The key to Betsy's heart

IT was a summer full of events for both Van and his mistress. Slowly and patiently Aunt Kate corrected Betsy’s uncouth ways, and the book of “Manners” grew. Betsy took smaller mouthfuls now, used her fork properly and ate quietly. She learned her tricks like Van, having to be told but once. If she forgot she corrected herself.

Aunt Kate said one day to Uncle Ben,

“The child ‘eats’ everything I say to her, as if she were greedy for it, and what’s more, she digests it.”

“She’s just at the impressionable age,” said Dr. Johns. “Look at her out on the lawn there with the dog. When she thinks no one is looking at her she gambols almost as gracefully as he does.”

“I’m so glad she came to us. Everything seems different. I feel as if I had a rare, strange plant to tend, and when she grows out of that hard little bud of shyness, she’ll be the rose of my heart’s desire. It was a great inspiration, getting her into pretty clothes at the very start. I really think she is trying to live up to them.”

“I think it more likely that she is trying to live up to her Aunt Kate,” Uncle Ben chivalrously said, and as he started for the office, there was on his face the smile that Aunt Kate loved to see—the smile that made all the Hospital patients love him.

Betsy came in with her book as soon as she saw him go.

“I’m getting a lot of manners, Aunt Kate. My book’s ’most full.”

“I am so glad, dear, and you are getting them by heart, too. I haven’t heard you say ‘ain’t’ for a week. By the way, how about those finger-nails? Let me see.”

But instead of showing them Betsy snapped her hands behind her.

“Let me look, dear. Haven’t you remembered?”

“No—no’m—not much. I try, but they just chew theirselves when I’m not thinking. They aren’t fitten to see.”

Aunt Kate took the two little hands in her own delicate ones. They lay palms up, showing a row of callous spots at the base of the fingers.

For a moment dear Aunt Kate looked; then she softly stooped and kissed them. The child stood wide-eyed, wondering.

“What’d you do that for? They aren’t pretty.”

“Because every one of those spots means that a little girl has helped her mother, and I love them. I almost wish that I could have some myself for so fine a reason.”

She turned the hands over.

“But these—these—oh, my little Betsy! To trim such good hands in such a sorry way. Nails are intended to be the ornaments of a hand, quite as much, and more, than rings are. Every nail should have a crescent moon at its base, and another little pearl moon-rise at the tip. There should be no ragged edges or hang-nails. I’ve told you so many times. Now I shall have to do something to make you remember.

“Remember, too, dear, that I do this because I love you, and I want you to be sweet in every way.”

Mrs. Johns went to her desk, and returned with a bottle of India ink and a small brush.

“Now, Betsy, as long as the edges of your nails are rough and black, the middle might as well be black, too.”

Quickly Aunt Kate put a drop of ink in the center of each nail. Betsy held her breath with the surprise of it.

“Hold them out like that till they’re dry. If the spots come off when you wash your hands, I’ll put on more. When you see them you will think not to bite your nails, and you must keep them on for a week. By that time your nails will grow out, and then I’ll show you how to take proper care of them.”

“Oh, Aunt Kate, please! Must I wear them like that to the table—right before Uncle Ben? What will he say?”

“Uncle Ben will think as I do, that the black spots look no worse than the close-bitten edges.”

Tears came in Betsy’s eyes. It was not like Aunt Kate to punish. For a moment she stood with quivering lips, looking down at the queer, ink-spotted finger-tips. Then she straightened up.

“I can stand it a week. You can stand anything you got to stand. I guess this’ll be a warnin’ to me.”

Not another whisper of rebellion came from her lips. She wore her badges of disgrace manfully, hiding her hands, if she could, when any one came near her. Uncle Ben looked at them, then at Mrs. Johns, but never a word did he say, and Betsy to this day does not know what he thought about them.

Aunt Kate replaced the spots as they came off, and the week dragged by.

Then, one morning, Aunt Kate came into Betsy’s room, and instead of the bottle of ink, she carried a dainty little box.

“See here, Betsy.”

Betsy looked, and saw, under the satin-lined lid, a tiny pair of curved scissors, a nail file, a buffer with a silver handle, a box of rosy ointment—all the things that go to make up a manicure set.

“Now, let me see the nails again, Betsy dear. Have you remembered all the time?”

“I forgot twice, Aunt Kate, but I got black on my lips, so I had to remember.”

“Why, they’ve grown out beautifully! Good!”

With a bowl of warm, soapy water and a towel, the fingers were soaked, cleaned and dried. Deftly Aunt Kate cut each tip to a white “moon-rise,” and with an orange stick she found the beginnings of the crescent at the base. When the nails had been polished Betsy did not know them for her own.

“There! They look like rose petals. And now you can do it for yourself next time. This case is for you.”

“Aunt Kate!”

“Yes, dear.”

“I’m awful much obliged, and—and—I like you a lot. And—may I do Van’s nails for him, too?”

