CHAPTER V.
DOTTY HAVING HER OWN WAY.
Yes, Fly was out of sight; that was certain. Whether she had turned to the right, or to the left, or had merely gone straight on, fallen down, and been trampled on, that was the question. How was one to find out? People enough to inquire of, but nobody to answer.
Horace had as many thoughts as a drowning man. How had he ever dared bring such a will-o'-the-wisp away from home? How had his mother consented to let him? His father had charged him, over and over, not to let go Fly's hand in the street. That did very well to talk about; but what could you do with a child that wasn't made of flesh and blood, but the very lightest kind of gas?
"Dotty, turn down this street, and I'll keep on up Broadway. No—no; you'd get lost. What shall we do? Go just where I do, as hard as you can run, and don't lose sight of me."
Dotty began to pant. She could not keep on at this rate of speed, and Horace saw it.
"You'll have to go back to Stewart's."
"Where's Stewart's?" gasped Dotty, still running.
"Why, that stone building on Tenth Street, with blue curtains, where we left auntie."
"I don't know anything about Tenth Street or blue curtains."
"But you'll know it when you get there. Just cross over—"
"O, Horace Clifford, I can't cross over! There's horses and carriages every minute; and my mother made me almost promise I wouldn't ever cross over."
"There are plenty of policemen, Dotty; they'll take you by the shoulder—"
"O, Horace Clifford, they shan't take me by the shoulder! S'pose I want 'em marching me off to the lockup?" screamed Dotty, who believed the lockup was the chief end and aim of policemen.
"Well, then, I don't know anything what to do with you," said Horace, in despair.
It seemed very hard that he should have the care of this willful little cousin, just when he wanted so much to be free to pursue Flyaway.
"If you won't go back to Stewart's, you won't. Will you go into this shop, then, and wait till I call for you?"
"You'll forget to call."
"I certainly won't forget."
"Well, then, I'll go in; but I won't promise to stay. I want to help hunt for Fly just as much as you do."
"Dotty Dimple, look me right in the eye. I can't stop to coax you. I'm frightened to death about Fly. Do you go into this store, and stay in it till I call for you, if it's six hours. If you stir, you're lost. Do—you—hear?"
"Yes, I hear.—H'm, he thinks my ears are thick as ears o' corn? No holes in 'em to hear with, I s'pose! Horace Clifford hasn't got the say o' me, though. I can go all over town for all o' him!"
"What will you have, my little lady?" said a clerk, bowing to Dotty.
"I don't want anything, if you please, sir. There was a boy, and he asked me to stay here while he went to find something."
"Very well; sit as long as you please."
"Screwed right down into the floor, this piano stool is," thought Dotty; "makes it real hard to sit on, because you can't whirl it. Guess I'll walk 'round a while. Why, if here isn't a window right in the floor! Strong enough to walk on. There's a man going over it with big boots and a cane. I can look right down into the cellar. Only just I can't see any thing, though, the glass is so thick."
Dotty watched the clerks measuring off yards of cloth, tapping on the counter, and calling out, "Cash." It was rather funny, at first, to see the little boys run; but Dotty soon tired of it.
"Horace is gone a long while," thought she, going to the door and looking out.
"He has forgotten to call, or he's forgotten where he left me, or else he hasn't found Fly. Dear, dear! I can't wait. I'll just go out a few steps, and p'rhaps I'll meet 'em."
She walked out a little way, seeing nothing but a multitude of strange faces.
"Well, I should think this was queer! I'll go right back to that store, and sit down on the piano stool. If Horace Clifford can't be more polite! Well, I should think!"
Dotty went back, and entered, as she supposed, the store she had left; but a great change had come over it. It had the same counters, and stools, and goods on lines, marked "Selling off below cost;" but the men looked very different. "I don't see how they could change round so quick," thought Dotty; "I haven't been gone more'n a minute."
"What shall I serve you to, mees," said one of them, with a smile that was all black eyes and white teeth. Dotty thought he looked very much like Lina Rosenbug's brother; and his hair was so shiny and sticky, it must have been dipped in molasses.
She answered him with some confusion. "I don't want anything. I was the girl, you know, that the boy was going somewhere to find something."
The man smiled wickedly, and said, "Yees, mees." In an instant it flashed across Dotty that she had got into the wrong store. Where was the glass window she had walked on? They couldn't have taken that out while she was gone. The floor was whole, and made of nothing but boards.
