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Read Ebook: 'Tilda Jane: An Orphan in Search of a Home. A Story for Boys and Girls by Saunders Marshall Carleton Clifford Illustrator
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Ebook has 1412 lines and 55191 words, and 29 pages
"Nothin'," she said, faintly, "only I feel as if there was a rat inside o' me. You ain't got any crackers round, have you?"
"No, but I've got something better," and he drew a flask from the pocket of his big ulster and put it to her mouth.
Her nostrils dilated. "I'm a Loyal Legion girl."
"Loyal Legion--what's that?"
"Beware of bottles, beware of cups, Evil to him who evil sups."
"Oh! a temperance crank," and he laughed. "Well, here's a hunk of cake I put in my pocket last night."
The little girl ate with avidity the section of a rich fruit loaf he handed her.
"How about your dog?" asked the young man.
"Oh, I guess he ain't hungry," she said, putting a morsel against the brown muzzle thrust from the shawl. "Everythin' was locked up last night, an' there warn't enough lunch for him an' me--see, he ain't for it. He knows when hunger stops an' greed begins. That's poetry they taught us."
"Tell us about that place you've been raised. No, stop--you're kind of peaked-looking. Settle down an' rest yourself till we pull up for dinner. I'll gabble on a bit if you'll give me a starter."
"I guess you favour birds an' things, don't you?" she observed, shrewdly.
"Yaw--do you?"
"Sometimes I think I'm a bird," she said, vehemently, "or a worm or somethin'. If I could 'a' caught one o' them crows this mornin' I'd 'a' hugged it an' kissed it. Ain't they lovely?"
"Well, I don' know about lovely," said the young man, in a judicial manner, "but the crow, as I take him, is a kind of long-suffering orphan among birds. From the minute the farmers turn up these furrows under the snow, the crow works like fury. Grubs just fly down his red throat, and grasshoppers ain't nowhere, but because he now and then lifts a hill o' petetters, and pulls a mite o' corn when it gets toothsome, and makes way once in so often with a fat chicken that's a heap better out o' the world than in it, the farmers is down on him, the Legislature won't protect him, and the crow--man's good friend--gets shot by everybody and everything!"
"I wish I was a queen," said the little girl, passionately.
"Well, sissy, if you ever get to be one, just unmake a few laws that are passed to please the men who have a pull. Here in Maine you might take the bounty off bob-cats, an' let 'em have their few sheep, an' you might stand between the mink and the spawning trout, and if you want to put a check on the robins who make war on the cherries an' strawberries, I guess it would be more sensible than chasing up the crows."
"I'm remarkin' that you don't beat your horse," said his companion, abruptly.
"That mare," said the young man, reflectively, "is as smart as I be, and sometimes I think a thought smarter."
"You wouldn't beat that little dog," she said, holding up her bundle.
"Bet your striped shawl I wouldn't."
"I like you," she said, emphatically. "I guess you ain't as bad as you look."
The young man frowned slightly, and fell into another reverie.
EVEN SHARKS HAVE TENDER HEARTS.
The old Moss Glen Inn, elm-shaded and half covered by creeping vines, is a favourite resort for travellers in the eastern part of Maine, for there a good dinner can be obtained in a shorter space of time than in any other country hotel in the length and breadth of the State.
"And all because there's a smart woman at the head of it," explained the young man to the little waif beside him. "There she is--always on hand."
A round, good-natured face, crowning a rotund, generous figure, smiled at them from the kitchen window, but while the eyes smiled, the thick, full lips uttered a somewhat different message to a tall, thin woman, bending over the stove.
"Ruth Ann, here's that soapy Hank Dillson round again,--takin' in the farmers, as usual, engagin' them to pay for machinery and buildings more than are needed, considerin' the number of their cows, an' he's got a washed-out lookin' young one with him. She'll make a breach in the victuals, I guess."
Ruth Ann, who was her sister and helper in household affairs, came and looked over her shoulder, just as Dillson sprang from the sleigh.
Mrs. Minley stepped to the door, and stood bobbing and smiling as he turned to her.
"How de do, Mrs. Minley. Give this little girl a place to lie down till dinner's ready, will you? She's dead beat."
'Tilda Jane walked gravely into the kitchen, and although her head was heavy, and her feet as light as if they were about to waft her to regions above, she took time to scrutinise the broad face that would have been generous but for the deceitful lips, and also to cast a glance at the hard, composed woman at the window, who looked as if her head, including the knob of tightly curled hair at the back, had been carved from flint.
"Step right in this way," said Mrs. Minley, bustling into a small bedroom on the ground floor.
'Tilda Jane was not used to being waited on, and for one proud moment she wished that the children in the orphan asylum could see her. Then a feeling of danger and insecurity overcame her, and she sank on one of the painted, wooden chairs.
"You're done out," said Mrs. Minley, sympathetically. "Are you a relation of Mr. Dillson's?"
"No, I ain't."
"You can lie on that bed if you like," said Mrs. Minley, noticing the longing glance cast at it.
"Well, I guess I will," said 'Tilda Jane, placing her bundle on a chair, and stooping down to unloose her shoes.
"Stop till I get some newspapers to put on the bed," said the landlady--"what's in that package? It's moving," and she stared at the shawl.
"It's a dog."
"Mercy me! I don't allow no dogs in my house."
"All right," said the little girl, patiently putting on her shoes again.
"What you going to do, child?"
"I'm goin' to the wood-shed. Them as won't have my dog won't have me."
"Land sakes, child, stay where you be! I guess he can't do no harm if you'll watch him."
"No ma'am, he'll not rampage. He's little, an' he's ole, an' he's lame, an' he don't care much for walkin'. Sometimes you'll hear nothin' out o' him all day but a growl or a snap."
The landlady drew away from the bundle, and after she had seen the tired head laid on the pillow, she softly closed the door of the room.
In two minutes 'Tilda Jane was asleep. The night before she had not dared to sleep. To-day, under the protection of the creamery shark, she could take her rest, her hunger satisfied by the cake he had given her in the sleigh. The shark crept in once to look at her. "Ain't she a sight?" he whispered to Mrs. Minley, who accompanied him, "a half-starved monkey."
She playfully made a thrust at his ribs. "Oh, go 'long with you--always making your jokes! How can a child look like a monkey?"
He smiled, well pleased at her cajoling tone, then, stretching himself out in an armchair, he announced that dinner must be postponed for an hour to let the child have her sleep out.
Mrs. Minley kept a pleasant face before him, but gave vent to some suppressed grumbling in the kitchen. With fortitude remarkable in a hungry man, he waited until one o'clock, then, losing patience, he ate his dinner, and, telling Mrs. Minley that he had business in the neighbourhood, and would not be back until supper-time, he drove away in his sleigh.
At six o'clock 'Tilda Jane felt herself gently shaken, and opening her eyes, she started up in alarm.
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