Part 13 (1/2)

”But Eunice thought of doing it first,” answered Cricket, quickly. ”I only thought of the postage stamps.”

”He's too heavy for you, my dear,” said Mrs. Bemis, then. ”Carry him gently into the house, Eliza. He's faint with the loss of so much blood.

Let him go, dear,” as Cricket demurred. ”Eliza can carry him better than you. Let me give him a few drops of this, first,” and she moistened the baby's lips with a few drops from a flask she had brought in her hand.

When the little procession reached the hall door, Mrs. Bemis said:

”Let me take care of him now, with Eliza, girls. You keep the twins amused out-of-doors,” for Zaidee and Helen came creeping down the staircase, looking frightened to death. The girls willingly turned back, having taken them in charge.

”Oh, the watch!” suddenly exclaimed Edna, and they all raced down to the beach, where the accident had happened. The watch still lay, gleaming in the sunlight, where it had fallen, ticking as unconcernedly as if no adventure had befallen it. Fortunately, it had alighted on a particularly soft bit of sand. Edna picked it up.

”If only I hadn't forgotten to put this away when mamma told me to, all this wouldn't have happened,” she said, remorsefully.

”I suppose Kenneth just slipped in there after 'Liza finished dressing him,” said Eunice, ”and saw it lying on the table. You know he's always teasing auntie to show him her 'tick-tick.'”

They went slowly back into the yard, scarcely knowing what to do with themselves. They could not settle to any of their regular amus.e.m.e.nts, and n.o.body wanted to go off riding. The twins were still under the tree, where they had left them. Helen ran towards them.

”Eunice, won't you please make Zaidee stop drinking up all the Pond's Extrap? She says she likes it, and I'm afraid it will kill her,” she said, half crying. ”I told her to don't, and she didn't don't.”

”Put the bottle right down, Zaidee,” ordered Eunice, laughing. ”If you drink the Pond's Extract, what will you do when you fall down and hurt yourself, next time?”

Zaidee took a last hasty swallow. Strange to say, she did like it, very much.

”I suppose it goes all down inside my legs,” she said, with calm conviction, ”and if I b.u.mp my legs it will do them lots more good inside than outside. Come on, Helen. 'Liza said cook would give us our supper to-night, and she's calling us.”

”What funny children,” exclaimed Edna. ”Does Zaidee really _like_ it?”

”Yes, really. 'Liza keeps the bottle locked up. Isn't it funny?”

Just before auntie and grandma returned, Dr. Bemis came over, and went to see his little patient. He was amused at Cricket's original plaster, for which he carefully subst.i.tuted the proper article, but he p.r.o.nounced the dressing of the cut very nicely done, and said that the cut would not have healed so well as he hoped it would now, if it had been left open for that two hours that elapsed before he could get there.

CHAPTER IX.

GEORGE W. AND MARTHA.

A rattling, banging, clattering sound, like a small army of tin pans on a rampage, suddenly woke the echoes one still, sultry afternoon. Auntie Jean thought it was the circus, and sighed as she wondered if they were going to keep it up long enough to make it worth while for her to leave her cool room and her afternoon nap, to go and stop them. Grandma heard it, and supposed it was Cricket, trying some new experiment as a tinware merchant, and hoped she would soon turn her attention to some different employment. Cricket heard it, and promptly started for the scene of action, meeting, in the hall, Eunice and Edna, who came running down-stairs, as well as the boys, who appeared from the kitchen, where they had been foraging for a mid-afternoon lunch.

The disturbance came from the front piazza, but when they went out there nothing, for a moment, was visible, though the same mysterious whacking and banging went on, under the table.

”What is it?” they all exclaimed, but straightway the question was solved, for out from under the table-cover backed a half-grown black kitten, with its head firmly wedged into a tin tomato can. Backing and scratching, as a cat will when its head is covered, the poor little thing, evidently half frantic, tumbled up against the chairs and the side of the house, mewing most frightfully and banging its inconvenient headdress against the piazza floor.

”You poor little cat! Has some horrid boy been abusing you?” cried Cricket, making a dive for it, but dropping it, when she caught it, with equal promptness, as its sharp claws tore her hands. ”Why, stop! you dreadful little thing! How you hurt me!”

”Pick it up, boys,” begged Edna, as the cat resumed its backward way.

”Do get that can off. How did any one ever get it on, do you suppose?

Here, kitty! kitty!”

”Curiosity killed a cat, they say,” said Will, watching his chance at it. ”I suppose it wanted to see the inside of that can, and now that it has seen it, it isn't satisfied. There's no suiting some people. There you are, sir!” and Will, having caught the table-cloth from the table, sending the magazines and papers in a shower to the floor, threw it over the poor little black thing, so that, in picking it up, he could m.u.f.fle its claws, so that it could not scratch. Its neck was torn a little, with the sharp, rough edges of the tin can, and a redoubled chorus of frightened meows greeted his first attempt to remove it.