"Well, it's very queer stores should be twins," thought Dotty.
She entered the next one. It was not a "twin;" it was full of books and pictures.
"Why didn't Horace leave me here, in the first place, it was so much nicer. And they let people read and handle the pictures. O, they have the goldest-looking things!"
How shocked Prudy would have been, if she had seen her little sister reaching up to the counter, and turning over the leaves of books, side by side with grown people! Miss Dimple was never very bashful; and what did she care for the people in New York, who never saw her before? She soon became absorbed in a fairy story. Seconds, minutes, quarters; it was a whole hour before she came to herself enough to remember that Horace was to call for her, and she was not where he had left her.
"But he can't scold; for didn't he keep me waiting, too? Now I'll go back."
The next place she entered was a cigar store.
"I might have known better than to go in; for there's that wooden Indian standing there, a-purpose to keep ladies out!"
"O, here's a 'Sample Room.' Now this must be the place, for it says 'Push,' on the green door, just as the other one did."
What was Dotty's astonishment, when she found she had rushed into a room which held only tables, bottles, and glasses, and men drinking something that smelt like hot brandy!
"I shan't go into any more 'Sample Rooms.' I didn't know a 'Sample' meant whiskey! But, I do declare, it's funny where my store is gone to."
The child was going farther and farther away from it.
"Here is one that looks a little like it Any way, I can see a glass window in there, on the floor."
A lady stood at a counter, folding a piece of green velvet ribbon. Dotty determined to make friends with her; so she went up to her, and said, in a low voice, "Will you please tell me, ma'am, if I'm the same little girl that was in here before? No, I don't mean so. I mean, did I go into the same store, or is this a different one? Because there's a boy going to call for me, and I thought I'd better know."
Of course the lady smiled, and said it might, or might not be the same place; but she did not remember to have seen Dotty before.
"What was the number of the store? The boy ought to have known."
"But I don't believe he did," replied Dotty, indignantly; "he never said a word to me about numbers. I'm almost afraid I'll get lost!"
"I should be quite afraid of it, child. Where do you live?"
"In Portland, in the State of Maine. Prudy and I came to New York: our auntie sent for us—I know the place when I see it; side of a church with ivy; but O, dear! I'm afraid the stage don't stop there. She's at Mr. Stewart's—she and Prudy."
"Do you mean Stewart's store?"
"O, no'm; it's a man she knows," replied Dotty, confidently; "he lives in a blue house."
The lady asked no more questions. If Dotty had said "Stewart's store," and had remembered that the curtains were blue, and not the building, Miss Kopper would have thought she knew what to do; she would have sent the child straight to Stewart's.
"Poor little thing!" said she, twisting the long curl, which hung down the back of her neck like a bell-rope, and looking as if she cared more about her hair than she cared for all the children in Portland. "The best thing you can do is to go right into the druggist's, next door but one, and look in the City Directory. Do you know your aunt's husband's name?"
"O, yes'm. Colonel Augustus Allen, Fiftieth Avenue."
"Well, then, there'll be no difficulty. Just go in and ask to look in the Directory; they'll tell you what stage to take. Now I must attend to these ladies. Hope you'll get home safe."
"A handsome child," said one of the ladies. "Yes, from the country," replied Miss Kopper with a sweet smile; "I have just been showing her the way home."
Ah, Miss Kopper, perhaps you thought you were telling the truth; but instead of relieving the country child's perplexity, you had confused her more than ever. What should Dotty Dimple know about a City Directory? She forgot the name of it before she got to the druggist's.
"Please, sir, there's something in here,—may I see it?—that shows folks where they live."
"A policeman?"
"No; O, no, sir."
After some time, the gentleman, being rather shrewd, surmised what she wanted, and gave her the book.
"Not that, sir," said Dotty, ready to cry.
Perhaps you will be as ready to laugh, when you hear that the child really supposed a City Directory was an instrument that drew out and shut up like a telescope, and, by peeping through it, she could see the distant home of Colonel Allen, on "Fiftieth Avenue."
The apothecary did not laugh at her; but, being a kind man, and, moreover, not having curls hanging down his neck which needed attention, he gave his whole care to Dotty, found an omnibus for her, told the driver just where to let her out, and made her repeat her uncle's street and number till he thought there was no danger of a mistake.
CHAPTER VI.
DOTTY REBUKED.
