Read Ebook: Kitty's Picnic and Other Stories by Anonymous

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Ebook has 171 lines and 9207 words, and 4 pages

There were five more swimming about beside their mother; there might be dozens more in the farmyard, while they had nothing of their own. A sharp little duck like that would be as good as a dog to play with. Jack had watched it with longing eyes; he was certain the farmer would never miss it, if he were to take it home for a little while--only a little while; he could easily bring it back again, and it wouldn't be one bit the worse.

The others played on with the daisies and the butterflies; the babies sucked their thumbs and fell asleep in their small nurses' arms; the little duck forgot his mother and his brothers and sisters, and strayed farther and farther away after the crumbs, till presently two small brown hands pounced down, and he found himself a prisoner.

'Quack! quack!' called the mother duck, missing the wanderer.

'Quack! quack!' cried the little duck.

Peggy and Bessy looked round.

'Why, what are you doing, Jack? Didn't Farmer Jones say you weren't to tease the ducks?'

'Who is teasing the ducks?' demanded Jack, in a tone of injured innocence. 'I'm going to take it home for a bit, and teach it a lot of tricks.'

'You'd better leave it alone!' cried Peggy, in alarm; 'it would be stealing.'

'It would be nothing of the kind. I'm not going to keep the duck. Girls haven't a bit of sense; they're just made to go telling tales.'

'I don't ever tell tales,' returned Peggy, with dignity. 'Did I ever tell who it was left the gate open when the pigs got in that day?'

'Well, don't tell tales this time either,' was Jack's only acknowledgment. 'We'd better be going now, before anybody comes.'

Jack was the biggest boy, and liked his own way. Moreover, he generally made the rest like it too. Peggy and Bessy uneasily got up from their seat, and back the procession went across the green grass and daisies, Jack carrying the duck inside his jacket, where it quacked loudly, and made the company look round anxiously, for fear of stray listeners.

'What will mother say when she sees it?' suggested Tommy, as they slunk along the lane.

'Mother is not going to see it,' returned Jack; 'it's going into the wood-shed. I'll make it a nice house there, all to itself--better than it had at the farm by a long way.'

So instead of going straight into the house, the party repaired to the wood-shed at the end of the garden, where the duck was carefully fenced in behind some boards, and supplied with the remainder of the crusts for supper.

'He'll go off to sleep in a bit,' said Jack, with a sigh of relief. 'Now we'll go in; and mind, you're not to say anything about it.'

It was easy for Jack to say that, but it wasn't by any means so easy to do it. Every minute or two somebody would begin to say something bearing upon the subject, and break off short in sudden alarm. Every time there was a moment's silence, they would be listening for faint quacks from the wood-shed, and somehow it befell that there came no further opportunity of visiting the prisoner that evening; for it was Saturday,--the great festival of the bath-tub,--and by the time the whole seven had gone through the performance, it was too late for anything but bed.

Never mind; to-morrow would be Sunday, and Jack promised himself a lovely time with his dear cluck. He would slip a piece of bread into his pocket at breakfast; there was a noble ditch not very far off, where nobody ever went, and he would take it there for a swim. Jack took a last look through the curtainless window at the shed roof, and went to bed brimful of plans for to-morrow and the duck.

Ah, if that duck had but known or understood the joys that lay before him! But he didn't; he was only a poor solitary baby duck, taken away from his mother and his home, and left all alone in a cold, strange place, and the night was very long and very bleak, and his little body ached with cold and hunger, and he quacked and quacked till his throat grew sore, and the quacks wouldn't come any longer, and at last, just as it was beginning to grow grey morning, he feebly curled up his yellow toes, and rolled over on his back--and died!

'Tommy, come down the garden, and mind nobody sees you,' whispered Jack, after breakfast. 'We'll take that duck to the ditch, and have some fun. Hurry up!'

The two raced down to the wood-shed; all was quiet enough inside. Jack looked round in some astonishment. 'He must be fast asleep yet; I thought he'd have been quacking like anything for some food.'

Tommy was peering into the corner. He got up suddenly with a startled face.

