Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends Part 20

"Oh--my--senses!" said Mrs. Finley, "what a little fool;--use your eyes a little more and your tongue less, and you'll find things, I guess; and now let me see every thing right end up when I come down stairs.

_Do you hear?_"

"Yes, ma'am," said Letty, drawing a long sigh as Mrs. Finley closed the door.

"Came from the poor-house, didn't you?" said Master John Finley, cracking a whip over Letty's head. "Well, I'm glad you've come here at any rate; I haven't known what to do with myself all vacation. It will be prime fun, I'm thinking, to tease you, you little scared rabbit; and I'll tell you, to begin with, that my name is Mr. John Finley, and that I'm my mother's pet, and that whatever _I_ say is pretty likely to be done in this house;--so you'd better be careful and keep on the right side of me," said the wicked boy, as he gave her arm a knock, and sent the waiter of dishes out of her hand upon the floor.

"Oh! Master John," said Letty; "see what you have done--oh!"--and Letty wrung her little white hands.

"See what _I've_ done?" said John. "I like that, Miss Letty, or Hetty, or whatever you call yourself; but what's that string round your neck for?--what's on the end of it, hey?"--and he gave it a rude twitch, snapped it in two, and picked up a little locket that Letty wore in her bosom.

"Oh, Master John," said Letty, "give it back, do,--it's all I have to make me happy now,--my mamma gave it me when she died. She used to wear it once when she was rich. Oh, Master John, don't, please, take it away from me."

"Look here! cry-baby," said John, putting the locket in his jacket pocket, "you never'll see that locket again. I shall say, too, that _you_ broke all those dishes, and if you contradict it, I'll take that locket to a police-man, and tell him you stole it. Won't you look pretty going to jail with your long black curls? Answer me _that_, Miss Hetty Letty?"

Letty only answered by her sobs.

"What's all this?" said Mrs. Finley, opening the door; "one might as well try to sleep in Bedlam. Merciful man! who broke all those dishes?

John Madison Harrison Polk! who broke all those dishes, I say?"

"I told her she'd catch it, mother, when you came down," said John; "see if she dare deny it?"

"Letty," said Mrs. Finley, seizing her by the shoulders and giving her a shake, "did you break that breakfast set?"

Letty thought of John, and the police-man, and the jail, and was silent.

"John," said Mrs. Finley, "go bring me your father's horse-whip from behind the kitchen door."

"Oh, Mrs. Finley," said Letty, growing very white about the mouth, and trembling violently all over; "don't whip me; my mamma never whipped me. Oh, mamma--mamma!"

Down came the heavy whip on Letty's fair head and shoulders;--"There--take that, and that, and that!" said Mrs. Finley, "and remember that I didn't take you into my house to quarrel with my children, and break up dishes; and now take yourself up into the dark garret, and get into bed, and don't you get up till Mr. Finley comes home to dinner, and let's see if he can manage you."

Letty pushed her hair from before her eyes, and staggered to the door; then, up the stairs where they told her, into the garret; then, she groped her way to bed; then, she laid her head on the pillow; but she didn't cry--no--not even when she thought of her mamma,--the tears wouldn't come; but her head was very hot, and her hands burning. There she lay, hour after hour, talking to herself about a great many things; and had it been light enough you would have seen how flushed her cheeks were, and how very strangely her eyes looked.

"The child has a brain fever," said the Doctor to Mrs. Finley.

"No wonder," said the wicked woman, "she had such a dreadful fall down the cellar stairs. You see how she bruised her face and neck."

The Doctor looked very sharp at Mrs. Finley--so sharp that she stooped down, pretending to pick something from the floor, that he needn't see her blush.

"I don't know how I am to nurse a sick child," grumbled Mrs. Finley; "there's John Madison Harrison Polk, and Sarah Jenny Lind, and Malvina Cecelia Victoria, and Napoleon Bonaparte, four children of my own to look after. It's a hard case, Doctor."

"Not so hard a case as little Letty's," said the kind Doctor. "Those bruises never came from falling down stairs, Mrs. Finley; that child has been cruelly abused. I _may_ tell of it, and I may _not_,--that depends upon whether she lives or dies; but I am going to take her home to my own house, and see what good doctoring can do for her. She looks like my little dead Mary, and for her sake I'll be a father to her."

So Letty was carried on a litter to Doctor Harris' house; and there, for a great many weeks, she lay in her little bed, quite crazy--her beautiful hair shaved off, and her little head blistered to make her well. The Doctor's wife was a sweet, kind lady;--_she_ thought, too, that "Letty looked like her little dead Mary," and often, when she held her little burning hand, the tears would come to her eyes, and she would pray G.o.d to let her live, for she had no child to love now, and she wanted Letty for her own little girl.

Well, after a long, long while, Letty's senses came slowly back. She put her little hand to her forehead and tried to remember what had happened;--she didn't know what to make of the nice, pretty room, and soft bed with its silken curtains;--she thought she was dreaming, and rubbed her eyes and looked again, and then hid her face in the sheet for fear she should see Mrs. Finley, or John, or the police-man;--and then Mrs. Harris put her finger on Letty's lip and told her not to talk now, because she was sick and weak, but that she was always going to live with her, and be, not her servant, but her own dear little girl; and then Letty kissed Mrs. Harris' hand, and shut her eyes, and went to sleep as quietly as if she were on her mother's bosom.