One would have thought that now all Dotty's troubles were over; and so they would have been, if she had not tried so hard to remember the number. She said it over and over so many times, that all of a sudden it went out of her mind. It was like rolling a ball on the ground, backward and forward, till most unexpectedly it pops into a hole. Very much frightened, Dotty bit her lip, twirled her front hair, and pinched her left cheek—all in vain; the number wouldn't come.
"O, dear, what'll I do? I'd open that cellar door, where the driver is; but he's all done up in a blue cape, and don't know anything only how to whip his horses. And there don't anybody know where anybody lives in this city; so it's no use to ask. For what do they care? They'd tell you to look in the Dictionary. There's nobody in Portland ever told me to look in a Dictionary. Here they are, sitting round here, just as happy, all but me. They all live in a number, and they know what it is; but they keep it to themselves,—they don't tell. It always makes people feel better to know where they're going to. When I'm in Portland I know how to get to Park Street, and how to get to Munjoy, and how to get to Back Cove, with my eyes shut. But they don't make things as they ought to in New York. You can't find out what to do."
So the stage rumbled, and Dotty grumbled. Presently a lady in an ermine cloak got out, and Dotty did not know of anything better to do than to follow. She certainly was on Fifth Avenue, and perhaps, if she walked on, she should come to the number.
"There isn't any house along here that looks like auntie's," said she, anxiously; "only they all look like it some. I never saw such a place as this city, So many same things right over, and over; and then, when you go into 'em, its just as different, and not the place you s'posed it was."
Here Dotty ran up some steps, and rang a bell. She thought the damask curtains looked familiar.
"No, no," cried she, running down again, as fast as the mouse ran down the clock; "my auntie don't keep onions in her bay window, I hope!"
It was hyacinth bulbs, in glass vases, which had excited Dotty's disgust.
"O, I guess I'm on the wrong side of the street; no wonder I can't find the house. There, I see a chamber window open; our chamber window was open. I'm going to cross over and get near enough to see if there's a little clock on the shelf that ticks like a dog wagging his tail."
No, there was no clock of any sort, and where the shelf ought to be was a baby's crib.
"Well, any way, here's that beautiful church, with ivy round it; it's ever so near auntie's; so I'll keep walking."
Dotty was right when she said the church was near auntie's—it was within three doors; but she was wrong when she kept walking precisely the wrong way. She crossed over to Sixth Avenue. Now, where were the brown houses? She saw the horse-cars plodding along, and tried to read the words on them.
"'Sixth Ave. and Fifty-Ninth Street.' Why, what's an ave? I never heard of such a thing before; we don't have 'aves' in Portland. There are ever so many people getting out of that car. While it stops, I'll peep in, and see where it's going to. Perhaps there's a name inside that tells."
And, with her usual rashness, Dotty stepped upon the platform of the car, and looked in. What she expected to see she hardly knew,—perhaps "Aunt Madge's House," in gold letters; but what she really saw was, "No Smoking;" those two words, and nothing more.
"Well, who wants to smoke? I'm sure I don't," thought Dotty, disdainfully, and was turning to step off the platform, when Horace Clifford seized her by the shoulder.
"Where did you come from, you runaway?" said he, gruffly.
Close beside him were Aunt Madge and Prudy; all three were getting out of the car.
"Thank Heaven, one of them is found," cried Aunt Madge, her face very pale, her large eyes full of trouble.
Prudy kissed and scolded in the same breath. "O, Dotty Dimple, you'd better believe we're glad to see you?—but what a naughty girl! A pretty race you've led Horace, and he just wild about Fly!"
"H'm! what'd he go off for, then, and leave me there, sitting on a piano stool? S'pose I's going to sit there all day? Didn't I want to go home as much as the rest of you."
"And how did you get home? I'd like to know that," said Horace, walking on with great strides, and then coming back again to the "ladies;" for his anxiety about his little sister would not allow him to behave calmly.
"I rode."
"You weren't in the car we came in."
"N-o; I just happened to be peeking in there you know. But I came in an omnibius."
"It is wonderful," said Aunt Madge, looking puzzled, "that you ever knew what omnibus to take."
Dotty looked down to see if her boot was buttoned, and forgot to look up again. "Well, I shouldn't have known one omnibius, as you call it, from another," said Prudy, lost in admiration. "Why, Dotty, how bright you are! And there we were, so afraid about you, and spoke to a policeman to look you up."
"I wouldn't let a p'liceman catch me," said Dotty, tossing her head. "But haven't you found Fly yet?"
