THE BOY THAT MEANT TO MIND HIS MOTHER.
"Come on, Billy Button."
"O, Gid Noonin, I can't."
"Why not? Got the cramp?"
"Look here, Gid."
"Well, I'm looking."
"Now, Gid Noonin!"
"Yes; that's my name!"
"I shan't go a step!"
"So I wouldn't," returned Gid, coolly. "I only asked you for fun."
"O--h! H'm! Are you going to swim in the brook or the river?"
"Brook, you goosie. Prime place down there by the old willow tree.
Don't you wish I'd let you go?"
"No; for my mother says--"
"O, _does_ she, though?"
"My mother says--"
"Lor, now, Billy Button!"
"Hush, Gid; my mother says--"
"A pretty talking woman your mother is!" struck in Gid, squinting his
eyes.
What a witty creature Gid was! Willy could hardly keep from laughing.
"Can't you let me speak, Gid Noonin? My mother says she won't--"
"Says she _won't_? That's real wicked kind of talk! I'm ashamed of your
mother!"
Willy laughed. Gid did have _such_ a way of making up faces!
"Come on, you little girl-baby! Guess I _will_ take you, if you won't
cry."
Willy laughed again. It was not at all painful, but extremely funny, to
hear Gid call names, for he never did it in a provoking way at all.
"Come along, you little tip end of a top o' my thumb."
"No, _sir_. Shan't go a step!"
Willy was a boy that meant to mind his mother.
"But I s'pose you'll have to go if I take you."
Willy caught himself by the left ear. He felt the need of holding on by
something; still he was somehow afraid he should have to go in spite of
his ears. Was there ever such a boy as Gid for teasing?
"Why, Gid Noonin, I told you my mother said--"
"No, you didn't! You haven't told me a thing! You stutter so I can't
understand a word."
At the idea of his stuttering, Willy laughed outright; and during that
moment of weakness was picked up and set astride of Gid's shoulders.
"You put me down! My mother says I shan't play with you; so there!"
cried Willy, struggling manfully, yet a little pleased, I must confess,
to think he couldn't possibly help himself.
"Ride away, ride away. Billy shall ride," sang Gid, bouncing his burden
up and down.
Willy felt like a dry leaf in an eddy, which is whirled round and round,
yet is all the while making faster and faster for the hungry dimple in
the middle, where there is no getting out again.
"O, dear, Gid's such a great big boy, and I'm _only_ just eight,"
thought he, jolting up and down like a bag of meal on horseback. Well,
it would be good fun, after all, to go in swimming,--splendid fun, when
there was somebody to hold you up, and keep you from drowning. If you
could forget that your mother had told you not to play with Gid Noonin!
"If you get the string of that medal wet you'll catch it," said Gid.
"Better take it off and put it in your pocket."
"Just a-going to," said Willy. "D'you think I's a fool?"
Well, wasn't it nice! The water feeling so ticklish all over you, and--
Why, no, it wasn't nice at all; it was just frightful! After two or
three dives, Gid had snapped his fingers in his face, and gone off and
left him. Willy couldn't swim any more than a fish-hook. Where _was_
Gid?
"The water's up to my chin. Come, Gid, quick!"
What would Seth and Stephen say if they knew how he was abused? No--his
mother? No--Love, and Caleb, and Liddy? How they would feel! There
wasn't any bottom to this brook, or if there ever had been it had
dropped out.
"O, Gid, I can't stand up."
Gid was in plain sight now, on the bank, pretending to skip stones. Gid
was like a Chinese juggler; he could make believe do one thing, while he
was really doing another.
"Quick! Quick! Quick! I shall dro--ow--own!"
Gid took his own time; but as he swam slowly back to his trembling
little playmate, he was "rolling a sweet morsel under his tongue," which
tasted very much like a silver medal--with the string taken out.
"What d'you go off for?" gasped Willy.
"For fun, you outrageous little ninny!" mumbled Gid, tickling Willy
under the arms. "I'm going to get you out, now, and dress you, and send
you home to your mother."
"Dress me, I guess!"
"Well, you'd better scamper!" said Gid, hurriedly, as they got into
their clothes. "Your mother'll have a fit about you."
"My mother? No, she won't. She don't spect the codfish and mackerel till
most supper-time. She said I might play, but she wasn't willing I should
play with you, though, Gid Noonin," said little Willy, squeezing the
water out of his hair.
"But you did, you little scamp! Now run along home. I can't stop to
talk. Got to saw wood."
"Then what made you creep so awful slow when I called to you?" asked
Willy, indignantly.
"O, because I've got such a sore throat," wheezed Gideon. "Off with you!
Scamper!"
Upon that Gid took to his heels, and left Master Willy staring at him,
and wondering what a sore throat had to do with swimming, and what made
Gid in such a hurry all in a minute.
"He's a queer fellow--Gid is! Can't spell worth a cent. Should think
he'd be ashamed to see a little boy like me wear the medal. Glad I
didn't wet it, for the color would have washed out of the string."
With that Willy put his hand in his pocket.
"Out here and show yourself, sir."
This to the medal.
"What! Why, what's this?"
