MERRY-MAKING IN THE HAY-LOFT.
“Mosey!”
“Wotcher want, Nosey?”
“Wisht I had two bits.”
“Wot fer? You girls is alius thinkin’ o’ money.” Moses clinked the
nickels in his pocket with the air of a Vanderfeller. Betty’s voice
became wheedling.
“Mosey, ef I darn yer socks fer a month would you let me hev’ two
bits?”
“Well, I’ll be blowed, gosh! Mar’d larf to hear you tarlk. You’ll darn
my socks, two bits or no two bits, ef Mar says.”
“Now, Mosey, Mar’d be as mad as a wet hen ef she heard you. I want two
bits to give to the heathens in Arfrica an’ Mar don’t pay me fer doin’
chores like she pays you. Wisht I was a boy.”
“Well, I’ll see,” replied Moses, but as he plunged his hand again into
his pocket the cheerful jingle of coins stirred his masculine sense of
ownership to profounder depths and he frowned and turned on his heel.
For a moment Betty stood in an attitude of dejection, but suddenly her
face brightened. The muscles at the corners of her mouth stiffened,
her little pointed chin was thrust forward ever so slightly and a look
came into her brown eyes which said plainly, “Never you mind, Moses
Wopp, I’ll get money and more than two bits for my missionary box.”
The expression on the childish countenance became even more complex
and a close observer could have seen that all was not going to be well
with Moses Wopp for the next few days, and that “he’d be sorry.”
As far as general knowledge went, Betty was a complete encyclopedia
ahead of Moses. That youth’s brains had too many labyrinthine passages
through which knowledge meandered and got lost to ever lay claim to
erudition. As for creative ability, Betty imbibed ideas at every pore.
She took odd moments of her busy days and patching them together made
hours of creative joy, a sort of mental Joseph’s coat of rainbow
brightness.
Her disappointment over Moses’ parsimony led her now to see the urgent
necessity of ideas, vital ideas, in fact, ideas that could cause
silver to flow to her empty coffers, or in other words her missionary
box.
She had made the box herself of small pieces of wood, the lid was
nailed on and was provided with a wide inviting-looking slit so that
coins of large denomination could be deposited therein.
Betty had lent Moses fifteen cents of her Christmas money and was
receiving two pink and white candy canes as her weekly dividend—“truly
a lean annuitant.”
The child had been content to extract but fleeting moments of
sweetness from the confection and as the weeks passed had in the
time-honored custom kept the canes shining. Thus accumulated quite a
bagful of the tempting sweets. These she sold to a haughty plutocrat
at school for a dime. This coin of the realm made a pleasing clatter
in her wooden box; but she reflected, not without some degree of
logic, that ten cents would not go very far in carrying salvation to
the suffering heathen in Africa.
But ideas came flooding into Betty’s active mind. The desire to fill
her box, augmented by an even greater desire to let Moses see she
didn’t need his shekels, sent electrical energy to her brain.
Once she had seen a moving picture show. It was a marvellous
experience to her and had filled her dreams for many nights. She now
decided to have a little moving picture show of her own.
Her birthday would fall on the last Saturday in September and she was
sure to be allowed a party. Each guest could be secretly advised to
bring as many carrots as could be conveniently carried to gain
entrance to “The greatest movin’ picter gallery in the world, where
fairies an’ birds an’ flowers would act an’ tarlk.” The carrots so
obtained could be auctioned off to the adults present, and Betty felt
sure that her mother, seeing her carrots were not a success, would
give a high price for the succulent vegetables. A discreet hint must
also be thrown out that anyone not so fortunate as to be the possessor
of a spare carrot could bring silver.
How the missionary box would jingle! How the heathen would sing for
joy! While on the Wopp table carrot pudding could become a diurnal
felicity!
What delightfully busy and secret evenings Betty spent in the kitchen
with Mrs. Wopp helping and expostulating! What dismal sighs from Moses
who, like the Marchioness, cooled his eye at the keyhole! His sighs
penetrated through the said keyhole and almost softened the obdurate
Betty; but, alas, his eavesdropping ended only in whetting the edge of
his curiosity! What yelps from Jethro when Moses trod on his foot in
headlong flight from the door as his mother approached! What copious
notes written by Ebenezer Wopp on the whispering and conspiracies in
the kitchen! And then again what sweeping up and burning of cardboard,
what hunting through old newspapers and magazines, and what clicking
of scissors while a small pair of jaws worked simultaneously! What
gorgeous hues from the paint-box as Betty mixed her colors and painted
innumerable pictures cut from the magazines! Animals, birds, flowers!
Gay as color could make them! A veritable garden and zoo turned loose
in the kitchen!
Moses regretted a hundred times his refusal to grant Betty’s request
for two bits. He had since offered it and had tried to thrust it on
her, but injured pride could not thus be appeased.
At last the long-looked-for day arrived and by two o’clock eight
children from the nearest ranches had ridden or had been brought by
grownups to the Wopp farm, all arrayed in their best bibs and
tuckers.
For two days the aromas from the kitchen had been such as to dispel
the gloom from Moses’ countenance, and hope and anticipation blended
on his youthful visage.