They were at home by this time, and Horace was ringing the bell.
"No, the dear child is still missing; but the police are on her track," said Aunt Madge, looking at her watch. "It is now one o'clock. Keep a good heart, Horace, my boy. John shall go straight to the telegraph office, and wait there for a despatch. Don't you leave us, dear; we can't spare you, and you can do no good."
Horace made no reply, except to tap the heels of his boots together. He looked utterly crushed. A large city was just as strange to him as it was to Dotty, and he could only obey his aunt's orders, and try to hope for the best. Dotty seemed to be the only one who felt like saying a word, and she talked incessantly.
"O, what'd you send the p'lice after her for? To put her in the lockup, and make her cry and think she's been naughty? It's the awfulest city that ever I saw. Folks might send her home, if they were a mind to, but they won't. They don't care what 'comes of you. There's cars and stages going to which ways, and nothing but 'No Smoking,' inside. And I went and peeped in at a window, and there was onions! And how'd I know where to go to? There was a girl with a long curl, and she said, 'Go to the 'pothecary's;' and what would Fly have known where she meant? And he looked in a Dictionary, and put me in a stage,—I was going to tell you about that when I got ready,—and asked me if I had ten cents, and I had; and then I forgot what the number was, and that was the time I saw the onions, or I should have gone right into somebody's else's house. And I knew there was a church with ivy round, but Fly don't know; she's nothing but a baby. And I should have thought, Horace Clifford, you might have given her that money! That was what made her run off; you was real cruel, and that's why I wouldn't mind what you said. And—and—"
"Hush," said Aunt Madge, brushing back a spray of fair curls, which the wind had tossed over her forehead. "I don't allow a word of scolding in my house. If you don't feel pleasant, Dotty, you may go into the back yard and scold into a hole."
Dotty stopped suddenly. She knew her aunt was displeased; she felt it in the tones of her voice.
"Dotty, the wind has been at play with your hair as well as mine. Suppose we both go up stairs a few minutes?"
"There, auntie's going to reason with me," thought Dotty, winding slowly up the staircase; "I didn't suppose she was one of that kind."
"No dear, I'm not one of that kind," said Mrs. Allen, roguishly; for she saw just what the child was thinking. "'I come not here to talk.' All I have to say is this: Disobey again, and I send you home immediately."
"Yes'm," said the little culprit, blushing crimson. "Now, brush your hair, and let us go down." This was the only allusion Mrs. Allen ever made to the subject; but after this, she and Dotty understood each other perfectly. Dotty had learned, once for all, that her aunt was not to be trifled with.
The child really was ashamed—thoroughly ashamed; but do you suppose she admitted it to Horace? Not she. And he, so full of anguish concerning the lost Fly, found not a word of fault; scarcely even thought of his naughty cousin at all.
CHAPTER VII.
THE LOST FLY.
Now we must go back and see what has become of the little one.
At first her heart had swollen with rage. Anger had set her going, just as a blow from a battledoor sends off a shuttlecock. And, once being started, the poor little shuttlecock couldn't stop.
"Auntie gave me that skipt. Hollis is a very wicked boy; steals skipt from little gee-urls. I don't ever want to see Hollis no more."
What she meant to do, or where to go, she had no more idea than the blue clouds overhead. She had no doubt her brother was close behind, trying to overtake her. Her sole thought was, that she "wouldn't ever see Hollis no more." She knew nothing could make him so unhappy as that. "I'll lose me, and then how'll he feel?"
"Lose me!" A wild thought, gone in a moment; but meanwhile she was already lost.
"I hope auntie won't give Hollis nuffin to eat, 'cause he's took away my skipt; nuffin to eat but meat and vertato, athout any pie."
Flyaway shook her head so hard, that the "war-plume" under her bonnet would have nodded, if the air could have got at it. "Why, where's Hollis?" said she, looking back, and finding, to her surprise, he was not to be seen. "I spected he'd come. I thought I heard him walking ahind me."
Flyaway's anger had died out by this time. It never lasted longer than a Fourth of July torpedo.
"He didn't know I runned off. Guess I'll go back, and he'll give me the skipt; and then I'll forgive him all goody."
