"h.e.l.lo, Lin?" he shouted again.
Lin shaded her eyes, gazed hard at the boy, dropped the mop, and Alfred heard her call:
"My Gawd, Mary! Come out here, quick!"
The mother appeared as Alfred neared the house. Looking curiously at him, she covered her face with her ap.r.o.n and began to laugh. Lin ran into the house screaming and laughing. The boy stood abashed. The mother motioned him to approach her, pushing him into the house. She obtained a view of the rear of the warrior"s uniform and a fresh outburst of laughter prevented her even speaking to him. Lin and the mother clasped each other in their arms as they swayed, weakened with laughter. Lin was the first to recover her speech. The boy"s feelings were hurt.
"Where"s your regular clothes?" Lin first asked, "you bin in a-swimmin"
agin and lost "em, I reckon."
The children came romping home from school, Sister Lizzie rolled on the floor as she caught sight of the boy and asked Lin, between screams: "Who dressed brother Al up like that?"
The mother ordered him to remain in the room until they got other clothes for him. They did not want the neighbors to see him dressed as he was.
The boy"s spirit began to a.s.sert itself.
"Laugh, if you feel like it. Lacy Hare and Aunt Betsy made me these clothes, they"re regular soldier clothes. I"ll bet if you laugh at them when Aunt Betsy comes she will tell you something. I don"t see nothin"
to laugh at."
"Landsakes," spoke up Lin, "step in the parlor and look at yerself. Ef you don"t laugh you"re not the kind I took ye fer."
Alfred did laugh and he got out of the clothes mighty quickly. Lin was delegated to explain to Aunt Betsy why they changed Alfred"s clothes so quickly.
Aunt Betsy informed them:
"The boy had jes" romped until he was most naked. They didn"t want to send to town for clothes for him, so Lacy and her jes" banded together and made him the suit. They had plenty of time and they concluded to make him a suit different from any other boy"s. And it warn"t much trouble to trim it up and make it nice rather than to make it plain. It took two days more to trim it than it did to make it."
Lin told the good, honest soul they could not think of Alfred wearing the clothes every day in town. "We"ll keep "em off him "til the next battle and when the peepul are all sad over their friends that"s been killed, we"ll dress him up and send him down the street."
Many years afterwards, the writer, rummaging through the garret of the old home, the odd garments fashioned by Lacy Hare and Aunt Betsy were discovered. Recollections of the mirth they aroused when first brought to the notice of the family, prompted the carrying of the old musty outfit to the sitting room below.
But somehow the odd looking suit failed to excite any merriment. It was rather regarded with reverence. The sight of it sent the thoughts of all traveling back to other and happier days. The mother thought of those whose kindly hands had fashioned the fantastic garments; of an elder sister who had filled a mother"s place in the family. She remembered a happy home, its like unknown in all the country about, where hospitality was liberally dispensed, visitors always welcome. She thought of the first wife"s pa.s.sing, the coming of another to the big house. The lowering of the family name by the second marriage. The shunning of the old home by friends and relatives; of the rapid decline of the master; evil a.s.sociates whom he preferred to those who had honored and loved him; the estrangement of family and friends.
In her mind she could see in him a bent old man, prematurely old, leaving his home to seek shelter with strangers, lost to the sight of former friends, his whereabouts known only when the final summons came to him; his ident.i.ty made known by his last request:
"I have left money with George Gallagher to bury me. Bury me beside Betsy."
And in her mind she saw two graves side by side, one with a marker reading "My Beloved Wife," the other unmarked.
The mother softly said as she folded the coat and nether garments:
"Put them away again."
CHAPTER SEVEN
Backward, turn backward, oh, time in your flight, Make me a child again, just for tonight.
"Help is mighty skeerse an" ye got to take what ye kin git," was Lin"s answer to the query of a neighbor as to why they had re-employed Cousin Charley after the confusion he had created in the family of Alfred.
Cousin Charley was sent to the country on an errand that was supposed to consume a couple of hours.
It was Circus day. The head of the family gave the boys sufficient money to pay their way from side-show to concert.
That they might not miss any of the sights of Circus day, Charley arranged with Lin to serve breakfast by 5 a. m., to give him an early start, enabling him to return by 8 o"clock and take Alfred to the circus grounds to remain all day, the custom of the country folk in those days.
