Mabel's mishap

It was raining dismally. Mabel, leaning her arms on the broad window-sill, watched the drops trickling down the panes. Before her was an array of paper dolls in gay tissue dresses. They sat perched upon pasteboard chairs in front of a circle of queer creatures with flat heads, and no feet; hand in hand these stood, rather flimsy in appearance. Mabel had cut them all in one from a bit of newspaper.

Presently she gave the whole company a sweep off on the floor.

“I’m tired of you,” she said. “And it’s raining, and I don’t know what to do. I wish I were twins, so I could have someone to play with.”

“Why, Mabel,” said her mother, “suppose I had two discontented little Mabels to be fretting around on a rainy day, what should I do?”

“You wouldn’t have to have two Mabels,” returned the little girl, “you could call one something else: Maude, or--oh, mamma, you could call one May and one Belle. I think I’d like to be May, myself. That’s what I’ll do next time I play by myself: I’ll pretend I have a twin sister named Belle.”

“Suppose you pick up that company of people, lying there by the window, now, and play with your twin awhile.”

Mabel looked up mischievously. “I think I’ll let Belle pick them up,” she said.

“Well, let me see her do it. There is a looking glass in which I can watch her.”

“Oh, like ‘Alice in the Looking Glass Country’. You watch and see Belle pick them up.” And she set to work, glancing over her shoulder once in a while to see if her mother took in the performance. “There!” she said, after a time, “Belle has picked them up, but we are both tired of paper dolls. Mamma, there is a red flag hanging out by a door across the street; in that house where the little boy lives. What is it for? Do you suppose he has scarlet fever?”

Her mother laughed. “No, there is an auction--a sale going on.”

“What for?”

“Why, I don’t know, dear. For some reason they are selling off their household goods and furniture.”

“Oh, I wonder if the little boy likes to do that. Who is selling the things--his papa?”

“No, an auctioneer.”

“Does he say, ‘Going, going, gone,’ like Uncle Lewis does when he pretends to sell me?”

“Yes.”

“Can anybody go to a--a nauction?”

“Why, yes. How many questions a little girl can ask.”

“Well, mamma, I think if you’ll ’scuse me, I’ll go down stairs and find something else to do.”

“I’ll excuse you, certainly. Don’t get into mischief.”

But Mabel was out of the door and on her way down the steps by this time. She stopped at the parlor, peeped in, and then went over to the piano which she opened and began to drum softly upon it, but she knew her mamma did not allow this, so she went across the hall to the library. This was a favorite room, especially on a rainy day, and, when her father was not busy there, Mabel was often allowed to curl herself up in one of the big chairs with a book. To-day, however, she did not feel inclined to settle down and looked around to find something to invite her attention. A box of water-colors stood open upon the desk where her father had been working. He had been coloring some drawings to use in his class at the university.

Mabel stood gazing at the colors longingly; they did look so bright and pretty. She took up one of the brushes and wet it in the glass of water her father had been using; then she dipped it in the brightest vermillion in the box.

“I wish I had something to paint,” she said to herself. Looking through a pile of newspapers, she found nothing that would do, and her eyes next sought the books nearest her. She opened one; it was fresh and new. “Oh, I couldn’t take that,” she said. “But this old one, I don’t believe he cares much for this. It has pictures in it, but they are very queer, and so yellow, I’m sure the book isn’t of any account at all. I think it would look much better if I were to paint it up a little.” And, the action being suited to the word, the brush was soon making dabs at the colors on the box, and the figures in the engravings were given startling costumes of red, or blue, or yellow, as Mabel’s fancy dictated.

She could not help feeling a little guilty, though all the time telling herself that it was a worthless old book, and that her mamma often gave her old magazines to try her own paints upon.

Yet, when she heard a step on the stairs, she started guiltily, and shut the book with a snap, then put down her brush, unaware that she had upset the glass of water in her haste, and that it was running across the table and soaking through the book.

She hurried out of the door leading to the porch. Here she could listen to the voice of the auctioneer, as it came to her ears quite distinctly from across the street. It had stopped raining, though little puddles still lay among the bricks of the walk.

“Any one can go,” thought Mabel; “mamma said so. I should love to see a nauction. And that little boy, I wonder if he is there.”

It was mild spring weather, and Mabel thought she could dispense with a hat. She would rather not go in the house again just then; “I’ll go to the nauction,” she said. “It’s no more than going to a store; mamma said so.”

So, running across the street, she stood for a moment before the gate of the little boy’s home, then slipped in; another moment found her in a room full of people. She turned to run away, as several turned to look at her, but she caught sight of the forlorn figure of a little boy huddled up in one corner, hugging a large dog, and towards these two she made her way.

The little boy looked up with a faint smile as Mabel approached, then made room for her on the box on which he was sitting.

“Isn’t it funny?” whispered Mabel, while the auctioneer went on rapidly: “A dollar an’ a half an’ a half.”

But the little boy didn’t look as if he thought it very funny, for he turned his head away, and Mabel thought she saw two tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Is your father here?” she asked.

The little fellow shook his head, and just then, the articles in that room being disposed of, the crowd went into the next, and the two children were left alone.

“Are you going to move?” asked Mabel. “I live across the street, you know, and I saw the red flag hanging out, so I just came over.”

The boy nodded.

“I’m Mabel Ford. My sister told me your name; it’s Harold, isn’t it? What a dear dog that is. What’s his name?” Mabel was not to be daunted by Harold’s silence.

“Don.” This time he answered her.

“I wish you were not going away. Do you want to?” Mabel’s questions continued.

“No,” returned Harold, “but you know father has to go with his regiment to Cuba, and so I have to go.”