THERE had been a family council in which my relatives had all sat
around, gravely, and talked about me and my conduct. It was a painful
affair. They had mentioned every bad thing which I had done in the
course of a whole week, some of which I had not thought they knew about,
and then in the middle of it all grandmother Harcourt had made an
announcement.
"Rhoda's behavior grows worse and worse," she had advanced, severely.
"And as for her manners, she's a regular Hottentot!"
"Hottentot, eh?" granddad Lawrence repeated, whimsically.
He had me upon his knee, and as he spoke he turned my face toward his,
and regarded it with much apparent interest. I gazed back at him
wistfully. He was company, and it was very hard that company should hear
me called a Hottentot. I was sure that I did not look like that dreadful
name which had suddenly sprung upon grandmother's lips. It had such an
awful sound!
"She's no worse than other children," my mother urged, in defence.
She might blame me herself, but when grandmother Harcourt looked over
her spectacles and invented names my mother was sure to grow angry.
"It seems to me that I've heard about Hottentots before," granddad
Lawrence went on, nodding his head. "They're very fond of candy,
Hottentots are, and they like their own way. Yes, they like their own
way."
"Not any more than other children," my mother said again. "Rhoda gets
into mischief solely because she has nothing to do."
"Why don't you send her to school?" granddad Lawrence asked. "She is
seven years old."
"Oh, I couldn't send her to school!" my mother cried, anxiously.
"No, not yet," grandmother protested, in her turn.
It was the one subject upon which they agreed.
"Well, let her take lessons in something, then. There's the piano
standing untouched. I've heard of Hottentots who had a very good ear for
music."
He pinched my ear as he spoke, and puffed out his cheeks in a funny way,
as he always did when he wanted to laugh. He had very little hair on his
head, and a round, pink face like a baby's, and a pair of wicked blue
eyes that saw everything, both before and behind him. I had never heard
of granddad Lawrence being cross. He was good to everybody, from the
little newsboy who ran after him every morning in the street to the
stray dogs which selected him for a master on account of his smile. Most
of all he was good to us, his grandchildren, and hardly a day passed by
that granddad Lawrence did not come walking in to hear the news. There
were no children at his own house, for Auntie May was growing into a
young lady, and granddad Lawrence liked children, being a child himself
at heart, with all a child's love of mischief. But to the friends who
trusted in him, he was the soul of loyalty, in thought as well as in
word.
When he went home I walked out to the hall door with him, as I always
did, and then we had what he called a mercantile transaction. He bent
down low, and patted his pocket.
"Don't you want to draw on the bank?" he asked, invitingly.
I ran my hand far into the depths of that jingling pocket. I could have
whatever I liked, but the little brass pennies were the prettiest, and
the cute little silver ten-cent pieces, which seemed especially made for
children.
"Draw again," he said, generously. "Now give the cashier a kiss."