“She said it was her big sister Solly's dress.”
“Her what?”
“Her big sister Solly's dress. Edward, has Content ever had a sister?
Has she a sister now?”
“No, she never had a sister, and she has none now,” declared the rector,
emphatically. “I knew all her family. What in the world ails the child?”
“She said her big sister Solly, Edward, and the very name is so inane.
If she hasn't any big sister Solly, what are we going to do?”
“Why, the child must simply lie,” said the rector.
“But, Edward, I don't think she knows she lies. You may laugh, but I
think she is quite sure that she has a big sister Solly, and that this
is her dress. I have not told you the whole. After she came home from
school to-day she went up to her room, and she left the door open, and
pretty soon I heard her talking. At first I thought perhaps Lily or
Amelia was up there, although I had not seen either of them come in
with Content. Then after a while, when I had occasion to go up-stairs,
I looked in her room, and she was quite alone, although I had heard her
talking as I went up-stairs. Then I said: 'Content, I thought somebody
was in your room. I heard you talking.'
“And she said, looking right into my eyes: 'Yes, ma'am, I was talking.'
“'But there is nobody here,' I said.
“'Yes, ma'am,' she said. 'There isn't anybody here now, but my big
sister Solly was here, and she is gone. You heard me talking to my big
sister Solly.' I felt faint, Edward, and you know it takes a good deal
to overcome me. I just sat down in Content's wicker rocking-chair. I
looked at her and she looked at me. Her eyes were just as clear and
blue, and her forehead looked like truth itself. She is not exactly a
pretty child, and she has a peculiar appearance, but she does certainly
look truthful and good, and she looked so then. She had tried to fluff
her hair over her forehead a little as I had told her, and not pull it
back so tight, and she wore her new dress, and her face and hands were
as clean, and she stood straight. You know she is a little inclined to
stoop, and I have talked to her about it. She stood straight, and looked
at me with those blue eyes, and I did feel fairly dizzy.”
“What did you say?”
“Well, after a bit I pulled myself together and I said: 'My dear little
girl, what is this? What do you mean about your big sister Sarah?'
Edward, I could not bring myself to say that idiotic Solly. In fact, I
did think I must be mistaken and had not heard correctly. But Content
just looked at me as if she thought me very stupid. 'Solly,' said she.
'My sister's name is Solly.'
“'But, my dear,' I said, 'I understand that you had no sister.'
“'Yes,' said she, 'I have my big sister Solly.'
“'But where has she been all the time?' said I.
“Then Content looked at me and smiled, and it was quite a wonderful
smile, Edward. She smiled as if she knew so much more than I could ever
know, and quite pitied me.”
“She did not answer your question?”
“No, only by that smile which seemed to tell whole volumes about that
awful Solly's whereabouts, only I was too ignorant to read them.
“'Where is she now, dear?' I said, after a little.
“'She is gone now,' said Content.
“'Gone where?' said I.
“And then the child smiled at me again. Edward, what are we going to do?
Is she untruthful, or has she too much imagination? I have heard of such
a thing as too much imagination, and children telling lies which were
not really lies.”
“So have I,” agreed the rector, dryly, “but I never believed in it.” The
rector started to leave the room.
“What are you going to do?” inquired Sally.
“I am going to endeavor to discriminate between lies and imagination,”
replied the rector.
Sally plucked at his coat-sleeve as they went down-stairs. “My dear,”
she whispered, “I think she is asleep.”
“She will have to wake up.”
“But, my dear, she may be nervous. Would it not be better to wait until
to-morrow?”
“I think not,” said Edward Patterson. Usually an easy-going man, when
he was aroused he was determined to extremes. Into Content's room
he marched, Sally following. Neither of them saw their small son
Jim peeking around his door. He had heard--he could not help it--the
conversation earlier in the day between Content and his mother. He had
also heard other things. He now felt entirely justified in listening,
although he had a good code of honor. He considered himself in a way
responsible, knowing what he knew, for the peace of mind of his parents.
Therefore he listened, peeking around the doorway of his dark room.
The electric light flashed out from Content's room, and the little
interior was revealed. It was charmingly pretty. Sally had done her best
to make this not altogether welcome little stranger's room attractive.
There were garlands of rosebuds swung from the top of the white
satin-papered walls. There were dainty toilet things, a little
dressing-table decked with ivory, a case of books, chairs cushioned with
rosebud chintz, windows curtained with the same.
