FORBIDDEN BOOKS AND CANDY HEARTS
During the weeks of worry over Ernest's eyes and the deeper anxiety over
Marian's tragic weakness, Chicken Little was left much to her own
devices. Mrs. Morton was too overburdened and harassed to give the child
the usual care and oversight. Sewing lessons were dropped entirely and
practising was so irregular that her music teacher was in despair.
Fortunately the days were short and Jane didn't have much time out of
school hours to get into mischief. While Ernest was shut in, she spent
most of her play time faithfully trying to amuse him. But after he got
out she proved the truth of the old adage of Satan and the idle hands.
Mrs. Morton always watched Chicken Little's reading most carefully for
the child bade fair to be as much of a bookworm as Ernest. She was
never permitted to borrow books from other children without having
Mother look them over.
Miss Brown's room at school was cursed with the usual abnormal pupil in
a silly overgrown girl called Sary Myers. Sary's parents were shiftless
and ignorant people and though Sary was almost fifteen years old, and a
woman in size, she was still among children of ten and eleven.
She was a good-natured girl, always willing to pet and humor the little
girls, and they liked her in a half contemptuous patronizing way. Sary
came to school one day with a book done up carefully in a newspaper. She
was very mysterious about it taking it out of her desk when Miss Brown's
back was turned, pointing to it with smirks and nods till the little
girls were so curious, they could hardly wait for recess to see the
wonderful volume.
At recess it went the rounds, Sary assuring them that it was a grand
story with lots about love and getting married, and that there was a
woman in it who treated a girl just terrible.
Chicken Little was not in the least interested in love or lovers, but
she was not proof against Sary's mysterious manner. She promptly begged
the loan of the precious book till noon. But there was only time for
aggravating peeps in the short hour filled with recitations. So she
coaxed Sary to let her take it home that night. Sary was easily
persuaded. Reading was a painful process to her and she had been
secretly hoping that one of the children would read the book and tell
her the story.
Chicken Little slipped it home guiltily hidden in her school bag. She
found it a weighty responsibility. No sooner had she ensconced herself
snugly in one of the dormer windows to read, than she heard someone
coming upstairs. It was only Olga. She thought possibly she would be
safer in Ernest's room, but Ernest and Carol were doing their algebra
there. At last she settled down in the front parlor and by tea time was
deep in the adventures of Rosamond Clifford, romantic and unreal enough
to satisfy the most exacting child.
For days the book was her constant companion outside of school hours.
She read snatches of it to Sary and a chosen few in a corner of the
schoolyard at recesses and noons. She hid it under her pillow ready for
her devouring eyes at an early hour in the morning. To be sure Chicken
Little never could wake up at an early hour, her mother having to call
long and lustily before she could rouse her at all. Still the book was
there if she should happen to want it.
After Chicken Little finished it, the story was passed from hand to hand
among the children. Gertie being the only one with sufficient firmness
of character to decline to read it without asking Mother. One
adventurous child discovered she could get other books by the same
author from the public library. These the children also passed round and
gloated over their lurid adventures for days. The stories were doubly
fascinating because each small sinner realized that the mushy volumes
must be carefully concealed from mothers and teachers. The craze ended
finally by Miss Brown's discovering a copy of "Cousin Maud" and
confiscating it after a sharp lecture to the school on what children
should read.
But the mischief was done. Fully a dozen young heads seethed with
romance. They imagined they were abused by unfeeling sisters or stern
parents. They looked for unhappy lovers around every corner. They even
tried to lie awake nights nursing broken hearts, but ten o'clock was the
latest hour anyone reached, though Grace Dart said she knew she heard it
strike one. Katy, indeed, walked in her sleep one night to her mother's
horror. Mrs. Halford promptly gave her a liberal dose of castor oil and
she was never able to repeat the wonderful feat.
At least six dolls were re-christened Rosamond Clifford, and seven
others promptly became Cousin Maud. Marbles and tag and the usual spring
outdoor sports were neglected while they planned doll elopements or
family quarrels, and locked the tiny heroines in dark closets.
Chicken Little was in great demand on these occasions because she had
learned some of the choicest scenes in the stories by heart and she
would talk for the dolls.
"My, you do Dr. Kennedy just grand!" said Katy stirred out of her usual
calm by a thrilling scene in which her prettiest doll had defied a cruel
stepfather made from a stick of stove-wood.
"It's awful easy," Jane responded modestly. "I've read it so often I can
say it most all, and I just try to act mad."
The epidemic of play-acting among the dolls gave Katy's practical
talents a chance also. There was a great demand for boy dolls. One badly
damaged tin soldier and a fat sailor boy were all that could be found.
