We live downstairs in a great big room and eat there and everything, it seems just as if flowers grew right in it, for there are boxes of them at the windows and on the veranda, and Aunt Nellie puts big bunches of them all around the room and Peggy has a bird that lives in a white cage in the window and sings all the time, I guess becose the sun shines on him. The furniture is not gold at all like Aunt Josephine"s and it is not big like we have at home and there are only one or two rugs and the floor shines; Aunt Nellie does not fuss when we children move things around and we have lots of fun. There is a big fireplace made of rocks Billy says they pulled up from the beach. One time Mr.
Lee lighted some big logs in it and we all sat round and told terrible storys of pirates and things we made up most, but Billy could think of the worst and Mr. Lee and Aunt Nellie sat with us and told some just like they were children, too. Sometimes Aunt Nellie seems just like a girl, she is so jolly, she is not a bit like Aunt Josephine, though I am sure Aunt Josephine is a very nice lady and I don"t mean that I don"t love her, only Aunt Nellie kisses me as if she liked too and does not just peck my cheek. Last week she brought me home some lovly middy bloses like Peggy wears, and I play in bloomers all day and put on a white skirt for supper; Mr. Lee says Peggy and I look like twins.
Auntie brought me a bathing suit, too, and a tennis raket Peggy says is better than hers. She folded away all my hair ribbons, she said we would not bother with them in the country. Barbara wears middy bloses, too, but she cannot wear bloomers becose she is too old though she does not look old or grownup. She is going away to school in the fall and Auntie and she are getting her close ready. Alice is just a little girl and is some fun, although she crys real often Peggy says she is spoiled. Auntie says she will outgrow that and that Peggy cryed just as much when she was like Alice is. I wish I could see you becose I would like to ask you many questions about when I was a little girl. I am sure if I had a little sister like Alice I would try and be more polite than Peggy is, but Peggy says that families are all like that. Billy is awful. I do not think I like him very much. He says the queerest words and acts rude and rough. Tante would not like his manners at all. I am ashamed becose I do not like him becose Auntie loves him dearly and she only laughs when I think she will punish him; he does not read books and his English is bad like Dinah"s and he teses Peggy and Alice and eats very fast and talks with food in his mouth. I shall try to like him.
There are no sidewalks at Mr. Lee"s house; they have pebble paths with flowers here instead of sidewalks and a dirt road; it is just like the real country and there are daisies in the fields, Peggy says they do not call them lots. The gra.s.s is greener than in the Square at home.
All the children have gardens. Peggy says I may have half of her"s and I have a hoe and rake all my own. Billy Is going to sell his vegertables becose he wants to buy a new sending set for his wireless.
I like the pony, though I do not like to ride it after the first time when I fell off, though it did not hurt me at all and I was not even frightened.
To-morrow we are going into the lake for a swim, although I will have to learn, but Peggy says that it is easy only I must stay away from Billy or he will duck me. I shall try and not be afraid becose I am sure you would be ashamed of me if I acted frightened. It will be fun to put on my new bathing suit. Auntie taught Barbara and Peggy to swim.
Peggy is going to try and win the medal this year, and Barbara says she will becose she swims so well.
I will try and remember to write to Aunt Josephine like I promised I would becose she is my aunt, but I will not know what to tell her becose there is not anything in Overlook that is like what she has and she might not like what I tell her and scold us. I am sure she would be angry if I told her that once a week Auntie lets us girls cook the supper and we cook just what we please and surprise them, and Barbara puts down on a paper everything we use and how much it costs, and after supper she gives it to Mr. Lee and we talk about it. Tomorrow is our night. Oh I wish you were here, Daddy, it is such fun only it is very lonely without a father. I try to do all the things that Peggy does, though I can"t do them as well, but I will tell you in this diry how I improve as I intend to do. I have not any book to keep my thoughts in, but I will send them to you whenever I write them. Please excuse my spelling for I am sure no one should have to look in a d.i.c.kshunary when they are writing thoughts. Tante never did. I love you and I am sending a million kisses with this letter.
Your little soldier daugghter, Keineth Randolph.
Dear Mr. President of the United States:
Please send the letter I put in the envelope to my father. He is working for the Stars and Stripes somewhere, he said he could not tell me where becose it was a secret. He is a soldier, but he is one of those that do not wear any uniform. I am sure you will know where he is becose you are the President of our Country. I would like to know, too, very much where he is becose it is lonesome without him, for my father is the only family I have. But my father said I must be a little soldier. You know he just means me to do my duty and to like Overlook and everybody and to do what they do, but it makes me feel better to pretend that I am a soldier like he is and like all your soldiers.
Thank you if you send my letter to my father and much love.
Yours truly, Keineth Randolph.
P. S.--Aunt Josephine says postscripts are not good form, but I forgot to say that my father"s name is John Randolph, of Washington Square, New York. This was the letter over which Keineth, curled in a chair at the writing-desk, had labored for a long time, finishing it at last to her satisfaction. Slipping it into an envelope with the letter she had written to her father she sealed it hastily, anxious to have it addressed and mailed before Peggy and Billy returned from the golf club.