In the little white bed, with a rose-sprinkled coverlid over her, lay
Content. She was not asleep. Directly, when the light flashed out, she
looked at the rector and his wife with her clear blue eyes. Her fair
hair, braided neatly and tied with pink ribbons, lay in two tails on
either side of her small, certainly very good face. Her forehead was
beautiful, very white and full, giving her an expression of candor which
was even noble. Content, little lonely girl among strangers in a strange
place, mutely beseeching love and pity, from her whole attitude toward
life and the world, looked up at Edward Patterson and Sally, and the
rector realized that his determination was giving way. He began to
believe in imagination, even to the extent of a sister Solly. He had
never had a daughter, and sometimes the thought of one had made his
heart tender. His voice was very kind when he spoke.
“Well, little girl,” he said, “what is this I hear?”
Sally stared at her husband and stifled a chuckle.
As for Content, she looked at the rector and said nothing. It was
obvious that she did not know what he had heard. The rector explained.
“My dear little girl,” he said, “your aunt Sally”--they had agreed upon
the relationship of uncle and aunt to Content--“tells me that you have
been telling her about your--big sister Solly.” The rector half gasped
as he said Solly. He seemed to himself to be on the driveling verge of
idiocy before the pronunciation of that absurdly inane name.
Content's responding voice came from the pink-and-white nest in which she
was snuggled, like the fluting pipe of a canary.
“Yes, sir,” said she.
“My dear child,” said the rector, “you know perfectly well that you have
no big sister--Solly.” Every time the rector said Solly he swallowed
hard.
Content smiled as Sally had described her smiling. She said nothing.
The rector felt reproved and looked down upon from enormous heights of
innocence and childhood and the wisdom thereof. However, he persisted.
“Content,” he said, “what did you mean by telling your aunt Sally what
you did?”
“I was talking with my big sister Solly,” replied Content, with the
calmness of one stating a fundamental truth of nature.
The rector's face grew stern. “Content,” he said, “look at me.”
Content looked. Looking seemed to be the instinctive action which
distinguished her as an individual.
“Have you a big sister--Solly?” asked the rector. His face was stern,
but his voice faltered.
“Yes, sir.”
“Then--tell me so.”
“I have a big sister Solly,” said Content. Now she spoke rather wearily,
although still sweetly, as if puzzled why she had been disturbed in
sleep to be asked such an obvious question.
“Where has she been all the time, that we have known nothing about her?”
demanded the rector.
Content smiled. However, she spoke. “Home,” said she.
“When did she come here?”
“This morning.”
“Where is she now?”
Content smiled and was silent. The rector cast a helpless look at his
wife. He now did not care if she did see that he was completely at a
loss. How could a great, robust man and a clergyman be harsh to a tender
little girl child in a pink-andwhite nest of innocent dreams?
Sally pitied him. She spoke more harshly than her husband. “Content
Adams,” said she, “you know perfectly well that you have no big sister
Solly. Now tell me the truth. Tell me you have no big sister Solly.”
“I have a big sister Solly,” said Content.
“Come, Edward,” said Sally. “There is no use in staying and talking
to this obstinate little girl any longer.” Then she spoke to Content.
“Before you go to sleep,” said she, “you must say your prayers, if you
have not already done so.”
“I have said my prayers,” replied Content, and her blue eyes were full
of horrified astonishment at the suspicion.
“Then,” said Sally, “you had better say them over and add something.
Pray that you may always tell the truth.”
“Yes, ma'am,” said Content, in her little canary pipe.
The rector and his wife went out. Sally switched off the light with a
snap as she passed. Out in the hall she stopped and held her husband's
arms hard. “Hush!” she whispered. They both listened. They heard this,
in the faintest plaint of a voice:
“They don't believe you are here, Sister Solly, but I do.”
Sally dashed back into the rosebud room and switched on the light. She
stared around. She opened a closet door. Then she turned off the light
and joined her husband.
“There was nobody there?” he whispered.
“Of course not.”
When they were back in the study the rector and his wife looked at each
other.
“We will do the best we can,” said Sally. “Don't worry, Edward, for you
have to write your sermon to-morrow. We will manage some way. I will
admit that I rather wish Content had had some other distant relative
besides you who could have taken charge of her.”
“You poor child!” said the rector. “It is hard on you, Sally, for she is
no kith nor kin of yours.”
“Indeed I don't mind,” said Sally Patterson, “if only I can succeed in
bringing her up.”
Meantime Jim Patterson, up-stairs, sitting over his next day's algebra
lesson, was even more perplexed than were his parents in the study.
