says it'll buy salt."
"Salt!" said Conrad. "Well, I should smile! It would buy salt enough to
pickle the whole party. Why, that little St. Johns woman goes out with a
nickel an' lays in provisions. I've seen her do it."
"Shame on you, Buddy!"
"I'm not jokin', Meg. At least, I saw her buy a _quartie's_ worth o'
coffee and a _quartie's_ worth o' sugar, an' then ask for _lagniappe_ o'
salt. Ain't that layin' in provisions? She uses a cigar-box for her
pantry, too."
"Well," she protested, seriously, "what of it, Conrad? It doesn't take
much for one very little person. Now, then, the party is voted for; but
there's one more thing to be done before it can be really decided. We
must ask Momsy's permission, of course. And that is goin' to be hard,
because I don't want her to know about it. She has to be out reportin'
festivals for the paper clear up to Christmas mornin', and if she knows
about it, she'll worry over it. So I propose to ask her to let us give
her a Christmas surprise, and not tell her what it is."
"And we know just what she'll say," Conrad interrupted; "she'll say, 'If
you older children all agree upon anything, I'm sure it can't be very
far wrong or foolish'--just as she did time we put up the stove in her
room."
"Yes, I can hear her now," said Ethel. "But still we must _let_ her say
it before we do a single thing, because, you know, _she mightn't_. An'
then where'd the party be?"
"It would be scattered around where it was last Christmas--where all the
parties are that don't be," said Conrad. "They must be the ones we are
always put down for, an' that's how we get left; eh, Sisty?"
"Never mind, Buddy; we won't get left, as you call it, this time,
anyway--unless, of course, Momsy vetoes it."
"Vetoes what, children?"
They had been so noisy that they had not heard their mother's step on
the creaking stairs.
Mrs. Frey carried her pencil and notes, and she looked tired, but she
smiled indulgently as she repeated, "What am I to veto, dearies--or to
approve?"
"It's a sequet! A Trismas sequet!"
"Yes, an' it's got owanges in it--"
"--An' bananas!"
"Hush, you ponies! And, Dolly, not another word!" Meg had resolutely
taken the floor again.
"Momsy, we've been consulting about our Christmas money, and we've voted
to ask you to let us do something with it, and not to tell you a thing
about it, only "--and here she glanced for approval at Ethel and
Conrad--"only we _ought_ to tell you, Momsy, dear, that the surprise
isn't for you this time."
And then Mrs. Frey, sweet mother that she was, made just the little
speech they thought she would make, and when they had kissed her, and
all, even to Ethel, who seemed now as enthusiastic as the others,
caught hands and danced around the dinner table, she was glad she had
consented.
It was such a delight to be able to supplement their scant Christmas
prospects with an indulgence giving such pleasure.
"And I'm glad it isn't for me, children," she added, as soon as the
hubbub gave her a hearing. "I'm very glad. You know you strained a point
last year, and I'm sure you did right. My little stove has been a great
comfort. But I am always certain of just as many home-made presents as I
have children, and they are the ones I value. Dolly's lamp-lighters are
not all used up yet, and if she _were_ to give me another bundle this
Christmas I shouldn't feel sorry. But our little Christmas _money_ we
want to send out on some loving mission. And, by-the-way, I have two
dollars which may go with yours if you need it--if it will make some
poor body's bed softer or his dinner better."
"Momsy's guessed!" Felix clapped his hands with delight.
"'Sh! Hush, Felix! Yes, Momsy, it 'll do one of those things exactly,"
said Meg. "And now _I_ say we'd better break up this meeting before the
ponies tell the whole business."
"F'lix never telled a thing," chirped Felicie, always ready to defend
her mate. "Did you, F'lixy? Momsy said 'dinner' herself."
"So I did, dear; but who is to get the dinner and why you are going to
send it are things mother doesn't wish to know. And here are my two
dollars. Now off to bed, the whole trundle-bed crowd, for I have a lot
of copy to write to-night. Ethel may bring me a bite, and then sit
beside me and write while I sip my tea and dictate and Meg puts the
chickens to roost. And Conrad will keep quiet over his books. Just one
kiss apiece and a hug for Dolly. Shoo now!"
So the party was decided.
