MR. STARBIRD'S DREAM.
Mr. Starbird began the school with his hands in mittens; but for all
that he governed the big boys without the least effort. His blisters
were so troublesome that he had to go to Squire Lyman's every day to
have them done up, and in that way Patty grew very well acquainted with
him. Before spring the whole family felt as if they had always known
him, and Mrs. Lyman called him Frank, because she and his mother had
been "girls together." Dorcas did not call him Frank, but they were
remarkably good friends.
After the winter school was done, Mr. Starbird still staid at
Perseverance, studying law with Mr. Chase, and boarding at Squire
Lyman's. He was a very funny man, always saying and doing strange
things; and that brings me round at last to Patty's dollar.
One evening Patty was so tired with picking up chips that she went and
threw herself into her mother's arms, saying, "Why don't the boys stick
the axe clear through the wood, mamma; then there wouldn't be chips to
bother folks."
For a wonder Mrs. Lyman was sitting down without any work in her hands,
and could stop to stroke Patty's hair and kiss her "lips like snips of
scarlet," which made the little girl happier than anything else in the
world. Mr. Starbird sat in a large armchair, holding a skein of yarn for
Dorcas, who sat in a small rocking-chair, winding it.
"Mrs. Lyman," said Mr. Starbird, "do you believe in dreams?"
"Indeed, I do not," replied Mrs. Lyman. "Why do you ask?"
"Well, I don't believe in them myself any more than you do, Mrs. Lyman.
But I did have such a very singular dream last night!"
"Do tell us what it was," said Dorcas.
"Certainly, if you like," said Mr. Starbird; "but I--but I don't know
about it; is it best to speak of such things before Patty?"
"Yes, you must, Mr. Starbird," cried Patty, springing up eagerly. "_I_
won't tell anybody, long's I live."
Mr. Starbird laughed.
"Well, in the first place, Mrs. Lyman, let me ask you if you lost any
money ever so long ago?"
"Yes, I lost a twenty-dollar gold piece last summer."
"Yes; and me, too. I had a silver dollar, 'n' I lost it," cried Patty.
"How strange!" said Mr. Starbird. "So my dream does have some sense in
it. Excuse me, Mrs. Lyman; but will you tell me where you kept the
money?"
"In my black silk pocket; but the pocket went too."
"And I suppose you have hunted everywhere for it."
"Of course we have," said Dorcas. "I guess you'd think so, Mr. Starbird;
why, we've turned this house upside down."
"To be sure. Well, I'd like to ask another question, Mrs. Lyman. Did you
ever think that woman that is about here so much--Siller Noonin, I
believe they call her--could have taken the money?"
"O, no, indeed, Francis; we consider Priscilla an honest woman."
"That was not what I meant to say, Mrs. Lyman. What I was going to ask
was this: Wasn't there a funny old man here at the time you lost the
money? and didn't Siller Noonin say that either he stole the money or
she did?"
Mrs. Lyman looked surprised.
"Yes; there was a little old man at the house in haying-time, and I
believe Priscilla did say she thought--"
"Yes, mother," broke in Dorcas; "and he was sitting out on the fence
when she said it, and we were afraid he heard; but how did you know
that, Mr. Starbird? It didn't come to you in your dream?"
"Ah, Miss Dorcas, you are beginning to be curious; but when I go on to
tell you more, you will open your eyes wider yet. I never saw that
little old man, Mrs. Lyman, and never heard you speak of him; but I
dreamed I was husking corn in your barn, and a man about as tall as your
Mary--"
Just then Mary, and Moses, and George, and Silas, and John, and Rachel
came into the room, followed by William Parlin; and Mr. Starbird had to
begin at the beginning and tell as far as this all over again.
"A man as tall, perhaps, as Mary, with hair the color of pumpkin and
milk, limped up to me--"
"Why, mother, why, Rachel, his hair _was_ all yellow and white," said
Moses.
"Well, so I said," pursued Mr. Starbird. "And there were red rings round
his eyes, and he had a turn-up nose, and hands all covered with warts."
"Mr. Starbird, you must have seen Israel Crossman," said Mrs. Lyman, who
had stopped rocking in her surprise.
"Israel Crossman! That was the very name he spoke as he limped into the
barn. I declare, Mrs. Lyman, this is growing more and more mysterious;
but I never saw Israel Crossman; I give you my word."
"How very strange!" said Dorcas; "but do make haste and finish, for I am
getting all of a tremble."
"Me, too," cried Patty, clinging close to her mother's neck.
"Well, the old man sidled along to me, and said he,--
"'I'm Isr'el Crossman; and look here: me and Squire Lyman's two hired
men and (I've forgotten the other name) got in hay into this ere barn
last summer. Squire Lyman's folks used me well; but there's one thing
that's laid heavy on my mind. Mrs. Lyman lost a gold piece while I was
here--'"
"Yes, and me a silver dollar," cried Patty.
"'And it distressed me bad,' said Israel, 'for Siller Noonin up and said
that either she stole it, or I did. But it's come to me lately,' said
Israel, 'what must have 'come of that money! I never took it; bless you,
I never stole a pin! But I see that little Patty to play out in the barn
with one of her rag babies.'"
