THE STRAWBERRY MARK
Agnes Kenway had never been so uncomfortable in her life as she was
sitting at that pleasant tea-table, at which the invalid, Mrs. Buckham,
presided. And for once her usually cheerful tongue was stilled.
"What's the matter with Aggie?" asked Neale O'Neil. "Lost your tongue?"
"I believe our pretty one is bashful," suggested Mrs. Buckham, smiling
upon the next to the oldest Corner House girl.
"Well, if she is, it's the first time," murmured Neale. But he said no
more. Neale suddenly guessed what was troubling his girl friend, and had
tact enough to keep his lips closed.
Agnes was just as honest a girl at heart as ever breathed. She did not
need the reminder of the farmer's old doggerel to keep her from touching
that which was not hers.
At the time when she had led the raid of the basket ball team and their
friends upon Mr. Buckham's strawberry patch, she had been inspired by
mere thoughtlessness and high spirits. The idea that she was
trespassing--actually stealing--never entered her helter-skelter
thoughts until afterward.
The field was so large, there were so many berries, and she and her
mates took so few, that it really did not seem like stealing to
thoughtless Agnes--no, indeed! It was just a prank.
And now to hear Bob Buckham express his horror of a thief!
"And that's what I am!" thought the bitterly repentant Agnes. "No, not a
thief _now_. But I was at the time I took those berries. I am awfully
sorry that I did such a thing. I--I wish I could tell him so."
That thought took fast hold upon the girl's mind. Her appreciation of
the enormity of her offence had not been so great before--not even when
Mr. Marks, the principal of the Milton High School, was talking so
seriously to the girls about their frolic.
Then she had felt mainly the keen disappointment the punishment for her
wrong-doing had brought. Not to be allowed to take part in the play
which she felt sure would be enacted by the pupils of the Milton schools
for the benefit of the Women's and Children's Hospital was a bitter
disappointment, and that thought filled her mind.
Now she felt a different pang--far different. Shame for her act, and
sorrow for the wrong she had done, bore Agnes' spirit down. Little
wonder that she was all but dumb, and that her flowerlike face was
overcast.
Tea was over and Mr. Buckham drew his wife's wheel-chair back to its
usual place by the window. The light was fading even there, and Ruth
said that they must start for home.
"Don't run away, sis," said the old farmer. "Marm and me don't have many
visitors like you; an' we're glad to have ye."
"I fear that Mrs. MacCall will be afraid for us if we remain away much
after dark," Ruth said cheerfully. She had already explained about Mrs.
MacCall and Aunt Sarah, and even about Uncle Rufus.
"But we all have had such a nice time," Ruth added. "I know we shall
only be too glad to come again."
"That's a good word," declared the invalid. "You can't come too often."
"Thank you," said Ruth. "If Neale will get the ponies ready----"
"And while he's doin' so, I'll take a look at that dog's ear again,"
said Mr. Buckham, cheerfully. "Wouldn't want nothin' bad to happen to
such a brave dog as Tom Jonah."
"He's layin' out behind my kitchen stove, and he behaves like a
Christian," Posy declared.
"He's a gentleman, Tom Jonah is," said Tess, proudly. "It says so on his
collar," and she proceeded to tell the good-natured maid-of-all-work Tom
Jonah's history--how he had first come to the old Corner House, and all
that he had done, and how his old master had once unsuccessfully tried
to win him back.
"But he wouldn't leave us at all. Would he, Dot?" she concluded.
"Of course not," said the smallest girl. "Why should he? Aren't we just
as nice to him as we can be? And he sleeps in the kitchen when it's
cold, for Mrs. MacCall says he's too old to take his chances out of
doors these sharp nights."
"That's very thoughtful of your Mrs. MacCall, I do allow," agreed the
jolly invalid. "And do you suppose she will get your doll's cloak done
in time for your call on Mrs. Eland?"
"My Alice-doll's cloak? I do hope so," said Dot, with a sigh of anxiety.
"Wouldn't you go to call on the lady without her, if the cloak shouldn't
be done?" asked the farmer's wife, much amused.
"Oh, no! I couldn't do that," said Dot, gravely. "You see, I promised
her."
"Who, Mrs. Eland?"
"No, ma'am. My Alice-doll. I told her she should go with us. You see,"
said the smallest Corner House girl, "she was with us when we made the
acquaintance of Mrs. Eland--Tess and me. And my Alice-doll liked her
just as well as Tess and me. So there you are!"
"I see," agreed Mrs. Buckham, quite seriously. "You couldn't disappoint
the child."
"Oh, no indeed!" said Dot. "I wouldn't want to! You see--she's not very
strong. She hasn't been since that time she was buried alive."
"Buried alive!" gasped the lady in horror and surprise.
"Yes, ma'am. With the dried apples."
"Buried with dried apples?" repeated Mrs. Buckham, her wonder growing.
