INTO TROPIC CLIMES
The tinkle of the bells on the Christmas tree was silvery in tone, and
there was nothing about the sound to frighten even Dot. But it was
mysterious, and Mrs. MacCall approached the door of the dining-room with
some hesitation.
She had only recently left the room with the arrangements completed for
Christmas morning when the youngsters should first run down to look at
the present-laden tree, and exclaim in “Ohs!” and “Ahs!” at the sight.
She could imagine nothing that would cause the tree to sway and thus
make the silvery bells tinkle. There was no window open which would
create a draft and so wag the branches back and forth. What could be the
cause of the bells’ ringing?
She turned the knob of the door and pushed it open a tiny bit. There was
no light in the room, although the tree was strung with electric bulbs
of rainbow hues. Instead of an open fireplace now, as there once had
been, there was a gas log under the old mantelpiece. But this was turned
off. The steam-heating plant in the cellar warmed the house sufficiently
and the logs were used only in the fall and spring before and after
Uncle Rufus and Neale started the heater.
Mrs. MacCall’s finger searched for the button on the wall just inside
the door which would light all the lamps in the room. And just then she
heard a muffled thumping sound, and the bells all rang again!
“Slosh!” ejaculated the housekeeper. “’Tis ghosties, sure enough!”
She did not mean that, of course. She was just puzzled. But she knew, in
spite of the darkness, that there was something moving under the
Christmas tree where the rug had been turned back for the framework,
which held the tree, to stand.
“Who is it?” demanded Aunt Sarah from above.
“I’m nae so sure ’tis not Sammy Pinkney,” grumbled the housekeeper.
“He’s always up to something. To be sure! I was right,” she added, for
now she had pressed the electric light button and the whole room was
ablaze with light.
The thing under the tree jumped again and the bells once more jingled.
The housekeeper stepped forward in wonder. Was it another big cat?
Or—or——
“For the land’s sake!” gasped Mrs. MacCall. “I knew I was right. Nobody
but that dratted Sammy would have brought in a rabbit and tied it to
that tree. And there’s a Christmas card tied to the creature’s neck.”
She had to laugh, however. It was not a cat, but a big Belgian hare—the
biggest Mike Donlan had in his pen. And the price of it had simply wiped
out Sammy’s bank account!
He had scrawled on a mistletoe bepictured card the following:
“Fore Tes and Dot, from there fathefull frend S. P.”
Mrs. MacCall had not the heart to say anything about it when she went
upstairs again, after having confined the Belgian hare in the sink
closet in the kitchen, out of which he was not likely to gnaw his way
before morning. The “Christmas bells” had ceased ringing, and so the two
little girls went back to sleep without learning of their unexpected
present until the proper time.
But a lot of fun was had over that gift of Sammy’s. Neale and Uncle
Rufus made a proper pen for the Belgian hare in one end of the goat shed
where Billy Bumps chewed his cud in lonely glory.
“Billy won’t eat him up, and maybe the two will become good friends,”
said Neale.
“What won’t that boy think of next?” gasped Agnes, weak from laughter.
What Mrs. Pinkney said about it when she learned the nature of her son’s
“nice present” to Tess and Dot, was plenty! And how Sammy’s father
laughed!
“I can’t understand,” said the worried Mrs. Pinkney, “how that boy comes
to do such ridiculous things. I know I never had such ideas when I was a
child and I don’t believe you did.”
“No, I never did,” her husband chuckled. “I own up that Sammy has
inventive traits—and others—that he does not come by, by heredity.”
“Say, Mom!” said Sammy thoughtfully.
“What is it, you strange boy?” sighed his mother.
“Didn’t you have a chance to see me before I was born?”
“Goodness! No,” gasped Mrs. Pinkney.
“Then I guess you must have ‘bought a pig in a poke’ and that’s
something Mrs. MacCall says is awful silly to do. You ought to have been
more careful when you was picking out a boy to last.”
Of course, Christmas was a great day in and about the old Corner House.
Although the older girls could not, as usual, visit their tenants in a
poor part of the town and take them presents, Neale drove the little
girls over there in the automobile and Mrs. Kranz, the “delicatessen
lady,” and the girls’ very good friend, undertook to distribute the
gifts to the needy.
Uncle Rufus’s daughter, Petunia Blossom, and her large family, came in
for a generous share of the good will that spilled out of the Corner
House.
Neale O’Neil’s good friend, Mr. Con Murphy, the cobbler, with whom the
boy still lived, was not forgotten, and included in his list of presents
was a fine green ribbon which Neale soberly produced and proceeded to
tie around the fat neck of the perennial pig that occupied a clean sty
in Mr. Murphy’s back yard. For the old cobbler was always very fond of
“the gintleman that pays the rint,” which was his name for the pig.
Agnes tried to be as merry as her condition would allow. And on
Christmas afternoon her school friends came in, and they had a little
party.
