Part 7 (1/2)

Up the steep stairs they toiled softly, and were ushered into a room so darkened that, coming from the glare of the sun outside, it was at first difficult to see anything.

But Phil at length made out a figure, wrapped in a shawl this warm summer day, seated in a cus.h.i.+oned rocking-chair, and felt a cool, slim hand take his own for an instant. He looked timidly into the face above him and saw with a lightened heart that Miss Lunette was not dreadful at all, that she didn't look in the least as he had expected and feared to see her look.

And in the fullness of his heart, little Phil spoke out.

”Why, you are pretty,” said he to Miss Lunette.

Miss Lunette's pale, thin face flushed with pleasure, and she laid a hand lightly upon Philip's head.

”I feel so well to-day,” said she graciously, ”that I want to show you children some toys that I've been making. Some day I mean to sell them in the city, but it won't do any harm, I suppose, to show them to you beforehand. It is what we call wool-work,” added she carefully.

On a table, drawn close to Miss Lunette's chair, stood a group of animals made of worsted. There were yellow chickens standing unsteadily upon their toothpick legs. Lopsided white sheep faced a pair of stout rabbits evidently suffering from the mumps. A dull brown rooster suddenly blossomed out into a gorgeous tail of red and green and purple yarn.

For a grown person it would be difficult to imagine who, in the city, would purchase these strange specimens of natural history, but such a disloyal thought did not occur to the children. They admired the toys to Miss Lunette's complete satisfaction, and they had their reward. For Miss Lunette took from the shelf under the table a book, a home-made book, between whose pasteboard covers had been sewed leaves of stiff white paper.

”As a special treat,” said Miss Lunette sweetly to her round-eyed audience, ”I am going to show you my book.”

She paused for an instant to allow Susan and Phil to feast their eyes upon the book in silence.

”This is the cover,” said she at last, ”and I made the picture myself.”

The picture was that of a rigid little boy, in a paper soldier cap, stiffly blowing upon a tin trumpet. The picture was carefully colored with red and blue crayons.

”Oh, it's pretty,” said Susan, in honest admiration. She meant to make a book herself as soon as she reached home.

”What's inside?” asked Philip. He felt sorry for that little boy, who, as long as he lived with Miss Lunette, might never make a noise.

”I think the cover ought to be bright and gay, so that it will attract the children,” went on the auth.o.r.ess. ”Don't you think so, too?”

Yes, Susan and Phil thought so, too.

”But what's inside?” asked Philip again.

How was that little boy going to play soldier, and never once shout or fire off a gun?

”The name of the book is 'Scripture for Little Ones,'” continued Miss Lunette. ”I will read parts of it to you if you like.” And opening at page one, she began to read.

A is for Absalom who hung by his hair From a tree-How painful to be left swinging there.

B is for Baalam-He had a donkey who spoke- If we heard it to-day we would think it a joke.

C is for Cain-His brother Abel he slew- He was a murderer-May it never be true of you!

D is for Daniel who, in the lion's den, Suffered no harm from beasts or from men.

E is for-

But whom E stood for the children never knew, for Miss Liza appeared in the doorway bearing a tray.

”Here is your dinner, Lunette,” said she gently. ”Children, you creep downstairs now. You don't want to overdo, Lunette,” she added, as she placed the invalid's substantial dinner before her. ”You've been talking for an hour now.”