"OF all the childer I've iver seen he's the worst," Norah cried. "He's
as sharp as tacks, and as bad as a young magpie."
She had come into the sitting room, and stood regarding my mother at her
sewing.
"What is the matter, Norah?" my mother demanded, anxiously.
"It's Dick, ma'am. What else should it be? Ain't I been after making a
grand gingerbread for your lunch? And ain't he under your own bed this
blessèd moment?"
She paused for breath, almost crying, and wringing her hands.
"He's eating the whole of it!" she exclaimed.
"What, a whole gingerbread?" my mother repeated, evidently startled.
"Yes, ma'am. I've been poking at him with a broom; but it's no use."
There was a quick procession up to my mother's room, my mother leading
it, with her head thrown up in wrath, then little Trixie and I
hand-in-hand, and Norah following behind us to see justice done. The
room was dark and orderly; but there was a curious shuffling sound under
the bed.
"Dick!" my mother cried. "Come out of there! Dick! Do you hear what I
say? Richard!"
When my mother said "Richard" things were apt to be pretty serious.
Little Dick crawled out from under the bed very reluctantly. He was red
and sticky; but he had a happy expression as if he had been having
rather a good time. He brought a tin plate with him, and it was quite
empty. There was not even so much as a crumb in it. My mother looked at
him in horror, and grandmother, who had been attracted by the noise,
looked at him, too, over my mother's shoulder, with strong
disapprobation.
"If he were my son," she said, distinctly, "I'd give him a good
thrashing. He richly deserves it."
It was a dreadful moment. Little Trixie and I stared at the scene
fascinated, while my mother wavered between justice and mercy. When she
finally spoke her voice was very cold and severe.
"I don't know what I ever did to have such a son," she said. "After this
I am not going to be his mother any longer. I shall call him Master
Richard, as if he were a stranger, and he shall call me Mrs. Harcourt.
Nothing else."
Trixie and I held each other closer. It was a terrible sentence. To be a
stranger in one's own home! And not to have any mother! Little Dick's
red, childish cheeks paled, and he looked frightened. He made a hurried
movement forward, and caught hold of my mother's dress.
"Oh, mother!" he cried, beseechingly.
"Go away, Master Richard," she commanded. "I am not your mother."
"Oh, please, Mrs. Harcourt," Dick wailed. "Oh, please, Mrs. Harcourt,
let me call you mother!"
But my mother was inexorable. She pushed away his hands, and walked out
of the room, leaving him behind. They all went away, she, and
grandmother, and Norah, and even little Trixie. I was the only one who
remained.
I was very sorry for Dick, and I wanted to hug him badly. But I did not
quite dare. Dick never liked anybody to hug him, and it was very seldom
that he cried. He dug his fists into his eyes for a moment, and then he
took them away, and looked at me, gloomily.
"All right," he said. "If she ain't my mother I ain't her little boy!"
Then he walked into the next room which was his own, and went down into
the bottom bureau drawer, and got out a box with a red lining. In it was
his Waterbury watch. That was the most valuable thing that Dick
possessed. He always took it to bed with him at night, and he wound it
up in the mornings, and sometimes, when he didn't mean to play very
hard, sometimes he wore it. He put it on now, and he put two clean
handkerchiefs in his pocket, and his knife, and a red ball, and the knob
off the machine drawer, and two rubber bands, and a wish-bone, and the
little box out of a doll that makes her cry, and the stopper of a
cologne bottle. And he opened his missionary box, and fished out ten
pennies,--the ones which he was saving to educate a native child in
India. When I saw that I knew that things were very serious. I went up
close to him and touched him.
"Dick," I said. "Dick! What are you going to do? Oh, Dick!"
I said it timidly, for although little brother Dick was only six, and I
was nine, he was nearly as big as I was. And he was always masterful.
But he didn't repulse me this time, so I kissed him on his ear, and
rubbed my head against his shoulder, just to let him know that I loved
him. Somehow I thought that he would like to be loved just then. And
wonder of wonders he rubbed back!
"When I come home--" Dick said. "When I'm a rich man, sister, I'll buy
you some nice things. I'll buy you some candy, and a pretty dress. And
I'll buy you some guinea-pigs! I guess you'd like to have some
guinea-pigs, wouldn't you, sister?"
I didn't care a rap for guinea-pigs, but I nodded at him just to comfort
him. I felt that I should like an elephant if Dick bought it.
"And we'll build a nice house for them in the backyard," Dick went on,
evidently cheering up at the prospect. "Under the walnut-tree. And
there'll be fathers and mothers and sisters and brothers, and little
weany, weany ones, all white and pink!"
"But where are you going, Dick?" I demanded.
His face fell.
"I'm going through the Green Door," he said, doggedly.
"Oh!" I breathed, in alarm.
Now there was a long, high fence behind our house where the
morning-glory vines climbed up and still up, and then fell in beautiful
showers of purple and pink blossoms, and just in the very center of the
fence where the vines were the thinnest there was a door,--a bright,
green door, with a massive lock, and a huge key, and two great iron
hinges. None of us children knew what lay on the other side; but there
was something secret-looking about that door, as if it might lead into
Bluebeard's house, or out into fairy lanes and meadows. Once, a good
while ago, little Dick had climbed up to the top and looked over. Then
he came down again in a scramble.
"What did you see, brother?" I quavered.
"The black people!" he replied, in a whisper.
He caught hold of my apron, and we both stood listening. It seemed to
me that I could hear some one singing in the distance, a queer, elfish
sort of a song, and once a step passed along outside the gate,--a
loitering step.
"Run, sister, run!" Dick cried.
He caught me by the hand in sudden panic, and we both fled back to the
house together, and we never went near the Green Door for whole days and
days.
I remembered all this now, and I felt sorry for Dick. I think that Dick
felt sorry for himself, for he looked around the bedroom almost
wistfully when he went away. And he didn't slide down the banisters as
he usually did, but walked downstairs, step by step, very slowly, and
paused by the sitting room door. My mother was talking inside in quite a
happy fashion. There was the buzz of the sewing-machine, and a murmur of
conversation between her and grandmother, and once when she came to the
end of a seam, once the machine stopped, and my mother laughed. When
Dick heard that he went on down the hall with his head up; but he came
to a halt in the dark corner to hug the hobby-horse, and he cut off a
bit of its white mane, and put the piece carefully away in his pocket.
Dick was always very fond of the hobby-horse.
"Good-bye, old fellow, good-bye," he said. "Don't forget me,
Alcibiades."
Alcibiades pranced a little, but he did not say anything.
I was the one who spoke. I had been feeling pretty bad for sometime; but
now I couldn't stand it any longer. To see dear little brother Dick go
out into the world alone! Never to have any brother any more! I threw my
arms about him from the other side of the hobby-horse.
"Dick," I cried, tearfully. "Oh, please, Dick, don't go away! Take me
with you, won't you, Dick?"
"Will you go, too, sister?" Dick demanded, eagerly.