"I guess it"s that rough brown stuff they make potato bags of."
"Burlap?"
"Yes. But we haven"t many ashes at this time of year and we"ll have still less if we live on mush and milk."
"Maybe we could get ashes somewhere," she said, thoughtfully.
"We"d have to, because it would take us over a year to get enough to repent in."
"There"ll be ashes left from the automobile and the suits, and if you can get enough potato bags, I"ll fix "em so we can wear "em at the sacrifice and afterwards we can buy deep mourning."
"All right, but you mustn"t make pretty suits."
"I couldn"t, out of potato bags. They"ll have to be plain--very plain."
"The first thing is to get this car into our barn, and write and tell Colonel Kent where it is. Then we"ll get our black clothes, and then we"ll shoot the dogs and bury "em, and then we"ll have the sacrifice, and then--"
"And then," repeated Juliet.
"Then we"ll have to go and tell "em all what we"ve done, and offer to pay all the bills, and give "em the price of the car besides for damages."
"Oh, Romie," cried Juliet, with a shudder, "we don"t have to go and tell "em, do we? We don"t have to take strangers into our consciences, do we?"
"Certainly," replied Romeo, sternly. "Just because we don"t want to do it is why we"ve got to. We"ve got to do hard things when we make a sacrifice. Lots of people think they"re charitable if they give away their old clothes and things they don"t want. It isn"t charity to give away things you want to get rid of and it isn"t a sacrifice to do things you don"t mind doing. The harder it is and the more we don"t want to do it, the better sacrifice."
His logic was convincing, but Juliet drooped visibly. The bent little figure on the blanket was pathetic, but the twins were not given to self-pity. As time went on, the conversation lagged. They had both had a hard day, from more than one standpoint, and it was not surprising that by midnight, the self-appointed sentries were sound asleep upon one blanket, with Romeo"s coat for a pillow and the other blanket tucked around them.
The red lanterns burned faithfully until almost dawn, then smoked and went out, leaving an unpleasant odour that lasted until sunrise. The rumble of a distant cart woke them, and they sat up, shamefacedly rubbing their eyes.
"Oh," cried Juliet, conscience-stricken, "we went to sleep! We went to sleep on duty! How could we?"
"Dunno," returned Romeo, with a frank yawn. "Guess we were tired.
Anyhow, the machine is all right."
When the milkman came in sight, they hailed him and purchased a quart of milk. He was scarcely surprised to see them, for the Crosbys were widely known to be eccentric, and presently he drove on. His query about the wrecked car had pa.s.sed unnoticed.
"If you"ll stay here, Jule," said Romeo, wiping his mouth, "I"ll go and get a team and some rope and we"ll get the car in."
"Can"t I go too?"
"No, you stay here. It"s bad enough to sleep at your post without deserting it."
"You slept, too," retorted Juliet, quickly on the defensive, "and I"m a girl."
"Huh!" he sneered. The claim of feminine privilege invariably disgusted him beyond words.
"Suppose people come by--" Juliet faltered; "and--ask--questions."
"Answer "em," advised Romeo, briefly. "Tell "em we"ve killed a man and are going to suffer for it. We deserve to have everybody know it."
But, fortunately for Juliet"s quicker sensibilities, no one pa.s.sed by in the hour Romeo was gone. He came from the nearest farm with an adequate number of a.s.sistants and such primitive machinery as was at hand. The car was not badly damaged and was finally towed into the Crosbys" barn.
Then they went into the house and composed a letter to Colonel Kent, but put off copying and sending it until they should be able to get black bordered stationery.
Two weeks later, clad in deepest mourning, the twins trudged into town.
At Colonel Kent"s there was no one in authority to receive them and their errand was of too much importance to be communicated to either physician or nurse. Their own unopened letter lay on the library table, with many others.
Subdued and chastened in demeanour, they went to Madame Bernard"s and waited in funereal silence until Madame came down.
"How do you--" she began, then stopped. "Why, what is the matter?"
"We ran over him," explained Romeo, suggestively inclining his head in the general direction of Kent"s. "Don"t you remember?"
"And if he dies, we"ve killed him," put in Juliet, sadly.
"We"ll be murderers if he dies," Romeo continued, "and we ought to be hung."
In spite of her own depression and deep anxiety, Madame saw how keenly the tragedy had affected the twins. "Why, my dears!" she cried. "Do you think for a minute that anybody in the world blames you?"
"We ought to be blamed," Romeo returned, "because we did it."
"But not on purpose--you couldn"t help it."
"We could have helped it," said Juliet, "by not celebrating. We had no business to buy an automobile, or, even if we had, we shouldn"t have gone out in it until we learned to run it."
"That"s like staying away from the water until you have learned to swim," answered Madame, comfortingly, "and Allison isn"t going to die."
"Really? Do you mean it? Are you sure? How do you know?" The words came all at once, in a jumble of eager questions.
"Because he isn"t. The worst that could possibly happen to him would be the loss of his left hand, and his father is looking all over the country for some surgeon who can save it."
"I"d rather die than to have my hand cut off," said Juliet, in a small, thin voice.
"So would I," added Romeo.
"We"re all hoping for the best," Madame went on, "and you must hope, too. n.o.body has thought of blaming you, so you mustn"t feel so badly about it. Even Allison himself wouldn"t want you to feel badly."
"But we do," Romeo answered, "in spite of all the sacrifices and everything."
"Sacrifices," repeated Madame, wonderingly, "why, what do you mean?"
"We did sentry duty all night by his car," Romeo explained, "and we"re taking care of it in our barn."
"And we"ve lived on mush and milk ever since," Juliet added.
"I shot all the dogs but the one with the puppies," said Romeo.
"She wasn"t in it, you know," Juliet continued. "I helped dig the trench and we buried the whole nineteen end to end by the fence, with their new collars on."