The Corner House Girls Growing Up

by Grace Brooks Hill

  CHAPTER IX

  EVERYTHING AT SIXES AND SEVENS

  Things sometimes begin to go wrong the very moment one wakes up in themorning.

  Then there is the coming down to breakfast with a teeny, weeny twist inone's temper that makes some unfeeling person say:

  "I guess you got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning."

  Now, of course, that is silly. There can be no wrong side to a bed--thatis, to get out of. Getting up has nothing to do with it. Things are justwrong and that is all there is to it.

  Fortunately this state of mind seldom lasted all day with any of thefour Corner House girls; nor did they often begin the day in such ahumor.

  But there are exceptions to every rule, they say. And this Wednesdaymost certainly was the day when matters were "at sixes and sevens" forDorothy Kenway.

  It would not be at all surprising if the trouble started the eveningbefore when she learned that she had inadvertently named her new baby NoSmoking. That certainly was cause for despair as well as making one feelhorribly ridiculous.

  Of course, Ruth in her kind way, had tried to make the smallest CornerHouse girl forget it; but Dot remembered it very clearly when morningcame and she got up.

  Then, she could not find the slippers she had worn the day before; andif Mrs. MacCall saw her with her best ones on, there would be somethingsaid about it--Dot knew that.

  Then, Tess seemed suddenly very distant to her. She had something on hermind and carried herself with her very "grown-upest" air with Dot. Thelatter, on this morning particularly, hated to admit that Tess was morethan a very few days older than herself.

  Tess went off on this business that made her so haughty, all by herself,right after breakfast. When Dot called after her:

  "Where are you going, Tess?" the latter had said very frankly, "Where_you_ can't go," and then went right on without stopping for a moment toargue the point.

  "I do think that is too mean for anything!" declared Dot to herself,quite too angry to cry. She sat sullenly on the porch steps, andalthough she heard Sandyface purring very loudly and suggestively, justinside the woodshed door, she would not get up to go to see the oldcat's babies--of which Sandyface was inordinately proud.

  "Wait," ruminated Dot, shaking her head. "Wait till Tess Kenway wants meto go somewhere with her. _I won't go!_ There, now!"

  So she sat, feeling very lonesome and miserable, and "enjoying" itimmensely. She need not have been lonely. She could hear the older girlsand Luke laughing in the front of the house, and she would have beenwelcomed had she gone there. Ruth was always a comforter, and even Agnesseldom said the smallest girl nay.

  But Dot had managed to raise a laugh a little while before--she beingthe person laughed at. She chanced to hear Luke, who was running lightlyover the old and yellowed keys of the piano, say:

  "No wonder these instruments cost so much. You know it takes severalelephants alone to make these," and he struck another chord.

  Dot had heard about the intelligence of elephants and like most otherlittle people believed that the great pachyderms could do almostanything. But this was too much for even Dot Kenway's belief.

  "Oh, Ruth! elephants can't work at that trade, can they?" she demanded.

  "What trade, honey?" asked the surprised older sister.

  "Piano making. I should think that carpenters built pianos--notelephants."

  Of course, the older ones had laughed, and Dot's spirits had fallenanother degree, although Ruth was careful to explain to the little girlthat Luke had meant it took the tusks of several elephants to fashionthe ivory keys for one piano.

  However, Dot was in no mood for "tagging" after the older ones. Shejust wanted to sit still and suffer! She heard Mabel Creamer"hoo-hooing" for her from beyond the yard fence, but she would notanswer. Had it not been for the Alice-doll (which of course she huggedtight to her troubled little breast) life would have scarcely seemedworth living to the smallest Corner House girl.

  And just then she looked up and saw a picture across the street evenmore woe-begone than the one she herself made. It was Sammy Pinkney,gloom corrugating his brow, an angry flush in his cheeks, and sullenlykicking the toe first of one shoe and then the other against the picketsof the fence where he stood.

  It was evident that Sammy had been forbidden freedom other than that ofhis own premises. He stared across at the smallest Corner House girl;but he was too miserable even to hail Dot.

  After all, it seemed to the latter, that Sammy was being inordinatelypunished for having given Sandyface and her family an aerial ride.Besides, misery loves company. Dot was in no mood to mingle with thejoyous and free. But Sammy's state appealed to her deeply.

  She finally got up off the step and strolled out of the yard and acrossthe street.

  "'Lo, Sammy," she said, as the boy continued to stare in anotherdirection though knowing very well that she was present before him.

  "'Lo, Dot," he grumbled.

  "What's the matter, Sammy?" she asked.

  "Ain't nothin' the matter," he denied, kicking on the pickets again.

