Four Little Blossoms at Brookside Farm Part 14

Meg shrieked in terror as she saw what the bull meant to do.

"Peter! Jud! Aunt Polly! Come quick!" she screamed, hardly knowing what she was crying.

"Coming!" called a big voice, and over the fence corner sprang Peter Apgar, a pitchfork in his hand. He had been gathering up the loose hay left along the edge of the field after the hayloader had gathered the main crop.

After Peter came Spotty, who met the bull just as that cross animal's nose appeared at the gap in the fence. Indeed, Spotty met him so suddenly that both grunted.

"I'll turn him. You stay back here out of sight," commanded Peter, running past the four little Blossoms.

The children were very glad to stay huddled behind the bushes, but they couldn't help peeping out now and then to see what Peter and Spotty were doing with the bull.

"Woof, woof!" barked Spotty.

"You will, will you?" shouted Peter.

He jabbed the bull with the pitchfork, and that surprised beast turned with a bellow. Holding the pitchfork so that it would not hurt him unless he tried to come at him, Peter forced the bull back through the fence, and then he and Spotty drove him across the field.

Presently Peter and the dog came back, a bit warm and breathless, and very glad the four little Blossoms were to see them.

"You can finish berrying in peace," said Peter. "I drove the bull into Simmonds' barnyard and told his man to keep him there. No farmer has a right to leave a cross bull at large."

The children set to work at the berries again, and, as nothing further happened to disturb them, they filled all four pails before supper time. Bobby and Meg helped the twins a little, and maybe they weren't proud to have berries of their own picking and cream, as Meg said, of their own milking, for their supper that night! And there were enough berries left over for four small turnovers. Aunt Polly made this pleasant announcement.

"I intended to bake cookies to-morrow morning," she said, smiling.

"And I don't know why I shouldn't make turnovers, too, and maybe doughnuts. Perhaps some one would like to keep me company? Linda is going to spend the day with her mother in town, and like as not I shall be lonesome."

"We'll all keep you company," promised Bobby gravely.

So the next morning every one was up early because Linda wanted to have breakfast cleared away before Jud drove her over to town. Soon after she was gone Aunt Polly put on a large white ap.r.o.n and the four children trooped into the pleasant kitchen after her.

"Let me see," thought Aunt Polly out loud. "Meg should have an ap.r.o.n.

Suppose I tie one of Linda's around your neck, dear? Hers are shorter than mine."

In a very short time Aunt Polly had rolled out the crust for the turnovers and filled them with berries and sugar.

"When they are done you can take them outdoors and eat them while they're hot," she said. "Make believe you're having a picnic."

"Can't we have a picnic, a real picnic?" asked Bobby quickly.

"Why, of course," agreed Aunt Polly. "I meant you should have a picnic weeks ago. Only time goes so fast. However, before vacation is over we'll have a real picnic with all kinds of good things to eat."

Every one was very much interested in the first batch of cookies, and Aunt Polly gave each one a sample, which was p.r.o.nounced delicious.

Then Aunt Polly put on her big kettle and started to fry some doughnuts.

Dot, when no one was looking, took Spotty out into the hall and gave him half a cookie. Then they both came back into the kitchen wearing such an innocent air that Aunt Polly had to laugh.

"Spotty has a sweet tooth, all right," she declared. "Don't let him tease all your cookies away from you, dear. Twaddles, look out!"

The warning came too late, for Twaddles, reaching across the bowl of freshly fried doughnuts to get something, caught his sleeve on the rim of the bowl and succeeded in turning the whole thing upside down over himself.

"I really think," said patient, long-suffering Aunt Polly, when the doughnuts had been picked up and brushed off and Twaddles had explained how it happened, "I really think, that four children and a dog are too many to have in the kitchen on baking day. Anyway, the turnovers are done. I'll slip them on a plate and let Meg carry it out under the chestnut tree. Then you may have your picnic." And so it was settled.

"I wish," confided Meg, as she bit into a juicy bit of pie--Aunt Polly made wonderful berry pies--"I had my 'Black Beauty' book."

"I'll never have another doll like Geraldine!" sighed Dot. "Never! And what good are all her clothes? I haven't any doll to fit 'em."

"You might take a tuck in 'em for Totty-Fat," suggested Bobby, using the disrespectful name he had invented for Dot's old doll. "She's a sight. Oh dear! I wish I had tried to fly my airplane just once before I lost it."

"Well, there's my bird," mourned Twaddles. "Aunt Polly never heard it sing. And now she never will."

"I dripped a little juice on my dress," announced Dot doubtfully, after Meg had gone in to help her aunt wash dishes.

"I should think you had," said Bobby, gazing severely at the little girl. "I don't believe blackberry juice comes out, either. Prob'ly that dress will always be spotted now."

"Linda said when she was a little girl her mother made her wash her own dresses if she got too many dirty in one day," Dot declared.

"Maybe I could wash this."

Twaddles and Bobby hadn't a very clear idea of how to wash a dress, and because it was something they had not done before, the idea appealed to them.

"We'll help you," offered Bobby generously. "I saw a piece of soap out at the barn this morning. And the rain barrel's full. Come on."

They trotted down to the barn. Neither Peter nor Jud was anywhere in sight, which was just what the washers hoped for. Of course, they argued, it wasn't naughty to wash a dress, but you never can tell what objections grown-ups are going to make. Sometimes they find fault with every single thing one wants to do.

"Let me rub the soap on," begged Dot, as Bobby unb.u.t.toned her frock for her and she stepped out of it, a st.u.r.dy little figure in a brief white petticoat.

So Dot rubbed plenty of soap on the blackberry spots. It was harness soap, which Jud had been using for the leather harness, but the children thought it made a fine lather. Linda would have scolded had she seen them, for soap sets fruit juice stains so that it is almost impossible ever to get them out.

"Let's put in our handkerchiefs, too," suggested Bobby, pulling out a grimy square.

Twaddles had lost his, and Dot's was in the pocket of her dress and already wet, but Bobby added his to the wash.

"We must let 'em soak," advised Dot, who had been in the kitchen on wash days. "Linda says that gets the dirt out."

The three children balanced themselves on the edge of the rain barrel while they waited for their wash to soak.

"Well, for pity's sake, what are you up to now?" It was Jud's voice, and Jud came out of the barn so unexpectedly that he made them jump.

Twaddles tumbled to his knees, and Bobby stood up, but poor Dot lost her shaky balance and fell into the barrel with her dress and the handkerchief.

"There, there, sister, you're not hurt," soothed Jud, as he pulled the dripping child out and stood her on the gra.s.s. "For mercy's sake don't yell like that. Miss Polly will think you're killed!"

Dot was frightened and wet, and she had no intention of smiling at such misfortune. She cried so loud that Aunt Polly heard her and came running down to the barn, Meg running behind her.

"Why, Baby!" Aunt Polly was surprised to see streams of water running off her small niece, and at first she did not notice that Dot had no dress on.

"Where's your dress?" demanded Meg.