CHAPTER VII.
ELFIE TELLS A STORY.
Six of the girls were spending the Saturday mending-hour in Lily’s room. All the girls in the school were required to spend that one hour in sewing, and as rents and holes were subject to fines and bad marks it became an unwritten law that the hour was to be spent in mending. The little girls were expected to do their mending in the smaller recitation-room, with one of the teachers to direct and assist them, but the larger ones were allowed to work in their rooms.
“It is not a hilarious pursuit,” said Lily, looking solemnly at a three-sided tear above the hem of a clean white skirt, “and I am very sorry that there seems to be such a deep-seated prejudice against the Chinese.”
“And what earthly connection is there between mending and Chinese?”
“The connection, my inquisitive Bertha, is not with mending, but abolishing the necessity for the practice, which I regard as a most disagreeable one. I have understood that the gentle creatures with the peanut-colored complexions and the blinking, bias eyes are acquainted with a process for making paper undergarments, which are taken off when soiled and used for lighting fires. I suppose if my lovely figure were draped in paper I should make a cheerful rattling as I walked about, and toward the close of a paper garment’s career I might even have to tie it about me with twine, like any other paper-wrapped package. Still, I should prefer it to mending cotton materials, and so I wish they would offer the Chinese inducements to stay here and begin manufacturing.”
The girls were convulsed with laughter, for Lily had an overwhelmingly droll way of making her highly original remarks.
“I have no mending to do,” said Katie; “so if you want me to read aloud I am quite at your service.”
Lily laid down her work and looked reproachfully at the speaker. “Have you stolen a march on me, uncandid Katherine, with a K, and supplied yourself with a full line of paper garments while I am still groveling in cotton cloth?”
“No; I wear as much muslin as you do, and wear and tear it into twice as many holes. I laid a frightful pile of clothes that wanted mending on my table yesterday, but when I went to bed I found them all mended.”
“That sounds supernatural,” said Lily, using her chest tones and speaking sepulchrally; “I am afraid it was the work of no mortal fingers. Perhaps you have a ghostly double who sits and sews while you otherwise amuse yourself.”
“O, stop talking that way,” said Katie; “you make me feel creepy; I know well enough who did it. It was Mary Ann.”
“How very nice!” said Edna, airily; “I believe I will hire her services too. I have plenty of pocket-money to spare, for there’s no way of spending it here.”
“But she didn’t do it for pay,” protested Katie; “it’s because she likes me.”
“And because you are always so nice to her,” said Lily, with an approving nod which greatly pleased Katie.
Edna drew up her lip scornfully. “I should not accept unpaid services,” she said, loftily.
“Do excuse my forgetfulness,” exclaimed Lily, hurriedly fumbling in her little purse. “O, can any one change a half-dollar; never mind, here’s some pennies, one, two, three, four, five. Here, Edna, is this about right for gluing my photo-case so nicely the other day?”
“Why, Lily Dart! How dare you offer me money!” exclaimed Edna, springing up and scattering the pennies Lily had tossed into her lap in every direction.
The other girls looked shocked too; but Lily serenely said, “I must be stupid, but I thought you said you wouldn’t accept unpaid services, and I felt reproached at once for not having as good a rule of conduct as yours.”
Edna looked violently angry, but before she could express her indignant sentiments there was a little tap on the door, and Mrs. Abbott and Elfie came in.
Perhaps Mrs. Abbott could tell by Edna’s flushed cheeks and the angry tears which filled her eyes that something disagreeable was in progress, but she gave no sign of noticing any thing, and after a few minutes of pleasant chat asked if she might leave Elfie with them till the sewing-hour was up.
Bertha, with a fear that Edna and Lily might recommence the interrupted conversation, invited Elfie to tell them a story while they sewed.
“I can’t tell a book story,” said the child, “but I’ll tell you one that Mammy Candace tells, or I’ll tell you one of Marion’s history stories.”
“Which would you rather tell, Elfie?”
“I sink I’d rather tell one of mammy’s stories, ’cause I forget the history names.”
“Very well, do as you like.”
“Well, once dere was a little girl, ’bout so big as me, and her mother telled her to go over the field and take some nice custard in a bowl to a poor sick woman in a little bit o’ cabin. So she put on her little hat an’ comed an’ comed an’ comed till she ’most come to de little cabin. Den she sat down under a bush an’ she look in de bowl, an’ de custard look yellow like gole, an’ smooth like silk, an’ den she took a holly-leaf an’ she ate de nice custard all up. An’ den she lie down an’ go sleep. Pretty soon dere comes big bumble-bee, buzz-buzz-buzz, an’ she wakes up an’ says, ‘Go ’way, bad bee.’ But de bee say, ‘No, no; I goin’ ter sting a bad chile doan’ mine ’er mudder.’”
The girls were noticing with much amusement that Elfie was unconsciously imitating the Southern accent Candace used.
“Den a lil’ chipmunk come an’ say, ‘Cha-cha-cha-cha, I goin’ bite her lil’ toes, ’cause she doan’ mine ’er mudder.’ Den a lil’ owl comes an’ says, ‘Who-a-who-a-who, I goin’ pull ’er har, ’cause she doan’ mine ’er mudder.’ Den dere comes a lil’ chink-bug, tick-a-tick-a-tick-a, an’ says, ‘I goin’ pinch ’er, ’cause she doan’ mine ’er mudder.’ Den dey all say, ‘Sting ’er, bite ’er, pull ’er, pinch ’er, ’cause she doan’ mine ’er mudder.’ So she cry an’ holler, an’ de poor sick woman crawls outer bed an’ sends ’em all off. Den she says, ‘You got somefin’ nice for me in dat blue bowl?—somefin’ you mudder send me, yellow as gole an’ smooth as silk? Gib it to me, ’cause I got nuffin’ to eat.’
“Dat was the worse of all, an’ de lil’ girl runs out de door an’ runs home an’ says, ‘Mudder, mudder, gib me all de supper I can have;’ an’ de mudder gibs her bread an’ milk an’ jam-tart, an’ she takes ’em an’ runs ’way, ’way off to de cabin, to gib ’em to de sick woman, an’ de bee, an’ de chipmunk, and de lil’ owl, and de chink-bug, dey all comed too, an’ dey didn’t sting ’er, nor bite ’er, nor pull ’er, nor pinch ’er, ’cause she was sorry she was bad an’ didn’t mine ’er mudder.
“I can tell you better stories when I know how to read,” said Elfie, modestly, as she received their thanks for the one she had just told in a highly dramatic manner. “I have a beautiful big book of stories called The Raving Nights, but Auntie Abbott wont let me have the stories read to me, because I heard her tell Miss Blake I was too—too magical now.”
“O, yes; dat was it.”
“Well,” said Lily, who had seen the big storybook, “‘magical’ isn’t a bad word for the Arabian Nights.”
“And ‘Raving’ is as forcible as the real title,” added Edna, who seemed to have recovered her temper.