By and by, little by little, she got strong and well again; her checks grew plump and rosy; her hair came out in little black, curls all over her head, and she was just the happiest little girl--as happy as you are when you climb on your mother's lap and kiss her, as if you never wanted to stop.

She had a little room of her own, close by her new mother's, with a cunning little bed, and wash-stand, and bureau, and rocking chair. She had plenty of playthings, too,--(not little Mary's, for mothers can't give away their little children's playthings when they are dead.) Letty had playthings of her own;--but sometimes, Mrs. Harris would unlock a little trunk, and show her a little cake, all dried up, _with the marks of tiny little teeth in it_; and a slate on which was a word left unfinished by little Mary; and a little chest of doll's clothes, with such nice little womanly st.i.tches in them; and a little fairy thimble; and then the tears would fall into the trunk as she locked it up again, and then Letty would throw her arms about her neck and say, "Don't cry--Letty loves you."

And now, my little darling readers, there is one verse in the Bible which Aunt f.a.n.n.y wants you to remember; it is this:

"When thy father and thy mother forsake thee, then the Lord will take thee up."

FRONTIER STORIES.

"Joseph," said his mother, "I want you to run over to Aunt Elsie's and borrow a pair of flat-irons; she said she would lend them to me, till I could get some from the settlement."

"Yes, mother," said little Joe; "and I can whittle my stick going along. I'm afraid Bill Sykes will get _his_ arrows made first; and if I ain't but eight years old, he shan't beat me at anything."

So Joe perched his cap on the top of his head, and started off through the woods, with his jack-knife for company.

"Aunt Elsie" was a widow, who lived just half a mile from Joe's mother's. Everybody loved her, she was so motherly, and so ready to do a kindness; every man, woman and child in the neighborhood, would have run their feet off for her, if it would have done her any good.

Yes, Aunt Elsie was a regular sunbeam; and yet she had known sorrow and trouble enough, for, as I told you, she was a widow; but she looked forward to a better home than any _this_ world can furnish, and so she bore her trials just as one would the little wearinesses and discomforts of a journey, when every hour is bringing him nearer and nearer to his own dear fireside, with its loving hearts.

Well, little Joe went whistling and whittling along, thinking of Bill Sykes and his arrows. Half a mile was no great distance to go; he might finish one arrow going along; that is, if his jack-knife didn't break, or if he didn't whittle off one of his fingers by mistake. He wished the wood wasn't quite so hard: he wondered whether Bill Sykes would make _his_ arrows of hickory: he wondered whether Bill's brother Tom, wouldn't make them for him--just as like as not, now, he would, and then Bill would be _sure_ to have the best ones: too bad! Joe wished _he_ had a brother, too; he wished----ph-e-w! What's that?

A _bear_! as sure as you are alive! (and may _not_ be long.) What's to be done now? Joe was a nice fat little boy, and the bear might be hungry. He wasn't afraid: pooh!--no. A little backwoods boy afraid?

They are made of different stuff than the little ruffled-collar boys that tag about with the nursery maid at their heels, in Broadway.

Joe examined his jack-knife, and took another look at the bear, as he lay behind the bushes. Old Bruin was fast asleep.

All right;--Joe's mother wouldn't have to wait for her flat-irons; so he stepped carefully along (not to disturb Bruin's nap) and reached Aunt Elsie's, with a whole skin.

Aunt Elsie was very glad to see Joe, for she loved children, and always ran to the cupboard to get them a piece of wholesome frontier pie, or gingerbread, or bit of hoe-cake; but Joe said he couldn't stop; because his mother had her clothes already sprinkled and folded ready for the irons, and had told him to hurry back as fast as ever he could.

Did he tell Aunt Elsie about the bear? Do you suppose a frontier boy would take refuge under a woman's ap.r.o.n?

No, sir!

If you should mention such a thing to him, he would tuck up his pinafore, roll up his jacket sleeves, and show you his little brown fists, in a trice!

No, sir; he never _alluded_ to the bear, but taking a flat-iron in each hand, went whistling along as if no such animal had ever walked out of Noah's ark into the back woods.

Well, he had got through "Hail Columbia," and "Auld Lang Syne," when he spied Bruin again; and this time he was wide awake, too.

He began whistling Yankee Doodle; first, to show his independence, and secondly, because he knew if anything would take the nonsense out of the letter _B_, it was Yankee Doodle!

"I'll iron him with these flat-irons, anyhow," said Joe to himself, "if he comes here to eat _me_." But whether the bear wasn't hungry, or whether he didn't like the looks of the flat-irons, or whether Joe's house was a little too near, or whether it was all three, I can't say; all I know is that he never touched a paw to him, and Joe and his flat-irons arrived home in perfect safety.

"I'm _so_ glad you are come, Joe," said his mother, taking the irons and putting them over the fire to heat. "I've a heap of work to do, and besides I felt uneasy like, after you went off alone through the woods, for fear you might _possibly_ meet a bear."