By the 1st of June Mrs. Thayer had the sun-bonnets done. There were four
of them, for the four youngest girls--Eliza, Mary Ann, Harriet, and
Mirandy. She had five daughters besides these, but two were married and
gone away from home, and the other three were old enough to make their
own sun-bonnets.
There were four Thayer boys; one of them came next to Mirandy, the
youngest girl, the others ranked upward in age from Harriet, who was
eleven, to Sarah Jane, who was sixteen. There were thirteen sons and
daughters in all in Josiah Thayer's family, and eleven were at home. It
was hard work to get enough from the stony New England farm to feed
them; and let Mrs. Thayer card and spin and dye and weave as she would,
the clothing often ran short. And so it happened that little Mirandy
Thayer, aged six, had no shoes to her feet.
One Sunday in June she cried because she had to go to meeting
barefooted.
"Ain't you ashamed of yourself, a great big girl like you, crying?" said
her mother, sternly. "You go right over there, and sit down on the
settle till father gets hitched up, and Daniel, you go and sit down
'side of her, and teach her the first question in the catechism. She'd
ought to find out there's something else to be thought about on the
Sabbath day besides shoes."
So Mirandy, sniffing between the solemn words, repeated them after
Daniel, who was twelve years old, and knew his catechism quite
thoroughly. And when the great farm wagon, with the team of oxen, stood
before the door, she climbed in with the rest without a murmur.
But sitting in the meeting-house through the two hours' discourse, she
drew up her little bare feet under her blue petticoat, and going down
the aisle afterwards, she crouched, making it sweep the floor, until her
mother dragged her up forcibly by one arm.
"Ain't you ashamed of yourself?" she whispered. "A great big girl like
you!"
Mirandy was in reality very small for her age, and everybody called her
"little;" but she got very few privileges on account of her youth and
littleness. In those days, and especially in a family like Josiah
Thayer's, where there were so many children that each had to scratch for
itself at an early age or go without, six years was considered
comparatively mature, and the child who had lived that long was not
exempt from many duties.
So Mrs. Thayer did not think herself in the least severe when she said
to Mirandy after meeting: "If you want some shoes so bad, you'll have to
work an' earn 'em."
Mirandy looked up inquiringly at her mother.
"You can pick berries an' sell 'em," replied her mother. "You're plenty
big enough to."
Mirandy said nothing, and soon her mother set her to rocking Jonathan in
his red wooden cradle; but as she sat, with her small bare foot on the
rocker, ambition expanded wider and wider in her childish soul, and she
resolved that she would earn some shoes.
The berries were not ripe before the middle of July. She had some five
weeks to wait before she could fairly begin work. But not a day passed
that she did not visit the pastures to see if the berries were ripe. She
brought home so many partially ripe ones for samples that her brothers
and sisters remonstrated. They, too, were vitally interested in the
berry crop in behalf of shoes and many other things. "She won't leave
any berries on the bushes to get ripe if she picks so many green ones,"
they complained, and her mother issued a stern decree that Mirandy
should not go to the berry pasture until the berries were fairly ripe.
But at last, one hot morning in July, the squad of berry-pickers
started. There were four Thayer girls and two Thayer boys, besides
Jonathan, the baby, whom Eliza dragged in his little wooden wagon.
"If you go berrying this mornin', you've got to take Jonathan with you,"
Mrs. Thayer had said. "Dorcas is weaving, an' Lyddy an' I have got to
dye. You'll have to take him out in the pasture with you, an' tend him."
The berry pasture whither they were bound was about a half-mile from
home. The two boys scurried on ahead, the four yellow sun-bonnets
marched bravely on, and Jonathan's wagon rattled behind.
"The berries are real thick," said Harriet; "but they say the bushes are
loaded with 'em over in Cap'n Moseby's lot, an' they're as big as
walnuts."
"He can't use quarter of 'em himself," returned Mary Ann. "I call it
real stingy not to let folks go in there pickin'!" She nodded her
sun-bonnet indignantly.
When they reached the berry pasture, they fell to work eagerly.
Jonathan's wagon was drawn up on one side, under the shade of a
pine-tree, and Mirandy was bidden to have an eye to him. Nobody had much
faith in the seriousness of Mirandy's picking, and they thought that she
might as well tend Jonathan and leave them free.
But Mirandy stationed herself at a bush near Jonathan, and began with a
will. They all had birch baskets fastened at their waists to pick into,
and they had brought buckets to fill. Mirandy had hers as well as the
rest.
The yellow sun-bonnets and the palm-leaf hats waved about among the
bushes, and the berries fell fast into the birch-bark baskets. Mirandy
stayed close to Jonathan, as she had been bidden, and she struggled
bravely with her berry bush, but it was too tall for her; the bushes in
this pasture were very tall. Mirandy tugged the branches down, and
panted for breath. She was eager to fill her basket as soon as anybody.
She heard Harriet and Mary Ann talking near her, although she could not
see them.
