morning, and you thought you’d see what I’d got for you, didn’t you?”
he added to make conversation, the others meanwhile encircling Phronsie
and watching her with the most intense interest.
“Oh, I’ve never had a pair for my very own,” said the little girl,
simply.
“Haven’t you, now?” said the old man, kindly. “Well, then, I don’t see
but we must make this the best pair you’ve ever bought,” and he laughed
and shook his sides till his spectacles nearly tumbled off; and all the
children laughed with him, he was so jolly.
Then he got up and rummaged among some boxes over in the corner, until
he emerged from them with two or three pairs of little shoes hanging
over his arm.
“There, now, here’s a pair,” he said, and he proceeded to try on a
beautiful shiny shoe over Phronsie’s little red stocking. It just
fitted; but Polly saw to her dismay that it was “rights and lefts.”
“Oh, Ben,” she whispered to him aside, “they won’t do, and they’re
lovely; for Mamsie said, you know, we must be _sure_ to get ‘evens.’”
“Well, we can try again, then,” said Ben, “he’s got plenty more, I
s’pose.” And he told Mr. Beebe the difficulty.
But Ben was wrong. It wasn’t so easy to fit Phronsie’s little fat foot
thus nicely again, and Mr. Beebe brought forward shoe after shoe until
they were almost in despair.
In the meantime, Ben kept his own counsel. He walked around the shop
to see if he could possibly spy out a pair of “red-topped ones.” If he
couldn’t, he wasn’t going to take away Phronsie’s pleasure in the plain
ones by mentioning it. But no delightful “red-topped ones” appeared, or
showed signs of appearing, and he had almost given up the idea, when--
“Stay! wait a bit!” said the old man; “now I remember I made a pair
once for the squire’s little daughter down to the Point, but her ma
didn’t take ’em, she thought they were too small. Maybe they’ll just
fit. I shouldn’t wonder, now.”
And he ambled away to the farther part of the room; there, from
underneath a shelf, he produced a pair, saying as he brought them
towards the children, “But perhaps you’ll object to them for being
red-tops.”
“_Object_ to them!” Phronsie screamed right out. “Oh, Ben, he _did_
have them!” And then she was so ashamed she hid her face in Polly’s
cloak, while Ben explained to delighted Mr. Beebe, who began to try
them on.
Ben and Polly both held their breath. What if they shouldn’t fit! But
on the little shoe went; snugly it buttoned up; and then Mr. Beebe told
Phronsie to stand up.
“Stamp in it, child. Why, it looks as if ’twas made for her, don’t it?”
he said, pleased almost as the children.
The price, too, was just right. Polly didn’t know, as she counted out
the money into the old man’s hand, that at least a quarter of their
value was deducted. Phronsie wouldn’t have the shoe taken off; so the
old man cut the string, buttoned on its mate, and rolled up the poor
little old ones in a bit of newspaper.
“There, now!”--and then he put into her hand a most beautiful
button-hook; it had a bright little handle that looked like silver,
and it was just as cunning as it could be,--“that’s from me! And you’ll
come and see the old man again, won’t you, dear, and tell him how the
shoes go?”
And then Mrs. Beebe had to come in to see the “Pepper children” and to
ask after their mother; and to hear all about Phronsie’s accident of
the day before; and then she must run out and get a doughnut apiece for
them all, out of the big stone pot; and for Phronsie, a big piece of
cinnamon candy extra.
And then they all said “good-by,” and “Oh, thank you!” added Polly,
“ever so much!”
Out again and into the old wagon.
“I say,” said Joel, “that’s prime! Don’t I wish some of us had to get
new shoes every day!” And he settled back to a huge bit of his doughnut.
Over, back, and away they went home, only stopping to do Deacon Brown’s
errand. Phronsie would keep sticking her feet out from under the old
shawl to be sure that her shoes were really there, despite Polly’s fear
that she would take cold; for it was getting towards evening and a
little chilly.
Such an uproar as they had when they got home. The shoes were admired
and admired again, Mrs. Pepper protesting that she couldn’t have done
better if she had gone herself; as indeed she couldn’t. And she praised
the children heartily for their good behavior. As for Phronsie, she
danced around the old kitchen till the “red-tops” seemed only little
specks of color.