  "Dear me," sighed Dot, "_I_ just think _every_thing's too mean for_any_thing!"

  "Huh!"

  "And everybody at my house is mean to me, too," added the little girl,stirring up her own bile by the audible reiteration of her thoughts."Yes, they are!"

  "Huh!" repeated the scornful Sammy. "They ain't nowhere near as mean toyou as my folks are to me."

  "You don't know--"

  "Did they lick you?" demanded the boy fiercely.

  "No-o."

  "And then make you stay in your room and have your supper there?"

  "No-o."

  "Ma brought it up on a tray," the boy said fiercely, "so I couldn't getno second helping of apple dumpling."

  "Oh, Sammy!" Somehow, after all, his misery seemed greater than her own.Yet there was a sore spot in the little girl's heart. "I--I wish I couldrun away," she blurted out, never having thought of such a thing untilthat very moment. "_Then_ they'd see."

  "Hist!" breathed Sammy, coming closer and putting his lips as close tothe little girl's ear as the pickets would allow. "Hist! _I am going torun away!_"

  Dot took this statement much more calmly than he expected.

  "Oh, yes," she said. "When you go to be a pirate. You've told me thatbefore, Sammy Pinkney." In fact, she had been hearing this threat eversince she had come to the old Corner House and become acquainted withthis youngster.

  "And I _am_ going to be a pirate," growled Sammy, with just as deep avoice as he could muster.

  "Oh! not _now_?" gasped Dot, suddenly realizing that this occasion wasfraught with more seriousness than any previous one of like character."You aren't going right off now to be a pirate, Sammy Pinkney?"

  "Yes, I am," declared the boy.

  "Not now? Not this morning? Not before your mother comes back frommarketing?" for she had seen Mrs. Pinkney's departure a few minutesbefore.

  "Yes, I am," and Sammy clinched it with a vigorous nod, although he hadnot meant to run away until nightfall. People usually waited for nightto run away so it seemed to Sammy, but he was not going to have hisintention doubted.

  "Oh, Sammy!" gasped Dot, clasping her hands across the Alice-doll'sstomach, "are--are there _girl_ pirates?"

  "Are there what?" questioned Sammy in doubt.

  "Can girls run away and be pirates, too?"

  "Why--er--they wouldn't dars't."

  "Yes, I would."

  "You! Dot Kenway?"

  "Yes I would," repeated Dot stubbornly.

  "You want to be a pirate?" repeated Sammy. Of course he would ratherhave a boy to run away with. But then--

  "Why can't girls be pirates?" demanded the logical Dot. "Don't pirateshave to have somebody to cook and wash and keep house for them?"

  "I--I don't know," admitted Sammy honestly. "I never read about any girlpirates. But," as he saw Dot's pretty face beginning to cloud over, "Idon't know why there shouldn't be, if they wasn't too 'fraid." />
  "I won't be afraid," Dot declared, steeling herself as she had once donewhen she was forced to go to the dentist's office.

  "We-ell," began Sammy still doubtfully. But Dot was nothing if notdetermined when once she made up her mind.

  "Now, you come right along, Sammy Pinkney, if we're going to run awayand be pirates. You know your mother won't let you if she comes home andcatches you here."

  "But--but we ought to take something to eat--and some clothes--and--anda pistol and a knife--"

  "Oo-ee!" squealed the little girl. "You won't take any horrid pistol andknife if you're going to run off to be pirates with _me_, Sammy Pinkney.Why, I'd be afraid to go with you."

  "Huh!" grumbled Sammy, "you don't haf to go."

  "But you said I could," Dot declared, sure of her position. "And now youcan't back out--you know you can't, Sammy. That wouldn't be fair."

  "Aw, well. We gotter have money," he objected faintly.

  "I'll run and get my purse," the little girl said cheerfully. "I've gotmore than fifty cents in it."

  But now unwonted chivalry began to stir faintly in Sammy's breast. Ifthey were going away together, it should be his "treat." He marched intothe house, smashed his bank with the kitchen poker, and came out with apocket full of silver and nickels that looked as if they amounted tomuch more than they really did.

  However, the sinews of war in his pocket was not without a certaininspiration and comfort. Money would go a long way toward getting themto a place where their respective families could neither nag nor punishthem.

  As runaways they may have been different from most. But, then, Sammyand Dot were very modern runaways indeed. People who saw them merelyobserved two very well dressed children, walking hand in hand toward thesuburbs of Milton; the little girl hugging a doll to her breast and theboy with a tight fist in one pocket holding down a couple of dollarsworth of change.

  Who would have dreamed that they were enamored of being pirates andexpected to follow a career of rapine and bloodthirsty adventure on theSpanish Main?