[Illustration: 9034]
RULY no one ever looked into a face more beaming than Regie's when Mrs.
Fairfax told him of their plan to leave him in Sister Julia's care, and
that they were both to board at the Murrays.
“I've been wondering what you would do,” said Regie. “I knew you
could not take along a boy on crutches; and, Mamma Fairfax,” he added,
ruefully, “I thought I was in the way for once at any rate.”
Then Mrs. Fairfax drew the little fellow into her lap, and said, very
tenderly and earnestly, “Remember this, Regie Fairfax: you have never
been in the way yet, and you never will be so long as you stay the dear
good boy you are to-day.” A grateful, happy look came into Regie's face,
and he nestled his head close down on Mamma Fairfax's shoulder, quite
forgetting that nine-year-old boys are supposed not to care in the least
for that sort of thing.
Well, the day for the move to the Murrays dawned at last, though at
times it had seemed to Regie as if it never would come.
In the thought that he was going to live in the same house with Nan and
Harry, the little reprobate almost forgot he was to say good-bye to
Papa and Mamma Fairfax for three whole months at least. But Mr. and
Mrs. Fairfax were quite willing he should forget it, and were only too
delighted to see the little fellow anticipating so much happiness. It
would have been sad enough to have sailed away over that great ocean,
leaving a brokenhearted as well as a broken-legged little Reginald
behind them.
Still dependent upon his crutches, Regie of course could not help
very much with the packing, but as he sat on the piazza, in the warm
September sunshine, Sister Julia gave him a lapful of his own neckties
to sort over and fold into a box. They were to move that very afternoon.
It was half-past eleven now, and at twelve Harry and Nan were coming, as
they thought, to say “Good-bye.”
Puzzled little Nan and Harry! They had not heard a word of Reginald's
coming to stay with them. Had they known it, they would not have been
trudging sorrowfully along the beach as they were that very moment.
Naturally they wondered at the strange preparations going forward at
home. Fresh dimity curtains had been tacked up in the room over the
kitchen, and there was a new bowl and pitcher on the wash-stand, and
some red-bordered towels that were very beautiful in Nan's eyes. But
when the children asked their mother the reason for all this, she had
told them that times were a little hard, as indeed they were, and that
they were going to take a couple to board.
“I don't like the idea of a couple to board at all,” Harry had confided
to Nan when they were gathering up the chips one morning in the
woodshed.
“Neither do I,” sighed Nan, “but if times are hard of course we ought
to make the best of it.” That Sister Julia and Reginald were the couple
never entered their foolish little heads for a second.
Regie sat sorting the neckties, putting the worn ones, and the ones he
did not like, at the bottom of the box, you may be sure. Now and then
he would stop to watch the four Brooks' boys, who were playing tennis in
front of their cottage, and then it seemed as though he could not stand
keeping still another moment; but he knew he must, and that word _must_
is a very tyrannical and exacting little master. Presently the waggon
from the store at Atlanticville, where they sold everything, from
kerosene oil to shoe-strings, drove up and stopped; and a little errand
boy, no larger than Regie, jumped down and pulled a basket out from the
back. The basket was filled with groceries, and was so very heavy that
the boy had to slip the handle way up to his elbow, so that he could
rest part of its weight on his hip, as he carried it into the Brooks's
kitchen.
[Illustration: 0036]
When he came out again he stopped to watch the little tennis players
with such a wistful look on his thin face, while the old horse, as
overworked as his child-driver, improved the opportunity for a hurried
browsing on the Fairfax terrace.
“What a difference!” thought Regie, noting the contrast between the
boys in knickerbockers and polo caps and this shabby little stranger.
“I wonder why some boys have to wear themselves out trudging round with
dinners for other boys who do nothing but have a good time the whole
summer long!”
In another moment the little fellow jumped into his waggon, and, as if
to make up for lost time, jerked the old horse into a bobbing sort of
gait, which was something better than a walk and yet could not honestly
be called a trot Then Reginald sat dreaming and looking out to sea.
Perhaps he was thinking of a time when there might be a better order
of things, not exactly of a better world,--that blue ocean and
cloud-flecked sky were about as beautiful as anything could be--but of
a time when the sins and misfortunes of the fathers should no longer
be visited upon the children, and when everyone should have an equal
chance. At any rate his thoughts were far away from anything about him,
and Harry and Nan came nearer and nearer, without his ever seeing them,
and he only knew they were there when Nan rushed up in front of him and
said “Boo!” as if to frighten him out of his reverie.
“Why, I did not see you at all!” exclaimed Regie.
“Of course you didn't; you were looking right over our heads,” said
Harry, seating himself on the edge of the piazza, and straightway
beginning to whittle on a block, which was fast being converted into a
boat hull. “You seem to be able to see farther than anyone I know of,”
he added. “You looked then as though you were staring right round the
world and up the other side.” Reginald blushed a little. Somehow or
other, in the presence of matter-of-fact Harry, he always felt ashamed
of this dreaming habit of his.
“We're awful sorry you're going,” said Nan. “It's so dull for bodyguards
when there's no king to care for.”
“I'm glad you're sorry,” said Regie, biting his lip to keep from
smiling. He did not want to have the pleasure of telling them over quite
yet. Then there was a lull in the conversation. It was going to be very
lonely without Regie, and the bodyguard, particularly Nan, had little
heart for conversation.
“How's your base-ball club getting on, Harry?” asked Reginald, feeling
he must either keep matters going or tell right away. “It was great fun
your beating those fellows up at the Branch.”
