THE HOME OF A HERO.
WITH November came heavier frosts and the first light snowfall of the
season, a skim of ice on the meadow-ponds, shorter days, and long
cheerful evenings around the library fire. More than that, it brought
the end of the extra home-lessons, for by this time the Little Colonel
had not only caught up with her classes, but stood at the head of most
of them.
"I think she deserves a reward of merit," said Papa Jack when she came
home one day, proudly bearing a record of perfect recitations for a
week. And so it came about that the next Friday afternoon she had a
reward of her own choosing. Allison, Kitty, and Elise were invited out
to stay until Monday. So for two happy days four little girls raced back
and forth under the bare branches of the locusts, where usually one
lonely child walked to and fro by herself. And because the daylight did
not last half long enough, and because bedtime seemed to come hours too
soon, they were invited to come out next week also.
"It is almost like having Betty back again to have Allison," Lloyd
confided to her mother. "She is so sensible, and has the same sweet
little ways that Betty had of thinking of other people's pleasure first.
Sometimes I forget and call her Betty. I wish they could all come out
again next week."
"Have you looked at the calendar to see what comes next week, Lloyd?"
"No, mothah. What is it? Anybody's birthday?"
"What do we always have the last Thursday in November?"
"Oh, Thanksgiving!" exclaimed Lloyd, joyfully. "Anothah holiday! How
fast they come!"
Usually Thanksgiving was made a great occasion at Locust, and the house
was full of guests; but this year Mr. Sherman was obliged to be in New
York all week, and the old Colonel was in Virginia. Lloyd and her mother
were planning to celebrate alone when Aunt Jane sent for them to spend
the Thanksgiving vacation with her in town.
Lloyd never enjoyed her visits to her great-aunt Jane. The house was too
big and solemn with its dark furniture and heavily curtained windows.
The chairs were all so tall that they lifted her feet high above the
floor. The books in the library were all heavy volumes with dull, hard
names that she could not pronounce. The tedious hours when she sat in
the invalid's dimly lighted room and listened to the details of her many
ailments, or to tales of people whom she had never seen, seemed endless.
This Thanksgiving Day it was unusually cheerless. "All so grown-up and
grumbly!" thought Lloyd. "Seems to me the lesson set for me to learn on
every holiday is patience. I'm tiahed of being patient."
Aunt Jane had her Thanksgiving dinner in the middle of the day. Much
turkey and plum-pudding made Lloyd drowsy, and the hour that followed
was a stupid one. She sat motionless in a big velvet armchair listening
to more of Aunt Jane's long stories of unknown people. Now and then she
stifled a yawn, wishing with all her heart that she could change places
with the little newsboy, calling papers in the street below the window,
or with the stumpy-tailed dog frisking by in the snow. She fairly ached
with sitting still so long, and wondered how her mother could be so
interested in all that Aunt Jane was telling. She could have clapped her
hands for joy when the maid broke the tediousness of the hour by asking
Mrs. Sherman to step out into the hall. Mrs. Walton wanted to speak to
her at the telephone.
Lloyd slipped from her chair and followed her mother out of the room,
thankful for any excuse to make her escape. She wished she could hear
what Mrs. Walton was saying, instead of only one side of the
conversation. This is what she heard her mother say:
"Is that you, Mary?"
"Yes; we came in for the Thanksgiving holidays, and expect to stay until
Saturday afternoon."
"A Butterfly Carnival? How lovely!"
"No, I couldn't possibly leave for any length of time, thank you. Aunt
Jane is counting on my staying with her; but I'll gladly accept for
Lloyd if she is willing to stay away all night without me. Wait a
moment, please, I'll ask her."
"Lloyd," she said, turning from the instrument, "Mrs. Walton has just
telephoned me that you are included in the invitation that Anna Moore
has given the girls to the Butterfly Carnival at the Opera House
to-morrow afternoon. It is for the benefit of the free kindergarten in
which Mrs. Moore is interested, and she has taken a box at the matinée
for Anna and her friends. Anna is going to give a butterfly luncheon
just before the performance. She heard that you were in town and
thought that you were visiting Allison, so she called at Mrs. Walton's
to invite you. Mrs. Walton has asked you to stay all night with the
girls. Would you like to go?"