A very nice plan; only, instead of going back, she turned a corner, and tripped along towards University Place. She had twisted her head so much in looking for Horace, that it was completely turned round. And, besides, a little farther on was a man playing a harp, and a small boy a violin. Fly paused and listened, till she no longer remembered Horace or the "skipt." She forgot this was New York, and dreamed she had come to fairy-land. Her soul was full of music. Happy thoughts about nothing in particular made her smile and clap her hands. Birds, flowers, Santa Clauses, Flipperties, and "pepnits" seemed to hover near. Something beautiful was just going to happen, she didn't know what.
After the man had played for some time without attracting attention from any body but Flyaway and a poor old beggar woman, he put his harp in a green bag, slung it over his shoulder, and walked off. Flyaway followed without knowing it. Down Sixth Avenue went the music-man, and close at his heels went she. By and by she saw a little girl, no larger than herself, with a great bundle on her shoulders.
"You don't s'pose she's got a music on her back?—No, not a music; it's too soft all swelled out in a bunch."
Fly went nearer the little girl, to see what she was carrying; and as she did so, some gray coals, mixed with ashes, fell out of the bundle upon her nice cloak.
"Why, she's been and carried off her mother's fireplace," thought Fly, shaking her cloak in disgust; "what you s'pose she wanted to do that for?"
But far from carrying off her mother's fireplace, the ragged little girl had only been picking up old coal out of barrels, and was taking it home to burn. It had already been burned once, and picked over and burned again, and thrown away; but perhaps this poor child's mother could coax it into a faint glow, warm enough to fry a few potatoes.
While Flyaway was shaking her cloak, and staring at some old silk dresses and bed-quilts, which were hung before a shop-door, the man with the harp on his back, and the boy with a violin under his arm, had turned a corner, and passed out of sight. Flyaway rubbed her eyes, and looked again. They must have gone down through the brick pavement, but she couldn't see any hole. Far away in the distance she heard their music again, and it did not come from under ground. She ran to overtake it, and turned into Bleecker Street. No music-man there, but a good supply of oranges and apples.
"Needn't folks put their hands in, and take some out the barrels? Then why for did the folks put 'em on' doors?"
While pondering this grave question, she was jostled by a man carrying a rocking-chair, and very nearly fell down stairs into an oyster-saloon. A minute more and she was back on Broadway, the very street, where Aunt Madge and Prudy were waiting for her, but so much lower down that she might as well have been in the State of Maine.
"Now, I'll go find my Hollis," said she turning another corner, and running the wrong way with all her might. Past candy-stalls, past toy-shops, past orange-wagons. Hark, music again! Not the soft strains of a harp, but the stirring notes of bugle, fife, and drum. Fly kept time with her feet.
"Here we go marchin' on," hummed she. But the crowd "marchin' on" with her was a strange one. Carts full of hammers, pincers, and all sorts of iron tools, and men in gray shirts, with black caps on their heads. Some of the men had banners, with great black words, such as "Equal Rights," or something like them, in German; but of course Fly could not tell one letter from another. She only knew it was all very "homebly," in spite of the music. She began to think she had better get away as soon as she could; so she tried to cross the street, but some one held her back; it was a lady, carrying a small dog in her arms, like a baby.
"Don't go there, child; that's a strike, you'll get killed."
Fly knew but one meaning for the word strike; and, tearing herself from the lady, ran screaming down Broadway, with the thought that every man's hand was against her.
On she went, and on went the strike, close behind her. A little while ago she had been following music, and now music was following her. But the fifes and drums were rather slow, and Flyaway's feet were very swift; so it was not long before the gray men, with their white banners and clattering carts, were far behind her. No danger now that any of the wicked creatures would strike her; so she slackened her pace.
She did begin to wonder why she had not found Horace; still, she was not at all alarmed, and there was a dreadful din in the streets, which confused her thoughts. It seemed as if people were making it on purpose. Once, at Willowbrook, she had heard boys banging tin pans, grinding coffee mills, and pounding with mortars. She had liked that,—they called it the "Calathumpian Band,"—and she liked this too; it sounded about as uproarious.
While she sauntered along, spying wonders, her eye was attracted by some balancing-toys, which a man was showing off at one of the corners. What a pleasant man he was, to set them spinning just to amuse little girls! Fly was delighted with one wee soldier, in a blue coat with brass buttons, who kept dancing and bowing with the greatest politeness. "Captain Jinks, of the horse-marines," said the toy-man, introducing him. "Buy him, miss; he'll make a nice little husband for you; only fifteen cents."
Fly felt quite flattered. It was the first time in her life any one had ever asked her to buy anything, and she thought she must have grown tall since she came from Indiana. She put her fingers in her mouth, then took them out, and put them in her pocket.
