Lydia's good times began every morning when she opened her eyes and
leaned over the edge of the bed to see how Lucy Locket had spent the
night in her new white cradle.
And all day long Lydia was so busy that at night she had been known to
fall asleep on Father's lap upstairs, and not remember a single thing
about going to bed at all. After breakfast she dried the dishes for her
mother, and no one could dust a room any better than could Lydia Blake.
Then out to market with Mother, and home again to wheel the doll
carriage up and down the sunshiny street.
And who do you think rode in the carriage? It really belonged to Lucy
Locket. But when day after day Miss Puss Whitetoes snuggled down on the
cushions and held up her paws so that Lydia could fasten the carriage
strap, Lydia couldn't resist giving sly Miss Puss a ride. And Lucy
Locket didn't mind at all. She was a great sleepy-head, and liked
nothing better than to lie in her cradle. Sometimes, too, Lydia would
prop her up in the front window and wave to the smiling Lucy every time
she wheeled the carriage past the house. At first Miss Puss would sit up
straight like a baby, with her paws folded in front of her, but little
by little her eyes would close and she would slip down until all you
could see was one gray ear. And by that time Lydia herself was ready to
go into the house.
And her afternoons were busy too. For one day Mr. Blake said,
"Lydia, would you like to give a present to Friend Morris?"
Yes, indeed, Lydia would.
"I can make nice horse-reins on a spool, Father," said she, proud of her
accomplishment.
"I know you can," said Mr. Blake. "But I was wondering if Friend Morris
wouldn't like a picture of you dressed like a little Quaker girl. Mother
will make the dress, just like the one Friend Morris wore when she was a
little girl. I will paint the picture, and you shall give it to her. I
believe Friend Morris would like that present."
"I think she would too," said Lydia, who herself liked the idea of
dressing up. "It's much nicer than horse-reins."
So Mother made a little gray dress, with a white kerchief, and a white
cap. And over the cap Lydia wore a little gray Quaker bonnet.
Then every afternoon, she stood very still while Mr. Blake painted the
picture, looking from Lydia to the canvas and back again at Lydia.
"Couldn't Miss Puss be in the picture, too?" asked Lydia. "She is all
gray and white, just like me."
So Miss Puss was put in the picture, sitting as still as could be at
Lydia's feet. Mr. Blake worked quickly, and so the picture was soon
finished, and it happened that the very next day Lydia had a party. Mary
Ellen and Sammy and Polly and little Tom were coming with Miss Martin to
spend the afternoon.
When Lydia saw the children walking up the street, their friendly faces
shining with soap and water and happy smiles, she hopped up and down in
the window and waved both hands in greeting. If she had been a boy she
would have turned a somersault, I know.
"Is this our quiet little Lydia?" Miss Martin asked Mrs. Blake, with a
laugh. "What have you done to her?"
For Lydia was dragging the children into her bedroom, and telling them
of Mother and Father and Miss Puss, and bidding them look at Lucy
Locket's cradle, and the doll carriage, and the picture-books, all in
one breath, and before they even had time to take off their hats and
coats. From the noise, and the confusion, and the rushing about, and the
sound of many voices all talking at once, as Lydia took them from one
end to the other of that little house, you might have thought that all
twenty children from the Children's Home had come visiting instead of
four!
But after a little they quieted down, and when Mrs. Blake and Miss
Martin peeped in at them, this peaceful scene met their eyes. Sammy was
lying flat on the floor, lost in a picture-book of cowboys and Indians
galloping madly over the Western plains. Polly was wheeling lazy Miss
Puss up and down the hall. Over in a corner, sure that no one was
looking at him, little Tom had turned his back upon the world, and was
comfortably rocking Lucy Locket to sleep as he swayed to and fro in the
little rocking-chair. In the closet, Lydia was proudly showing her
Quaker dress to the admiring Mary Ellen. When she spied her mother--
"May I put it on?" she asked. "Mary Ellen thinks it's almost as good as
a Red Cross nurse."
"Would you like to dress up as a nurse yourself this afternoon, Mary
Ellen?" asked Mrs. Blake, who read a longing in Mary Ellen's eye.