"What for?"
"It was a most awful cat's-triumph," said Dot, shaking her head, and
very, very solemn, "and it makes my Alice-doll very nervous even to hear
it talked about. If she were here I wouldn't mention it----"
"What? _What_ did you say, child?" gasped Mrs. Buckham. "About a cat, I
mean, my dear?"
"She means 'catastrophe,'" said Tess, coming to the rescue. "I really
wish, Dot Kenway, that you wouldn't use words that you can't use!"
Mrs. Buckham's mellow laughter rang out and she hugged the smallest
Corner House girl close to her side.
"Never mind, honey," she said. "If you want to make up a new word, you
shall--so there!"
Meanwhile Agnes had followed the farmer out into the big kitchen. The
old man sat in a low chair and pulled Tom Jonah tenderly between his
huge knees, till the dog laid his muzzle in his lap, looking up at the
man confidingly out of his big, brown eyes.
Mr. Buckham had put on a pair of silver-bowed spectacles and had the
salve-box in his hand. He laid the badly torn ear carefully upon his
knee and began to apply the salve with a gentle, if calloused,
forefinger.
"This'll take the pizen out, old feller," said the farmer, crooningly.
Tom Jonah whined, but did not move. The application of the salve hurt
the dog, but he did not pull away from the man's hand.
"He sure _is_ a gentleman, jest as the little gal says," chuckled Bob
Buckham.
He looked so kindly and humorously up at Agnes standing before him, that
the troubled Corner House girl almost broke out into weeping. She
gripped her fingers into her palms until the nails almost cut the tender
flesh. Her heart swelled and the tears stung her eyelids when she winked
them back. Agnes was a passionate, stormy-tempered child. This was a
crisis in her young life. She had always been open and frank, but nobody
will ever know what it cost her to blurt out her first words to Mr. Bob
Buckham.
"Oh, Mr. Buckham! do you _hate_ anybody who steals from you?"
"Heh?" he said, startled by her vehemence. "Do I hate 'em?"
"Yes."
"Goodness me, gal! I hope not. I'm a communin' Christian in our church,
an' I hope I don't have no hatred in my heart against none o' my
fellermen. But I hate some things that poor, weak, human critters
does--yes, ma'am! 'Specially some of the ornery things Bob Buckham's
done."
"Oh, Mr. Buckham! _you_ never stole," blurted out Agnes.
"Ya-as I have. That's why I hate stealin' so, I reckon," said the
farmer, slowly.
"Not, really?" cried Agnes.
"Yep. 'Twas a-many year ago. Marm and me had jest come on this farm. She
was young an' spry then, God bless her! And it was well she was. Bob
Buckham wouldn't never have owned the place and stacked up the few
dollars he has in bank, if it hadn't been for her spryness.
"I'd jest got my first strawberry patch inter bearin'----"
"Oh! Strawberries!" gasped Agnes.
"Ya-as'm. Them's what I've made most of my money on. I only had a small
patch. They was fust-class berries--most on 'em. They packed well, and
we had ter put 'em into round, covered, quart boxes to ship in them
days. I got a repertation with the local shipper for havin' A-number-one
fruit.
"Wal! Marm an' me was mighty hard up. We was dependin' on the _re_-turns
from the strawberry crop to pay mortgage, int'rest and taxes. And one
end of the strawberry patch--the late end--had the meachinest lookin'
berries ye ever seen."
Old Bob chuckled at the remembrance. His gaze sought the firelight
flashing through the bars of the grate of the big cookstove.
"Wal!" he said. "That was a bad time. We needin' the money so, and the
berry crop likely to be short of what we figgered. Them little old
barries at that last end of the patch began to ripen up fast; but I see
they wouldn't bring me no price at all--not if the shipper seed 'em.
"'Course, he was buyin' from a score o' farmers ev'ry day. My boxes
didn't have my name on 'em. They had his'n. He furnished the boxes and
crates himself.
"The devil tempted me," said Bob Buckham, solemnly, "and I fell for him.
'Course we had always to 'deacon' the boxes--we was expected to. The top
layer of berries had to be packed in careful, hulls down, so's to make a
pretty showin'.
"But I put a lot of them meachin' little berries at the bottom of each
box and covered 'em with big, harnsome fruit. They looked like the best
o' the crop. I knew my man would never question 'em. And it made a
difference of ten dollars to me on that one load.
"I done it," said the farmer, blowing a big sigh. "I done it with as
little compunction as I ever done anything in my whole endurin' life."
"Oh, Mr. Buckham! Didn't you think it was wicked?"
"If I did," he said, with a grin, "it didn't spile my appetite. Not
_then_. Not that day. I seen the carload shipped and never said a word.
I went home. I eat my dinner just as hearty as ever and made
preparations to work the next day's load the same way. Ye see, marm,
_she_ didn't know a thing about it.