"Here's my porte-monnaie-ry," said she, dolefully; "but I haven't but two cents—no more. Hollis carried it off."
"Well, well, run along, then. Don't you see you're right in the way?"
Fly was surprised and grieved at the change in the man's tone: she had expected he would pity her for not having any money.
"Come here, you little lump of love," called out a mellow voice; and there, close by, sat a wizened old woman, making flowers into nosegays. She had on a quilted hood as soft as her voice, but everything else about her was as hard as the door-stone she sat on.
"See my beautiful flowers," said the old crone, pointing to the table before her; "who cares for them jumping things over yonder? I don't."
The flowers were tied in bouquets—sweet violets, rosebuds, and heliotrope. Fly, whose head just reached the top of the table, smelt them, and forgot the "little husband, for fifteen cents."
"He's a cross man, dearie," said the old woman, lowering her voice, "or he wouldn't have sent you off so quick, just because you hadn't any money. Now, I love little girls, and I'll warrant we can make some kind of a trade for one of my posies."
Fly smiled, and quickly seized a bouquet with a clove pink in it.
"Not so fast, child! What you got that you can give me for it? I don't mind the money. That old pocket-book will do, though 'tain't wuth much."
It was very surprising to Fly to hear her port-monnaie called old; for it was bought last week, and was still as red as the cheeks of the painted lady.
"I don't dass to give folks my porte-monnaie-ry," said she, clutching it tighter, but holding the flowers to her nose all the while.
"O, fudge! Well, what else you got in your pocket? A handkerchief?"
"No, my hangerfiss is in my muff."
"That? Why, there isn't a speck o' lace on it. Nice little ladies always has lace. Here's a letter in the corner; what is it?"
"Hollis says it's K; stands for Flyaway."
"Well, you're such a pretty little pink, I guess I'll take it; but 'tain't wuth lookin' at," said the crafty old woman, who saw at a glance it was pure linen, and quite fine.
"Now run along, baby; your mummer will be waitin' for you."
Fly walked on slowly. Ought she to have parted with her very best hangerfiss!
"Nice ole lady, loved little gee-urls; but what you s'pose folks was goin' to cry into now?"
Tears started at the thought. One of them dropped into the eye of the squirrel, who sat on the muff, peeping up into her face.
"Nice ole lady, I s'pose; but folks never wanted to buy my hangerfisses byfore!" thought Fly, much puzzled by the state of society in New York. "And I've got some beau-fler flowers to my auntie's house. Wake up—wake up!" added she, blowing open a pink rose-bud; "you's too little for me."
But the bud did not wish to wake up and be a rose; it curled itself together, and went to sleep again.
"I don't see where Hollis stays to all the time," exclaimed the little one, beginning to have a faint curiosity about it.
CHAPTER VIII.
"THE FRECKLED DOG."
But just then a gentle-looking blind girl came along led by a dog. The sight was so strange that Flyaway stopped to admire; for whatever else she might be afraid of, she always loved and trusted a dog.
"Doggie, doggie," cried she, patting the little animal's head.
"O, what a sweet voice," said the blind girl, putting out her hand and groping till she touched Fly's shoulder. "I never heard such a voice!"
This was what strangers often said, and Flyaway never doubted the sweetness was caused by eating so much candy; but just now she had had none for two days.
"What makes you shut your eyes up, right in the street, girl? Is the seeingness all gone out of 'em?"
"Yes, you darling. I haven't had any seeingness in my eyes for a year."
"You didn't? Then you's blind-eyed," returned Flyaway, with perfect coolness.
"And don't you feel sorry for me—not a bit?"
"No, 'cause your dog is freckled so pretty."
"But I can't see his freckles."
"Well, he's got 'em. Little yellow ones, spattered out all over him."
"But if I had eyes like you, I shouldn't need any dog. I could go about the streets alone."
"Well, I don't like to go 'bout the streets alone; I want my own brother Hollis."
"I hope you haven't got lost, little dear?"
"No," laughed Fly, gayly; "I didn't get lost! But I don't know where nobody is! And there don't nobody know where I am!"
The blind girl took Fly's little hand tenderly in hers.
"Come, turn down this street with me, and tell me all about it."
Fly trudged along, prattling merrily, for about a minute: then she drew away. "'Tisn't a nice place; I don't want to go there."
A look of pain crossed the blind girl's face.
