Maybee's Stepping Stones

MOTHER KNOWS BEST.

“But he forsook the counsel of the old men, which they had given him.”

“Tod’s coming!” said Maybee, dancing up and down on the doorstep.

“How do you suppose they’ll behave?” said Sue, taking books, lunch-basket, and two clean pocket-handkerchiefs from mamma’s careful hands. “Tod is so queer; and what shall I do with Maybee’s tongue?”

“Do exactly as you would be done by,” said mamma, smoothing the anxious little forehead. “Remember, everything will be new and strange, and keep the wee things under your own wing as much as possible. Be very gentle and patient, help them over all the hard places, and my word for it, they will be your most obedient servants. I think Mabel means to be very good and quiet,” she added, stooping to kiss the dimpled chin on the doorstep.

“Yes’m, ’course,” nodded Maybee, skipping away to meet the freckle-faced Theodore, six months her junior. “On’y my ap’n’s so slippery it will rattle, and Tod’s got starch in his shoes, so’s he can’t go very sofferly.”

Sue took Tod’s other hand and walked on in her most matronly manner.

“Good-morning,” said Bell Forbush, coming out of her gate. “You look for all the world like a hen with two chickens. Don’t tell me those tots are going to school.”

“Why not? Maybee is six,” returned Sue, dignifiedly, “and Tod wants to go everywhere she does, so aunty said he might.”

“They’ll be such a bother, only, of course, you can leave them quite by themselves; they’ll get broken in all the sooner.”

“Mamma expects I’ll take care of them,” said Sue, dropping behind with Bell.

“Oh, fudge! Grown-up folks never seem to think we need any better fun than looking after such small fry, when really they ought to wait on us. In English schools they call them fags, and make them run errands and everything. Now, take my advice, Sue Sherman: put those young ones in a front seat, and just let them know who is who to begin with. Fan is going to bring her croquet this morning.”

Mamma had said, “Be very gentle and patient, help them over the hard places, and they will be your obedient servants”; but to have them mind simply because they ought to was a deal easier, and besides, Sue was so fond of croquet and the children would only be in the way. “You mustn’t stir one inch till I come back,” she said, lifting the little dumpy figures into the seat Bell picked out, and running off, mallet in hand.

It just suited Maybee,—the shouting, laughing, and general confusion; but poor little Tod! He couldn’t hide his face on Maybee’s shoulder because it would “rumpfle” her “ap’on,” and so he hung his round flaxen head at a right angle very trying to his bit of a neck. It was such a relief when a tall, black-whiskered man rang a bell and it grew suddenly quiet. He liked the singing and reading, and he could even venture to look around when the hum of study and recitation began. Maybee, on the contrary, found that dull and tiresome.

But we can’t begin to tell all the day’s trials,—how Maybee crept away to where Sue and Bell were busy with slates and pencils, and was picked up by the stern Mr. Blackman and dropped back into her seat as if she had been a spelling-book, after which Tod didn’t dare wink when anybody was looking; and how Maybee crawled away again to an empty seat, and played “keep house” with the peanut-shells, bits of chalk and crumbs stowed away in the desk; how she meant just to touch her tongue to the ink-bottle, and tilted it up against her nose and all down the “slippery” white apron; how Sue gave them their lunch at noon, and sent them alone to the pump to wash; how Joe Travers sprinkled water all over them, and Tom Lawrence ran off with the “apple turnovers”; how somebody called Tod a “toad,” and tried to scrub off his freckles, and everybody else laughed at the way Maybee’s saucy little tongue sputtered, and her big black eyes blazed with indignation; how Tod’s miseries reached a climax, just before school was dismissed, in a loud outburst of grief, and how Mr. Blackman, with pity in his heart no doubt, but multiplication and mountains and a million or less of other matters in his head, laid a huge hand on the little yellow pate, stopping the flow of tears as suddenly as a patent stop-cock; and how the tears turned to a big fountain of revenge way down in the angry little heart, so that when Sue tied on their hats and bade them walk straight along home, behind Bell and herself, Tod broke out with an emphatic “You bet! my’ll knock ’ou over.”