“I’m going to have ’em to sleep with me anyway, Polly,” she declared,
as Polly insisted on taking them off at last.
So to bed Phronsie trudged, grasping the precious shoes tightly to her
breast. And when Polly went to get into the big bed with her mother,
she peeped the last thing at Phronsie and laughed right out. One small,
red-topped shoe was clasped in the little well hand; the other, tucked
up on the pillow, had settled right down over her nose.
III
THE LITTLE TIN PLATE
“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, out in the “Provision Room.” “What’s
that?”
A loud noise struck her ear, and she dropped the end of the big bag,
out of which she was getting some potatoes for dinner and stopped to
listen. There it was again.
“Oh, my goodness me!” Polly gave a merry little laugh, “It’s at the
door,” and dropping the tin pan she had brought for the potatoes, she
skipped nimbly over the big bag. “P’raps it’s somebody come to call;”
for Polly dearly loved to be elegant, and nothing could have been so
truly magnificent as to have callers in their very best clothes come
and rap at the old green door. She had often imagined how they would
look. And now, “Perhaps--just perhaps,” she thought, as she skipped
along over the rickety steps leading up to the kitchen, “that there is
one really and truly come to see us!”
She raced through the kitchen and threw open the old door, the color
flying up to her brown hair, and her eyes sparkling. A man was standing
on the old flat stone, and pressed up close to the green door.
“Oh, Mr. Beggs!” cried Polly, the color dropping all out of her cheek
in her disappointment. He wasn’t a caller, not a bit of it, only the
ragman who drove through Badgertown once in a while, and collected the
rags and old bottles at the houses. And in return he gave tinware of
every description and brooms and wooden pails. There, off by the old
gate, was his big red cart, waiting in the road.
“Yes, I’ve come.” Mr. Beggs pushed back his flapping straw hat from his
forehead, and pulling out a big red cotton handkerchief from the pocket
of his much-worn linen coat that flapped around his legs, he wiped
his forehead vigorously. “Call’ated your Ma was ready maybe to trade
to-day.”
“We don’t have many rags, Mr. Beggs,” said Polly, stifling her
disappointment. “You know Mamsie told you not to trouble to stop often
because--”
“I know--I know,” said Mr. Beggs, interrupting. Then he leaned against
the door-casing to rest on one foot while he talked. “But then I alwus
d’rather stop, for you might get ready to trade. An’ tain’t no trouble
to me, cause it rests th’ horse. Is the boys to home?”
“No,” said Polly, “they went off to dig flag-root.”
“Pshaw, now.” The ragman pushed the old straw hat farther off from his
head till it began to look like a new background for it. “Why couldn’t
they have dug flag-root any other day, pray tell,” he exclaimed in
vexation; “I was a-goin’ to take ’em to ride on my cart.”
“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, just as much distressed, and clasping her
hands, “now, isn’t that too bad, Mr. Beggs!”
“’Tis,” said Mr. Beggs, gloomily. “I got to go all down round about
here, an’ over to the Hollow.”
Polly couldn’t say anything. To go “all down round about here and over
to the Hollow” on top of the red cart was such an enchanting thing, and
now the boys must lose it all!
“An’ I ain’t comin’ this way agin this summer,” said Mr. Beggs, as if
the other statement was not as bad as it possibly could be.
“O dear me!” said Polly again.
“I s’pose you an’ th’ little gal wouldn’t go, now.” The ragman pointed
a dingy thumb into the kitchen to indicate Phronsie.
For one wild moment Polly thought, “Oh, Mamsie wouldn’t care, and I
never get the chance if the boys are home.” And she took one rapturous
step to get Phronsie from the bedroom where she was washing “Baby”;
then she turned and stood quite still. “No,” she said.
“Well, you come right along,” said Mr. Beggs, well pleased to see her
start for Phronsie. “I’ll wait for ye an’ th’ little gal,” and he was
already slouching down to the old gate.
“I can’t go,” called Polly after him.
