonderful house-party with Tante?”
asked Cicely. “Tell us about it, Nancy.”
“Yes,” said Nancy chuckling. “You see, this famous naturalist was
visiting there too; and the boys and girls loved to tease the old
dear, who was awfully nice to us and didn’t seem to mind our jokes
a bit. He was just crazy to see a moccasin-snake--that’s the very
poisonous and very dangerous kind, you know. He wanted to put him in
a book.”
“Ugh!” shivered Gilda, much as old Sal might have done. “Put um in a
book? What for zere, Nancy? I zink, in a trap is better!”
“Zey are safe in a book,” laughed Nancy, imitating Gilda’s accent.
“But not when zey crawl in ze grass, and squish in ze mud, and drop
wiggling off ze trees!”
“Stop, Nancy!” shrieked the girls in chorus.
Nancy went on with the tale. “Uncle John had the worst luck! We boys
and girls had all managed to see a moccasin somewhere. But though
he got up early and kept awake late, hunting along the river and in
under the live oaks, never a moccasin did he see.
“Well, we were kind children; and we put our heads together to get
the old man what he wanted. He must see that moccasin! So we fixed
up a nice little scene for him. I went up to my bedroom and got one
of my Indian moccasins--maybe Sal Seguin had made it. Anyway, I had
brought it from here. It was a New England moccasin. And it was
brownish, with grey fur around its neck. After dinner Jack--he was
one of the boys--took the thing down to the river bank and planted it
under a bush, pinning it down with a forked stick, the way they catch
snakes. Then two of us girls joined him carelessly. For we saw Uncle
John sitting on the piazza worrying because he hadn’t yet seen any
moccasin. Pretty soon both of us began to scream. Ethel ran away as
if she were frightened to death, and I raced up to the house calling
‘Uncle John! Uncle John! Oh, do come quick and see the moccasin! Jack
has him pinned down. He’s quite safe. Quick!’
“You see, I didn’t say a word that wasn’t true. I was very careful
about that. I knew how Uncle John hated nature-fakirs.”
“Nancy, what is a nature-fakir?” asked Cicely, who often had to have
American words translated for her.
“A nature-fakir? Why, he’s somebody who mixes up fact and fancy
without calling it a fairy-story,” explained Nancy. “Uncle John says
that isn’t playing fair.”
“I should call those unfairy stories,” said Cicely. But the Club
warned her with a howl that she was talking too much like Dick.
“Well,” went on Nancy after this interruption had been punished,
“when Uncle John heard that word _moccasin_ he scampered down the
walk to the riverbank faster than any old man you ever saw! And as he
ran he cried ‘Don’t hurt him, Jack! Don’t bruise him! I want to see
that moccasin alive, just as he is.’
“‘I’ve got him!’ cried Jack. ‘I’m holding him. I won’t hurt him. But
hurry up!’
“As Uncle John drew near he caught sight of the grey fur around the
top of the moccasin, for he has sharp eyes. ‘Gracious!’ said he,
‘That’s the queerest-looking snake I ever saw!’ Then as he came close
he guessed what it was. ‘It’s a joke of that Nancy!’ he shouted.
‘Wait till I catch her, the good-for-nothing girl!’ And he chased
me all the way back to the house. But he couldn’t catch me!” Nancy
giggled at the memory of that chase.
“You ought to have sent him a pair of moccasins to keep his feet
warm,” suggested Beverly. “I think you owed it to him, Nancy. It was
mean to tease a great man so!”
“It would have been mean if he had minded,” said Nancy. “But he _was_
a great man every way; and he acted like a dear about it. He loved to
tell this story on himself. I made a limerick about it. This is the
way it goes:”
“_A man with a hobby like Thoreau’s
Once hunted the highways and furrows
For a moccasin snake.
What he found was a fake
More frequent in bureaus than burrows._”
“I know who it was!” shouted Beverly. “You’ve told now! _That_ great
man! How dared you do it, Nancy? I call it disrespectful!”
“Sh!” warned Nancy. “You mustn’t say his name, if the others can’t
guess. Dear Uncle John! It must have been the rebellious southern air
that led me into mischief,” she answered Beverly’s reproach.
“What are you girls quarreling about?” demanded Dick Reed, swinging
himself onto the piazza. “What’s the joke?”
“Only one of Nancy’s foolish stories, in which she is always the
heroine,” drawled Beverly.
“And a poem, which I do not understand,” said the bewildered Gilda.
“Nobody ever understands a poet, except himself. Isn’t that so,
Nancy?” Dick teased her.
“Nancy’s poetry is usually very easy to understand,” said Cicely
loyally. “But this has some kind of joke in it. They say we English
aren’t quick at jokes.”
“I say,” said Dick interrupting, “the old witch has been here, hasn’t
she?” He pointed at the pile of baskets at Beverly’s feet. “I saw her
down along the shore. She looked cross enough and was muttering at a
great rate. I’d hate to have her down on me.”
“She is down on Anne, then,” said Beverly, and told Dick what had
happened.
“Well, you couldn’t blame Anne for feeling hurt at having her
father called a bad man,” Dick defended the absent lady, like a
knight-errant. “Is he a bad man, Nancy?”
“How do I know?” said she. “I only know people don’t like him here.
And I think he is not very kind to Anne; though she won’t say so.”
“Sh! Here comes Anne!” whispered Beverly. “Goodness, what style!”
Anne appeared from her tent, white-gowned, with gloves on her hands,
and a parasol over her head.
“Anne! I never saw a parasol in camp before!” exclaimed Nancy. “And
as for gloves,--we use them only in the vegetable garden, shaking
hands with the weeds.”
Anne deigned no reply to this sally. “Norma said she would like to go
with me to see Idlewild this afternoon,” she said. “If anyone else
wants to come, I should be glad to have you. I haven’t the keys, but
we can see a good deal outside the house.”
“But why these clothes?” gasped Nancy.
“I haven’t dressed for a week,” said Anne. “I like to feel
respectable once in a while. Khaki doesn’t seem to belong at
Idlewild. But of course, if _you_ don’t mind----”
“Cap’n Sackett has the keys,” volunteered Dick. “You might call on
him.”
“Why, I’d like to go with you, Anne,” said Cicely.
“So would I,” agreed Nancy and Beverly.
“And I,” added Gilda. “Here comes Norma.”
Dick had an errand elsewhere. “I say!” he whispered to Nancy, as the
girls started for the walk along the shore, “the Golden Girl is going
to get a surprise when she sees the palace of the king her father!”
“Why, Dick?” asked Nancy. But Reddy would not tell her.