"O, I never," exclaimed Patty.
"Don't interrupt," whispered one of the twins, deeply interested.
"You know I am only telling a silly dream, my dear," said Mr. Starbird.
"This little man said he saw Patty playing on the scaffold before the
hay was got into the barn, and she had something round her doll's neck
that looked like a pocket. He didn't know any more than that; but he
'sort of mistrusted' that she might have left the doll on the scaffold,
and the men might have pitched hay right on top of it."
"Sure enough," exclaimed Dorcas, with a nervous laugh; "who knows but
she did?"
"Have you lost a doll, Patty?" asked William Parlin.
"No; I never."
"O, she doesn't know when she loses dolls," said Rachel; "she always
keeps more than a dozen or so on hand."
"Well, I was going to say," continued Mr. Starbird, "you could easily
find out whether there was any meaning to my dream. If there _is_ a doll
up there on the scaffold, the hay is getting so low you could scrape
round and find it."
"That's so," cried the twins.
"Not that it's really worth while, either," added Mr. Starbird; "for, as
I said, it was only--"
"But there isn't the least harm in going out to see," said Mary and the
twins, and William Parlin, all in a breath, as they started on a run for
the barn. Patty slipped down from her mother's arms and followed.
"Me! Me! Let me go first," she cried. And before any one else could do
it, her swift little feet were mounting the ladder, and next minute
tripping over the scaffold.
"O, look! O, catch! Here it is! Here is my dolly all up in the corner,
and here's a pocket round her neck!"
Dorcas, who was always rather nervous, sat on the barn floor and laughed
and cried herself into such a state that Mr. Starbird had to give her
his arm to help her back to the house.
There was a great time, you may be sure, when Patty shook the pocket
before everybody's eyes, and James rang the twenty-dollar piece on the
brick hearth to make sure it was good gold. Dorcas was so excited that
pink spots came in both her cheeks, and even James did not know what to
think. Betsey Gould started right off to Dr. Potter's, where Siller
Noonin happened to be, to tell Siller the story. Dorcas kept having
little spasms of laughing and crying, and the whole household had rather
a frightened look; for it was the most marvellous dream they ever heard
of.
"Well, mother, what do you think now of dreams?" said Moses. "Guess
you'll have to give it up."
Mrs. Lyman had been in her bedroom to put the gold piece into her
drawer, and she now came back and took up her stocking-basket, as if
nothing had happened.
"I will tell you to-morrow what I think of dreams, Moses.--Hush, Patty,
I am afraid we shall be sorry you found your dollar, if it makes you so
noisy."
Mr. Starbird went up to the table where Mrs. Lyman sat, pretending to be
looking for the shears, but really to get a peep at the lady's eyes. At
any rate, he did not go away till he had made her look at him, and then
they both smiled, and Mrs. Lyman said, in a very low voice,--
"Francis, you have kept up the joke long enough."
Frank nodded and went back to the settle.
"James," said he, "you are the wise one of the family; I wish you would
tell me how you account for my dream."
"Can't account for it," said James, shaking his head; "don't pretend
to."
"Well, then, if you can't," returned Mr. Starbird, looking very
innocent, "perhaps you can tell me what day of the month it is?"
There was a general uproar then.
"Have you been making fools of us, Frank Starbird?" cried James and
Rachel, seizing him, one by the hair, the other by the ears.
"April Fools! April Fools!" exclaimed all the children together,--all
except Dorcas.
"It's the best fool I ever heard of," said William Parlin; "but how did
you do it, sir?"
"Yes, explain yourself," said James and Rachel. "Was mother in the
secret?"
"No; but Dorcas was. Let go my hair, James, and I'll speak.--Fact is, I
happened to find that rag baby out there on the scaffold this afternoon
with that pocket on its neck, and so I dreamed a dream to suit myself."
"Yes," said Dorcas; "and I told him just how Israel Crossman looked, and
all about Siller Noonin, and didn't he say it off like a book?"
"Wasn't it a dream, then?" asked little Patty.
"No, dear; it was only nonsense."
"Well, then, I didn't put my dolly out there,--did I?"
"Yes, of course you did," said her mother; "only you have forgotten it."
But Patty looked puzzled. She could not recollect that ever so long ago,
the day the beggar girl came to the house, she had cured Polly Dolly
Adaline's sore throat with her mother's quilted pocket, and then had
carried the sick dolly out to the barn, "so she could get well faster
where there wasn't any noise."
No, Patty could not recollect this, and the whole thing was a mystery to
her.
"Children," said Mrs. Lyman, looking up from her stockings, as soon as
there was a chance to speak, "I have one word to say on this subject:
whenever you hear of signs and wonders, don't believe in them till
you've sifted them to the bottom. And when you've done that, mark my
words, you'll find there's no more substance to them than there is to
Francis Starbird's April Fool Dream."
"True," said Rachel and James; and then, as half a dozen of the younger
ones had gone out, they had a quiet talk, five or six of them, round the
fire, and Patty went to sleep sitting on Mr. Starbird's knee.