He paid little attention to his book. “I can manage little Lucy,” he
reflected, “but if the others have got hold of it, I don't know.”
Presently he rose and stole very softly through the hall to Content's
door. She was timid, and always left it open so she could see the hall
light until she fell asleep. “Content,” whispered Jim.
There came the faintest “What?” in response.
“Don't you,” said Jim, in a theatrical whisper, “say another word at
school to anybody about your big sister Solly. If you do, I'll whop you,
if you are a girl.”
“Don't care!” was sighed forth from the room.
“And I'll whop your old big sister Solly, too.”
There was a tiny sob.
“I will,” declared Jim. “Now you mind!”
The next day Jim cornered little Lucy Rose under a cedar-tree before
school began. He paid no attention to Bubby Harvey and Tom Simmons,
who were openly sniggering at him. Little Lucy gazed up at Jim, and the
blue-green shade of the cedar seemed to bring out only more clearly the
white-rose softness of her dear little face. Jim bent over her.
“Want you to do something for me,” he whispered.
Little Lucy nodded gravely.
“If my new cousin Content ever says anything to you again--I heard her
yesterday--about her big sister Solly, don't you ever say a word about
it to anybody else. You will promise me, won't you, little Lucy?”
A troubled expression came into little Lucy's kind eyes. “But she told
Lily, and Lily told Amelia, and Amelia told her grandmother Wheeler,
and her grandmother Wheeler told Miss Parmalee when she met her on the
street after school, and Miss Parmalee called on my aunt Martha and told
her,” said little Lucy.
“Oh, shucks!” said Jim.
“And my aunt Martha told my father that she thought perhaps she ought
to ask for her when she called on your mother. She said Arnold Carruth's
aunt Flora was going to call, and his aunt Dorothy. I heard Miss Acton
tell Miss Parmalee that she thought they ought to ask for her when they
called on your mother, too.”
“Little Lucy,” he said, and lowered his voice, “you must promise me
never, as long as you live, to tell what I am going to tell you.”
Little Lucy looked frightened.
“Promise!” insisted Jim.
“I promise,” said little Lucy, in a weak voice.
“Never, as long as you live, to tell anybody. Promise!”
“I promise.”
“Now, you know if you break your promise and tell, you will be guilty of
a dreadful lie and be very wicked.”
Little Lucy shivered. “I never will.”
“Well, my new cousin Content Adams--tells lies.”
Little Lucy gasped.
“Yes, she does. She says she has a big sister Solly, and she hasn't got
any big sister Solly. She never did have, and she never will have. She
makes believe.”
“Makes believe?” said little Lucy, in a hopeful voice.
“Making believe is just a real mean way of lying. Now I made Content
promise last night never to say one word in school about her big sister
Solly, and I am going to tell you this, so you can tell Lily and the
others and not lie. Of course, I don't want to lie myself, because my
father is rector, and, besides, mother doesn't approve of it; but if
anybody is going to lie, I am the one. Now, you mind, little Lucy.
Content's big sister Solly has gone away, and she is never coming back.
If you tell Lily and the others I said so, I can't see how you will be
lying.”
Little Lucy gazed at the boy. She looked like truth incarnate. “But,”
said she, in her adorable stupidity of innocence, “I don't see how she
could go away if she was never here, Jim.”
“Oh, of course she couldn't. But all you have to do is to say that you
heard me say she had gone. Don't you understand?”
“I don't understand how Content's big sister Solly could possibly go
away if she was never here.”
“Little Lucy, I wouldn't ask you to tell a lie for the world, but if you
were just to say that you heard me say--”
“I think it would be a lie,” said little Lucy, “because how can I help
knowing if she was never here she couldn't--”
“Oh, well, little Lucy,” cried Jim, in despair, still with
tenderness--how could he be anything but tender with little Lucy?--“all
I ask is never to say anything about it.”
“If they ask me?”
“Anyway, you can hold your tongue. You know it isn't wicked to hold your
tongue.”
Little Lucy absurdly stuck out the pointed tip of her little red tongue.
Then she shook her head slowly.
“Well,” she said, “I will hold my tongue.”
This encounter with innocence and logic had left him worsted. Jim could
see no way out of the fact that his father, the rector, his mother,
the rector's wife, and he, the rector's son, were disgraced by their
relationship to such an unsanctified little soul as this queer Content
Adams.