But Katy was ingenious. She took her tallest doll and made her a
complete outfit of men's clothes including a cunning straw hat with a
black band. She sheared Angelina's blonde wig short and painted a smart
black mustache on her rosebud mouth.
Angie was so changed she wouldn't have known herself in the glass. But
she didn't need to. She became Horatio Seymour and was never permitted
to wear petticoats again.
The other children were so charmed, Katy was besieged with teasing to
make over their dolls. It was no small job and after being obliging once
or twice, Katy had the happy thought of charging fifteen cents for the
transformation.
This was more money than most of the little girls had, so they took to
borrowing boy dolls. Horatio Seymour was much over-worked. He took the
parts of villain, lover and irate father on an average of at least once
every day and from two to three times on Saturdays. Katy had to put a
little stick up his back-bone, he got so limp.
But the interest in this doll lovering began to wane after a time. The
children looked about for something else exciting. They began to make
Horatios out of the boys they knew. Some of the older girls started
writing notes, and the smaller ones hung round breathlessly to hear the
answers read. The boys were not always responsive. This was the height
of the marble season and most of the lads were too crazy over the mooted
question of "playing keeps" to care to spell out scrawly notes.
"Who is your beau, Jane?" Grace Dart demanded one day.
Chicken Little cherished a secret admiration for Carol, but she wouldn't
have betrayed it for worlds. Still she felt that she must claim somebody
to be in the swim. She thought about it for several days and finally
announced proudly to Grace that Johnny Carter was her beau.
"Why he's the boy you slapped! I thought you didn't like him Jane."
"I don't so very well," confessed Chicken Little reluctantly. "That's
the reason I took him. Don't you see--I'm going to reform him."
Grace looked decidedly puzzled.
"Yes, like the heroines do in books."
"What you going to do to Johnny?"
But Jane had it all thought out.
"His hands most always need washing awful bad--I did think of that, but
they don't seem ever to begin with hands. They most always make them
promise not to use tobacco or drink wine and stuff."
"Yes," said Grace doubtfully, "but Johnny doesn't do anything like
that--Mr. Carter would lick him if he did. He's temperance and awful
strict with Johnny. I heard Mother say so."
"Johnny chews gum. I've seen him lots of times--I think gum's most as
bad as tobacco don't you?"
"Maybe it's just as bad for a boy. Miss Brown always makes us throw it
in the waste-paper basket."
"Well, my mother thinks it's a horrid habit. She says no lady would do
such a thing."
"How you going to make him quit?"
This was a point that was not quite clear to Chicken Little herself. To
tell the truth she and Johnny had not been on very good terms since the
candy episode. She thought it best to be a little vague with Grace.
"For me to know and you to find out," she said with dignity.
"Bet you can't do it," retorted Grace, nettled. "Johnny Carter likes
that red-headed girl who goes to our Sunday School better than you
anyhow. I saw him talking to her. I guess it doesn't make a boy your
beau, just wanting him to be!" And Grace departed with her nose in the
air after this parting thrust.
It made Chicken Little feel a trifle uncomfortable. She wished she
hadn't been so hasty about claiming Johnny's affections. She wished this
still more when she went over to Halford's that evening for Katy called
to her before she got inside the gate.
"Somebody's got a beau!--somebody's got a beau!" and Katy pointed the
finger of scorn at her vigorously.
Chicken Little tried to appear unconcerned.
"Pooh, that's nothing--all the girls have."
Katy ignored this remark and returned to the charge.
"Jane Morton's got a beau! Johnny Carter is Jane's beau!"
Chicken Little began to feel distinctly uncomfortable. She did wish Katy
wouldn't sing it out so loud.
But Katy was thoroughly enjoying herself. She had discovered Ernest and
Carol coming along the walk and she saw her chance to make a hit. She
took up the refrain again with embellishments.
"Jane Morton's got a beau
And I know what'll please her,
A bottle of wine----"
but she got no further. Chicken Little, too, had caught sight of her
brother Ernest and Carol, and she flew at Katy like a young fury.
The remainder of the doggerel was largely drowned in the scuffle that
ensued, but Katy managed to get "Johnny Carter" out in a shrill treble
that carried far, in spite of the hands clapped over her mouth.
The boys heard it, grinned, and passed on. Chicken Little was furious.
"I'll never forgive you, Katy Halford, as long as I live, so there!" And
she turned her back on the offending Katy, stalked straight out of the
yard and banged the gate after her emphatically.
The feud lasted a week. Chicken Little passed Katy by as if she did not
exist, and Katy lost no opportunity to hector her. She chanted Johnny's
name every time Jane came in sight till the child loathed the sound. To
add to her woes, Grace Dart began to demand some visible proof that
Johnny was her beau.
"He hasn't ever given you anything, has he?" she quizzed. "He gave
Sallie a big red apple yesterday at recess--I saw him."