* * * * *
The Frey home, although one of the poorest, was one of the happiest in
New Orleans, for it was made up of cheery workers, even little Dorothea
having her daily self-assumed tasks. Miss Dorothea, if you please,
dusted the banisters round the porch every day, straightened the rows of
shoes in mother's closet, folded the daily papers in the rack, and kept
the one rug quite even with the front of the hearth. And this young lady
had, furthermore, her regular income of five cents a week.
Of course her one nickel contributed to the party had been saved only a
few hours, but Dorothea was only five, and the old yellow _praline_
woman knew about her income, and came trudging all the way up the stairs
each week on "pay-day."
Even after the invitations were sent it seemed to Dolly that the
"party-day" would never come, for there were to be "three sleeps" before
it should arrive.
It was Ethel's idea to send the cards early, so as to forestall any home
preparation among the guests.
But all things come to him who waits--even Christmas. And so at last the
great day arrived.
Nearly all the invited had accepted, and everything was very exciting;
but the situation was not without its difficulties.
Even though she was out every day, it had been so hard to keep every
tell-tale preparation out of Mrs. Frey's sight. But when she had found a
pan of crullers on the top pantry shelf, or heard the muffled
"gobble-gobble" of the turkey shut up in the old flour-barrel, or smelt
invisible bananas and apples, she had been truly none the wiser, but had
only said, "Bless their generous hearts! They are getting up a fine
dinner to send to somebody."
Indeed, Mrs. Frey never got an inkling of the whole truth until she
tripped up the stairs a half-hour before dinner on Christmas day to
find the feast all spread.
The old mahogany table, extended to its full length, stood gorgeous in
decorations of palmetto, moss, and flowers out upon the deep back porch,
which was converted into a very pretty chamber by the hanging curtain of
gray.
If she had any misgivings about it, she betrayed them by no single word
or look, but there were bright red spots upon her usually pale cheeks as
she passed, smiling, into her room to dash into the dinner dress Ethel
had laid out for her.
To have her poverty-stricken home invaded by a host of strangers was
striking a blow at the most sensitive weakness of this proud woman. And
yet the loving motive which was so plain through it all, showing the
very spirit in her dear children for which she had prayed, was too
sacred a thing to be chilled by even a half-shade of disapproval.
"And who are coming, dear?" she asked of Meg, as soon as she could trust
her voice.
"All the roomers, Momsy, excepting the little hunchback lady and Madame
Coraline."
"Madame Coraline!" Mrs. Frey could not help exclaiming.
"Yes, Momsy. She accepted, and she _even came_, but she went back just
now. She was dressed terribly fine--gold lace and green silk, but it was
old and dowdy; and, Momsy, her cheeks were just as red! I was on the
stepladder tackin' up the Bethlehem picture, Sisty was standin' on the
high-chair hanging up the star, and Buddy's arms were full of gray moss
that he was wrappin' round your chair. But we were just as polite to her
as we could be, and asked her to take a seat. And we all thought she sat
down; but she went, Momsy, and no one saw her go. Buddy says she's a
witch. She left that flower-pot of sweet-basil on the table. I s'pose
she brought it for a present. Do you think that we'd better send for her
to come back, Momsy?"
"No, daughter, I think not. No doubt she had her own reasons for going,
and she may come back. And are the rest all coming?"
"Yes'm; but we had a time gettin' Miss Guyosa to come. She says she's a
First Family, an' she never mixes. But I told her so were we, and we
mixed. And then I said that if she'd come she could sit at one end o'
the table and carve the ham, while you'd do the turkey. But she says
Buddy ought to do the turkey. But she's comin'. And, Momsy, the turkey
is a perfect beauty. We put pecans in him. Miss Guyosa gave us the
receipt and the nuts, too. Her cousin sent 'em to her from his
plantation. And did you notice the paper roses in the moss festoons,
Momsy? She made those. She has helped us fix up _a lot_. She made all
the Easter flowers on St. Joseph's altar at the Cathedral, too, and--"
A rap at the door announcing a first guest sent the little cook bounding
to the kitchen, while Ethel rushed into her mother's room, her mouth
full of pins and her sash on her arm.
She had dressed the three little ones a half-hour ago; and Conrad, who
had also made an early toilet, declared that they had all three walked
round the dinner table thirty-nine times since their appearance in the
"dining-room." When he advanced to do the honors, the small procession
toddling single file behind him, somehow it had not occurred to him that
he might encounter Miss Penny, the canary lady, standing in a dainty old
dress of yellow silk just outside the door, nor, worse still, that she
should bear in her hands a tiny cage containing a pair of young
canaries.