And yet he looked at the poor lonely little girl, who was trying very
hard to learn her lessons, who suggested in her very pose and movement
a little, scared rabbit ready to leap the road for some bush of
hiding, and while he was angry with her he pitied her. He had no doubts
concerning Content's keeping her promise. He was quite sure that he
would now say nothing whatever about that big sister Solly to the
others, but he was not prepared for what happened that very afternoon.
When he went home from school his heart stood still to see Miss Martha
Rose, and Arnold Carruth's aunt Flora, and his aunt who was not his
aunt, Miss Dorothy Vernon, who was visiting her, all walking along in
state with their lace-trimmed parasols, their white gloves, and their
nice card-cases. Jim jumped a fence and raced across lots home, and
gained on them. He burst in on his mother, sitting on the porch, which
was inclosed by wire netting overgrown with a budding vine. It was the
first warm day of the season.
“Mother,” cried Jim Patterson--“mother, they are coming!”
“Who, for goodness' sake, Jim?”
“Why, Arnold's aunt Flora and his aunt Dorothy and little Lucy's aunt
Martha. They are coming to call.”
Involuntarily Sally's hand went up to smooth her pretty hair. “Well,
what of it, Jim?” said she.
“Mother, they will ask for--big sister Solly!”
Sally Patterson turned pale. “How do you know?”
“Mother, Content has been talking at school. A lot know. You will see
they will ask for--”
“Run right in and tell Content to stay in her room,” whispered Sally,
hastily, for the callers, their white-kidded hands holding their
card-cases genteelly, were coming up the walk.
Sally advanced, smiling. She put a brave face on the matter, but she
realized that she, Sally Patterson, who had never been a coward, was
positively afraid before this absurdity. The callers sat with her on the
pleasant porch, with the young vine-shadows making networks over their
best gowns. Tea was served presently by the maid, and, much to Sally's
relief, before the maid appeared came the inquiry. Miss Martha Rose made
it.
“We would be pleased to see Miss Solly Adams also,” said Miss Martha.
Flora Carruth echoed her. “I was so glad to hear another nice girl had
come to the village,” said she with enthusiasm. Miss Dorothy Vernon said
something indefinite to the same effect.
“I am sorry,” replied Sally, with an effort, “but there is no Miss
Solly Adams here now.” She spoke the truth as nearly as she could manage
without unraveling the whole ridiculous affair. The callers sighed with
regret, tea was served with little cakes, and they fluttered down the
walk, holding their card-cases, and that ordeal was over.
But Sally sought the rector in his study, and she was trembling.
“Edward,” she cried out, regardless of her husband's sermon, “something
must be done now.”
“Why, what is the matter, Sally?”
“People are--calling on her.”
“Calling on whom?”
“Big sister--Solly!” Sally explained.
“Well, don't worry, dear,” said the rector. “Of course we will do
something, but we must think it over. Where is the child now?”
“She and Jim are out in the garden. I saw them pass the window just
now. Jim is such a dear boy, he tries hard to be nice to her. Edward
Patterson, we ought not to wait.”
“My dear, we must.”
Meantime Jim and Content Adams were out in the garden. Jim had gone to
Content's door and tapped and called out, rather rudely: “Content,
I say, put on your hat and come along out in the garden. I've got
something to tell you.”
“Don't want to,” protested Content's little voice, faintly.
“You come right along.”
And Content came along. She was an obedient child, and she liked Jim,
although she stood much in awe of him. She followed him into the garden
back of the rectory, and they sat down on the bench beneath the weeping
willow. The minute they were seated Jim began to talk.
“Now,” said he, “I want to know.”
Content glanced up at him, then looked down and turned pale.
“I want to know, honest Injun,” said Jim, “what you are telling such
awful whoppers about your old big sister Solly for?”
Content was silent. This time she did not smile, a tear trickled out of
her right eye and ran over the pale cheek.
“Because you know,” said Jim, observant of the tear, but ruthless, “that
you haven't any big sister Solly, and never did have. You are getting us
all in an awful mess over it, and father is rector here, and mother is
his wife, and I am his son, and you are his niece, and it is downright
mean. Why do you tell such whoppers? Out with it!”
Content was trembling violently. “I lived with Aunt Eudora,” she
whispered.
“Well, what of that? Other folks have lived with their aunts and not
told whoppers.”
“They haven't lived with Aunt Eudora.”
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Content Adams, and you the
rector's niece, talking that way about dead folks.”
“I don't mean to talk about poor Aunt Eudora,” fairly sobbed Content.