Chicken Little grew desperate. She didn't care very much to have Johnny
or anybody else as a beau. She wished there were no such things as beaux
on the face of the earth, but her pride was stung to the quick. She
began to imagine that Johnny grinned when he saw her. Suppose he had
heard. She wanted to run every time she saw him coming, but she felt
that she must do something to make friends with him.
Finally she thought out a way. She saw some of the older girls buying
candy hearts at the grocery store one Saturday when she went downtown on
an errand for her mother. That would be just the thing she thought. If
she could find one with a nice motto it surely wouldn't be very hard to
turn around and lay it on Johnny's desk.
The more she thought about it, the more feasible the plan seemed. Sunday
afternoon she went upstairs and shook a nickel out of her bank which she
invested in candy hearts the next morning, going downtown on her way to
school--a thing strictly forbidden in the Morton household.
She didn't have a chance to look at them till she got home at noon, and
then, alas, none of the mottoes seemed suitable. She couldn't make up
her mind to give him "You're my girl," or "I love you," or "Sweetheart
mine," which appeared oftenest in flaming red letters on their tombstone
surfaces.
She decided to try again. That night she took another nickel out of her
bank and bought more hearts the following morning. This time she found
two she thought might do. She wavered quite a while between "Be my
friend," and "I like you," at length deciding on the latter.
She wrapped it up carefully in a bit of white paper, then waiting her
opportunity took the rest of the bag of hearts and dumped them in the
grate. She was sick of them. Her mother coming in soon after wondered
what made such an odor of burned sugar.
But the act of putting the fateful heart on Johnny's desk wasn't as
simple as she had fancied beforehand. If Miss Brown wasn't looking,
Grace Dart was. It seemed to her that Grace didn't study a single bit
that whole afternoon. Twice when the coast was clear, she actually
turned around with the heart in her hand, but some way her courage
failed her. One look into Johnny's impish eyes paralyzed her hand.
Finally she decided to put it on his desk when he went to the board. She
would wait till he was almost back to his seat so nobody could get it,
and, then lay it down real quick.
The deed was done and Chicken Little turned back to bury her burning
face in her Geography and await results. She listened to the rustling of
paper as Johnny unwrapped the heart. There was a long silence. She
wondered if he would eat it. But Johnny evidently didn't eat it. She
couldn't detect the tiniest crunch. She began to grow more and more
uncomfortable. Suppose he should show it to some of the other
children--or to teacher.
But Johnny wasn't thinking of doing anything of the kind. He was
furtively contemplating the tip of a very red ear and a strip of cheek,
which were about all he could see of Chicken Little's face. Johnny had
secretly admired Chicken Little ever since she had got even with him so
artistically. He was considerably overcome by this unlooked-for mark of
her favor. But he couldn't think off-hand of any suitable way of
returning the courtesy.
He went through his pockets thoughtfully. Their contents were not
inspiring--five marbles, a piece of string, two broken slate pencils and
a red bandanna handkerchief slightly soiled. He cherished this
handkerchief specially because he had seen so many teamsters and
jockeys--his special admiration--carrying them. Further, he was the only
boy in school who had one.
He smoothed the handkerchief out carefully and looked at it. Finally he
folded it up into the smallest wad possible, tied it with the bit of
string, and reached under the desk touched Jane's arm. He pressed it
into her hand furtively when she looked around.
"'Tain't much," he said apologetically, "but maybe it'll do for your
doll."
Chicken Little walked on air going home from school that night. She
called Grace Dart clear across the street to come over and see. Grace
came and saw and bowed down. There was no need to ask who had given
Chicken Little the trophy. Only Johnny Carter possessed such a one--and
the handkerchief was undeniably big and masculine. But Jane's troubles
were not over yet. Grace had a good memory.
"I don't care if he did give it to you. I saw him chewing gum this
morning coming to school."
Chicken Little felt that having a beau was harder work than she had
bargained for. She privately resolved never never to have one again,
even if she never grew up to be like Rosamond Clifford. But she hated to
back down on any part of her program before Grace. She didn't like Grace
very well anyway.
But Johnny himself made things easier for her this time. He caught up
with her going home from school the next day and carelessly extended a
brand new paper of gum in passing.
"Oh, Johnny," she said, "I'd love it but Mother don't let
me--and--Johnny----"
Johnny looked expectant.
"I wish you wouldn't chew it either."
Johnny was surprised. He didn't reply for a moment then demanded:
"Why, gum's all right."
"No, it isn't--my Mother says it's a very bad habit."
Johnny pondered. He wasn't walking along with Jane, he was about two
steps ahead.
"Well, I don't mind quittin'--it's kind of girls' stuff anyway."