Under the Lilacs (2 page)

“I’d rather see the old spinning wheel up garret, and the big pictures, and the queer clothes in the blue chest. It makes
me mad to have them all shut up there, when we might have such fun with them. I’d just like to bang that old door down!” And
Bab twisted round to give it a thump with her boots. “You needn’t laugh; you know you’d like it as much as me,” she added,
twisting back again, rather ashamed of her impatience.

“I didn’t laugh.”

“You did! Don’t you suppose I know what laughing is?”

“I guess I know I didn’t.”

“You did laugh! How dare you tell such a fib?”

“If you say that again I’ll take Belinda and go right home; then what will you do?”

“I’ll eat up the cake.”

“No, you won’t! It’s mine, Ma said so; and you are only company, so you’d better behave or I won’t have any party at all,
so now.”

This awful threat calmed Bab’s anger at once, and she hastened to introduce a safer subject.

“Never mind; don’t let’s fight before the children. Do you know, Ma says she will let us play in the coach house next time
it rains, and keep the key if we want to.”

“Oh, goody! that’s because we told her how we found the little window under the woodbine, and didn’t try to go in, though
we might have just as easy as not,” cried Betty, appeased at once, for, after a ten years’ acquaintance, she had grown used
to Bab’s peppery temper.

“I suppose the coach will be all dust and rats and spiders,
but I don’t care. You and the dolls can be the passengers, and I shall sit up in front and drive.”

“You always do. I shall like riding better than being horse all the time, with that old wooden bit in my mouth, and you jerking
my arms off,” said poor Betty, who was tired of being horse continually.

“I guess we’d better go and get the water now,” suggested Bab, feeling that it was not safe to encourage her sister in such
complaints.

“It is not many people who would dare to leave their children all alone with such a lovely cake, and know they wouldn’t pick
at it,” said Betty proudly, as they trotted away to the spring, each with a little tin pail in her hand.

Alas, for the faith of these too confiding mammas! They were gone about five minutes, and when they returned a sight met their
astonished eyes which produced a simultaneous shriek of horror. Flat upon their faces lay the fourteen dolls, and the cake,
the cherished cake, was gone!

For an instant the little girls could only stand motionless, gazing at the dreadful scene. Then Bab cast her water pail wildly
away, and, doubling up her fist, cried out fiercely—

“It was that Sally! She said she’d pay me for slapping her when she pinched little Mary Ann, and now she has. I’ll give it
to her! You run that way. I’ll run this. Quick! quick!”

Away they went, Bab racing straight on, and bewildered Betty turning obediently round to trot in the opposite direction as
fast as she could, with the water splashing all over her as she ran, for she had forgotten to put down her pail. Round the
house they went, and met with a crash at the back door, but no sign of the thief appeared.

“In the lane!” shouted Bab.

“Down by the spring!” panted Betty; and off they went
again, one to scramble up a pile of stones and look over the wall into the avenue, the other to scamper to the spot they had
just left. Still nothing appeared but the dandelions’ innocent faces looking up at Bab, and a brown bird scared from his bath
in the spring by Betty’s hasty approach.

Back they rushed, but only to meet a new scare, which made them both cry “Ow!” and fly into the porch for refuge.

A strange dog was sitting calmly among the ruins of the feast, licking his lips after basely eating up the last poor bits
of bun, when he had bolted the cake, basket, and all, apparently.

“Oh, the horrid thing!” cried Bab, longing to give battle, but afraid, for the dog was a peculiar as well as a dishonest animal.

“He looks like our China poodle, doesn’t he?” whispered Betty, making herself as small as possible behind her more valiant
sister.

He certainly did; for, though much larger and dirtier than the well-washed China dog, this live one had the same tassel at
the end of his tail, ruffles of hair round his ankles, and a body shaven behind and curly before. His eyes, however, were
yellow, instead of glassy black, like the other’s; his red nose worked as he cocked it up, as if smelling for more cakes,
in the most impudent manner; and never, during the three years he had stood on the parlor mantelpiece, had the China poodle
done the surprising feats with which this mysterious dog now proceeded to astonish the little girls almost out of their wits.

First he sat up, put his forepaws together, and begged prettily; then he suddenly flung his hind legs into the air, and walked
about with great ease. Hardly had they recovered from this shock, when the hind legs came down, the
forelegs went up, and he paraded in a soldierly manner to and fro, like a sentinel on guard. But the crowning performance
was when he took his tail in his mouth and waltzed down the walk, over the prostrate dolls, to the gate and back again, barely
escaping a general upset of the ravaged table.

Bab and Betty could only hold each other tight and squeal with delight, for never had they seen anything so funny; but, when
the gymnastics ended, and the dizzy dog came and stood on the step before them barking loudly, with that pink nose of his
sniffing at their feet, and his queer eyes fixed sharply upon them, their amusement turned to fear again, and they dared not
stir.

“Whish, go away!” commanded Bab.

“Scat!” meekly quavered Betty.

To their great relief, the poodle gave several more inquiring barks, and then vanished as suddenly as he appeared. With one
impulse, the children ran to see what became of him, and, after a brisk scamper through the orchard, saw the tasseled tail
disappear under the fence at the far end.

“Where
do
you s’pose he came from?” asked Betty, stopping to rest on a big stone.

“I’d like to know where he’s gone, too, and give him a good beating, old thief!” scolded Bab, remembering their wrongs.

“Oh, dear, yes! I hope the cake burnt him dreadfully if he did eat it,” groaned Betty, sadly remembering the dozen good raisins
she chopped up, and the “lots of ’lasses” mother put into the dear lost loaf.

“The party’s all spoilt, so we may as well go home”; and Bab mournfully led the way back.