Mrs. Sherman could not help laughing at the expression of delight on
Lloyd's face as she began noiselessly clapping her hands.
"Oh, if it wouldn't be rude to Aunt Jane," she exclaimed, in a whisper,
"I'd just _squeal_, I'm so glad to get out of this dismal place. It is
all so grown-up and grumbly heah, and a Buttahfly Cahnival has such a
delicious sound."
Mrs. Sherman turned to the receiver again, and Lloyd listened eagerly to
one side of a short conversation about what to wear and when to go. Then
Mrs. Sherman hung up the receiver, saying, "Allison and Kitty are coming
for you. They will start on the next car. I'll ask Aunt Jane to send the
man over with your clothes in a little while, and I'll call in the
morning."
Twenty minutes later two bright faces smiled up at the window, two
little muffs waved an excited greeting, and Kitty and Allison ran up the
front steps to meet the Little Colonel.
"We're going to have the best time that ever was," cried Kitty. "Malcolm
and Keith and Rob are invited, too. So is Ranald, but he went out to
grandmother's directly after dinner to-day. He said he wouldn't miss the
good times he'd have in the country for forty old Butterfly Carnivals.
But the lunch is going to be beautiful, and it will be so nice to go to
the Carnival afterward, and all sit in the same box."
Mrs. Sherman, watching from an upper window, breathed a sigh of relief
as she saw the three girls going gaily down the street together. She
knew that Lloyd's vacation time could not fail to be a happy one if
spent in the home of her old friend, Mary Walton.
"I feel so queah," said the Little Colonel, as she followed Kitty and
Allison into the house and up the stairs to their rooms. "It is just as
if some one had waved a wand, and said, 'Presto! change!' Only half an
hour ago I was in a big dark house that was as quiet as a deaf and dumb
person. But heah, it seems as if the very walls were talkin', and I
can't take a step without seeing something curious. I am sure that there
is a story about that Indian tomahawk and peace-pipe on the wall, and
all those pretty things hanging ovah the doah."
"There is," answered Allison, pausing to point over the bannister to the
curios arranged in the hall below. "Papa brought them back from that
Indian campaign, when he was out so long, and captured that dreadful old
Apache chief, Geronimo. The things in that other corner are relics of
the Cuban War, and the other things are from the Philippines."
Lloyd lingered a moment on the stairs, leaning over the bannister to
peep into the library, where a flag, a portrait, and a sword shrined the
memory of one of the nation's best belovèd. It was only a glimpse she
caught, but with it came the impressive thought that she was in the home
of a hero; and a queer feeling, that she could not understand, surged
over her, warm and tender. It was as if she were in a church and ought
to tread softly, and move reverently in such a presence.
"Come on," called Allison, throwing open the door into her room.
"How different this is from the Cuckoo's Nest," was Lloyd's next
thought, as she looked about the interesting room, filled with toys and
souvenirs from all parts of the world.
"I'd lots rathah look at these things than play," she said, when a
choice of entertainment was offered her. "Oh, what a darling book!"
It was a quaint little volume of Japanese fairy tales she pounced upon,
printed on queer, crinkly paper, with pictures of amazing dragons and
brilliant birds, such as only the Japanese artists can paint. But before
she could examine that, Kitty had brought her a tortoise-shell
jinrikisha, and Allison a toy Filipino bed. Elise marshalled out a whole
colony of dolls, from Spanish soldiers to fur-clad Esquimaux babies.
Each brought out her special treasures, and all talked at once. They
piled the floor around her with interesting things, they filled her lap,
they covered the chairs and tables. And for every article there was an
interesting tale of the time or place where it had come into their
possession.
Outside the snow began to fall again. The electric cars passed and
repassed with whirr and rush and clang. The short winter day ended in
sudden dusk, and the maid came in to light the gas.