“Yes, come right along,” the ragman kept saying, so of course he
couldn’t hear any one else talk.
“I can’t go, and Phronsie can’t either.” Polly panted it out as she
went flying down the path after him, and she took hold of the end of
his old brown linen coat as he had one foot on the trace preparing to
jump up to his seat.
“Pshaw, now!” exclaimed Mr. Beggs, pausing to regard her ruefully. “Ye
can’t?”
“No,” said Polly. She couldn’t trust herself to look at the dear,
delightful tin things hanging all down the side of the cart. What a
lovely music they must make jingling together as the old horse jogged
along on his way! And the brooms stuck up at the corners, and smelling
so nice and new, and the quantities of other things, they might be the
most beautiful in all the world hidden within, that Mr. Beggs would
take out when customers were ready to buy. And she must give it all up!
“Pshaw, now--yer Ma won’t care, an’ I ain’t a-comin’ this way agin this
summer.” Mr. Beggs didn’t take his foot from the trace while he argued
it out. “An’ I’m goin’ all down round about here, an’ home by the
Hollow.”
“O dear!” Polly turned off and threw herself down on the grass just
beside the road. “I must go,” she cried passionately to herself. “I’ve
never been, and I can’t get the chance again.” Then Mamsie’s face
seemed to hop right up before her, saying only one word, “Polly.”
“So run along an’ git your bunnit, an’ bring th’ little gal.” Mr.
Beggs, seeing everything now fixed to his satisfaction, mounted his
cart, and took up the well-worn leather reins.
“No,” said Polly. She was standing by the cart now. “I can’t go, Mr.
Beggs. I thank you, sir, very much, but Mamsie wouldn’t like it; that
is, I can’t ask her.” The brown eyes seemed to say more than the words,
for the ragman, giving a long whistle to vent his regrets, clacked
to the old horse, and away the red cart rumbled down the dusty road,
leaving Polly standing on the grass by its side.
And the two little boys, hurrying around by the back way, found her so,
just as the red cart turned the corner of the road.
“Joel!” cried Polly, turning around. “Oh, I thought you’d gone to dig
flag-root.”
“So we did,” grumbled Joel, “but Davie forgot the knife.”
“I did, Polly,” confessed little Davie, hanging his head.
“Never mind, now,” cried Polly, in such a twitter she jumbled up her
words, “the ragman--Mr. Beggs--oh, Joe, run after him--”
“Where?” cried Joel, his black eyes roving wildly. To have Mr. Beggs
with them was an event not to be missed. “Where, Polly?” twitching her
sleeve.
“There,” Polly cried, just as wildly and pointing in the direction in
which the ragman had disappeared; “oh, run, Joe,--he’s been here to
take you and Davie to ride on his cart.”
It wasn’t necessary to tell Joel to run after that, and even Davie
showed a nimble pair of heels, and presently they were lost to view,
and Polly was left alone to go in and get the potatoes for dinner.
Joel roared so hard at every step of the road in pursuit of the red
cart that when he finally did come up with it, he had little breath
left. Mr. Beggs had slackened speed at the beginning of the hill, and
was now ruminating sourly over his failure to give pleasure to the
Little Brown House people, when he heard a faint piping sound that made
him crane his neck to look around the stack of brooms to see where it
came from. “We’re going,” gasped Davie, running to the side of Joel,
both boys having anxious hands outspread.
“Jerusalem, and th’ natives!” ejaculated the ragman, pulling the old
horse up straight. “I thought you was a-diggin’ flag-root.”
“We were,” gasped David. But it wasn’t until they were both fairly on
the cart and beside Mr. Beggs on the seat, that breath could be wasted
to relate the whole, “Only I forgot the big knife.”
“I’ll drive,” declared Joel, promptly. To talk about digging flag-root
was well enough when there was nothing greater as a subject, but
now--and he made a dash at the leather reins.
“Not yit,” said the ragman, holding them fast in his horny hand. “Well,
I never!” and he slapped his knee with the other fist. “Ain’t this
just--well, Jerusalem, an’ th’ natives--’tis!”