"No, I dare say you don't. It isn't much of a place for folks with silk bonnets on."
"You can't see my bonnet; you can't see anything, you're blind-eyed; but," said Fly, glancing sharply around, "it isn't pretty here, at all; and there's a dead cat right in the street."
"Yes, I think likely."
"And there's a boy. I spect he frowed the cat out the window; he hasn't nuffin on but dirty cloe's."
"Do you see some steps?" said the blind girl, putting her hand out cautiously. "Don't fall down."
"I shan't fall down; I'm going home."
"O, don't child; you must come with me. My mother will take care of you."
"I don't want nobody's mother to take 'are o' me; I've got a mamma myself!"
"How little you know!" said the blind girl, thinking aloud; "how lucky it is I found you! and O, dear, how I wish I could see! You'll slip away in spite of me."
But Flyaway allowed herself to be drawn along, step by step, partly because she liked the "freckled dog," and partly because she had not ceased being amused by the droll sight of a person walking with closed eyes.
"What's the name of you, girl?"
"Maria."
"Maria? So was my mamma; her name was Maria, when she was a little girl. O, look, there's another boy; don't you see him? Up high, in that house. Got a big box with a string to it."
A very rough-looking boy was standing at a third-story window, lowering a bandbox by a clothes-line. As Fly watched the box slowly coming down, the boy called out,—
"Get in, little un, and I'll give you a free ride."
"O, no—O, no; I don't dass to."
"Yes, yes; go in, lemons," said the boy, choking with laughter, as he saw the child's horror. "If you don't do it, by cracky, I'll come down and fetch you."
At this, Fly was frightened nearly out of her senses, and ran so fast that the dog could scarcely have kept up with her, even if he had not had a blind mistress pulling him back.
"O, where are you?" exclaimed Maria. "Don't run away from me,—don't!"
"He's a-gon to kill me in two," cried Flyaway, stopping for breath.' "he's a-gon to kill me in two-oo!"
"No, he isn't, dear! It's only Izzy Paul He couldn't catch you, if he tried. He's lame, and goes on crutches."
"But he said a swear word,—yes he, did," sobbed the child, never doubting that a boy who could swear was capable of murder, though he had neither hands nor feet.
"Stop, now," said Maria, clutching Fly as if she had been a spinning top. "This is my house. Mother, mother, here's a little girl; catch her—hold her—keep her!"
"Me? What should I catch a little girl for?" said Mrs. Brooks, a faded woman with a tired face, and a nose that moved up and down when she talked. She had been standing at the door of their tumbledown tenement, looking for her daughter, and was surprised to see her bringing a strange child with her. It was not often that well-dressed people wandered into that dirty alley.
"The poor little thing has got lost, mother. Perhaps you can find out where she came from. I didn't ask her any questions; it was as much as I could do to keep up with her."
Maria put her hand on her side. Fast walking always tired her, for she was afraid every moment of falling.
They had to go down a flight of stairs to get into the house; and after they got there Fly looked around in dismay.
"I don't want to stay in the stable," she murmured. Indeed it was not half as nice as the place where her father kept his horse.
"But this is where we have to live," sighed Maria.
"Have things to eat?" asked the little stranger, in a solemn whisper.
There were a few chairs with broken backs, a few shelves with clean dishes, a few children with hungry faces. In one corner was a clumsy bedstead, and in a tidy bed lay a pale man.
"Who've you got there, Maria?" said he. "Bring her along, and stick her up on the bed."
"Don't be afraid," said Mrs. Brooks; "it's only pa; wouldn't the little girl like to talk to him? He's sick."
Flyaway was not at all afraid, for the man smiled pleasantly, and did not look as if he would hurt anybody. Mrs. Brooks set her on the bed, and Maria, afraid of losing her, held her by one foot. The children all crowded around to see the little lady in a silk bonnet holding a button-hole bouquet to her bosom.
"Ain't she a ducky dilver!" said the oldest boy. "Pa'll be pleased, for he don't see things much. Has to keep abed all the time."
Mr. Brooks tried to smile, and Flyaway whispered to Maria, with sudden pity,—
"Sorry he's sick. Has he got to stay sick? Can't you find the camphor bottle?"
"O, father, she thinks if ycu had some camphor to smell of, 'twould cure you."
Then they all laughed, and Fly timidly offered the sick man her flowers.
"What, that pretty posy for me? Bless you, baby, they'll do me a sight more good than camfire!"
