Three little Trippertrots

One day Mrs. Trippertrot called to her three children.

“Now, children,” she said, “I am going out for a little while, and I do hope you will not trot off anywhere this time. You don’t know how worried I am when you run off, as you have done several times lately.”

“We’re sorry, mamma,” said Tommy.

“And we don’t ever really mean to trot off,” said Mary Trippertrot.

“It—it just seems to happen,” spoke Johnny Trippertrot. “Our legs run off with us before we know it.”

“Well, try and not let them run off with you to-day,” said their mamma. “I will leave Suzette in charge of you.”

“We’ll try to be good, mamma,” said Mary politely.

“But, oh! we did have such fun the other day when we rode off on the funny horses!” exclaimed Tommy.

“Yes, when we met the false-face man and the old fisherman,” added Johnny.

“Oh, I know what let’s do!” cried Mary. “We’ll get out our false-faces and play it’s Hallowe’en again.”

“That will be nice, I think,” said their mamma, “and it ought to keep you in the house. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

So off she went, downtown shopping, I guess, and the children got out their funny false-faces, and played some games. They were having a good time, when, all at once, they heard some one out in the street crying.

“I wonder who that is?” said Johnny.

“Let’s go look,” suggested Tommy.

“No, you had better not,” said Suzette the maid. “For it might be a funny monkey, and then you would want to go off after it, and you would be lost again. You had better stay here and play at having a surprise party.”

Well, the children didn’t want to do that, but they knew they must mind Suzette, for she was in charge of them. But just then something happened. The delivery wagon came from the big downtown store, and Suzette had to go down to the side door to take in some things for the children’s mamma. Then Mary and Tommy and Johnny heard the crying noise out in the street again, and Mary said:

“I don’t believe it would do any harm to take just one peep, to see who is crying.”

“Me, either,” spoke Tommy.

“Then let’s do it,” said Johnny, and they did. They went to the front window and looked out. And this is what the children saw:

There was a tiny little girl walking along, and she had fallen down, and her knee had been cut on a sharp stone, and that’s why she was crying.

“Oh, see the poor thing!” cried Mary.

“We ought to help her,” said Johnny.

“Then let’s do it,” suggested Tommy. “Suzette or mamma wouldn’t care if we helped somebody in trouble. Mamma would want us to, I’m sure. Besides, mamma isn’t here now, and neither is Suzette.” For you see, the nursemaid was still talking to the delivery boy. He had forgotten to bring a spool of thread that Mrs. Trippertrot needed, and Suzette was asking about it.

“We’ll go down to the little girl,” said Mary. “We can’t get lost in front of our own house.”

So down they went, and I just want you to listen, and see what happened after that. It just goes to show that you never, never can tell what is going to happen in this world.

“What is the matter, little girl?” asked Mary, after she had wiped the child’s tears away with her handkerchief.

“Oh! Boo-hoo! I’m lost!” cried the little girl. “I went to the store for a stick of candy, but I came back the wrong way, and I’m lost.”

“Where is the stick of candy?” asked Tommy.

“I ate it all up,” said the little lost girl. “Look! You can’t see it.” And she opened her mouth so the Trippertrots could see away down her throat, and believe me, there wasn’t a bit of candy to be seen!

“Yes, it’s all gone,” said Johnny sorrowfully, when he got through looking.

“Say, do you know what I think we ought to do?” spoke Tommy suddenly.

“What?” asked Mary and Johnny.

“We ought to take this little lost girl home. We’d want some one to take us home if we were lost, and I don’t believe mamma or Suzette would mind.”

“I don’t, either,” said Mary.

“Then let’s do it,” said Tommy. “Do you know which street you live on?” he asked of the little girl.

“Oh, yes. It’s a street with trees on it,” said the child, and now she stopped crying. “Please take me to it.”

“There are lots of streets with trees on,” said Tommy, “but we’ll try to find the right one for you. Come on.”

And so that’s how the Trippertrots started tripping and trotting off again, and at the beginning they didn’t really mean to do so at all. But you see how some very funny things happen sometimes.