“When can I, say?” Joel pounded Mr. Beggs’s knee, and fastened his
black eyes pleadingly on the face under the old straw hat. Little Davie
had lapsed into a state of silent bliss, and was hanging to the edge of
the seat where it turned up on the outside. “Say, Mr. Beggs, when will
you let me drive?”
“You be still,” said Mr. Beggs, turning a pair of ruddy cheeks on which
a broad smile of satisfaction played; “I’ll let you drive when the time
comes.”
“When is it coming?” asked Joel, in impatience.
“’Tain’t never comin’,” said Mr. Beggs, “if you ain’t still, an’ behave
yourself.”
Joel, very much alarmed at this, sank back in his seat, and kept still
till it seemed to him that the ragman had forgotten his promise, so he
slid forward and began to clamor again.
“Can I--you said you would,” he teased, stretching out both brown
little hands.
“I said when ’twas time,” replied Mr. Beggs, coolly.
“’Tisn’t ever going to be time,” declared Joel, quite gone in despair.
The ragman burst out laughing, but seeing Joel’s face, and also that
little Davie on the other side was leaning forward much disturbed since
something that Joel didn’t like was being said, he added kindly, “now,
Joel, I’ll let you take th’ reins when we come to that house. See it?”
and he pointed off with his whip.
“Where--where?” cried Joel, eagerly, and jumping up to his feet.
“Sit down,” cried Mr. Beggs, pulling him back. “Land o’ Goshen, you’ll
be out an’ break your neck; then you never’d go with me agin, an’ what
would your Ma say?”
“Well, where is the house?” cried Joel, struggling to get a sight of
it. “I can’t see it.”
“You will in a minnit--there, now, look.”
It wasn’t necessary to advise this as Joel’s black eyes were doing
their best to acquaint their owner with an idea as to how soon the
little brown hands could hold those reins. And at last he squealed
right out, “Oh, there ’tis--oh, goody! I’m going to drive, Dave, I am,
soon’s we git up to that house,” pointing to a red farm-house set back
from the road and in between two tall poplars.
When they arrived, he was in great excitement, not caring in the least
for the pleasure of hearing Mr. Beggs calling out, “_Ra-ags--Ra-ags_,”
in a tone that began in a sort of a roar, and ended in a little fine
squeal that seemed to vanish into thin air; but it always brought every
farmer’s wife and daughter to the window or door, eager to turn the
last year’s or half year’s supply of carefully hoarded rags and old
bottles to good account. For sometimes, if Mr. Beggs could not dispose
of his tinware and brooms and pails which, of course, he much preferred
to do, he would count out pennies and five-cent pieces, so that new
ribbons or a bit of lace would be possible for such as cared for finery.
But little Davie, if it were possible to add to his bliss as he sat
there clinging to the edge of his seat on the top of the red cart,
now experienced that increase of delight, and he hung entranced as
Mr. Beggs bawled again impressively, “_Ra-ags--Ra-ags!_” as they came
almost up to the poplars.
A woman thrust her head in a sweeping-cap out of the side door. “The
ragman’s here, Em’line!” she screamed. Then she ran out to the
grass-plot. “Here, stop, Mr. Beggs,” she called frantically, waving
both hands.
“All right, marm,” said the ragman, pulling up his old horse. “I’m
a-stoppin’; you needn’t screech so.”
“You said I might drive when we got here.” Joel turned on him perfectly
furious, his black eyes flashing.
“Well, an’ so you may,” replied Mr. Beggs, composedly, preparing to get
down over the wheel. “But we ain’t a-goin’ to run over Mis’ Hinman.
When we start from here, Joel, you can have them lines. Now, then, both
o’ you boys can git down an’ stretch your legs, while I dicker with th’
women folks.”
Joel, seeing that this was all he could get, suffered himself to be
helped down from the cart, and little Davie followed, for both of them
hung absorbed over the exciting bargaining and exchange that now took
place.
“There’s another bag in the wood-chamber,” said Mrs. Hinman, as
Em’line, a tall, thin maiden not over young, with her red hair done up
in a hard twist like a door-knob on the back of her head, came hastily
dragging after her a swelled-up bag over the grass. “You’ve forgot
that.”