“Aggie is managing to inject considerable pep into these proceedings, in
spite of her lack of strength,” Neale remarked to Ruth.
The news that the Corner House girls were going South for two months or
so, was now general knowledge; so the young folks when they departed
bade the Kenways good-by. It was positive that Agnes’ face grew longer
and longer during this proceeding, and when they had all gone she
suddenly looked at Neale, gulped, grabbed him by both shoulders and
shook him a bit, sobbing:
“You horrid boy! How can you be so cheerful, Neale O’Neil, when I’m
go-going so—so far away?”
“Crackey, Aggie!” he exclaimed, “I thought you wanted to go!”
“I—I do! But Ruth is going to have Luke along, while you—you——”
“Hold on, Aggie! Don’t turn on the sprinkler,” he begged. “I’d thought
of that. You bet I have been thinking about it every minute.
And—and——Oh, you wait!”
He dashed away, and she did not see him again during Christmas day. But
Mr. Howbridge was surprised to receive a visit from Neale O’Neil, whose
affairs were in his care while Mr. O’Neil was in Alaska.
“What’s the matter now, Neale?” asked the old bachelor guardian. “What’s
gone wrong?”
“Nothing, sir. Nothing yet, I mean. But something is bound to go wrong
if you and those girls go off to the West Indies without making a
provision that you have not thought of.”
“Yes? Is that so? I thought I had arranged for almost everything. Will
you please tell me what you have discovered missing in the arrangements
Hedden and I have made?” and the lawyer smiled grimly.
“First of all, I want you to look at that report, Mr. Howbridge,” said
Neale respectfully, handing Mr. Howbridge a report from the principal of
his school.
“Humph! Yes! I had already observed it. And I must say, Neale, that your
standing does you credit.”
“Thank you, sir,” the young fellow said, glowing at this praise. “And I
am away ahead in my classes. I can keep up all right if I chance to be
out of school for a few weeks. I can show you——”
“What’s this? What’s this?” demanded the lawyer.
“Yes, sir, that’s just what I mean!” cried Neale O’Neil, rushing on. “I
have just got to go with you all, Mr. Howbridge. I couldn’t bear to be
left behind. And—and Agnes couldn’t bear it either.”
“Ah-ha!” cried the lawyer. “Sits the wind in that quarter? Then that is
the explanation of the note I got this very day from our surprising
Sister Agnes.”
“What’s that?” demanded Neale, amazed.
“She says here,” Mr. Howbridge said, reading the note which was written
in Agnes’ unmistakable hand, but rather shakily, “that she thinks she
doesn’t want to go with the party, but would rather go back to school
and catch up with her class. And she needs the voyage just as much as
Ruth does.”
“The blessed kid!” exploded Neale O’Neil, his face very red.
“Quite so, Neale,” said the lawyer soberly, and laying a hand upon the
boy’s sleeve. “That is exactly what our Agnes is—‘a blessed kid.’ Don’t
forget it. She is an impulsive, loving, _blessed_ girl.”
“Yes, sir,” gulped Neale.
“Never forget it,” repeated Mr. Howbridge. “But I want to tell you that
I had already favorably considered taking you along. I think I can make
use of you down there. Goodness! I can’t be expected to look out for
four girls without any help at all, can I?”
This matter being satisfactorily settled, there was nothing left to do
but to pack their trunks and otherwise prepare for the voyage into
tropic climes, as Agnes, having suddenly recovered all her gayety,
expressed it.
The new year came in with an old-fashioned snowstorm and Agnes and Ruth
began to cough again. Mr. Howbridge looked grave, but Dr. Forsyth
prophesied that the coughs would wear off as soon as the afflicted girls
got into the belt of steady, warm weather.
On the third of January they started. Mrs. MacCall was red-eyed and
Linda was really not fit to be seen! Old Uncle Rufus was as mournful as
could be, but tried to show some cheerfulness.
Sammy, having observed certain weddings in the neighborhood, tied a
number of old shoes on the back of the automobile for luck and was
restrained with difficulty from throwing rice all over the Corner House
girls as they left home.
Mr. Howbridge had taken Luke Shepard’s advice, and had booked passage on
the steamship _Horridole_ from the port of Boston. Luke met them with
Professor Keeps and his outfit at the dock. It was a gay party indeed
that went aboard and sought their reservations among the best staterooms
on the boat.
“Dear me!” sighed Agnes ecstatically, and now quite her pleasure-loving
self, “it is so nice to be wealthy. If we should ever be poor again,
Ruth, I know I should be the hatefulest thing in skirts.”
“Why, Aggie! Don’t talk that way.”
“It is the truth,” said the flyaway sister. “Nothing poor or mean can
ever satisfy me again. I sometimes think I shall have to marry a
millionaire, or else I shall make my husband very miserable.”
“You won’t have to worry about that yet,” laughed Ruth, but she flushed
very prettily and looked at Luke, who was out of earshot.