Along they walked, all four children together, hand in hand, looking for the house where the little lost girl lived. Ivy Vine, the cat, didn’t come along this time, nor did Fido, the dog. For Ivy Vine was washing her face with her red tongue, and Fido was gnawing a bone.

“What is your name, little girl?” asked Mary, when they had gone a short distance down the street.

“My name is Jack,” she answered.

“Why, that is not a girl’s name, it’s a boy’s!” said Tommy in surprise.

“I know it,” said the little lost girl, “and I want to be a boy, so I choosed a boy’s name. My mamma lets me, and when I grow up I’m going to ride a horse and play football.”

The Trippertrot children laughed at that, and they thought the little girl who wanted to be a boy was very nice. But still they couldn’t seem to find her home. They looked all over for her house, and every time they came to a street with trees on it they asked her if it was there she lived, but she said:

“No, none of these houses are my papa’s house. I guess we’ll have to go on a little farther.”

So they went on a little farther, but still they couldn’t seem to find the place, and the little girl said:

“Oh, dear! I guess I’m lost still, aren’t I?” And she took a tighter hold of Mary Trippertrot’s hand.

“I guess you are,” answered Mary.

“And I guess we are, too,” said Tommy.

“Well, that’s just what I was afraid would happen,” said Johnny. “Here we are lost again, and we promised mamma we wouldn’t go out of the house.”

“Oh, but we really didn’t mean to,” said Mary; “and besides, she’ll forgive us when she knows we tried to do a kindness.”

“Yes, I guess so,” said Tommy, “but what are we going to do? I don’t know which way to go.”

Neither did any of the others, and Mary was just looking around, hoping she could find a nice policeman, when, all at once, the door of a house, in front of which they were standing, opened, and a kind little old lady looked out.

“Oh, you poor, dear, little lost children!” she exclaimed. “Come right in here, and let me love you.”

“How did you know we were lost?” asked Tommy.

“Oh, I was once a little girl myself,” said the nice little old lady, and, though her hair was white, her eyes were as bright as the snapping fire on a cold night. “So I know when children are lost,” she added.

So the little lost girl and the Trippertrots, who were also lost now, went into the house of the little old lady. She brought out some nice low chairs for them to sit on, and she gave them some picture books to look at, and then what do you think she did? Why, she went out and got them some bowls of milk from a mooley-cow—the milk was from the cow, you know, not the bowls—and she brought some bread; and say! I just wish I had some of that bread and milk myself! Oh, it was very good! But I can’t have any, because the Trippertrots and the lost girl finished it all up, down to the last drop, and they ate some sugar cookies, too.

“My, I’m sure I don’t know what to do with you children,” said the little old lady, shaking her white head at them, after they had finished eating. “I wish I knew where your home was.”

“Send for a policeman,” said Mary.

“What! A policeman? Why, you’re not bad, are you?” cried the little old lady.

“Oh, no! But policemans most always know where we live,” said Johnny. “We’re the Trippertrots, and we’re always getting lost.”

“Yes, send for a policeman,” said Tommy.

“I believe I will,” spoke the little old lady. “I’ll go for one myself; but I’ll have to leave you here all alone, as no one lives with me. But I know you’ll be all right, and you can look at the pictures and listen to the cat purring.”

And sure enough, there was a big gray cat sleeping on the rug in the middle of the floor, and it was purring just like a sewing machine because it was so happy. The cat was happy, not the sewing machine, you know. And the cat purred, not the rug, you see.

Then the little old lady put on her bonnet and shawl, and went out for a policeman who might find the homes of the lost Trippertrots and the lost girl.

“I like it here very much,” said Mary, as she rubbed the cat’s back.

“So do I,” said the little lost girl. “It is almost as nice as my home.”

Tommy and Johnny liked it, too, and they were just looking at some picture books, and wishing they had more bread and milk, when, all at once, there came a knock at the door.

“I guess that is the policeman, come to take us home,” said Mary, with a happy laugh.

“Maybe it’s my papa,” suggested the little lost girl named Jack. And then the door opened, and there stood a funny little man, making low bows to the children, and saying:

“Oh, I’m so glad I found you. Come with me.”