Part 14 (1/2)
”I remember him,” said Mr. Hawtry, ”a well-bred beast but a holy terror, go on dear.”
”One Byccle.
Three Tickets.
Stanley's Darkest Africa two books but not very new.
One printing press.
Two Tickets.
Treasure Island. One Book.”
”And that's all the big things,” finished Cecelia Anne in evident relief. ”Jimmie wrote down the prices, wouldn't you like to see them?”
And she crossed to Mr. Debrett and laid the open book on his knee.
Mr. Debrett, as Cecelia Anne teetered up and down on her heels and toes before him, read the list again, counted up the total expenditure and admitted that his ward had got remarkably good value for her money.
”But what are all these 'tickets,' my dear?” he asked her.
”Eden Musee,” answered Cecelia Anne. And the very thought of it drew her to her mother's knee. ”Jimmie and the boys used to take me there Sat.u.r.day afternoons in the winter to try to get my nerve up. They say,”
she admitted dolefully, ”that I haven't got much. So they used to take me to the Chamber of Horrors so's I'd get accustomed to life. That's what Jimmie thought I needed. They used to like it, and I expect I'd have liked it, too, if I could have kept my eyes open, but I never could. I couldn't even _get_ them open when the boys stood me right close to that gentleman having death throes on the ground after he'd been hung on a tree. You can hear him breathing!”
”I know him well,” said Mr. Debrett. ”He is rather awful I must admit.
And now we'll talk about the books. Don't you care at all about 'Little Men' and 'Little Women' or the 'Elsie Books?'”
”Jimmie says,” Cecelia Anne made reply, ”that 'Darkest Africa' is better for me. It tells me just where to hit an elephant to give him the death throes. He says the 'Elsie Books' wouldn't be any help to us even with a buffalo. We're going to buy 'The Wild Huntress, or Love in the Wilderness' next month. Jimmie thinks that's sure to get my nerve up--being about a girl, you see--”
”And 'Treasure Island' now;” said her guardian, ”did you enjoy that? It came rather late in my life, but I remember thinking it a great book.”
”It's great for nerve. Jimmie often reads me parts of it after I go to bed at night. There's a poem in it--he taught me that by heart--and if I think to say it the last thing before I go to sleep he says I'll get so's _nothing_ can scare me.”
”Recite it for Mr. Debrett,” urged Mrs. Hawtry. And Cecelia Anne obediently began, with a jerk of a curtsey and a shake of her delicate embroideries and blue sash.
”Fifteen men on the dead man's chest Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
Drink and the devil had done for the rest Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!”
Mr. Debrett's astonishment at this lullaby held him silent for some seconds.
”You see, sir,” Cecelia Anne explained, ”if you _can_ go to sleep thinking about that it shows your nerve. I can't. Not yet. But it never makes me cry any more and Jimmie says that's something.”
”I should say it was!” he congratulated her. ”It's wonderful. And now in the matter of dolls,” he went on referring to the list, ”no rag babies, eh?”
”Oh, but she has beautiful dolls, Mr. Debrett,” interposed her mother.
”She'll show them to you to-morrow morning, won't you honey-child? But she did not buy them. They were given to her at Christmas and other times. But really, since we came out here for the summer they've been rather neglected. Their mother has been so busy.”
”And Jimmie made me a house for them!” Cecelia Anne broke in. ”And furniture! And a front yard stuck right on to the piazza! But I don't know, mother, whether I'd have time to show them to Mr. Debrett in the morning. I'm pretty busy now. It's getting so near the race. And I pace Jimmie _every_ morning.”