Over on the window seat Barbara sat sewing, watching Keineth with amused eyes; for Keineth had been writing with the dictionary open at her elbow and had stopped very often to consult it as to the spelling of a word.
"Very different from Peggy," thought Barbara.
Aware after a little that Keineth"s face wore a perplexed frown, she said to her:
"Can I help you, Ken?"
"If you"ll just tell me how to address a letter to the President, please."
"The President! What President?"
"The President of the United States."
"Good gracious--" Barbara, dropping her sewing, stared at Keineth in amazement. "I thought--no wonder you"re using a dictionary! I am sure I would, too! But--" Keineth broke in hastily. "You see I have been writing a sort of diary, about everything I think and do, to send to my father, but I don"t know where he is because he has gone away on a mission for our country and it has to be kept a secret, but I thought--" Her voice broke a little and she held the letter tightly in her hands.
Barbara, feeling how close the tears were to Keineth"s bright eyes, crossed quickly to her side.
"Oh, I see!" she said briskly. "What a splendid idea! Of course the President will know where he is and will send it to him. Let me think--we learned all that in school and had to address make-believe letters to him--" Taking a sheet of paper she wrote in large letters:
Honorable Woodrow Wilson, White House, Washington, D. C.
"It looks too simple for the President--it ought to have more flourishes to it and t.i.tles and things, shouldn"t it, Ken? You copy it and we"ll walk straight down to the post office and mail it so that it will go on to-night"s train." Tears were far from Keineth"s eyes as she walked by Barbara"s side down the white road between the fields of daisies and b.u.t.tercups. The little cloud of loneliness that had for a brief time threatened her sky had disappeared and she was again a light-hearted little girl, eagerly awaiting the happy things that each new day at Overlook seemed to bring to her.
CHAPTER V
PILOT COMES TO OVERLOOK
"This is the third time in a week that Billy"s been late for dinner,"
said Mrs. Lee, looking from Billy"s empty place at the table to his father"s face.
Mr. Lee was serving the steaming chicken and biscuits that Nora had placed on the table.
"He asked me if he could go to the fair at Middletown! He wanted his next week"s allowance."
"William," and Mrs. Lee"s gentle voice was stern, "you do spoil that boy dreadfully!"
"He"s with Jim Archer!" Peggy put in. She knew that her mother did not like Jim Archer.
"Billy"s with him a lot," added Barbara.
"He teases us girls all the time, too, Mother! He put June bugs in my bed last night!" cried Alice.
"Billy is certainly in all wrong just now," answered Mr. Lee with a twinkle in his eyes.
"But _do_ you think these fairs are quite the places for boys like Billy and Jim Archer--alone?" asked Mrs. Lee with a troubled look. "He should have been home long ago! They must have ridden their wheels!"
"Don"t worry, little mother! Billy will come home tired and hungry and none the worse for the fair! Why, when I was a boy I never missed a fair anywhere around and always walked, too! _They_ used to be real fairs--nothing like them these days!"
The children knew that when their father began his "when I was a boy,"
it could mean a story if there was a little coaxing!
"Oh, tell us a story!" Alice cried.
"Please do!" added Keineth. It would make them all forget to feel cross toward Billy!
So, chuckling a little under his breath, Mr. Lee began:
"Down in our village old Cy Addington had a calf he"d entered in the County Fair. He"d set his heart on that calf"s winning a prize--all the other farmers had told him it would. It was black as jet with just a little white mark on its fore quarter. He tended that calf like a baby and spent hours at a time getting it all in shape for the Fair. Well, the night before the Fair opened two boys--bad boys they were--stole that calf out of its shed, took it off in some woods where they had a lantern and a can of paint hidden under a log. What do you think they did? Painted the animal white--snow white--every bit of him! Then they took him to the graveyard and tied him to a tombstone!"
"Oh, Daddy, how dreadful!" cried Alice.
"Then what happened?" demanded Keineth and Peggy in one voice.
"Well, a lot of things happened, and they happened fast! Miss Cymantha Jones, a nervous spinster, was walking home from Widow Markham"s house--rather late, but she"d been caring for the widow through a sick spell. And Miss Cymantha saw that calf jumping around among the tombstones and thought it was a ghost! She let out such screams that it brought Charley, the old s.e.xton, running to the door in his night shirt, and he saw the calf, and Miss Cymantha scuttling down the road screaming and holding her skirts high so"s she could run faster, and I guess he thought it was the resurrection itself, for what did he do but ring the bell and the folks all thought it was a fire and came rushing out in all kinds of clothes! Then Cy Addington found his precious calf and the neighbors had an indignation meeting right then and there and the ones who had the most clothes on started out to find the offenders and some of the others went in to quiet Miss Cymantha, and a few others put the s.e.xton to bed and locked him in so that he couldn"t give any more alarms!"
"But what happened to the boys?"
"Oh, when the crowd was the most excited they just climbed over a woodshed into the house and by the time the volunteers were lined up to go to find them they were sound asleep!"