Many families brought their lunch with them and picnicked on the show grounds. Among them was Abner Linn, a large man noted for his appet.i.te and great strength. Abner was making his way through the crowd on Circus day, clearing a path, as it were, for his delicate little wife and more than half a dozen children. The frail little woman carried a large basket filled with eatables. The basket was more than a load and the little woman struggled to keep near her muscular husband. Glancing back and noticing the wife faltering, he relieved her of the basket and started forward at a faster walk than before.
Gentle Harry Mason admiringly complimented him by saying:
"Abner, that was very kind and thoughtful of you to carry that heavy basket for your wife."
Ab, with a leer, said: "Gosh, I was afeard she"d get lost."
Alfred cried to go to the country with Charley. Lin said:
"Ye"ll be so tired ye can"t enjoy the show ef ye walk out thar an" back so early in the mornin"."
Go Alfred would. Up Town Hill, through Sandy Hollow, through the old toll gate to Thornton"s Lane where the boys were to turn off the old pike. But they did not turn off. They lingered under the big locust trees throwing stones at birds and against the high fence surrounding the Fair Grounds where Black Fan had won her famous race. The circus was coming in on the old pike from Uniontown. All circus travel was overland in those days.
Cousin Charley argued if they did not see the show come in they"d miss one of the big sights of the day: they had plenty of time. The show would pa.s.s that way soon and Alfred was only too willing to linger.
The dew, sparkling like diamonds as it lay on gra.s.s and plant, had disappeared; a summer"s sun was pouring its direct rays on the old pike.
Cousin Charley prevailed on the younger boy to continue the journey further eastward on the pike until they met the wagons. Cousin Charley explained that he was familiar with a short cut to their destination, and as they crossed the creek they would have a swim.
This met with the hearty approval of Alfred. The boys walked out the old highway, pa.s.sing Captain Abram"s fine farm where Charley had dug potatoes on the shares, on beyond Uncle Jack"s big stone house, nearly to Redstone School-house ere the circus wagons were met. As the wagons rolled by, the boys conjectured as to what each contained. There were no animal vans as the menagerie had not combined with the circus in those days. The big, gold-mounted band wagon, followed by a dozen pa.s.senger wagons, buggies and hacks, a half dozen led ring horses and ponies, pa.s.sed, and the cavalcade was lost in the dust.
Striking across the fields the boys were soon on the banks of Dunlap"s Creek. Instead of the gently flowing stream in which they expected to bathe their heated bodies, they found a raging, muddy torrent, fast flowing, spreading over bottom lands, water half way up the stalks of the growing corn.
Cousin Charley declared the water too muddy for bathing purposes; but he would undress, construct a raft of the plentiful rails that had lodged along the banks of the creek, and seating Alfred on the raft, he would swim, pushing the raft across the creek.
Cousin Charley began constructing the raft near the creek bank proper, where the water was backed into the field. He dragged the rails through the water, sometimes lying down and swimming, at other times diving under the water. Alfred could not resist the temptation to undress and a.s.sist with the raft.
[Ill.u.s.tration: The Life Raft]
When completed, Cousin Charley seated Alfred on the top of the raft, the clothing of both boys being piled on his lap that they might not get wet. The raft was pushed off, Cousin Charley insisting that he was a stern wheel tow boat, kicking his feet out of the water to imitate the splash of the wheel. The boat did not make great headway but backed and went ahead as the raft floated down the creek. The banks were steeper on either side, therefore, the tow boat decided to go down the stream a little further ere landing. In fact, the towboat was having such a good time he did not fully realize the current was carrying his tow rapidly towards the old mill dam. Neither did the pa.s.senger on the raft realize this until he noticed a changed expression on the face of the tow boat.
He further realized that the tow boat was laboring powerfully.
In rounding a bend in the stream the tow actually swung around in the current, the tow boat not having power to prevent it. The younger boy for the first time noticed the roaring of the old dam, a fact the boy doing the towing had been aware of and terribly worried over for some time.
In his excitement, the younger boy stood up on the raft.
"Set down! Set down!" frantically yelled the boy in the water.
Another alarming fact presented itself at this juncture. Several of the under rails had worked out and were only connected to the raft by one end. This caused the raft to settle on the port side and the younger boy could no longer keep his seat, fearing he would tumble off backwards into the stream.