“Why, The-od-erer Smith! you wicked boy!” exclaimed Maybee, very much shocked.

Bell and Sue were already some ways ahead, talking over their new hats.

“All ’em big toads say it,” pouted Tod, “an’ my’s going to gwow till my can pound ’em heads off.”

Poor little Tod! Both lips and heart blackened with the touch of evil, so much worse than the dust and ink on Maybee’s white apron.

When the girls stopped at Bell’s gate the little flaxen and brown heads had both disappeared.

“They’ve lagged behind on purpose. Come in and I’ll show you my new dress,” said Bell. Then Sue must see it tried on. Of course the children had gone right along home. Sue wasn’t so sure, but Bell talked so fast it was half an hour before she could get away.

“They may have gone to aunty’s,” said mamma, looking anxiously up and down the street, after Sue had stammered out something about “waiting,” and “supposing,” and “not thinking.”

But they were not at aunty’s, and the two mothers ran here and there, half wild with fright. Uncle Thed was out of town, but Papa Sherman was summoned from the bank; and in the gathering twilight, men, women, and children went hurrying about the village, across the outlying green fields, into the dark, lonesome woods. Sue, up-stairs, her face buried in the pillows, sobbed and moaned and listened.

Oh, if she had only kept fast hold of the little hands! if she had only kissed the tired, dirty little faces! If she had only taken mother’s advice instead of Bell’s! Such sorrowful “ifs”! And then on her knees she whispered over and over, “Dear Father in Heaven, if you will only bring them safe back, I’ll never—never—never forget mother knows better than all the little girls in the whole world.”

II.

LED INTO SIN—AND OUT.

“And He shall give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, who did sin, and who made Israel to sin.”

Where were Tod and Maybee?

Half-way between the school-house and Bell Forbush’s, a sort of cart-path led off from the main road into Farmer Grey’s sugar-orchard, shaded with large, thick-leaved maples, carpeted with soft, green grass, and spangled with golden dandelions and buttercups.

“Isn’t it nice? S’ouldn’t ’ou like to go down it?” asked Tod, the new, “starched” shoes feeling, oh, so hot and dusty!

“Yes; but Sue wouldn’t let us,” said matter-of-fact Maybee.

“My don’t care, my will!” returned Tod, shaking two soiled fists at Cousin Sue and her chatty friend. “Let’s wun.”

It was a sudden temptation, and Maybee yielded at once. Hand in hand they scampered down the cool, shady lane, never once stopping till the farther side of the orchard was reached. Then, how they rolled and tumbled in the fresh, green grass! What handfuls of daisies and violets they picked! and what a dear little brook they found, babbling along over the stones, and how fast and far they skipped along beside it, tossing in dandelions to see if the fishes liked butter, and launching bits of bark loaded with clover blossoms.

“Hello! What’s going on?” cried Dick Vance, the laziest, wickedest boy in school, now on the way after his father’s cows. Tod recognized one of his noon-time tormentors, and straightened himself up, muttering, “My’ll kill you, you bet!” with a furtive glance at Maybee, who was busy a little ways off, launching a whole fleet of maple-leaves.

“Ho! here’s a man for you,” cried Dick. “Ain’t he a stunner now! Regular man, he is.”

Tod relaxed a little at the compliment.

“Want me to make you a boat, a real boat with masts?” asked Dick, dropping down on the ground and opening his knife. Is there any magnet stronger than a knife to draw little boys to itself? Tod settled down just a few feet from the new-comer. Dick whittled and talked; Tod edged nearer and nearer.

“I wouldn’t make boats for many boys,” said Dick, “but you’re ’cute. If I had a sail, now! Let me have that red pocket-handkerchief of yours. By thunder! we’ll have a gay one.”

“By funder! my will,” echoed Tod, exactly as Dick meant he should.

Maybee had followed her little fleet quite out of sight. There was no one but the All-seeing Father up in heaven to hear, and Dick seldom thought of him; so he went on, saying vulgar, wicked words, and dreadful oaths, laughing till he had to hold his sides to hear Tod echo them in his droll baby-fashion. After a while Maybee came hurrying back into hearing of the low, mean words Dick was rattling off so glibly. Then she stopped.