The loft in the barn had been swept and garnished by Mr. Wopp for
Betty’s moving picture show, and thither, after the preliminary
how-d’you-do’s were over, she led her eager audience. Her head was
held at the exact angle for ascending the ladder to perform the
imposing duties of moving picture operator, and her foot was on the
first rung when she suddenly thought of the collection box for the
carrots the children were carrying.
“Moses,” she directed, “git an empty apple-box fer the burnt
orfferin’s.”
Moses, who was still in the dark as to the exact character of the
entertainment planned, was all eagerness to get preliminaries over.
“Here, slow-pokes, drop yer carrots in this here bin.” He indicated an
empty oat-bin.
Pat Bliggins approached the receptacle and deposited a prodigiously
overgrown, forked, dusty carrot, miraculously endowed with powers of
emotion, for several wrinkles beneath its green feathery top betrayed
extreme agitation.
Norah Bliggins carried in a little basket several carrots of various
sizes and complexions, all carefully scrubbed as became respectable
members of the vegetable family, and shining as sweet and clean as the
face of the child. These must have put to shame their forked brother,
for that perturbed carrot rolled heavily to a corner and hid his grimy
visage.
Norah clutched a fat smiling doll in one arm. As the result of a
puncture from a nail in the fence the doll was bleeding sawdust badly
at the knee. However a surgical operation with needle and thread would
restore health, and Norah stanched the wound with her pinafore and
prepared to enjoy life to the full. The doll continued to smile gaily
as though Spartan sawdust ran in her veins.
Peter Stolway carried a large paper bag, and as the carrots fell with
resounding thuds into the bin, they seemed like inebriated question
marks, so ungainly and irregular were their shapes. One giddy carrot
teetered on the edge as though about to entertain the onlookers by an
acrobatic performance.
“Git in there, an’ no nonsense,” ordered Moses, who was chafing at the
delay.
Mannel Rodd’s round face was very solemn as in two chubby fists he
held out a small box containing a number of short knobby specimens.
With the gracious air of a duchess, Maria Mifsud dropped into the
oat-bin about a peck of the vegetables. They were coiffured and
manicured correctly and doubtless considered themselves the elite of
the carota species.
“Bctcher took orl mornin’ to tittyvate them there carrots,” offered
Moses, edging up to Maria with conciliatory glances, and jostling St.
Elmo who stood waiting to contribute his donation. The little fellow,
whose nose was still “bluggy” from tripping over the saw-horse,
dropped his lonely long scraggy carrot on the floor, and in stooping
to pick it up struck his head against the handle of a hay-fork and
emitted a howl that might have been heard by the heathen themselves in
Africa. Betty comforted him with a gum-drop that had lain neglected in
her pocket for several weeks, and the cries ceased.
Lila Williams, with her dark curls falling over a pale blue gingham
dress, stood watching the proceedings with impatience. She was
yearning to burst into speech. As soon as St. Elmo’s cries were
reduced to intermittent gum-droppy sobs she turned to Betty, and
looking up trustfully into her brown eyes, she launched forth.
“I wathed theeth carroth mythelf, aint they lovely and red jutht like
Motheth hair.” She was quite oblivious of the scornful glance bestowed
on her by that outraged shock-headed youth.
Lastly came Moses’ turn to pay the admission fee, and with a
shame-faced expression he dropped several silver coins into the box
held in Betty’s hand. Her face was a study in feminine triumph as
Moses mumbled, “I aint got no carrots, so here’s my pay to git in ter
yer little ole show.”
On reaching the hay-loft all were seated with the least possible
degree of discomfort on upturned soap-boxes and apple-boxes. Betty
covered both windows with blankets and lit a lantern. She had
constructed a pasteboard box with a large square opening and now set
the lantern in such a way that a picture placed at the opening in the
box was illuminated so that all could see it clearly. Betty showed her
pictures in a well arranged order and her lively imagination supplied
the connecting links in the story her lantern “slides” unfolded.
The child was gifted in this most elemental of the arts, and her
histrionic ability carried along the interest of her listeners even
when the printed matter on the back of the paper interfered with the
clearness of the picture. Her imagination bolstered up the defects of
dry facts.
The story had fairly begun when Mrs. Wopp, Nell Gordon and Mrs.
Bliggins could be heard coming up the ladder.
“Them carrots do smell sweet.”
It was Mrs. Wopp’s voice. From her remarks one would gather that the
rarest perfumes wafted on the winds invoked by Solomon could never
seem so sweet to Woppian nostrils as the mingled odor of hay and
freshly dug carrots.
The ladder fairly creaked under the portly lady, and Miss Gordon felt
relieved when the loft was reached in safety. Mrs. Bliggins made no
remark, but smiled placidly. The three stood at the landing and
listened to the childish entertainer.
Betty was thoroughly engrossed in her subject. Her story was entirely
of birds and flowers and fairies. True, the pictures did not realize
in their movements the lightning-like rapidity of “really truly”
moving pictures, but they moved as fast as the young eyes that
followed them could wish.