'Jack,' he said solemnly, 'I do believe he's gone and died! See how he's lying.'

Jack had him up in his arms in an instant. He did not know much about dead ducks, but the first touch of the little body, that had been so soft and warm the night before, sent a cold chill right through him. He looked down at it for a minute in speechless dismay, and then he burst out into a perfect storm of sobs.

'Let's go and tell mother,' said Tommy, beginning to cry too; and off they went.

But even mother could not bring the little duck back to life. She quietly put it into a basket, and told Jack to take it up to Farmer Jones, and tell him all about his wrong-doing.

'It was because it was such a dear little duck that Jack wanted it,' explained Tommy valiantly, when Jack got to the end. 'We didn't mean to hurt it.'

The farmer listened in grim silence. 'Perhaps not,' he said; 'but I can't have you in my fields again: you'll have to be content with the lane for the rest of the summer, so I'm thinking you'll find it's been a dear duck for you more ways than one.'

Little Miss Muffle was sitting waiting. She had on her new winter coat and her new winter bonnet, and she sat as still as a mouse.

'Why is little Miss Muffle so gay, In her winter coat and bonnet to-day? Because she is going with mother away For a drive in a carriage and pair,'

said Uncle George, coming into the room. He always called his niece Miss Muffle, though her real name was Annette.

'Yes,' said Miss Muffle, 'I am going with my mother, and I shall not be a bit cold. I am never cold in the winter; my mother keeps me so warm.'

'Yes,' said Uncle George; 'your father and mother are rich, and can give their little girl all she wants. I wonder if Miss Muffle would like to go and see some little girls who have no warm coats or shoes and stockings?'

Miss Muffle looked up at Uncle George.

'I should like to see those little girls, Uncle George. Will you take me to see them?'

So Uncle George went in the carriage with Miss Muffle and her mother. And as they were driving along he told the coachman to stop at some poor cottages near the road. He lifted Miss Muffle out of the carriage, and told her mother they would not be long, if she would not mind waiting. Uncle George knocked at the door of the first cottage.

Miss Muffle gave a little shiver, for there was no fire, and sitting close together on the floor were three little children, trying to get warm under an old shawl of their mother's.

'And how are the children getting on at school?' said Uncle George.

'Only Ben has gone,' said the mother, 'for the others have on shoes, except a pair of slippers that they wear in turn on fine days, but such weather as this they would be wet through at once.'

'Have they had their dinner?' asked Uncle George.

'They have each had a piece of dry bread; that is all I can give them, for the father is out of work.'

The tears were in Miss Muffle's eyes.

Uncle George slipped out of the door, and presently came back with a great basket, which he opened, and gave each of the children a large sandwich, at sight of which their eyes gleamed with joy. How hungry they were!

'And you must get some coal at once, Mrs. Trotter,' said Uncle George, putting some money on the table, and at the same time taking out of the basket tea, sugar, bread, cheese, bacon, and all sorts of food. 'And you must have a good meal for your husband and the children, and we will see about shoes and stockings in a day or two.'

'Uncle George,' said Miss Muffle, when they returned to the carriage, 'I will give them all the money I have, and father and mother will give some, and we will buy clothes and shoes and stockings for the poor little children.

'Now, Miss Sibyl, why did you go and tell that "Red Riding-hood" to Baby? You know it always makes him cry, the soft-hearted darling!'

'Well, he ought to learn not to be so silly. I won't amuse the little ones again, nurse, if you want me to spoil them!' said Sibyl, with dignity.

'I do think you might make the story end nicely, any way,' grumbled nurse, hushing Baby, who was crying lustily.

This was Sibyl's parting shot as she ran out of the nursery.

'Never you mind what she says, my lambie; there are no wolves here at all, and Red Riding-hood was not killed. There, stop crying, my beauty, and you shall come and help me sort the linen in the next room. No, not you, Miss Jean; one is enough to worrit; you just stay here till tea-time, like a good girl.'

So nurse went away with Baby, leaving little seven-year-old Jean alone in the great nursery.

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