He felt in the other pocket.
"Why! Why!"
He drew out junks of blue clay, wads of twine, a piece of chalk, a
fish-hook, and various other articles more or less wound up in a wad;
but no medal.
"Guess there's a hole in my pocket, and the medal fell through."
And without stopping to examine the pocket, he ran back all the way to
the brook. Nowhere to be found. Not in the grass on either side of the
road; not on the bank.
Then he remembered to look at his pockets; turned them all three inside
out four times. No hole there.
"Well, I never!--Look here, you Oze Wiggins; did you pick up anything in
the grass?"
"Noffin' but a toadstool," replied little Ozem, innocently; and Willy
wondered if he wasn't a half-fool to make such an answer as that.
"Where can that medal be?" said he, with a dry sob.
He did not once suspect that Gideon Noonin had taken it.
"I'll go home and tell my mother. O, dear! O, dear!"
He was still at the tender age when little boys believe their mammas can
help them out of any kind of trouble. True, he had been naughty and
disobedient; but if he said he was sorry, wouldn't her arms open to take
him in? He was sorry now,--no doubt of that,--and was running home with
all speed, when the sight of his father in the distance reminded him of
his errand, and he rushed back to the store for the codfish and
mackerel.
"What makes your hair so wet, bubby?" asked Daddy Wiggins, rolling the
fish in brown paper. "Haven't been in swimming--have you?"
"Don' know," stammered Willy, darting out of the store.
If his hair was wet it wouldn't do to go home till it was dry; for his
father would find out that he had been in the brook, and the next thing
in order would be a whipping. It was hard enough to lose the medal;
Willy thought a whipping would be more than he could bear, for it was
always given with a horsewhip out in the barn; and the unlucky boy could
never help envying the cows, as they looked on, chewing their cuds with
such an air of content and unconcern. Cows never were punished, nor
sheep either. Good times they had--that's a fact. _Sheep_ wouldn't mind
a real heavy horse-whipping, they were done up so in wool; but when a
little boy had to take off his jacket, why, there wasn't much over his
skin to keep off the smart. Ugh! how it did hurt!
There was another advantage in being a sheep, or a cow, or a hen;
animals of that sort never lost anything--didn't have medals to lose.
"And this wasn't mine," groaned Willy. "What'll the mistress do to me?
Don' know; blister both hands, I s'pose!"
Willy had intended to play ball with the little boys, but it was not to
be thought of now. Putting his fish behind a tree, he ran to the brook
again and poked with a stick as far as he could reach; then waded in up
to his knees, for the medal might have rolled out of his pocket.
"No, it couldn't; for my breeches were tucked in up there between two
rocks."
Suddenly he recollected Gideon's going back to the bank.
"That wicked, mean boy!" almost screamed Willy. "He stole my medal! I'll
go right off and tell mother!"
Mrs. Parlin had on her afternoon cap, and was sitting alone in the
well-sanded "fore-room," doing the mending, and singing,--
"While shepherds watched their flocks by night,
All seated on the ground,"--
when Willy, with his pantaloons tucked up to his knees, and his head
dripping with water, rushed wildly into the room.
"My medal's gone! Gid Noonin stole it!"
"My son! What do you mean?"
"Yes, ma'am; Gid Noonin stole it! Made me go in swimming, and then he
stole it!"
"Gideon Noonin?" said Mrs. Parlin, with a meaning glance. "That boy?
_Made_ you go swimming, my son?"
Willy hung his head.
"Yes, ma'am! Marched me off down to the brook pickaback,--he did!"
"Poor, little baby!" said Mrs. Parlin, in the soft, pitiful tone she
would have used to an infant. "Poor little baby!"
Willy's head sank lower yet, and the blush of shame crept into his
cheeks.
"Why, mother, he's as strong's a moose; he could most lift _you_!"
"'My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.'"
"Well, but I--"
"You consented in your heart, Willy, or Gideon could not have made you
go swimming."
What a very bright woman! Willy was amazed. How could she guess that
while riding on Gid's back he had been a _little_ glad to think he could
not help it? He had hardly known himself that he was glad, it was such a
wee speck of a feeling, and so covered up with other feelings.
"But I tried not to go, mother. I tell you I squirmed awf'ly!"
"Well, you didn't try hard enough in the first place, Willy. Come here,
and sit in my lap, and let us talk it over.--Do you know, my son, if you
_had_ tried hard enough, the Lord would have helped you?"
Willy raised his eyes wonderingly. Had God been looking on all the
while, just ready to be spoken to? He had not thought of that.
"O, mamma," said he solemnly, "I will mind, next time, see 'f I don't.
But there's that medal; why, what'll I do?"
"If Gideon will not return it, you must pay Miss Judkins a quarter of a
dollar."
"With a hole in," sighed Willy. "Why, I've only got two cents in this
world."
"O, well," said Mrs. Parlin, hopefully, "perhaps you can hire out to
papa, and earn the rest."
"O, if he'll _only_ let me! Won't you please ask him, mamma?" cried
Willy, filled with a new hope. "Ask him, and get Love to ask him, too.
_I_ shouldn't dare do it, you know."