“It was quite a beat,” Harry replied, complacently, “but I guess our
beating days are over.”
“Why?” asked Regie, astonished.
“Oh, our catcher, the best in the 'nine,' you know, is disabled.”
“That's too bad, but I suppose he'll get over it,” said Regie, cheerily.
“Well, I rather guess not,” Harry drily remarked; “he's dead,” and he
held the little boat-hull at arm's length to get a better view of its
shape. If Nan had been paying attention she would have taken Harry to
task for speaking in such apparently heartless fashion of poor little
Joe Moore's death. But instead of listening, she was wondering when
would be the best time to give Regie a little rubber pencil-case her
right hand was affectionately clasping, as it lay in the bottom of her
pocket. There was another long pause, and Reginald could keep his secret
no longer.
“Children,” he said, importantly, “where do you suppose I am going to
when I leave here?”
“To New York, of course,” replied Nan, with a little sigh.
“No, sir'ree; to Captain Epher Murray's;” and Regie, glancing from one
puzzled face to the other, fairly beamed with delight.
“To our house?” said Nan, incredulously.
“By Jimmini!” exclaimed Harry, tossing his hat so high in the air that
it caught on the leader of the roof.
“It isn't so!” said Nan, decidedly, and shaking her head from side to
side, showing that she believed that to be one of the things literally
too good to be true.
“Yes, it is true,” said Sister Julia, who had just come on to the porch
with her arms full of boxes; “and I am coming too, and the pony, and
Hereward, and Ned.”
“And we're going to stay till Christmas,” chimed in Regie.
“And what is more,” added Sister Julia, “we are coming this very day,
and you have arrived just in time to escort the king in person, as a
true bodyguard should. His little Royal Highness will ride in his own
court carriage,” and as she spoke Pet and the village cart jogged up to
the door.
[Illustration: 9039]
Then for a few moments Sister Julia and Nan busied themselves, stowing
away in the cart such valuable commodities as two or three tennis
racquets, a base-ball bat, a tool chest, a small photographing camera,
and other things too numerous to mention. Meanwhile Harry, to use his
own expressive English, had “shinned up” one of the piazza posts, and
succeeded in regaining his jubilant hat.
Nan's brown little face as she bustled about was wreathed in smiles, but
she said nothing. Awhile ago she was too sorry to talk, and now she was
too happy.
Finally, Sister Julia helped Reginald into the cart, and Nan, with
Regie's crutches in her lap, took her seat on one side and Harry on the
other.
'“When is your mother going?” questioned Harry.
“To-morrow morning early,” Reginald replied.
“Well, don't you want to say goodbye to her?”
“Do you suppose I'd be going off like this, Harry Murray, if I were not
going to see her again?” with as much imperiousness as a real king.
“Mr. and Mrs. Fairfax are coming to your house to-night to supper,”
Sister Julia explained.
“They are, are they?” said Harry, somewhat gruffly. “Well, I think they
might have told Nan and me something about it all.”
“Oh! I don't,” Nan cried, eagerly. “I think s'prises are lovely. I love
to be s'prised.”
“And I love to s'prise people,” said Reginald; “and so Mamma Fairfax
planned for me to do it.”
“Now I guess you're all ready,” Sister Julia remarked, wisely changing
the subject, as she tucked the linen lap-robe close about Nan, so that
her stiffly-starched little gingham dress should not puff out against
the wheel.
“Where are the dogs?” asked Harry, looking forward to their
establishment in his home with possibly as much interest as to that of
their little master.
Regie gave a loud, shrill whistle. That was one of the few things he
could do just as well as before he broke his leg, and so he seemed to
take special delight in doing it. Hereward and Ned came bounding from
some point back of the house, and Pet, seeming to understand that all
was in readiness, started off of his own accord. Hereward and Ned,
comprehending at once that they were to be allowed to follow, flew
hither and yon in the wildest manner, bringing up at the cart every few
minutes as if to report proceedings.
“Regie, why do you always say Papa Fairfax and Mamma Fairfax, instead
of just papa and mamma?” Nan asked presently. Evidently she had been
turning the matter over in her mind for some seconds.
“Because--because--” Regie hesitated,--“because, don't you know, I'm
adopted.”
“'Dopted,” said the children, in one breath. Reginald nodded his head in
the affirmative, and sat thoughtfully watching the sand as it fell from
the wheel with each revolution. If he had looked into Nan's face or
Harry's he would have seen a world of wonder in it.
Finally Nan said, in a very sympathetic way, as though she felt it must
be something very dreadful,--
“I do not know just what being adopted means, but have you always been
so?”
“Almost always. You see, Nan, my own father died when I was a little
fellow, and then Papa Fairfax, who was my father's best friend, took me
for his own little boy; and that being took is being adopted.”
In certain earnest moments Regie often forgot all about grammar.
“O--h!” said Nan.
It is astonishing how much that one word may mean when one gives it the
right inflection. As Nan used it, it stood for “Yes, I understand now;
you need never say another word about it, but isn't it strange? Not your
own father and mother! I shall have to do a great deal of thinking about
that.”
By this time Pet had travelled the half mile between the cottages, but
without doubt Hereward and Ned had made two miles of it. Regie half
believed they had understood the conversations going on about them, and
knew that they were to be permitted to enjoy, for three months longer,
the freedom of their life by the sea, instead of being cooped up in the
cramped backyard in town. At any rate, they were a pair of very jolly
dogs that warm September morning.
[Illustration: 5041]
[Illustration: 0042]