Part 6 (1/2)

She is likely, her morals mebby bein' able to stand more bein' so sort o' withy and soft than if they wuz more hard and brittle, they could bend round considerable without breakin'.

And Miss Huff had also a little grand-niece, Dorothy Evans, whose mother had pa.s.sed away, and Miss Huff bein' next of kin had took into her family to take care of. Dretful clever I thought it wuz of Miss Huff. Dorothy's mother, I guess, didn't have much faculty and spent everything as she went along; she had an annuity that died with her, but she had been well enough off so she could hire a nurse for the child, an elderly colored woman, Aunt Tryphena by name, who out of love for the little one had offered to come to Miss Huff's just to be near the little girl.

And Dotie, as they well called her, for everyone doted on her, wuz as sweet a little fairy as I ever see, her pretty golden head carried suns.h.i.+ne wherever it went. And her big blue eyes, full of mischief sometimes, wuz also full of the solemn sweetness of them ”Who do always behold the face of the Father.”

I took to her from the very first, and so did Josiah and Blandina. The hull family loved and petted her from Miss Huff and her old father down to Billy, who alternately petted and teased her.

To Aunt Tryphena she wuz an object of perfect adoration. And Aunt Tryphena wuz a character uneek and standin' alone. When she wuz made the mould wuz throwed away and never used afterwards. She follered Dorothy round like her shadow and helped make the beds and keep the rooms tidy, a sort of chamber-maid, or ruther chamber-woman, for she wuz sixty if she wuz a day.

Besides Aunt Tryphena Miss Huff had two more girls to cook and clean. She had good help and sot a good table, and Aunt Feeny as they called her wuz a source of constant amus.e.m.e.nt and interest; but of her more anon.

We got to Miss Huff's in the afternoon and rested the rest of that day and had a good night's sleep.

In the mornin' Josiah, who went out at my request before breakfast to buy a little peppermint essence, come in burnin' with indignation, his morals are like iron (most of the time).

He said a man had been advisin' him to take the Immoral Railway as the best way of seein' the Fair grounds as a hull before we branched out to see things more minutely one by one.

”Immoral Railway!” he snorted out agin.

”I hope you didn't fall in with any such idee, Josiah Allen.” And I sithed as I thought how many took that kind of railway and wuz whirled into ruin on't.

”Fall in with it! I guess the man that spoke to me about it thought I didn't fall in with it. I gin that feller a piece of my mind.”

”I hope you didn't give him too big a piece,” sez I anxiously; ”you know you hain't got a bit to spare, specially at this time.”

Oh, how I watched over that man day by day! I wanted the peppermint more for him than for me. I laid out if he seemed likely to break down to give him a peppermint sling.

Not that I am one of them who when fur away from home dash out into forbidden paths and dissipation, but I didn't consider peppermint sling wrong anyway, there hain't much stimulant to it.

Well, we started out for the Fair in pretty good season in the mornin', Billy Huff offered to go and put us on the right car, so he walked ahead with Blandina, Josiah and I follerin' clost in their rears. Blandina looked up at him and follered his remarks as clost and stiddy as a sunflower follers the sun. She had told me that mornin' whilst I wuz gittin' ready to start that he wuz the loveliest young man she had ever met, and a woman would be happy indeed who won him for her consort. And I said, as I pinned my collar on more firmly with my cameo pin, that I presoomed that he would make a good man and pardner when he growed up.

And she said, ”Difference in age don't count anything when there is true love.” Sez she, ”Look at Aaron Burr and Lord Baconsfield,” and she brung up a number more for me to look at mentally, whilst I wuz drapin' my mantilly round my frame in graceful folds.

But I told her I didn't seem to want to spend my time on them old ghosts that mornin', havin' such a big job on my hands to tackle that day as first chaperone to Josiah, and I got her mind off for the time bein', by the time I had fastened on my mantilly so the tabs hung as I wanted 'em to hang.

CHAPTER V.

Josiah wuz for goin' into the show by the entrance nighest to Miss Huff's, but I said, ”No, that may do for other times, but when I first enter this Fair ground as a Observer” (for in our visit to the Inside Inn we wuz only weary wayfarers, too tired to observe, and the Sabbath we felt wuz no time to jot down impressions). No, this day I felt wuz in reality our dayboo, and I sez impressively, ”I will not go sneakin' in by any side door or winder, I'm goin' to enter by the main gateway.”

Josiah kinder hummed:

”Broad is the road that leads to death And thousands walk together there.”

But when he found we could go in there at the same price he didn't parley further, and Billy took us to the car that would leave us where I wanted to be.

The main entrance is in itself a n.o.ble sight worth goin' milds and milds to see, a long handsome buildin' curvin' round gracefully some in shape like a mammoth U only bendin' round more at the ends, and endin' with handsome buildin's, and tall pillars decorate the hull length and flags wave out n.o.bly all along on top.

Mebby it wuz meant for a U and meant Union, a name good enough for entrance into anything or anywhere. And if it wuz I approved on't, and would encouraged 'em by tellin' 'em so if they'd asked me beforehand. Union! a name commandin' world-wide respect, writ in blue and gray on millions of hearts, sealed with precious blood.