Betty puckered up her face to cry, but burst out laughing
in spite of her woe. “It was
so
funny to see him spin round and walk on his head! I wish he’d do it all over again; don’t you?”

“Yes, but I hate him just the same. I wonder what Ma will say when — why! why!” and Bab stopped short in the arch, with her
eyes as round and almost as large as the blue saucers on the tea tray.

“What is it? oh, what is it?” cried Betty, all ready to run away if any new terror appeared.

“Look! there! it’s come back!” said Bab in an awestricken whisper, pointing to the table.

Betty did look, and her eyes opened even wider — as well they might — for there, just where they first put it, was the lost
cake, unhurt, unchanged, except that the big B had coasted a little further down the gingerbread hill.

C
HAPTER
2

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either spoke for a minute, astonishment being too great for words; then, as by one impulse, both stole up and touched the
cake with a timid finger, quite prepared to see it fly away in some mysterious and startling manner. It remained sitting tranquilly
in the basket, however, and the children drew a long breath of relief, for, though they did not believe in fairies, the late
performances did seem rather like witchcraft.

“The dog didn’t eat it!”

“Sally didn’t take it!”

“How do you know?”

“She
never would have put it back.”

“Who did?”

“Can’t tell, but I forgive ’em.”

“What shall we do now?” asked Betty, feeling as if it would be very difficult to settle down to a quiet tea party after such
unusual excitement.

“Eat that cake up just as fast as ever we can,” and Bab divided the contested delicacy with one chop of the big knife, bound
to make sure of her own share at all events.

It did not take long, for they washed it down with sips of milk, and ate as fast as possible, glancing round all the while
to see if the queer dog was coming again.

“There! now I’d like to see anyone take
my
cake away,” said Bab, defiantly crunching her half of the piecrust B.

“Or mine either,” coughed Betty, choking over a raisin that wouldn’t go down in a hurry.

“We might as well clear up, and play there had been an earthquake,” suggested Bab, feeling that some such convulsion of Nature
was needed to explain satisfactorily the demoralized condition of her family.

“That will be splendid. My poor Linda was knocked right over on her nose. Darlin’ child, come to your mother and be fixed,”
purred Betty, lifting the fallen idol from a grove of chickweed, and tenderly brushing the dirt from Belinda’s heroically
smiling face.

“She’ll have croup tonight as sure as the world. We’d better make up some squills out of this sugar and water,” said Bab,
who dearly loved to dose the dollies all round.

“P’r’aps she will, but you needn’t begin to sneeze yet awhile. I can sneeze for my own children, thank you, ma’am,” returned
Betty, sharply, for her usually amiable spirit had been ruffled by the late occurrences.

“I didn’t sneeze! I’ve got enough to do to talk and cry and cough for my own poor dears, without bothering about yours,” cried
Bab, even more ruffled than her sister.

“Then who did? I heard a real live sneeze just as plain as anything,” and Betty looked up to the green roof above her, as
if the sound came from that direction.

A yellow bird sat swinging and chirping on the tall lilac bush, but no other living thing was in sight.

“Birds don’t sneeze, do they?” asked Betty, eyeing little Goldy suspiciously.

“You goose! of course they don’t.”

“Well, I should just like to know who is laughing and sneezing round here. Maybe it is the dog,” suggested Betty, looking
relieved.

“I never heard of a dog’s laughing, except Mother Hubbard’s. This is such a queer one, maybe he can, though. I wonder where
he went to?” and Bab took a survey down both the side paths, quite longing to see the funny poodle again.

“I know where
I’m
going to,” said Betty, piling the dolls into her apron with more haste than care. “I’m going right straight home to tell
Ma all about it. I don’t like such actions, and I’m afraid to stay.”

“I ain’t; but I guess it is going to rain, so I shall have to go anyway,” answered Bab, taking advantage of the black clouds
rolling up the sky, for
she
scorned to own that she was afraid of anything.

Clearing the table in a summary manner by catching up the four corners of the cloth, Bab put the rattling bundle into her
apron, flung her children on the top, and pronounced herself ready to depart. Betty lingered an instant to pick up odds and
ends that might be spoilt by the rain, and, when she turned from taking the red halter off the knocker, two lovely pink roses
lay on the stone steps.

“Oh, Bab, just see! Here’s the very ones we wanted. Wasn’t it nice of the wind to blow ’em down?” she called
out, picking them up and running after her sister, who had strolled moodily along, still looking about for her sworn foe,
Sally Folsom.

The flowers soothed the feelings of the little girls, because they had longed for them, and bravely resisted the temptation
to climb up the trellis and help themselves, since their mother had forbidden such feats, owing to a fall Bab got trying to
reach a honeysuckle from the vine which ran all over the porch.

Home they went and poured out their tale, to Mrs. Moss’s great amusement; for she saw in it only some playmate’s prank, and
was not much impressed by the mysterious sneeze and laugh.

“We’ll have a grand rummage Monday, and find out what is going on over there,” was all she said.

But Mrs. Moss could not keep her promise, for on Monday it still rained, and the little girls paddled off to school like a
pair of young ducks, enjoying every puddle they came to, since India-rubber boots made wading a delicious possibility. They
took their dinner, and at noon regaled a crowd of comrades with an account of the mysterious dog, who appeared to be haunting
the neighborhood, as several of the other children had seen him examining their back yards with interest. He had begged of
them, but to none had he exhibited his accomplishments except Bab and Betty; and they were therefore much set up, and called
him “our dog” with an air. The cake transaction remained a riddle, for Sally Folsom solemnly declared that she was playing
tag in Mamie Snow’s barn at that identical time. No one had been near the old house but the two children, and no one could
throw any light upon that singular affair.