LIGHTFOOT AND THE WAGON
With a clang of the bell the trolley car came to a stop, the motorman
putting the brakes on hard. Then he jumped off the front platform and
ran to where the little girl had sat down in the grass at the side of
the tracks. She had sat down rather hard, for Lightfoot had pushed her
with more force than he intended. He was so anxious to get her out of
the way of one of those clanging cars that once upon a time had hurt
him so.
“What is it?”
“What’s the matter?”
“What happened?”
The passengers in the trolley car, surprised by the sudden way it
stopped, called thus to one another as they hurried out. They saw the
little girl sitting in the grass, holding her doll by one leg. They saw
Lightfoot, the goat, standing near by as though keeping guard over the
little girl, and they saw the motorman holding the shiny handle, by
which he turned on and off the electricity that made the car go.
“Oh, what’s the matter?” asked a small boy who had gotten off the car
with his mother. “Did the goat bite the little girl?”
“No, my dear. Goats don’t bite. They butt you with their horns.”
“I don’t want any goat to butt me!” and the little boy hid behind his
mother’s skirts.
Then the little girl, sitting on the grass, made up her mind to cry. Up
to now she had not quite known whether to laugh or to cry, but suddenly
she felt that she had been hurt, or scared, or something, and the next
thing, of course, was to cry.
Tears came into her pretty blue eyes, she wiped them away with the
dress of her doll and then she sobbed:
“Go away you bad goat you! Go ’way! I don’t like you! You――you tried to
bite me!”
She had heard the little boy say that. But the little boy, getting
brave as he saw that Lightfoot did not seem to want to bite, or butt
either, any one, came from behind his mother’s skirts and said:
“Goats don’t bite, little girl; they butt. My mamma says so, and if you
is hurted she’ll kiss you and make you all well.”
Some of the passengers laughed on hearing this, and the lady with the
little boy went to where the little girl was sitting on the grass,
picked her up in her arms and wiped away her tears.
“There, my dear,” she said. “You’re not hurt. See the pretty goat. He
won’t hurt you.”
“You’re right there!” exclaimed the motorman. “He saved her from being
hurt by my car, that’s what he did.”
“What do you mean?” asked the conductor.
“I mean the goat butted the little girl off the tracks, just as the
lady said goats do. She was standing on the tracks, picking up her
doll, when my car came along. I wasn’t paying much attention, and I was
almost on her when the goat saw what the trouble was and pushed her off
the tracks with his head. He didn’t really butt her, but he got her out
of the way just in time.”
“He’s a smart goat,” said one of the men who had been riding in the
trolley car.
“He is that!” exclaimed the motorman. “And now that I look at him I
remember him. He’s the goat we knocked off the track about two months
ago. Don’t you remember?” he asked, turning to the conductor.
“Sure enough he is,” agreed the conductor, and he explained to the
passengers the accident, or adventure, that had happened to Lightfoot,
as I told it to you before.
“He must have remembered how the car hurt him,” said the lady with the
little boy, “and he didn’t want the child to be hurt. He is a smart
goat!
“Does any one know where the little girl lives?” asked the lady. “She
ought not be allowed to stay here near the tracks.”
None of the passengers knew the child, nor did the motorman or
conductor. As they were wondering what to do along came Mike Malony.
“Hello, Lightfoot!” called Mike as he saw his goat. And then, as he
noticed the crowd, the stopped trolley car and the little girl, he
asked:
“What’s the matter? Is Tessie hurt?”
“No one is hurt, I’m thankful to say,” replied the motorman; “but the
little girl might have been only for the goat. Do you know her?”
“Sure, she’s Tessie Rooney. She lives near me,” explained Mike. “I’ll
take her home if you like.”
“I wish you would,” said the lady who had given Tessie a five cent
piece, which to Tessie was almost as much as a dollar. The child forgot
all about her tears and what had happened to her.
“Sure I’ll take her home,” said Mike, kindly.
“Do you know whose goat that is?” asked the lady, as her little boy
whispered something to her.
“That’s mine,” said Mike proudly. “And there’s no better jumping goat
in these parts.”
“Nor smarter goat either,” said the motorman, and Mike, to his
surprise, learned what his pet had done.
“Do you want to sell the goat?” asked the lady. “My little boy would
like him. I have an idea that I could hitch him to a cart and have him
draw my boy about. Some neighbor’s children have a little pony named
Tinkle, and they have great fun riding around with him. My boy is too
small for a pony, but a goat might be good for him. Will you sell him
to me――Lightfoot I think you said his name was?”
“Well, ma’am, not wishing to be impolite to you, but I can’t sell
Lightfoot,” said Mike slowly, and he put his hand on the goat’s head.