“I hain’t forgot it,” said Em’line, tartly, releasing the bag on the
ground by the side of the red cart, “but I can’t get ’em both to once.
My arm’s ’most broke with this one.”
Mrs. Hinman’s faded eyes took a new light. “You’ll give us good weight,
Mr. Beggs,” she said greedily.
“I’ll give you th’ weight that ’tis,” said the ragman, lifting out from
under his seat the long iron steelyards.
Em’line ran her eyes, a second edition of her mother’s, over the two
little figures crowding up at the ragman’s elbow. “Can’t one o’ them
boys git that other bag o’ rags?” she said.
“Oh, you don’t want to let ’em in th’ house,” said Mrs. Hinman, in
dismay.
“They won’t do no hurt,” said Em’line, carelessly; “it’s in th’
wood-chamber.”
“But they’ve got to go through th’ kitchen,” protested her mother, “an’
you don’t know who they be.”
“Excuse me,” said the ragman, with great dignity, “but I don’t take
folks a-ridin’ with me on this cart unless I do know who they be, Mis’
Hinman.”
“Well, they’re boys,” said Mrs. Hinman, holding to her point,
notwithstanding her desire to get to trading.
“Yes, to be sure, they _is_ boys,” said Mr. Beggs; “I ain’t a-denyin’
that,” and running the hook of the steelyards through the tied strings
of the bags, “but they’re Mis’ Pepper’s boys, an’ that makes a
difference.”
“Not Mis’ Pepper over to Badgertown, who lives in that little brown
house!” exclaimed Mrs. Hinman.
“Yes, marm;” with that the ragman lifted the steelyards and gave the
bag a swing, endeavoring to slide the hook along the iron bar to adjust
the weight, peering at it closely, while he held the whole thing aloft.
“Take care--it’s a-tetchin’ you,” screamed Mrs. Hinman, and trying to
push the bag of rags away from the long linen coat.
Mr. Beggs turned on her an angry face. “When I weigh rags, I weigh ’em,
Mis’ Hinman,” he said, “or else I never drive a trade with nobody.”
Thus admonished, Mrs. Hinman folded her nervous hands across her apron,
and held herself in check.
“Well, are those boys a-goin’ in after that other bag?” said Em’line;
“I know I ain’t,--my arm’s broke almost, draggin’ this one down.”
But Mr. Beggs, not appearing to hear, and certainly Joel and David,
so absorbed over the excitement of seeing the rags weighed that they
couldn’t be expected to understand what was wanted of them, it really
began to look as if Em’line would have to go after the other bag
herself, if she wanted it brought down.
“Twelve--twelve an’ a ha-alf,” said Mr. Beggs, slowly moving the hook
along a hair’s breadth.
“It’s more’n that,” broke in Mrs. Hinman, standing on tiptoe to peer
over his arm.
“Of course it is,” declared Em’line; “it weighs a lot more. It most
broke my arm a-draggin’ it along,” she added, as if bringing out a
wholly new statement.
“Th’ bag’s fairly busting, it’s so full,” contributed her mother,
indignantly.
“Rags weigh light; it takes a good many to make a pound,” said Mr.
Beggs, oracularly, and squinting at the numbers on the iron rod.
“I don’t care if they is, an’ mine are good hefty ones--all them pieces
after we got through with Sarah’s jacket, you know, Em’line,” she
nodded across Mr. Beggs’s big back.
“Don’t I know, Ma?” said Em’line, thriftily; “of course, there’s lots
o’ money in that bag o’ rags.”
“Twelve pounds an’ half an ounce,” declared Mr. Beggs, dumping the bag
on the grass, and slipping out the iron hook from the strings. “There’s
every bit as much as ’tis, an’ if you want to sell ’em to some other
ragman, why, I don’t care,” he added squarely.
“Oh, we ain’t a-goin’ to sell ’em to no one else, Mr. Beggs,” Mrs.
Hinman made haste to say in alarm; “only we did think there was a
little more weight to ’em,--jest a leetle more.”
“That’s every scrap there is,” declared Mr. Beggs, pushing back his
straw hat from his forehead, and beginning to put up his steelyards
under his seat.