"Wal!" continued the old man, "it come bed-time and we went to bed. I
was allus a sound sleeper. Minute my head touched the husk piller, that
minute I begun ter snore. I worked hard and I slept hard.
"But--funny thing--I didn't git to sleep. No reason--'parently. Wasn't
worried. I was kinder tickled at what I'd done, and the slick way I'd
done it. I never had cheated before to my knowledge; but I was happy at
the thought of that extry ten dollars, and the other extry money that
was ter foller."
"And--and didn't your conscience trouble you?" asked Agnes, wonderingly.
"Nope, not a mite. I was jest as quiet and contented as though they'd
left a conscience out o' me when I was built," and the old man chuckled
again, heartily.
"Marm says she believes more folks lay awake at night because of empty
stomachs than from guilty consciences, an' so she always has a plate of
crackers by her side o' the bed. Wal! I lay as calm as a spring mornin';
but after a while I gotter countin' sheep jumpin' through a gap in a
stone-fence, and had jest about lulled myself ter sleep, when seems ter
me there was a hand writin' on the wall opposite the foot of our bed. I
didn't see the hand, mind you; but I seen the writin'. It was in good,
big print-text, too, or I couldn't have read it at all--for you know I
never had no schoolin', an' I kin jest barely write my name to this day.
"But that print showed up plain as plain! And it was jest one
word--kinder 'luminated on the wall. It was _strawberry_. That's all,
jest _strawberry_. You'd think it would ha' been somethin' like _thief_
or _cheat_. Nope. It was jest _strawberry_. But I had to lay there all
night with my eyes propped open, seeing that word on the wall.
"When daylight come it was still there. I seen it when I was dressin'. I
carried it with me out to the stable. Everywhere I looked against a
wall, I seed that word. If I hung my head and looked at the ground, it
was there.
"I knowed if what I'd done about those meachin' little berries was ever
knowed in the community, like enough I'd never be called by my right
name any more. They'd call me 'Strawberry Bob.' I knowed it. That was
goin' to be my punishment fur stealin'."
"Oh, Mr. Bob!" groaned Agnes, much moved by his earnestness.
"It's my belief," said old Bob Buckham, "that we don't hafter wait till
the hereafter ter git our punishment for wrong-doin' here. I reckon most
times we git it right here and now.
"Wal! I went erbout all that forenoon seein' _strawberry_ marked up
everywhere. I snum! it was right acrosst marm's forehead when I looked
at her--and there warn't no other mark there in them days, you may be
sure.
"I started in to pack berries jest the same as I did the day before.
Then, of a sudden, I says to myself, 'Bob Buckham, you derned thief!
Stop it! Ten dollars a day won't pay you for bein' called "Strawberry
Bob"!'
"So I boxed them poor berries separate and I told the shipper what I'd
done the day before. I told him to take ten dollars off my order. He
grinned at me.
"'There was a railroad wreck yesterday, Bob, and our car went to pot.
I'll git full damages from the railroad company.'
"'Not for them berries of mine, Silas,' I told him. He was Silas Wales.
'You _de_-duct what my berries cost you in full, and I'll turn back my
hull order to ye!'
"He hummed and hawed; but he done it. He axed me was I havin' a hard
time meetin' the int'rest on my mortgage, an' I told him the trewth.
When the mortgage come due that year he come 'round and offered to let
me have the money at a cheaper rate than I'd been payin', an' all the
time I wanted. Ye see, that was a cheap way of gittin' a reperation for
bein' honest, after all."
"And didn't you see the strawberry mark after that?" sighed Agnes.
"Nope. Nor they never called me 'Strawberry Bob,' though I've been
raisin' more berries than most folks in this locality, ever since,"
said Bob Buckham.
"Oh, Mr. Buckham!" exclaimed Agnes. "I ought to be called 'Strawberry
Agnes'!"
"Heh? What for?" asked the startled farmer.
"Because I stole berries! I stole them from you! Last May!" gulped the
girl. "You know when those girls raided your field? I was one of them. I
was the first one over the fence and picked the first berry. I--I'm
awfully sorry; but I really didn't think how wrong it was at the time.
And I wish I'd come to you and told you before, instead of waiting until
the principal of our school--Mr. Marks--and everybody, knew about it."
"Sho, honey!" exclaimed Mr. Buckham, softly. "Was you one o' them gals?
I'd no idee. Wal! say no more about it. What you took didn't break me,"
and he laughed. "And I won't tell nobody," he added, patting Agnes'
shoulder.
As Agnes dried her eyes before joining her sisters and Neale O'Neil at
the door, she thought that it was rather unnecessary for the farmer to
make that promise. When he had caused the list of girls' names to be
sent to the school principal, he had assured her punishment.
While Bob Buckham was saying to himself: "Now, that's a leetle gal after
my own heart. She's a hull sight nicer than that other one. And she's
truly repentant, too."