"There," said Maria, joyfully, "now pa is pleased; I know by the sound of his voice. Poor pa! only think, little girl, a stick of timber fell on him, and lamed him for life!"
"Yes," said Bennie, "the lower part of him is as limber as a rag."
"She don't sense a word you say," remarked Mrs. Brooks, shaking up a pillow, "See what we can get out of her. What's your name, dear?"
"Katie Clifford."
"Where do you live?"
"I have been borned in Nindiana."
Fly spoke with some pride. She considered her birth an honor to the state.
"But where did you come from, Katie? That's what we mean."
"I camed from heaven," said the child, with one of her wise looks.
"Beats all, don't she?" cried Mr. Brooks, admiringly. "Looks like an angel, I declare for't. Did you just drop down out of the sky?"
"No, sir," answered Flyaway, folding her little hands as if she were saying her prayers; "I camed down when I was a baby."
'I Camed Down when I Was a Baby.'
"That's what makes your hair so goldy," said Bennie. "Mother, did you ever see such eyes? Say, did you ever? So soft, and kinder shiny, too."
"Children, don't stare at her; it makes her uneasy."
"I can't stare at her," said Maria, bitterly. "I suppose you don't mean me, mother."
Mrs. Brooks only answered her poor daughter by a kiss.
"Well, little Katie, after you were born in Nindiana, you came to New York. When did you come?"
"One of these other days I camed here with Hollis."
"Who's Hollis?"
"He's my own brother. Got a new cap. Had his hair cut."
"Who did you come to New York to see?" "My auntie."
"Her auntie! A great deal of satisfaction we are likely to get out of this child," said Mr. Brooks, laughing. He had not laughed before for a week.
"What's your auntie's name?"
"Aunt Madge."
"Is she married?"
"O, yes; and so's Uncle 'Gustus. Married together, and live together, just the same."
"Uncle 'Gustus who? Now we'll come at it!"
"Alling," replied Fly, her quick eyes roving about the room, for she was tired of these questions.
"Allen, Augustus Allen!" said Mr. Brooks, in surprise; "I wonder if there can be two of them. Tell me, child, how does he look?"
"Don't look like you," replied Fly, after a keen survey of Mr. Brooks. "Your face is pulled away down long, like that;" (stretching her hand out straight) "Uncle 'Gustus's face is squeezed up short" (doubling her hand into a ball)
"I'll warrant it is the colonel himself," said Mrs. Brooks, smiling at the description.
"Yes, that's the name of him; the 'kernil's' the name of him."
"Is it possible!" said Mr. Brooks, looking very much pleased.
"Uncle 'Gustus has curly hair on his cheeks, on his mouf, all round. Not little prickles, sticking out like needles."
"O, you girl!" said Bennie, frowning at Fly. "You mustn't laugh at my pa's beard. There's a man comes in, sometimes, and shaves him nice; but now the man's gone to Newark."
"Is it possible," repeated Mrs. Brooks, taking the child's hand, "that this is Colonel Allen's little niece, and my Maria found her!"
"Your Maria didn't find me," said Fly, decidedly; "I founded Maria."
"So she did, pa. The first thing I knew, I heard somebody calling, Doggie, doggie,' in such a sweet voice; and then I looked—no, of course I couldn't look."
Here the discouraged look came over Maria's mouth, and she said no more.
"There, there, cheer up, daughter," said Mr. Brooks, with tears in his eyes; "I was only going on to say, it is passing strange that any of our family should run afoul of one of the colonel's folks."
"It's the Lord's doings; I haven't the slightest doubt of it," said Mrs. Brooks, earnestly. "You know what I've been saying to you, pa."
"There, there, ma'am, don't," said Mr. Brooks; "don't go to raising false hopes. You know I'm too proud to beg of anybody's folks."
"Why, pa, I shouldn't call it begging just to tell Colonel Allen how you are situated! Do you suppose, if he knew the facts of the case, he'd be willing to let you suffer? Such a faithful man as you used to be to work."
"No, I think it's likely he wouldn't. He's got more heart than some rich folks; but I hain't no sort of claim on the colonel, if I did help build his house. And then, ma'am, you know I've been kind o' hopin'—"
"Guess I'll go now, and find Hollis," said Fly, slipping down from the bed, for the talk did not interest her.
"O, but I want to go with you, Katie," said Mrs. Brooks, coaxingly. "Bennie, you amuse her, while I change my dress."