“An’ there’s another bag, you know,” cried Em’line. “Say, ain’t one o’
them boys goin’ to bring it down for me?”
“I d’no, I’m sure,” replied Mr. Beggs; “that’s as they say. I don’t
invite folks to go a-ridin’ with me on my cart an’ then work ’em while
they’re a-visitin’.”
“Well, don’t they want to?” said Em’line; “say, don’t you?” and she
turned to Joel.
“Want to what?” demanded Joel, turning his black eyes on her, since the
delights of weighing the rags was over.
“Go into th’ house an’ get another bag o’ rags,” said Em’line,
wheedlingly.
“May I bring ’em out,” cried Joel, his black eyes sparkling; “may I?”
“Yes, if you’re a good boy,” said Em’line.
“Oh, whickets!” screamed Joel, springing off; “come on, Dave.”
“At th’ head o’ th’ stairs from th’ kitchen,” screamed Em’line after
him, in a jubilant little shriek.
“An’ don’t tetch nothin’ in th’ kitchen,” Mrs. Hinman called shrilly.
“You better go with ’em, Em’line,” she advised anxiously.
“There ain’t no need,” said Em’line, yet she went lazily over the grass
and disappeared in the kitchen doorway. And presently down came Joel
and David carrying between them a bag as much bigger as possible than
the first one.
“There, now, I guess you’ll see rags, Mr. Beggs,” said Em’line,
triumphantly following them; “them’s mine,” as the boys deposited the
bag on the grass, and then stood up to draw a long breath.
“Whew!” whistled the ragman, and then to fill up conversation, he
added, “I guess you’re goin’ to git married, Miss Em’line--”
Em’line simpered, and hung her head with the little hard knob of red
hair at the back. “How’d you guess, Mr. Beggs?”
“The Land o’ Goshen, ye be!” exclaimed the ragman, in great surprise;
“well, who’s th’ man, pray tell?”
“It’s Isr’el Sawyer,” said Mrs. Hinman, quickly. “An’ we better be a
settlin’ up this rag business, for I’ve got all my work a-waitin’ for
me in th’ house.”
The ragman smothered something in his straggly beard that, if heard,
would not be very complimentary to Isr’el Sawyer’s good judgment.
“That’s so, Mis’ Hinman,” he declared briskly; “well, now, we must see
what this ’ere bag weighs. ’Tis heftier, ain’t it?”
“I sh’d think ’twas,” cried Em’line, with greedy eyes, and an expansive
smile.
“Well, now, bein’s you’re goin’ to git married, I s’pose we must make
these rags come to as much as possible. Goin’ to take ’em out in tin?”
All the while he was adjusting the iron hook in place on the steelyards
and getting ready for the final swing of the bag.
“I guess not,” snapped Em’line; “I’m goin’ to have money an’ nothin’
else.”
“I’d just as lieves,” assented Mr. Beggs; “there she goes!” Then, when
the bag ceased to tremble as it hung from the hook, and the final notch
on the long bar had been decided on, “Fif--teen pounds an’ a quarter--”
“There’s twice as much,” cried Em’line, with an angry twitch at the
steelyards; “let me weigh ’em myself.”
“No, sir--ee!” declared Mr. Beggs, quite insulted; “no one does th’
weighin’ on them steelyards but myself. You can see all you want to,
an’ there ’tis, an’ you can’t make no more, not a mite, but fifteen
pounds an’ a quarter. But I ain’t anxious to trade with you to-day,
Miss Em’line,” and he slid out the hook from the strings of the bag;
“so after you’ve picked out your tinware, Mis’ Hinman, or do you want a
broom to-day, or do you want money, I ain’t partic’lar which, why, I’ll
say good day to ye both.”
“There, now, you see, Em’line,” cried her mother, “how you bite your
nose off to spite your face! Now you won’t sell them old rags at all,
for another man won’t come along, like enough, who’ll buy ’em, in a
dog’s age.”
Em’line stood biting her lips and tapping the ground with an irritable
foot. “You can have ’em,” at last she said to Mr. Beggs.