“This,” said Betty, showing the picture of a robin, “is a wormivorious
bird.” Henry, the rooster, from his vantage point on a beam crowed
lustily, but Betty ignored his remark.
“He will dig up a worm from the ground, an’ while the worm stands on
one foot with droopin’ head the robin’ll pick it up an’ carry it orff
to feed the baby robins.”
Here she produced a picture of a nest of young robins, their beaks
wide open for a tempting morsel hanging from the bill of father robin.
“The robin is jist the carinest bird,” she added.
“Not arf as smart as a magpie,” dissented Moses, “I’ve saw magpies
that c’d think up the scheminest things.” Moses was beginning to
suffer from a surfeit of information and wanted to make a break in the
proceedings.
“Better quit tarlkin’, Moses, an’ let the picter show go on so’s we
kin hev supper, everythin’s laid an’ ready.”
Mrs. Wopp’s suggestion had an immediate and salutary effect on the
boy.
“This peacock,” went on Betty, showing the picture of a bird with
plumed tail outspread, “is the white peacock of the moon. It lives in
the moon, but when fairies want to come to play with li’l girls, they
harness the peacock an’ drive down to earth in a silver chariot.”
The pictures that followed were of fairies and sprites irresistible to
childish minds.
Through the Stygian darkness of the loft loomed the figure of Mrs.
Wopp, a white apron of huge dimensions indicating her presence. She
made as though to descend the ladder.
“Did you see the fine bin of carrots, Mar?” inquired Betty.
“Yes, I seen them an’ smelt them, too; they shore ’d delight the heart
of an Eskermo, Betty.”
“How much will you pay fer them fer my missionary box?” bargained the
child. “Will four shinin’ new quarters do?”
“O, Mar, won’t the heathens’ faces shine, too!” exclaimed Betty,
joyously, as the coins slipped into her box with an opulent clatter.
“Here are more beads of wampum, Betty, as I have no garden.” Nell
Gordon’s silver donation added appreciably to the weight of the
collection box.
The ladies, having descended the ladder, Betty began hurriedly to show
the remaining pictures. Visions of a sumptuous repast had flitted
before the minds of her listeners and a spirit of restlessness
pervaded the loft.
It may be that atmospheric changes helped to cause the disquiet, for
in the midst of an exciting account of a fairy dancing on a moonbeam,
a sudden shower descended on the barn and began to pour in a stream
through a hole in the roof, immediately over Moses’ head.
“I’d give my collar butting fer a seat on Noer’s ark right now,” said
Moses, loudly, interrupting the speaker. Then the roof began to leak
in another spot and a stream of water poured down on Betty’s moving
picture apparatus, so that the show had to be discontinued.
“I’m tho thorry, I wanted to hear more about the fairieth.” Lila
Williams would have braved the elements to listen to more of Betty’s
original stories.
“There aint no such things as fairies anyways.” Peter Stolway always
was a doubting Thomas, so Betty tossed her head in scorn as she
replied, “There is so, cos I’ve saw them with my very own eyes.”
St. Elmo clapped his tiny hands and asked for “Moah,” while Norah
Bliggins, who had been almost petrified when she heard the voice of
Mrs. Wopp, sat hoping no one would ask her for the golden text. She
was devoutly thankful that she could get up from her cramped position.
A wide lath in the upturned box which served as her seat had broken
and she had sunk deeper and deeper until her chubby chin and knees
were in close proximity. It required the united efforts of Maria and
Betty to extricate the unfortunate child. The doll was safe, however,
and with fortitude worthy of emulation still smiled although sawdust
again trickled from her re-opened wound. Henry started up a lusty
crowing and Moses began to whistle while Betty uncovered the windows
and made other preparations for leaving the loft. Several of her
pictures had been spoiled by the rain and the box reduced to a soft
pulpy mass.
Nero, nonchalantly fiddling a trifling accompaniment to the burning of
Rome, had nothing on Moses, as that blithe-hearted boy whistled a
joyous, albeit unmelodious, lilt to the devastation of Betty’s
picture show box.
The shower was over in a few moments and all prepared to leave the
barn for the house.
Moses came to the kitchen door pushing an untemperamental-looking
wheel-barrow with a leg in splints, that is, a leg of the vehicle. The
barrow was filled with carrots. He was accompanied by Job and Henry.
Behind him trooped a merry laughing group of expectant children.
As the door into the dining-room opened to the little guests, St. Elmo
Mifsud’s eyes almost darted out of his head, for there on the centre
of a bountifully-spread table stood an enormous chocolate cake with
eleven candles burning on it. The revelation supplied a fitting climax
for the epochal event of a thrilling picture show.
Betty entered the room last and was rendered almost speechless when
she saw the birthday cake. She knew it would have one more candle than
the cake for her last birthday had, but, O wonder of wonders! Around
the edge was a wreath of morning-glories, made of pink and white
icing, and in the heart of each was a silver dew-drop!
“Miss Gordon done it, I know,” whispered Betty, clasping and
unclasping her hands, “she’s not a school-teacher at orl, she’s jist a
fairy growed up, an’ Mar’s a fairy godmother!”