"Why, how could it get dark so soon!" exclaimed Lloyd, looking up in
surprise as she suddenly realised that it was night. "It doesn't seem to
me that I have been heah any time at all. I have enjoyed it so much."
After the big Thanksgiving dinner nobody was very hungry, but they all
followed Mrs. Walton down to the dining-room for a light lunch. Here
Lloyd found herself in another treasure-house of interesting things. She
could not turn her head without a glimpse of something to arouse her
curiosity, the quaint Chinese ladle on the sideboard, the gay procession
of elephants and peacocks around the border of the table-cover, the old
army chest, the silver candlesticks that had lighted the devotions of
many a Spanish friar in the gray monasteries of Cuba, and the exquisite
needlework of the nuns of far-away Luzon.
Mrs. Walton was the tale-teller now, and Lloyd listened with an intense
eagerness that made her dark eyes grow more starlike than ever, and
brought the delicate wild-rose pink flushing up into her cheeks.
Seeing what pleasure it was giving her little guest, Mrs. Walton took
her into the library afterward and opened the cabinets, pointing out one
object of interest after another. But the things that pleased Lloyd most
were the bells in the hall. Near the foot of the stairs, in an oaken
frame placed there for the purpose, swung three Spanish bells, that had
been presented to Mrs. Walton as trophies of war. They had been taken
from different church towers on the island of Luzon, by the Filipino
insurgents, when they were sacking the villages and taking everything
before them. These bells had been captured from the insurgents by the
soldiers of the general's division. A thrill went through the Little
Colonel as Mrs. Walton told her their history, and swung one of the
great iron tongues back and forth till the hall echoed with the clear
ringing.
Several times during the evening Lloyd slipped out into the hall again
to stand before these mute witnesses of the ravages of war, and tap the
rims with light finger tips. She tapped so lightly that only the
faintest echo sounded in the hall, but from her rapt face Mrs. Walton
knew that the note awakened other voices in the Little Colonel's
imagination. She had known Lloyd ever since she had gone to live at
Locust, and she remembered the child's quaint habit of singing to
herself.
All the words that pleased her fancy she strung together on the thread
of a soft minor tune, in a crooning little melody of her own. "Oh, the
buttercups an' daisies," she had heard her sing one time, standing
waist-high in a field of nodding bloom. "Oh, the buttercups an' daisies,
all white an' gold an' yellow. They're all a-smilin' at me! All a-sayin'
howdy! howdy!"
And another time when the August lilies, standing white and waxen in the
moonlight, had moved the old Colonel to speak tenderly of the wife of
his youth, Mrs. Walton had seen a smile cross his face, when the baby
voice, unconscious of an audience, crooned softly from the doorstep,
"Oh, the locus'-trees a-blowin', an' the stars a-shinin' through them,
an' the moonlight an' the lilies, an' Amanthis! An' Amanthis!"
Now, curious to know what thoughts the bells were awakening, Mrs. Walton
bent her head to listen as the Little Colonel chanted to herself in a
half-whisper, "Oh, the bells, the bells a-tolling, and the tales they
ring for evah, of the battle-flags an' victory, an' their hero! An'
their hero!"
The tears sprang to Mrs. Walton's eyes as she listened to the child's
interpretation of the voices of the bells, and presently, when she
looked up and saw Lloyd standing in front of the general's portrait,
gazing reverently into the brave, calm face, she crossed the room and
put an arm around her.
"Do you know," said the Little Colonel, in a confiding undertone, "when
I look up at that, I know just how Betty feels when she writes poetry.
She heahs voices inside, and thinks things too beautiful to find words
for. There's something in his face, and about that sword that he used
for his country, and the flag that he followed, and the bells that ring
for his memory, that make me want to cry; and yet there's a glad, proud
feelin' in my heart because he was so brave, as if he sort of belonged
to me, too. It makes me wish I could be a man, and go out and do
something brave and grand. What do you suppose makes me feel both ways
at the same time?"
"It is a part of patriotism," said Mrs. Walton, with a caressing hand on
her hair.