“Aunt Eudora was a real good aunt, but she was grown up. She was a good
deal more grown up than your mother; she really was, and when I
first went to live with her I was 'most a little baby; I couldn't
speak--plain, and I had to go to bed real early, and slept 'way off from
everybody, and I used to be afraid--all alone, and so--”
“Well, go on,” said Jim, but his voice was softer. It WAS hard lines for
a little kid, especially if she was a girl.
“And so,” went on the little, plaintive voice, “I got to thinking how
nice it would be if I only had a big sister, and I used to cry and say
to myself--I couldn't speak plain, you know, I was so little-'Big sister
would be real solly.' And then first thing I knew--she came.”
“Who came?”
“Big sister Solly.”
“What rot! She didn't come. Content Adams, you know she didn't come.”
“She must have come,” persisted the little girl, in a frightened
whisper. “She must have. Oh, Jim, you don't know. Big sister Solly must
have come, or I would have died like my father and mother.”
Jim's arm, which was near her, twitched convulsively, but he did not put
it around her.
“She did--co-me,” sobbed Content. “Big sister Solly did come.”
“Well, have it so,” said Jim, suddenly. “No use going over that any
longer. Have it she came, but she ain't here now, anyway. Content Adams,
you can't look me in the face and tell me that.”
Content looked at Jim, and her little face was almost terrible, so full
of bewilderment and fear it was. “Jim,” whispered Content, “I can't
have big sister Solly not be here. I can't send her away. What would she
think?”
Jim stared. “Think? Why, she isn't alive to think, anyhow!”
“I can't make her--dead,” sobbed Content. “She came when I wanted her,
and now when I don't so much, when I've got Uncle Edward and Aunt Sally
and you, and don't feel so dreadful lonesome, I can't be so bad as to
make her dead.”
Jim whistled. Then his face brightened up. He looked at Content with a
shrewd and cheerful grin. “See here, kid, you say your sister Solly is
big, grown up, don't you?” he inquired.
Content nodded pitifully.
“Then why, if she is grown up and pretty, don't she have a beau?”
Content stopped sobbing and gave him a quick glance.
“Then--why doesn't she get married, and go out West to live?”
Jim chuckled. Instead of a sob, a faint echo of his chuckle came from
Content.
Jim laughed merrily. “I say, Content,” he cried, “let's have it she's
married now, and gone?”
“Well,” said Content.
Jim put his arm around her very nicely and protectingly. “It's all
right, then,” said he, “as all right as it can be for a girl. Say,
Content, ain't it a shame you aren't a boy?”
“I can't help it,” said Content, meekly.
“You see,” said Jim, thoughtfully, “I don't, as a rule, care much about
girls, but if you could coast down-hill and skate, and do a few things
like that, you would be almost as good as a boy.”
Content surveyed him, and her pessimistic little face assumed upward
curves. “I will,” said she. “I will do anything, Jim. I will fight if
you want me to, just like a boy.”
“I don't believe you could lick any of us fellers unless you get a good
deal harder in the muscles,” said Jim, eying her thoughtfully; “but
we'll play ball, and maybe by and by you can begin with Arnold Carruth.”
“Could lick him now,” said Content.
But Jim's face sobered before her readiness. “Oh no, you mustn't go to
fighting right away,” said he. “It wouldn't do. You really are a girl,
you know, and father is rector.”
“Then I won't,” said Content; “but I COULD knock down that little boy
with curls; I know I could.”
“Well, you needn't. I'll like you just as well. You see, Content”--Jim's
voice faltered, for he was a boy, and on the verge of sentiment before
which he was shamed--“you see, Content, now your big sister Solly is
married and gone out West, why, you can have me for your brother, and of
course a brother is a good deal better than a sister.”
“Yes,” said Content, eagerly.
“I am going,” said Jim, “to marry Lucy Rose when I grow up, but I
haven't got any sister, and I'd like you first rate for one. So I'll be
your big brother instead of your cousin.”
“Big brother Solly?”
“Say, Content, that is an awful name, but I don't care. You're only
a girl. You can call me anything you want to, but you mustn't call me
Solly when there is anybody within hearing.”
“I won't.”
“Because it wouldn't do,” said Jim with weight.
“I never will, honest,” said Content.
Presently they went into the house. Dr. Trumbull was there; he had
been talking seriously to the rector and his wife. He had come over on
purpose.
“It is a perfect absurdity,” he said, “but I made ten calls this
morning, and everywhere I was asked about that little Adams girl's big
sister--why you keep her hidden. They have a theory that she is either
an idiot or dreadfully disfigured. I had to tell them I know nothing
about it.”