"Cap'n Moseby's pasture is right over there. You get over the
stone-wall, and go across one field, and you come to it," remarked
Harriet.
"I s'pose the berries are as thick as spatters," said Mary Ann, with a
sigh.
"Dan'l says the bushes are dragging down with 'em."
"Well," said Mary Ann, "nobody would dare to go there, for he keeps that
great black dog, and I've heard he watches with a gun."
"So've I. No; I shouldn't dare to go. I s'pose it would be stealing,
anyway."
"I don't s'pose 'twould," rejoined Harriet, hotly. "I guess if anything
is free, berry pastures are. Who planted berry bushes, I'd like to
know?"
"I s'pose the Lord did," said Mary Ann. "Mebbe it ain't stealin', but
anyhow I shouldn't dare to go there."
"I shouldn't," agreed Harriet; "an' I know Dan'l and Abijah wouldn't."
Mirandy listened; she thought both Harriet and Mary Ann very wise. She
trusted to their conclusion that it would not be stealing to pick Cap'n
Moseby's berries, but she privately thought she would "dare to."
Mirandy did not know what fear was; dogs did not alarm her in the least;
and as for Cap'n Moseby and his gun, she knew he would not shoot her;
once he had given her some peppermints.
She pulled her bush down painfully, and thought the berries were not
very large, and how fast those in Cap'n Moseby's pasture would fill up.
Harriet's and Mary Ann's voices grew fainter. Mirandy let the bush fly
back, and pushed softly through a tangle of blackberry vines to the
stone-wall; a narrow stretch of rocky land lay between it and the other
which bounded Cap'n Moseby's land. Mirandy stood on tiptoe, and peered
over; then she looked at Jonathan asleep in his little wagon, his yellow
lashes on his pink cheeks, his fat fists doubled up.
Mirandy was loyal, although she was so young, and she had been bidden
not to leave Jonathan. She looked at him, then at the stone-wall; it was
manifestly impossible for her to lift him over that. She took hold of
the little wagon, and pushed it carefully along. She remembered that she
had seen some bars a little farther back.
When she reached the bars, she shook Jonathan until he woke up. He
stared at her in a surprised way, but never cried; he was a good baby.
"Put your arms round sister's neck," ordered Mirandy; and Jonathan
obeyed.
Mirandy tugged him out of his little wagon, and they both rolled over
under a berry bush. Still Jonathan did not cry. He only gurgled a
little, by way of laugh. He thought Mirandy was playing with him.
The bars were close together, and Mirandy could not stir one. Jonathan
gurgled again when his sister rolled him, like a ball, under the lowest
bar, and then rolled under herself. But it was harder for her to tug
Jonathan across to the other bars which guarded Cap'n Moseby's berry
pasture; he could only toddle feebly when led by a strong hand. It was
quite a puzzle for six-year-old Mirandy, but she got him across and
under the other bars; then she set him down in a sweet-fern thicket, and
bade him keep still; and he fell asleep again.
Mirandy picked until she had filled her bucket and rounded it up. Her
heart beat faster and faster; her face was flushed and eager; she looked
a year older than when she started that morning. She had seen no great
black dog, and Cap'n Moseby, with his gun, had not appeared. In the
distance she could see the hipped roof and squat chimney of the Moseby
house; but nobody molested her.
When her bucket was full, she tugged Jonathan across the field again.
This time he rebelled; a blackberry vine had scratched his little legs,
and his peace was too rudely disturbed. Mirandy tugged him into his
little wagon, and he lay there kicking and screaming. She flew back
across the field for her bucket of berries. She had been forced to
leave it while she brought Jonathan over, and the bucket was gone. She
had set it close to the bars, and there could be no mistake about it.
Mirandy went back across the field; Jonathan wailed louder than ever.
Her four sisters were gathered about his little wagon, and Daniel and
Abijah were coming through the bushes. Then they all turned on her.
"Now, Mirandy Thayer, I'd like to know this minute where you've been?"
demanded Eliza.
Mirandy jerked her head backward.
"You 'ain't been over in Cap'n Moseby's pasture?"
Mirandy nodded.
"She's been over in Cap'n Moseby's pasture," announced Eliza to the
others.
They all stared at Mirandy, and paid no heed to Jonathan's wails.
Suddenly Mirandy flung her little blue apron over her face and began to
weep.
"Did you get scared?" asked Harriet.
"Did the dog chase you?" asked Mary Ann, very excitedly.
Mirandy shook her head, and sobbed harder.
"Did you see Cap'n Moseby with his gun?" asked Daniel.
Mirandy shook her head.
"I wouldn't be such a baby for nothing, then," said Daniel.
"I've lost my bucket!" sobbed Mirandy.
"Lost your bucket!" repeated Eliza. She was the oldest sister there.
Mirandy nodded.
"You're a wicked girl!" Eliza said, severely. "I don't know what
mother'll say. Here's Jonathan all scratched up, too. Did you take him
over there?"
"Yes," sobbed Mirandy.
"You're a dreadful wicked girl! Didn't you know 'twas stealing?"
