THE BOY PREDOMINATES
After Gay had sulked a little in his room, and indulged in rather
violent criticism of Miss Linn, the aspect of matters changed somewhat.
What was the use of spending the rest of the day in the dumps? There
must be some fun to be had even in the quiet guest-room. It occurred to
him that it would be sport to lean out of the window as far as possible
and try to look in the dining-room window, which was just below, with
his head upside down.
This was dangerous, of course, for a fall would have shaken up the
performer a trifle, but the danger was the fun and Gay hung out till
his head nearly touched the window below. While he was enjoying himself
in this way Margery passed through the garden and saw him.
"Goodness gracious," she cried. "You mustn't do that, Miss May."
"Why mustn't I?" asked Gay, not moving at all.
"You'll break your neck," answered Margery.
"Oh, no, I shan't," replied Gay, a good deal flattered by this
interest. "I could lean out still farther."
"May!" shrieked Margery, covering her head with her apron.
"Don't you like it?"
"Mercy, no. Are ye in yet?" said Margery, without uncovering her head.
"Yes, I'm in."
Margery uncovered her face and looked first on the ground to see if Gay
was there in fragments, then up at the window where he was now sitting
astride of the window-sill, swinging one foot on the outside.
"Oh!" shrieked Margery, when she saw this dreadful position. "Do get
in, miss; you'll get dizzy and fall out."
"I'm not allowed to do anything in this house!" sulked Gay. A moment
later he added, "Shall I have my dinner up here?"
"I guess so."
"Well, if you will give me some stout string and that little tray in
the kitchen with open work places on the ends, I'll rig something
to hoist my dinner up from the dining-room and let down the dishes
afterwards. It will save you lots of bother."
"I'll think about it," said Margery discreetly, hurrying away.
Gay sat quietly on the window for a moment, looking out over the garden
to the street beyond in search of something diverting. A boy, carrying
a large tin pail, was passing, and Gay recognized him.
"Hullo, Patsey!" he shouted. "Come into the yard, won't you?"
Patsey saw Gay at once and answered,—
"I can't now, miss; I'm carryin' ther dinner ter me mother's boarders."
"All right," returned Gay, who wouldn't have been guilty of interfering
with business. "Stop when you come back, then."
"I will, miss," Patsey replied, with a grin of delight. The democratic
manner of the visitor at Rose Cottage was quite to Patsey's mind; he
appreciated the good fellowship with which "Miss May" treated him.
"She's a darlin'," he thought, admiringly. "She's me notion of a
lady—speakin' to a b'y as if he was a human bein'."
Patsey's "notion of a lady" was a fairly good one, albeit he was
somewhat deceived in the specimen of which he spoke.
When Patsey was out of sight Gay remembered, with a pang of regret,
that he had an engagement with John at the noon hour. "I will write a
note to Aunt Beulah," thought he.
There were pen, ink and paper in the room, and after various trials Gay
wrote this note:—
"I write to ask you to Comute my Sentence. I have an Important
ingagement at twelve. I'll go back to prison when I've kept it, if you
will let me come down."
Gay did not know how to spell "commute" nor did he understand the
precise meaning of his first sentence, but he had heard his father, who
was a lawyer, use it in connection with prisoners, and he thought it
calculated to impress his aunts. He lowered the note by a string and
bobbed it up and down in front of the dining-room window until Margery
saw it and took it in.
"For Aunt Beulah, with my compliments," said Gay, with great courtesy.
A moment after Margery thrust her head out of the lower window. "You
can come down," she said.
"Hurrah!" shouted Gay, dashing out of the room, jumping down three
stairs at one jump and completing the descent by sliding down the
bannisters.
There was quite a group on the porch—the doctor's wife, who had been
"persuaded" to spend the day; the minister, who was willing to be
persuaded, so agreeable did he find Miss Celia's companionship, and the
doctor—who was not the doctor's wife's husband, by the way. They were
all laughing when Gay appeared.
"Your engagement must be very important, Miss May," said the doctor.
"It is," said Gay brightly, for he liked the big, bluff, jolly doctor,
"I'm going to feed the pigs for John."
This simple assertion was not received with favor by the feminine
portion of the group, but the doctor laughed heartily.
"I think pigs very interesting animals; so contented and fat and
jolly—Jane says contentment is better than wealth," Gay said.
"I have been told so," remarked the doctor, pleasantly.
"I mean to be a farmer when I grow up," continued unwary Gay. "I used
to think I'd be a lawyer, like father, but I've changed my mind."
"A lawyer!" Miss Linn exclaimed.
"I have heard," observed the minister, "that one of the results of the
popular movement for the higher education of women is to cause even
baby girls to select professions."
"Heaven forbid!" sighed the doctor's wife, who was reared in the good
old time when music, manners and morals were the only accomplishments
in which girls were instructed.
"Are you in favor of suffrage?" asked the doctor.
"Suffrage!" repeated Gay, for the word was not a familiar one.
"You will vote, won't you?"
"Yes," said Gay, on safe ground now, "when I'm twenty-one."
"How terrible!" gasped poor Miss Linn. "What is the world coming to?
The ballot and a profession! And to think such heresy is alive in
Elinor Walcott's household!"
"But you will go to balls and parties when you grow up, won't you?"
asked the doctor's wife, hoping this remark would elicit a fitting
reply.
"Not much!" said Gay, scornfully. "My father says we want fewer leaders
of the cotillon and more leaders of opinion in this country. I mean to
make mother proud of me."
"I think you'll do it, little girl," said the doctor. "Your parents
have exemplified in your training the advice of the eminent
divine—'make all your sons virtuous and all your daughters brave.'"
The minister opened his mouth to reply, but as the first word trembled
on his lips, Gay gave a whoop, cleared the stoop with one bound and ran
toward the pear orchard.
"What is it now?" said Miss Linn, plaintively.
The company rose with one accord and sought the lawn, where they had a
view of Gay, then in the midst of a group of boys, dealing blows right
and left.
"Is she fighting?" groaned Miss Linn.
"Oh, she will be hurt!" cried Miss Celia. "May, my dear child, come
here."
"What does it mean?" gasped the doctor's wife.
"Let her alone; she's a scientific boxer," the doctor cried, after a
hasty glance.
"A scientific boxer!" cried Miss Linn, clinging to Celia's arm for
support. "Elinor's daughter that!"
"I dare say it's so," said the doctor's wife. "I have heard that the
best families in New York are making athletes of their girls."
"Very sensibly, too," replied the doctor. "There goes the Carver boy
end over end."
"Somebody must separate them! What are we thinking of!" said Miss Celia.
"Shall I go?" asked the minister, who secretly thought the young Arab
could take care of herself, but who was anxious to do Miss Celia's
bidding.
"There goes the last boy over the fence," said the doctor. "Bravo! Miss
May," he added, as Gay, in tattered frock, joined them, "victory all
along the line, wasn't it?"
"I could have downed a dozen like them," gasped the victor. "They were
hardly worth tackling; they know about as much about boxing as hens,
but I guess they'll let the pears alone for a while."
"A girl," began Miss Linn, in awful tones, "a girl of refinement would
not fight with a vulgar rabble of boys; she would not notice them."
"Do I look like a girl of refinement?" asked Gay, with an audacious
smile.