“You see I’ve had him ever since he was a little kid, and I like him
too much to sell him.”
The lady saw how Mike felt about it, so she said kindly:
“Well, never mind, my boy. I wouldn’t want to take your pet away from
you, any more than I’d want my little boy to lose his, if he had one.
It’s all right. But you are lucky to have so good a goat.”
[Illustration: Lightfoot, coming up to get some of the salt which he
licked from Mike’s hand, did not know what his master was saying.]
“Yes’m; I think so myself. Come on now, Tessie. I’ll take you home, and
if ever you come by yourself on the trolley tracks again I’ll never
give you another pickaback ride.”
“Oh, then I won’t ever come,” lisped Tessie, her hand in Mike’s. “And
will you give me a piggy back ride now?”
“Yes,” promised Mike; and amid the laughter of the trolley car
passengers Mike took the little girl up on his back and trotted off,
making believe he was a horse. Lightfoot ran alongside, and, seeing
him, Tessie said:
“Lightfoot pushed me so hard I sat down in the grass, Mike.”
“Well, it’s a good thing he did, Tessie, else you might have been
harder hit by the car. Now you take my advice and keep away from the
tracks or, mind――no more pickaback rides!”
A day or so after that Mike, going up to the top of the rocks to take
some salt to his mother’s goats, saw Lightfoot leaping about, kicking
up his heels and shaking his horns.
“Sure it’s a fine goat you are intirely, as my dear mother would say,”
said Mike softly. “And I wish I could do it.”
Lightfoot, coming up to get some of the salt, which he licked from
Mike’s hand, did not know what his master was saying. Even if he had
understood the words he would not have known what they referred to.
Mike went on, talking to himself.
“If I only could do it,” he said, “it would be great! I could drive
home with the washings, and then, maybe, I could earn money with you.
I wonder if I could make it myself? I could get the wheels, and a big
soap box――
“No,” went on Mike, after a moment of thought, “that wouldn’t do. It
would be all right for taking home the washings, but not to give rides
for money. I’ve got to get a regular goat harness and a wagon. How can
I do it?”
Now you know what Mike was thinking of. He had heard the lady speak of
a pony cart, and he wanted a goat wagon for Lightfoot. If he had that
he could, as he said, drive home with the big baskets of clean clothes
to his mother’s customers. Then Mike had an idea he could give rides to
children in the goat wagon, and so earn money.
“But where can I get the wagon and harness?” he asked himself over and
over again.
At last, when he had talked the matter over with his friend Timothy
Muldoon, the railroad gate-tender, in his little shanty at the foot of
the street, Mike got the idea.
“Sure why don’t ye advertise in the papers?” asked Tim, as Mike called
him. “That’s what everybody does that has anything to sell or wants to
buy. Advertise for a goat wagon and harness. Sometimes goats dies, and
the folks that owns them don’t get another, but sells the outfit.”
“But it costs money to advertise,” objected Mike.
“Sure and won’t the paper you work for trust you?” asked the gateman.
“The paper I work for?” repeated Mike, wonderingly.
“I mean the one you delivers for, nights,” for Mike had a paper route
for an evening paper, the _Journal_.
“They ought to know you there,” went on Tim. “Tell the advertising man
what you want, and that you’ll pay him when you can.”
“I’ll do it!” cried Mike, and he did. When, rather timidly, he
explained to the man at the desk in the office what he wanted, and told
him that he had delivered the _Journal_ for several years, a bargain
was made.
The man would put the advertisement in the paper for Mike, saying he
wanted to buy a second-hand goat wagon and harness. He was to pay for
the advertisement at the rate of two cents each day, for the Widow
Malony and her son were so poor that even two cents counted.
“And you can easy make up that two cents by getting two new customers
for the paper,” said Tim, when Mike told him what had happened.
“Yes. But how am I going to pay for the goat wagon and harness in case
some one has it to sell?” Mike questioned.
“Well, maybe I have a bit of a nest egg laid away,” said Tim, with
a smile. “I might lend you the money, and when you get rich you can
pay me. Or whoever sells the outfit might let your mother make up the
amount by washing. We’ll see about that.”
To Mike’s delight he had two answers to his advertisement. One was for
a very fine goat wagon and harness, but the price asked was more than
even Tim would advise paying.
“You can get that, or one like it, when you’ve made a hundred dollars
on the goat rides,” said the gate-man to Mike.
The other outfit was just about right, Tim and Mike thought, and the
man who had the wagon and harness for sale said Mrs. Malony could pay
for it by doing washing and ironing. So, after Mike had paid for the
advertisement, no more money need be paid out.
“Sure, Lightfoot, now there’ll be grand times for you!” cried Mike as
he came home one day with the wagon and harness.