THE CAPTAIN'S SON.
"Is your name Dollyphus?"
"Yes, Adolphus Lally."
"Well, my name is Alice. Nobody calls me by it but my papa and my
grandmas. Dotty Dimple is my short name. There are a pair of dimples
dotted into my cheek; don't, you see? That's what it's for. I was born
so. My _other_ sisters haven't any at all."
Adolphus smiled quietly; he had seen dimples before.
"You didn't ever know till just now there was any such girl as _me_, I
s'pose."
"No, I never did."
"I live in the city of Portland," pursued Dotty, with a grand air, "and
my papa and mamma, and two sisters, and a Quaker grandma (only you must
say 'Friend') with a white handkerchief on. Have you any grandma like
that?"
"No, my grandmother is dead."
"Why, there's two of mine alive, and one grandpa. Just as nice! They
don't scold. They let you do everything. I wouldn't _not_ have
grandmothers and fathers for anything! But _you_ can't help it. Did you
ever have your house burnt up?"
"No, indeed."
"Well, ours did; the chambers, and the cellar, and the windows and
doors. We hadn't any place to stay. My sister Susy! You ought to heard
her cry! I lost the beautifulest tea-set; but I didn't say much about
it."
"Where do you live now?"
"O, there was a man let us have another house. It isn't so handsome as
our house was; for the man can't make things so nice as my father can.
We live in it now. Can you play the piano?"
"No, not at all."
"Don't you, honestly; Why, I do. Susy's given me five lessons. You have
to sit up as straight as a pin, and count your fingers, one, two, three,
four. X is your thumb."
Dotty believed she was imparting valuable information. She felt great
pleasure in having found a travelling companion to whom she could make
herself useful.
"I'm going to tell you something. Did you ever go to Indiana?"
"No."
"Didn't you? They call it Out West. I'm going there. Yes, I started
to-day. The people are called Hoojers. They don't spect me, but I'm
going. Did you ever hear of a girl that travelled out West?"
"O, yes; ever so many."
"I mean a girl as little as me, 'thout anybody but my papa; and he don't
know how to part my hair in the middle. I have to take all the care of
myself."
Dotty had been trying all the while to call forth some exclamation of
awe, or at least surprise. She was sure Adolphus would be impressed now.
"All the whole care of myself," repeated she. "My papa has one of the
_highest_ 'pinions of me; and he says I'm as good as a lady when I try.
Were you ever in the cars before, Dollyphus?"
"O, yes," was the demure reply, "a great many times. I've been round the
world."
Dotty started suddenly, dropping her porte-monnaie on the floor.
"Round the world! The whole round world?" gasped she, feeling as
insignificant as a "Catharine wheel," which, having "gone up like a
rocket," has come down "like a stick."
"You didn't say round the _whole_ world?" repeated she, looking very
flat indeed.
"O, yes, in my father's ship."
His "father's ship." Dotty's look of superiority was quenched entirely.
Even her jaunty hat seemed to humble itself, and her haughty head sink
with it.
Adolphus stooped and restored the porte-monnaie, which, in her surprise,
she had quite forgotten.
"Does your father keep a ship?" asked she, reverently.
"Yes; and mother often makes voyages with him. Once they took me; and
that was the time I went round the world. We were gone two years."
"Weren't you afraid?"
"No, I'm never afraid where my father is."
"Just a little afraid, I mean, when you found the ship was going
tip-side up?"
"Tip-side up?" said Adolphus. "I don't understand you."
"Why, when you got to the other side of the world, then of course the
ship turned right over, you know. Didn't you want to catch hold of
something, for fear you'd fall into the sky?"
Adolphus laughed; he could not very well help it; but, observing the
mortification expressed in his companion's face, he sobered himself
instantly, and replied,--
"No, Dotty; the world is round, but you wouldn't know it by the looks of
it. Wherever I've been, the land seems flat, except the hills, and so
does the water, all but the waves."
As the captain's son said this, he looked pityingly at his little
companion, wondering how she happened to be so silly as to suppose a
ship ever went "tip-side up." But he was mistaken if he considered Dotty
a simpleton. The child had never gone to school. Her parents believed
there would be time enough yet for her to learn a great many things; and
her ignorance had never distressed them half so much as her faults of
temper.
"Did you ever go as far as Boston before?" pursued Adolphus, rather
grandly, in his turn.
"No, I never," replied Dotty, meekly; "but Prudy has."
"So I presume you haven't been in Spain? It was there I bought my
beautiful rabbit. Were you ever in the Straits of Malacca?" continued
he, roguishly.
"No--o. I didn't know I was."
"Indeed? Nor in the Bay of Palermo? The Italians call it the Golden
Shell."
"I don't _s'pose_ I ever," replied Dotty, with a faint effort to keep up
appearances; "but I went to _Quoddy_ Bay once!"
"So you haven't seen the _loory_? It is a beautiful bird, and talks
better than a parrot. I have one at home."
"O, have you?" said Dotty, in a tone of the deepest respect.
"Yes; then there is the _mina_, a brown bird, larger than a crow;
converses quite fluently. You have heard of a mina, I dare say."
Dotty shook her head in despair. She was so overwhelmed by this time,
that, if Adolphus had told of going with Captain Lally to the moon in a
balloon, she would not have been greatly surprised.