"I didn't know I had any," said Lloyd, seriously, looking up with
wondering eyes. "I always took grandfathah's side, you know, because the
Yankees shot his arm off. I hated 'em for it, and I nevah would hurrah
for the Union. I've despised Republicans and the Nawth from the time I
could talk."
"Don't say that, Lloyd," said Mrs. Walton, still caressing her soft
hair. "What have we to do with that old quarrel? Its time has long gone
by. I, too, am a daughter of the South, Lloyd, but surely such lives as
his have not been sacrificed in vain." She pointed impressively to the
portrait. "That, if nothing else, would make me want to forget that
North and South had ever been arrayed against each other. Surely such
lives as his by their high loyalty should inspire a love of country deep
enough to make America the guiding star of the nations."
Bedtime came long before Lloyd was ready for it. "Do you want to tell
your mother good night?" asked Mrs. Walton, stopping at the telephone as
they passed through the upper hall.
"Oh, yes," cried Lloyd. "How different it is from the Cuckoo's Nest. You
can't get homesick when you know you're at one end of a wiah, and yo'
mothah is at the othah."
Mrs. Walton called up Aunt Jane's number, and, putting the receiver into
Lloyd's hand, passed on into her room.
"Oh, mothah," Allison heard her say, "it's like livin' in that fairy
tale, where everything in the picture was made alive. Don't you
remembah? The birds sang, and the fishes swam, and the rivah ran.
Everything in the picture acted as if it were alive and out of its
frame. Everything in the house talks, for it has a story of its own. All
the family have been tellin' me stories, and I've had a lovely
Thanksgiving Day."
There was a long pause while Mrs. Sherman answered, then Allison heard
Lloyd's voice again.
"The lesson is a beautiful one this time. It isn't patience any moah. It
is _Patriotism_. Good night. Can you catch a kiss? Heah it is." Allison
heard the noise of her lips, and then a laughing good night as she hung
up the receiver.
They often had what they called night-gown parties at the Waltons, and
they had one that night, when they were all ready for bed. The little
group of white-robed figures gathered on the hearth rug at Mrs. Walton's
feet, counting their causes for thankfulness, and chattering sociably of
many things. Presently, across the merry conversation, fell a
recollection that rested on Lloyd's mind like a shadow. She remembered
Molly in her bare little bedroom over the kitchen, at the Cuckoo's Nest.
Poor little Molly, who could never know a happy Thanksgiving so long as
Dot was away from her!
Here was shelter and home-light and mother-love, but Molly had none of
the latter to be thankful for. Lloyd could not drive away the thought,
and when there came a pause in the conversation she began telling
Molly's story to her interested listeners. It had the same effect on
them that it had on Joyce and Eugenia, and presently Allison slipped
down to the library to bring up a volume of bound magazines that the
girls might see the picture that reminded Molly of Dot.
The grief of the poor little waif seemed very real to Elise, who hung
over the picture, calling attention to every detail of the shabby room.
"Look at the old broken stool," she said, "and her thin little arms.
And her shoes are all worn out, too. I wish she had a pair of mine."
Long after she was tucked away in her little white bed she called out
through the darkness, "Mamma, do you s'pose Dot knows how to say her
prayers?"
"I don't know, darling," came the answer. "It has been a long time since
she had any one to teach her." There was a pause, then another whispered
call.
"Mamma, do you s'pose it would do any good if I'd say them for her?"
"Yes, love, I am sure it would."
There was a rustling of bedclothes. Two bare feet struck the floor, and
Elise knelt down in the dark, saying, softly:
"Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray thee, Lord, her soul to keep.
If she should die before I wake,
I pray thee, Lord, my soul to take.
Please, God, help poor little lost Dot to get back to her sister. Amen.
There, I guess he'll know, even if it did sound sort of mixed up," she
said, climbing back to bed with a sigh of mingled relief and
satisfaction.
"That's the kind he loves best, little one," said her mother, coming
into the room to tuck her in once more. "It doesn't make any difference
about the pronouns. The more we mix our neighbours with ourselves in our
prayers, the better he is pleased."