He said afterwards that "everything would have passed off all right if
it hadn't been for the twins." Of course he had forgotten that he had
himself been the first one to compare Miss Penny to a canary.
By the time the little black-eyed woman had flitted into the door, and
in a chirpy, bird-like voice wished them a merry Christmas, Felix had
stuffed his entire handkerchief into his mouth. Was it any wonder that
Felicie and Dorothea, seeing this, did actually disgrace the whole party
by convulsions of laughter?
They were soon restored to order, though, by the little yellow-gowned
lady herself, for it took but half a minute to say that the birds were a
present for the twins--"the two little ones who brought me the
invitation."
Such a present as this is no laughing matter, and, besides, the little
Frey children were at heart polite. And so they had soon forgotten their
mirth in their new joy.
And then other guests were presently coming in, and Mrs. Frey, looking
startlingly fine and pretty in her fresh ruches and new tie, was saying
pleasant things to everybody, while Ethel and Meg, tripping lightly in
and out, brought in the dishes.
As there was no parlor, guests were received in the curtained end of the
gallery. No one was disposed to be formal, and when the old Professor
entered with a little brown-paper parcel, which he declared, after his
greetings, to contain his dinner, everybody felt that the etiquette of
the occasion was not to be very strict or in the least embarrassing.
Of course Mrs. Frey, as hostess, "hoped the Professor would reconsider,
and have a slice of the Christmas turkey"; but when they had presently
all taken their seats at the table, and the eccentric guest had actually
opened his roll of bread and cheese upon his empty plate, over which he
began to pass savory dishes to his neighbors, she politely let him have
his way. Indeed, there was nothing else to do, as he declared--declining
the first course with a wave of his hand--that he had come "yust for de
sake of sociapility."
"I haf seen efery day doze children work und sing so nize togedder yust
like leetle mans und ladies, so I come yust to eggsbress my t'anks for
de compliment, und to make de acquaintance off doze nize y'ung
neighbors." This with a courtly bow to each one of the children
separately. And he added in a moment: "De dinner iss very fine, but for
me one dinner iss yust like anudder. Doze are all externals."
To which measured and kindly speech Conrad could not help replying, "It
won't be an external to us, Professor, by the time we get through."
"Oho!" exclaimed the old man, delighted with the boy's ready wit.
"Dot's a wery schmart boy you got dhere, Mrs. Vrey."
At this exhibition of broken English the twins, who were waiting on the
table, thought it safe to rush to the kitchen on pretence of changing
plates, while Dorothea, seated at the Professor's left, found it
necessary to bite both lips and to stare hard at the vinegar-cruet for
fully a second to keep from laughing. Then, to make sure of her
self-possession, she artfully changed the subject, remarking, dryly,
"My nickel buyed the ice."
This was much funnier than the Professor's speech, judging from the
laughter that followed it. And Miss Dorothea Frey's manners were saved,
which was the important thing.
It would be impossible in this short space to give a full account of
this novel and interesting dinner party, but if any one supposes that
there was a dull moment in it, he is altogether mistaken.
Mrs. Frey and Ethel saw to it that no one was neglected in conversation;
Meg and Conrad looked after the prompt replenishing of plates, though
the alert little waiters, Felix and Felicie, anticipated every want, and
were as sprightly as two crickets, while Dorothea provoked frequent
laughter by a random fire of unexpected remarks, never failing, for
instance, to offer ice-water during every "still minute"; and, indeed,
once that young lady did a thing that might have proved quite terrible
had the old lady Saxony, who sat opposite, been disagreeable or
sensitive.
What Dorothea said was innocent enough--only a single word of two
letters, to begin with.
She had been looking blankly at her opposite neighbor for a full minute,
when she suddenly exclaimed,
"Oh!"
That was all, but it made everybody look, first at Dolly and then across
the table. Whereupon the little maid, seeing her blunder, hastened to
add:
"That's nothin'. My grandma's come out too."
And then, of course, every one noticed that old lady Saxony held her
dainty hemstitched handkerchief quite over her mouth. Fortunately Mrs.
Saxony's good sense was as great as her appreciation of humor, and, as
she shook her finger threateningly at Dorothea, her twinkling eyes gave
everybody leave to laugh. So "Dolly's terrible break," as Conrad called
it, really went far to making the dinner a success--that is, if
story-telling and laughter and the merry clamor such as distinguish the
gayest of dinner parties the world over count as success.