A humorous smile played around the boy's mouth. Observing his little
companion's extreme simplicity, he was tempted to invent some marvellous
stories for the sake of seeing her eyes shine.
"I can explain it to her afterwards," said he to his conscience.
"Did you ever hear of the Great Dipper, Dotty?"
"I don't know's I did. No."
"You don't say so! Never heard of the Great Dipper! Your sister Prudy
has, I'm sure. It is tied to the north pole, and you can dip water with
it."
"Is it big?"
"No, not very. About the size of a tub."
"A dipper as big as a tub?" repeated Dotty, slowly.
"Yes, with the longest kind of handle."
"I couldn't lift it?"
"No, I should judge not."
"Who tied it to the north pole?"
"I don't know. Columbus, perhaps. You remember he discovered the world?"
Dotty brightened.
"O, yes, I've heard about that! Susy read it in a book."
"Well, I'll tell you how it was. There had been a world, you see; but
people had lost the run of it, and didn't know where it was, after the
flood. And then Columbus went in a ship and discovered it."
"He did?"
Dotty looked keenly at the captain's son. He was certainly in earnest;
but there was something about it she did not exactly understand.
"Why, if there wasn't any world all the time, where did _C'lumbus_ come
from?" faltered she, at last.
"It is not generally known," replied Adolphus, taking off his hat, and
hiding his face in it.
Dolly sat for some time lost in thought.
"O, I forgot to say," resumed Adolphus, "the north pole isn't driven in
so hard as it ought to be. It is so cold up there that the frost
'heaves' it. You know what 'heaves' means? The ground freezes and then
thaws, and that loosens the pole. Somebody has to pound it down, and
that makes the noise we call thunder."
Dotty said nothing to this; but her youthful face expressed surprise,
largely mingled with doubt.
"You have heard of the _axes_ of the earth? That is what they pound the
pole with. Queer--isn't it? But not so queer to me as the Red Sea."
Adolphus paused, expecting to be questioned; but Dotty maintained a
discreet silence.
"The water is a very bright red, I know; but I never _could_ believe
that story about the giant's having the nose-bleed, and coloring the
whole sea with blood. Did you ever hear of that?"
"No, I never," replied Dotty, gravely. "You needn't tell it, Dollyphus.
I'm too tired to talk."
Adolphus felt rather piqued as the little girl turned away her head and
steadily gazed out of the window at the trees and houses flying by. It
appeared very much as if she suspected he had been making sport of her.
"She isn't a perfect ignoramus, after all." he thought; "that last lie
was a little too big."
After this he sat for some time watching his little companion, anxious
for an opportunity to assure her that these absurd stories had been spun
out of his own brain. But Dotty never once turned her face towards him.
She was thinking,--
"P'rhaps he's a good boy; p'rhaps he's a naughty boy: but I shan't
believe him till I ask my father."
At Portsmouth, Captain Lally and son left the cars, much to Dotty's
relief, though they did carry away the beautiful Spanish rabbit; and it
seemed to the child as if a piece of her heart went with it.
"Is my little girl tired?" said Mr. Parlin, putting an arm around Dotty.
"No, papa, only I'm thinking. The north pole is top of the world--isn'
it? As much as five hundred miles off?"
"A great deal farther than that, my dear."
"There, I thought so! And we couldn't hear 'em pound it down with an
axe--could we? That isn't what makes thunder? O, what a boy!"
Mr. Parlin laughed heartily.
"Did Adolphus tell you such a story as that?"
"Yes, sir, he did," cried Dotty, indignantly, "and said there was a
dipper to it, with a handle on, as large as a tub. And a man tied it
that came from I-don't-know-where, and found this world. I know _that_
wasn't true, for he didn't say anything about Adam and Eve. What an
awful boy!"
"What did you say to Adolphus?" said Mr. Parlin, still laughing. "Hadn't
you been putting on airs? And wasn't that the reason he made sport of
you?"
"I don't know what 'airs' are, papa."
"Perhaps you told him, for instance, that you were travelling out West,
and asked him if _he_ ever went so far as that."
"Perhaps I did," stammered Dotty.
"And it is very likely you made the remark that you had the whole care
of yourself, and know how to part your hair in the middle. I did not
listen; but it is possible you told him you could play on the piano."
Dotty looked quite ashamed.
"This is what we call 'putting on airs.' Adolphus was at first rather
quiet and unpretending. Didn't you think he might be a little stupid?
And didn't you wish to give him the idea that you yourself were
something of a fine lady?"
How very strange it was to Dotty that her father could read the secret
thoughts which she herself could hardly have told! She felt supremely
wretched, and crept into his bosom to hide her blushing face.
"I didn't say Adolphus did right to tease you," said Mr. Parlin, gently.
He thought the little girl's lesson had been quite severe enough; for,
after all, she had done nothing very wrong: she had only been a little
foolish.
"Upon my word, chincapin," said he, "we haven't opened that basket yet!
What do you say to a lunch, with the Boston Journal for a table-cloth?
And here comes a boy with some apples."
In two minutes Dotty had buried her chagrin in a sandwich.
And all the while the cars were racketing along towards Boston.