And in a twinkling you wouldn't have known happy Mary Ellen. For a big
cooking-apron covered her from neck to heels, and, with a Red Cross cap
on her head, you couldn't have found a better nurse if you had searched
the whole world over. Polly was turned into a fine lady, in a silk
dress, a lace cap, and three strings of beads about her neck. Such
flauntings and preenings, such bowing and curtsying as the three little
peacocks indulged in, what time they weren't admiring themselves in the
mirror! They looked up to see Mr. Blake laughing at them in the doorway.
He made a low bow and shook them by the hand as if they had been real
grown-up people.
"Aren't you going to do anything for the boys?" he asked, for Sammy and
Tom were looking on with envious eyes. "Come upstairs with me, boys.
I've a trunkful of things to wear." And so he had, to use when he was
painting pictures.
Such shouting and laughing as now floated down from the studio! The
little girls sat at the foot of the stairs, and every now and then they
would creep a step higher. At last the door opened and they started up
with a rush, but it was only Father speaking to Miss Martin.
"Do you mind if I put paint on their faces?" he asked.
"Not a bit," said Miss Martin, who was used to all kinds of antics on
the part of her brood, and who never said "no" when she could possibly
answer "yes."
"But not on their mouths, Father," called Mother. "We haven't had the
real party yet."
Then the door closed again, for hours and hours it seemed to Lydia and
Polly and Mary Ellen, though Mother said it was only ten minutes by the
clock.
But when Mr. Blake called "All aboard!" and they trooped up into the
studio, they forgot their long wait in admiration at what they saw. For
there stood an Indian, wearing a real deerskin over his shoulders, and
with real deerskin leggings that ended in gay beaded moccasins. On his
head was a gorgeous feather head-dress, and in his hands he carried a
bow and arrow. His face was ornamented with spots and stripes and
splashes of red and yellow and blue paint. He was not a very
fierce-looking warrior, for he was grinning from ear to ear, and when
the girls saw that smile, they knew.
"Sammy!" said Lydia and Polly and Mary Ellen in a breath.
As for Tom, there he stood in a black velvet cloak, and a big black hat,
with green plumes drooping off the edge. He had a big black curling
mustache that almost covered his face, but the pride of his heart was a
pair of high, shiny, black boots, so big for him that he couldn't take a
step without holding on to them with both hands for fear of losing them
off. He wore a short wooden sword thrust in his belt, and I really don't
know what the fine lady and the Quakeress would have done without that
sword. For they immediately set sail down Studio River in a boat made of
two chairs and a stool. Tom's sword kept the alligators and crocodiles
from climbing into the boat after them. But alas! they were attacked by
an Indian brave, skulking in the woods. They were all but killed by him,
but were speedily brought back to health by a Red Cross nurse, who
happened to be taking a stroll that afternoon in those selfsame woods.
This was such a good game that they played it over and over again, until
Mrs. Blake called them to come to the "real party," and that they were
quite ready to do. Sandwiches, little cakes, cups of milk disappeared
like magic. They ate and ate and ate until even Sammy could eat no more.
Then there came a knock at the door, and who should it be but Friend
Morris! She stared in surprise at all of them, but at Lydia most of all.
And when Mr. Blake whispered in Lydia's ear, and she led Friend Morris
over to the picture Father had painted for her, it was a long time
before Friend Morris had a word to say. She looked and looked at the
picture, and she looked and looked at Lydia. Lydia couldn't tell whether
Friend Morris was going to laugh or cry.
"Don't you like the present?" asked Lydia. "I wanted to make you
horse-reins, but Father said you would like this better."
"Like it, Friend Lydia?" said Mrs. Morris at last. "There isn't another
present in the whole world that I would like so well as this."
Lydia and Father and Mother nodded and smiled at one another. They were
so glad that Friend Morris was pleased, and that their present was a
success.
Then, cozily, they all gathered round the open fire, and each of the
children hung up an apple on a string to roast before the blaze. They
turned and turned the string to cook the apples through and through, and
when at last they were done, a grown person might have thought them
burned in spots and raw in others, but the children ate them with the
greatest relish.
And while they watched the apples twist and turn, and the flames rise
and fall--
"Would thee like me to tell a story?" asked Friend Morris, with a hand
on Lydia's Quaker cap,--"a story my grandmother used to tell me, of a
little Quaker girl who lived a long time ago?"
"Are there Indians in it?" demanded Sammy, admiring, with head on one
side, his deerskin leggings stretched before him.
Friend Morris nodded, and every one settled back comfortably to hear the
story she had to tell.