“Why, if you want to. But his paws have to be on the ground, and he never bites his nails.”

“Well, I’m never going to bite mine any more. Van chews other things, though, Aunt Kate, and—and—may we have another ball, please? He’s chewed that little rubber one all up.”

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do, Betsy. We’ll try him with a rope-end. I found just the thing in the store-room this morning. Here it is, and I’ll tie a knot at each end. See how he likes that. A rubber ball every day is rather expensive.”

The rope proved highly successful, and Betsy and Van at either end made a great team. Betsy jerked and pulled and Van growled and shook. Then Van got the rope and flew all over the house and the lawn, and when Betsy finally caught her end there was a terrific growling and barking. Van liked it so much that he soon got in the way of trailing his rope on all occasions, hunting for some one who could be coaxed to play with him. Even a neighbor’s dog was invited to take part in the game; but, although he wagged his tail pleasantly, he showed no intelligence, and Van gave him up in disgust.

There was another beautiful game, even better than Rope, because the whole family could play it of an evening, and Van was never happier than when he could stir up everything and everybody on the place. This was “Hide-and-Seek.” Mrs. Johns or the Doctor would hold Van tightly, his little body quivering with excitement, while Betsy hid in some corner, behind a curtain or screen. Then she would call,

“Coop!”

At the sound Van would be released, and would dart like an arrow in the direction of Betsy’s voice. It never took him long to find her, for his little nose was even keener than his eyes and ears.

With a joyful bark he would pounce on her and drag her back by her skirts, growling as if he had caught a lion. Then somebody else must hide and be found.

Once, when Van and Betsy had strayed as far as the park gates, an old hen loomed up in their path. She was bigger than Van, but a puppy who could tree a cat could surely get some sport out of a large bird like that. After her went Van, and Mrs. Dorking took to her awkward legs. These, not filling entirely the necessity for speed, she added wing-power to the effort. Squawking, and frightened almost out of her feathers, she skimmed the ground, with Van close at her heels—if hens have heels.

Betsy laughed heartily at the funny sight, and that was a grave mistake, as later events proved. Of course Mrs. Dorking got away with all her feathers, so Van gave up the chase, and came back panting and wildly enthusiastic.

Van’s education did not consist of tricks and games alone. No, indeed! Fox terriers have a special use in the world; they are, above all things, a breed of rat-catchers, and Van was a sportsman, to the tips of his brown ears.

One morning he clambered out of his basket in the kitchen just in time to see a small, gray, furry thing dodge behind the basket and into the pantry. He did not stop to question; every instinct in him told him that this was Game. Like a flash he was after it. Mary was mixing pancakes at the far end of the pantry, and it went right under her feet. She jumped and screamed and nearly landed on Van’s toes.

“It’s a mouse! It’s a mouse! Quick, Van! There it goes!”

The door of the closet where the pots and pans were kept stood ajar. In went the mouse; in went Van. The mouse went under a skillet, Van turned it over and jumped after; he chased it around a vinegar jug; he knocked over a pile of pans, and they fell with a terrible clatter; the mouse crept under one, and Van rooted up the whole of them, and sent them flying galley-west, while Mary took turns screaming and laughing.

Van hunted the mouse through the pantry, out into the kitchen again, and behind a broom in the corner. Bang! That was the broom falling. Pounce! That was Van, and Mrs. Mouse was no more.

By this time the whole Johns family was on the spot. They could not, unless they had been stone deaf, have escaped hearing the racket. Van was in his element. Not only had he brought down his first game, but he had an admiring audience, which he loved of all things. He swaggered around and tossed the mouse into the air, as if by so doing he could make them all understand just what a grand, brave dog he was. Lastly, he came proudly to lay his prize at the feet of his beloved mistress.

And Betsy spoiled his fun by taking the mouse away from him. It was all right for Van to kill a mouse, she argued, because mice are harmful, but one should not gloat over it. Van did not see things that way. He gave one grieved look at the unfeeling Betsy, jumped into his basket and sulked.

Then Betsy added insult to injury by pulling him out of the basket and carrying him upstairs. Aunt Kate, passing by, saw the child on the window seat. Very busy Betsy was with something, and that something was Van, who was wriggling tremendously.

“See here just a minute, Aunt Kate. Ai—aren’t they nice?”

She exhibited Van’s paws, with every nail scraped clean and white.

“He didn’t like it a mite, but he knew it had to be did, or he couldn’t be a gentleman. I washed ’em with a nail brush to get the mouse off.”

The catching of the mouse was the clinching nail in Dr. Johns’ respect for Van. He looked upon him now as a good and useful dog, and no longer as a mere plaything.

As for Betsy, that evening, beside her napkin at the dinner table, there lay a tiny white box, and in it shone a gold circlet set with a tiny diamond. Uncle Ben’s card lay on top, with the words

“For the hand with the little pink nails.”