It was while the Professor was telling a funny story of his boy life in
Germany that there came a rap at the door, and the children, thinking
only of Madame Coraline, turned their eyes towards the door, only to see
the Italian organ-grinder, whom, in the excitement of the dinner party,
they had forgotten to expect. He was to play for the children to dance
after dinner, and had come a little early--or perhaps dinner was late.
Seeing the situation, the old man began bowing himself out, when the
Professor, winking mysteriously at Mrs. Frey and gesticulating
animatedly, pointed first to the old Italian and then to Madame
Coraline's vacant chair. Everybody understood, and smiling faces had
already shown approval when Mrs. Frey said, quietly, "Let's put it to
vote. All in favor raise glasses."
Every glass went up. The old Italian understood little English, but the
offer of a seat is a simple pantomime, and he was presently declining
again and again, bowing lower each time, until before he knew it--all
the time refusing--he was in the chair, his plate was filled, and Dolly
was asking him to have ice-water. No guest of the day was more welcome.
None enjoyed his dinner more, judging from the indications. And as to
Meg, the moving spirit in the whole party, she was beside herself with
delight over the unexpected guest.
[Illustration: THE ITALIAN ORGAN-GRINDER]
The dinner all through was what Conrad called a "rattlin' success," and
the evening afterwards, during which nearly every guest contributed some
entertainment, was one long to be remembered. The Professor not only
sang, but danced. Miss Penny whistled so like a canary that one could
really believe her when she said she always trained her young birds'
voices. Miss Guyosa told charming folk-lore anecdotes, handed down in
her family since the old Spanish days in Louisiana.
The smiling organ-grinder played his engaged twenty-five cents' worth of
tunes over and over again, and when the evening was done, persistently
refused to take the money until Felix slipped it into his pocket.
The Frey party will long be remembered in the Coppenole house, and
beyond it, too, for some very pleasant friendships date from this
Christmas dinner. The old Professor was just the man to help Conrad with
his German lessons. It was so easy for Meg to send him a cup of hot
coffee on cold mornings. Mrs. Frey and Miss Guyosa soon found many ties
in common friends of their youth. Indeed, the twins had gotten their
French names from a remote creole cousin, who proved to be also a
kinswoman to Miss Guyosa. It was such a comfort, when Mrs. Frey was kept
out late at the office, for the children to have Miss Guyosa come and
sit with them, telling stories or reading aloud; and they brought much
brightness into her life too.
Madame Coraline soon moved away, and, indeed, before another Christmas
the Freys had moved too--to a small cottage all their own, sitting in
the midst of a pretty rose-garden. Here often come Miss Guyosa and the
Professor, both welcome guests, and Conrad says the Professor makes love
to Miss Guyosa, but it is hard to tell.
One cannot keep up with two people who can tell jokes in four languages,
but the Professor has a way of dropping in as if by accident on the
evenings Miss Guyosa is visiting the Freys, and they do read the same
books--in four languages. There's really no telling.
When the Frey children are playing on the _banquette_ at their front
gate on sunny afternoons, the old organ-grinder often stops, plays a
free tune or two for them to dance by, smilingly doffs his hat to the
open window above, and passes on.
[Illustration: "THE PROFESSOR NOT ONLY SANG, BUT DANCED"]
LITTLE MOTHER QUACKALINA
LITTLE MOTHER QUACKALINA
STORY OF A DUCK FARM
CHAPTER I
The black duck had a hard time of it from the beginning--that is, from
the beginning of her life on the farm. She had been a free wild bird up
to that time, swimming in the bay, playing hide-and-seek with her
brothers and sisters and cousins among the marsh reeds along the bank,
and coquettishly diving for "mummies" and catching them "on the swim"
whenever she craved a fishy morsel. This put a fresh perfume on her
breath, and made her utterly charming to her seventh cousin, Sir Sooty
Drake, who always kept himself actually fragrant with the aroma of raw
fish, and was in all respects a dashing beau. Indeed, she was behaving
most coyly, daintily swimming in graceful curves around Sir Sooty among
the marsh-mallow clumps at the mouth of "Tarrup Crik," when the shot
was fired that changed all her prospects in life.
The farmer's boy was a hunter, and so had been his grandfather, and his
grandfather's gun did its work with a terrific old-fashioned explosion.
