Part 13 (1/2)
The word was cut in two by a scream. A large and very handsome snake was gliding gracefully across her path. The like of it for size and brilliancy, she had never seen before.
”O, how boo-ful!” cried Katie, darting after it. Horace held her back.
Dotty trembled violently.
”Kill it,” she screamed; ”throw stones at it; take me away! take me away!”
”Poh, Dotty; nothing but an innocent snake; he's more afraid of you than you are of him.”
”You told him take you away two times,” exclaimed Katie, ”and he didn't, and he didn't.”
”I never knew you had such awful things out West,” said Dotty shuddering. ”And I don't think _now_ there's _any_ difference in boy-cousins! They never take you away, nor do anything you ask 'em to--so there!”
”Why, Dotty, he was hurrying as fast as he could to get out of our sight; there was no need of taking you away.”
”She needn't be 'fraid,” observed Flyaway, soothingly; ”if I had a sidders, I could ha' cutted him in two.”
By this time the rest of the party had arrived. Grace and Ca.s.sy walked together very confidentially under the same umbrella which had sheltered them years ago--a black one marked with white paint, ”Stolen from H.S.
Clifford.” ”Bold thieves” Horace called them; but they deigned no notice of his remark.
”I'll get an answer,” murmured Horace, repeating aloud,--
”'Hey for the apple and ho for the pear, But give me the girl with the red hair.'”
At this Grace turned around sharply, and shook her bare head, which gleamed in the sun like burnt gold.
”Panoria Swan has red hair,” said she,--”fire-red; but mine is auburn.”
”O, I only wanted to make you speak, Grace; that will do.”
”Here we are at the woods,” said Mr. Clifford. He had once owned a neighboring lot, and his pecan trees had been fenced around to protect them from the impertinent swine; but now the party were going into the heart of the forest.
The pecan trees were tall, somewhat like maples, with the nuts growing on them in shucks, after the manner of walnuts. These shucks, if left till the coming of frost, would have opened of themselves, and scattered the nuts to the ground; but our friends preferred to gather a few bushels before they were perfectly ripened, rather than lose them altogether.
As the easiest method, Mr. Clifford said they might as well fell a tree, for he had a right to do so. He had brought an axe in his carriage; and Mr. Parlin, whose good right arm had never been injured in the war, soon brought a n.o.ble tree to the ground.
Then there was a scrambling to see which should break off the most shucks. Dotty sat down on a log, half afraid there might be a snake lurking under it, and picked with all her might.
[Ill.u.s.tration: GOING NUTTING.--Page 131.]
”We don't have any pecans at Deering's Oaks,” she thought, ”and nothing but sh.e.l.ls at the Islands. I only wish Prudy was here. Prudy would think I had a little temper at Horace just now; I wonder if he did. I will show him I am sorry; for he _is_ a good boy, and a great deal more 'style' and polite than Percy.”
”What makes our little darling look so dismal?” said Ca.s.sy, taking a seat beside Dotty Dimple.
”O, I was thinking a great _many_ things! I'm so far off, Ca.s.sy! When I think of that, I want to scream right out. Prudy's at home, and I'm here! I don't want to be so far off”.
”But only think, dear, how much you will have to tell when you get home; and in such a little while too.”
Dotty was instantly consoled, for a crowd of recollections rushed into her mind of wonderful events which had occurred since she parted from Prudy. The ”far off” feeling left her as she thought of the stories she should have to tell to admiring listeners one of these days.