"Harriet said--it wasn't," returned Mirandy, in feeble defence.
"It was. I shouldn't think you'd said such a thing, Harriet."
"Of course it's stealing," said Daniel, soberly.
"Here you've been stealing," scolded Eliza; "and your bucket's gone, and
Jonathan is all scratched up with blackberry vines. I don't know what
mother'll say."
She took Jonathan out of his wagon and hushed him, and then they had a
consultation as to what was best to be done. Mirandy related, with
tearful breaks, the story of her well-filled bucket and its mysterious
disappearance.
"Of course Cap'n Moseby was watching out there with his gun and took
it," said Daniel.
It was finally agreed that they would all go in a body to Cap'n
Moseby's, and try to recover Mirandy's bucket, that she might not have
to face her mother without it. When they reached the Moseby house the
doors were closed and the windows looked blank. They knocked as loudly
as they dared, and there was not a sound in response. They looked at one
another.
"S'pose he ain't at home?" whispered Harriet.
"Dan'l, you pound on the door again," said Eliza.
And Daniel pounded. Abijah pounded, too, and Eliza herself rattled away
on one panel, with her freckled face screwed up, but nobody came.
"If he's there, he won't come to the door," said Daniel.
Suddenly the silence within the house was broken. Then came a volley of
quick barks, and the children all fell back in a panic, and scurried
into the road.
"He's in there," said Daniel; "an' he's been keeping the dog still, but
he can't any longer."
"Just hear him!" whispered Harriet, with a shudder.
The dog was not only barking and growling, but leaping at the door.
[Illustration: "THE VISIT TO CAP'N MOSEBY'S"]
Mary Ann began to cry. "I'm going home," she sobbed. "S'pose that door
should break;" and she started down the road.
Eliza grasped the handle of Jonathan's wagon. "I guess we might just as
well go," she said. "I don't b'lieve he'll come to the door if we stand
there a week. I don't know what mother'll say when she finds that good
bucket's gone. I guess Mirandy'll catch it. An' when she finds out she's
been stealing, too, I don't know what she will say."
The sorry procession started. Jonathan's wagon creaked; but Mirandy
stood still, with a stubborn pout on her mouth, and her brows contracted
over her blue eyes.
"Come along, Mirandy," called Eliza, with a foreboding voice.
But Mirandy stood still.
"Why don't you come?" Harriet said.
"I ain't coming," said Mirandy.
"What?"
"I ain't coming till I get my bucket."
Then the whole procession stopped, and reasoned and argued, but Mirandy
was unmoved.
"What are you going to do? You can't get in," said Eliza.
"I'm going to sit on the door-step till Cap'n Moseby comes out,"
answered Mirandy.
"You'll sit there all day, likely's not," said Eliza. "What do you
s'pose mother'll say? I'm a-going to tell her."
"She'll send me right back again if I don't stay," said Mirandy.
And there was some show of reason in what she said. It was indeed quite
probable that Mrs. Josiah Thayer would send Mirandy straight back again
to confess her sins and get the bucket.
"I don't know but mother would send her back," said Eliza; and Daniel
nodded in assent.
"I'll stay with you," said Mary Ann, although she was still trembling
with fear of the dog.
"Don't want anybody to stay," protested Mirandy.
Finally she sat on Cap'n Moseby's door-step, and watched them all
straggle out of sight. The creak of Jonathan's wagon grew fainter and
fainter, until she could hear it no longer. The dog was quiet now.
Mirandy sat up straight in front of the panelled door.
She waited and waited; the time went on, and it was high noon. She heard
a dinner-horn in the distance. She wondered vaguely if Cap'n Moseby
didn't have any dinner because he lived alone. She began to feel hungry
herself. There was not a sound in the house. She wanted to cry, but she
would not. She sat perfectly still. Once in a while she said over to
herself the questions she had learned from the catechism, and she
reflected much upon the two boys in the _Pilgrim's Progress_. She had
eaten a few of the Cap'n's berries as she filled her bucket, and she
wondered that they did not make her ill, as the fruit did the boys.
Nobody passed the house, the insects rasped in her ears, she thought her
forlorn childish thoughts, and it was an hour after noon. She did not
see a curtain trimmed with white balls in a window overhead pulled
cautiously to one side, and a grizzled head thrust out; but this
happened several times.
About two o'clock there was a sudden puff of cool wind on her back; she
glanced around, trembling, and there stood Cap'n Moseby in the open
door, with his great black dog at his heels. His old face was the color
of tanned leather, and full of severe furrows; his shaggy brows frowned
over sharp black eyes. He leaned upon a stout oak staff, for he had been
lamed by a British musket-ball.
"Who's this?" he asked, in a grim voice.
Mirandy arose and stood about, and courtesied. She could not find her
tongue yet.
"Hey?" said Cap'n Moseby.
"Mirandy Thayer," she answered then, in a shaking voice that had yet a
touch of defiance in it.
"Mirandy Thayer, hey? Well, what do you want here, Mirandy Thayer?"