When it shot into the great clump of pink mallows everything trembled.
The air was full of smoke, and for a distance of a quarter of a mile
away the toads crept out of their hiding and looked up and down the
road. The chickens picking at the late raspberry bushes in the farmer's
yard craned their necks, blinked, and didn't swallow another berry for
fully ten seconds. And a beautiful green caterpillar, that had seen the
great red rooster mark him with his evil eye, and expected to be gobbled
up in a twinkling, had time to "hump himself" and crawl under a leaf
before the astonished rooster recovered from the noise. This is a case
where the firing of a gun saved at least one life. I wonder how many
butterflies owe their lives to that gun?
As to the ducks in the clump of mallows that caught the volley, they
simply tumbled over and gave themselves up for dead.
[Illustration: "THE FARMER'S BOY WAS A HUNTER"]
The heroine of our little story, Lady Quackalina Blackwing, stayed in a
dead faint for fully seventeen seconds, and the first thing she knew
when she "came to" was that she was lying under the farmer boy's coat in
an old basket, and that there was a terrific rumbling in her ears and a
sharp pain in one wing, that something was sticking her, that Sir Sooty
was nowhere in sight, and that she wanted her mother and all her
relations.
Indeed, as she began to collect her senses, while she lay on top of the
live crab that pinched her chest with his claw, she realized that there
was not a cousin in the world, even to some she had rather disliked,
that she would not have been most happy to greet at this trying moment.
The crab probably had no unfriendly intention. He was only putting up
the best hand he had, trying to find some of his own kindred. He had
himself been lying in a hole in shallow water when the farmer's boy
raked him in and changed the whole course of his existence.
He and the duck knew each other by sight, but though they were both "in
the swim," they belonged to different sets, and so were small comfort to
one another on this journey to the farm.
They both knew some English, and as the farmer's boy spoke part English
and part "farm," they understood him fairly well when he was telling the
man digging potatoes in the field that he was going to "bile" the crab
in a tomato can and to make a "decoy" out of the duck.
"Bile" and "decoy" were new words to the listeners in the basket, but
they both knew about tomato cans. The bay and "Tarrup Crik" were strewn
with them, and the crab had once hidden in one, half imbedded in the
sand, when he was a "soft-shell." He knew their names, because he had
studied them before their labels soaked off, and he knew there was no
malice in them for him, though the young fishes who have soft outsides
dreaded their sharp edges very much. There is sometimes some advantage
in having one's skeleton on the surface, like a coat of mail.
And so the crab was rather pleased at the prospect of the tomato can. He
thought the cans grew in the bay, and so he expected presently to be
"biled" in his own home waters. The word "biled" probably meant _dropped
in_. Ignorance is sometimes bliss, indeed.
Poor little Quackalina, however, was getting less comfort out of her
ignorance. She thought "decoy" had a foreign sound, as if it might mean
a French stew. She had had relations who had departed life by way of a
_puree_, while others had gone into a _saute_ or _pate_. Perhaps a
"decoy" was a _pate_ with gravy or a _puree_ with a crust on it. If
worse came to the worst, she would prefer the _puree_ with a crust. It
would be more like decent burial.
Of course she thought these things in duck language, which is not put in
here, because it is not generally understood. It is quite a different
thing from Pidgin-English, and it isn't all "quack" any more than French
is all "au revoir," or Turkey all "gobble, gobble," or goose only a
string of "S's," or darkey all "howdy."
The crab's thoughts were expressed in his eyes, that began coming out
like little telescopes until they stood quite over his cheeks. Maybe
some people think crabs have no cheeks, but that isn't so. They have
them, but they keep them inside, where they blush unseen, if they blush
at all.
But this is the story of the black duck. However, perhaps some one who
reads it will be pleased to know that the crab got away. He sidled
up--sidled is a regular word in crab language--until his left eye could
see straight into the boy's face, and then he waited. He had long ago
found that there was nothing to be gained by pinching the duck. It only
made a row in the basket and got him upset. But, by keeping very still
and watching his chance, he managed to climb so near the top that when
the basket gave a lurch he simply vaulted overboard and dropped in the
field. Then he hid between three mushrooms and a stick until the boy's
footsteps were out of hearing and he had time to draw in his eyes and
start for the bay. He had lost his left claw some time before, and the
new one he was growing was not yet very strong. Still, let us hope that
he reached there in safety.