Part 14 (1/2)

”Come and help me find George W.,” she called to Eunice and Edna, who were also on the piazza. ”He's mewing dreadfully, and I can't find him.”

”He's worse than a baby,” said Eunice, unwinding herself from the comfortable, twisted-up position in the steamer chair, which she loved.

”Couldn't you let him cry a little while and give him a lesson?”

”I wouldn't mind giving _him_ a lesson, but I'm afraid he'd give me one in patience,” returned Cricket, laughing. ”I'm sure I don't want to listen to that music long. There, he's stopped again, now.”

But five minutes later, George W. renewed his complaints.

”Now I'm going to let him cry!” said Cricket, returning in despair from another search. So down she sat, shutting her ears to outside sounds in her comfortable fas.h.i.+on.

Presently grandma appeared at the hall door.

”Cricket, my dear, George Was.h.i.+ngton seems to want something. Don't you think you'd better try and find him?”

”Grandma, he's been crying and weeping for an hour at least, and I just can't find him. But I'll look again.”

But wherever George W. was, he was certainly securely hidden. He cried now and then at intervals, but it was impossible to locate the sound, since it came first from one side, then from another.

”He's between the floors somewhere,” said Will, who had joined the search. ”The question is, where?”

”We'll have to decide that question at once,” said auntie, ”because we can scarcely have all the floors in the house taken up. How could he have gotten in?”

”Perhaps through some small hole in the garret floor. He's probably forgotten the way back. Or, perhaps there's some hole down cellar where he got inside, and ran up after the mice.”

”Perhaps the mice have gotten the best of him, and are tearing him limb from limb,” suggested Archie, making such a horrible face that Helen retreated behind Aunt Jean in terror.

All the afternoon they followed the sounds at intervals, listening at the floor, and calling over and over. George W. seemed to be exploring the entire interior of the house. Late in the afternoon, the cries came more constantly from the floor of the trunkroom, a small apartment off the garret, and directly over Eunice's room. There was a small knot-hole in the floor, and the light from a window fell directly on it, probably attracting George W. there. Saws and hatchets were brought, and the boys soon had a piece of the floor up, making a hole large enough for several cats the size of George to come up.

”George evidently likes this sort of thing,” said Archie, hacking away.

”First the tin can, then the floor. Come out here, old fellow.” But he was evidently frightened away by the noise, and could not be induced to come up.

”Bring a saucer of milk, Edna,” said Mrs. Somers. ”Stand it at one side, and then we will all go away and he will soon come up.” So the milk was brought, and as it was supper-time, they all went down and left George W. to his own devices. Cricket was much disposed to stay and make sure that he came up, but she was finally persuaded to come down with the rest.

”Isn't it funny how his voice came from all over?” she said, at the supper-table. ”Probably he was right there under the trunkroom floor all the time. He was a regular philanthropist.”

”A regular what?” asked grandma and Auntie Jean, together.

”A philanthropist. Don't you know? a man who--who talks where he isn't?”

”A _ventriloquist_!” said Will. ”That's what you mean.”

”Do I? Auntie, what is a philanthropist, then?”

”A philanthropist is one who loves man, dear, and who--”

”Then when a girl's engaged, is she a philanthropist?” broke in Cricket, with her gla.s.s of milk half raised. The others all laughed.