Chapter 7 Donald and Dorothy by Mary Mapes Dodge
THE DANBYS
Who were the Danbys?
They were the Reeds' nearest neighbors, and no two households could be more different. In the first place, the Reeds were a small family of three, with four servants; the Danbys were a large family of twelve, with no servants. The Reeds had a spacious country mansion, rich old furniture, pretty row-boats, fine horses, carriages, and abundant wealth; the Danbys had a little house, poor old furniture, one cow, five pigs, one home-made scow, one wheelbarrow, and no money, excepting the very moderate income earned by the father of the family and his eldest boy. There the great contrast ended. The Danbys were thoroughly respectable, worthy and cleanly; the parents, kind and loving souls, could read and write, and the children were happy, obedient and respectful. To be sure, it would have been very hard for the best schoolmaster of the county to parse some of Mrs. Danby's fluent sentences, or to read at a glance Mr. Danby's remarkable penmanship. But that same learned instructor would have delighted in the cleverness of the sons and daughters, had he been so fortunate as to direct their studies. True, the poor little Danbys had enjoyed but a scant and broken schooling; but they were sharp little things, and native wit served them whenever reading, writing, and arithmetic failed. Indeed, the very fact of their intercourse with Donald and Dorothy had done much for their language and deportment. Yet each individual, from the big brother Ben down to the latest baby, had his or her own peculiar character and style, which not twenty Dons and Dorothys could alter.
It was not very difficult, after all, to remember the names of the young Danbys; for Mr. Danby, being a methodical man, had insisted on their being named in alphabetical order and that they each should have two names, so as to give them their choice in after life. Therefore, the first was Amanda Arabella,—at the present stage of our story, a girl of seventeen, with poetical gifts of her own; the second was Benjamin Buster, aged fifteen; the third, Charity Cora, dark-eyed, thoughtful, nearly thirteen, and, the neighbors declared, never seen without a baby in her arms; the fourth, Daniel David, a robust young person of eleven; the fifth, Ella Elizabeth, red-haired, and just half-past nine, as she said; next came Francis Ferdinand, or "Fandy," as he was called for short, who, though only eight, was a very important member of the family; next, Gregory George, who was six. And here the stock of double names seems to have given out; for after Master Gregory came plain little Helen, aged four; Isabella, a wee toddler "going on three;" and last of all, little Jamie, "the sweetest, cunningest little baby that ever lived." So now you have them all: Amanda Arabella, Benjamin Buster, Charity Cora, Daniel David, Ella Elizabeth, Francis Ferdinand, Gregory George, Helen, Isabella, and roly-poly Jamie. If you cannot quite remember all the children, who can blame you? Even Mrs. Danby herself, with the alphabet to help her, always had to name them upon her fingers, allowing a child to a finger, and giving Elizabeth and Fandy the thumbs.
The stars of the family, in Donald's and Dorothy's estimation, were Benjamin Buster, who had seen the world already, had enjoyed adventures and hair-breadth escapes, and was now at home for the first time in four years; Charity Cora, whose eager, dark eyes told their own story of patient aspiration; and little Fandy. Mr. Danby was proud of all his children, though perhaps proudest of Baby Jamie because there was no knowing what the child might come to; but Mrs. Danby looked with absolute reverence upon her eldest—Amanda Arabella. "Such a mind as that girl has, Mr. Danby," she would say to her husband, "it isn't for us to comprehend. She might have come just so out of a book, Amanda might." And Mr. Danby would nod a pleased and puzzled assent, vaguely wondering how long he could manage to hold his high parental state over so gifted a creature.
Amanda Arabella's strong points were poetry and sentiment. To be sure, she scrubbed the floor and washed the dishes, but she did these menial duties "with her head in the clouds," as she herself had confessed to her mother. Her soul was above it, and as soon as she could, she intended to "go somewhere and perfect herself." This idea of going somewhere to perfect herself was one which she had entertained in secret for some time, though she had not the slightest idea of where she could go, and in just what way she was to be perfected. She only knew that, at present, housework and the nine brothers and sisters were quite as much as she could attend to, excepting at odd moments when "the poetry fit was on her," as her mother expressed it—"and then wild horses couldn't stop her!"
"I can't deny, Mr. Reed," said that proud mother to her kind neighbor,—who, on the morning after the interview with Donald and Dorothy in his study, had halted at Mrs. Danby's whitewashed gate, to wish her a stately "Good-morning, madam!" and to ask after her family,—"I can't deny, and be honest, that I'm uncommon blest in my children, though the Lord has seen fit to give us more than a extra lot of 'em. They're peart and sound as heart could wish, and so knowin'! Why," she continued, lowering her voice and drawing closer to the gate, "there's my Fandy now, only eight years old, can preach 'most like a parson! It'd rise your hair with surprise to hear him. An' Ben, my oldest boy, has had such adventures, an' haps an' mishaps, as ought to be writ out in a birogrophy. An' there's Amanda Arabella, my daughter—well, if I only could set down the workin's o' my brain as that girl can, I'd do! She has got a most uncommon lively brain. Why, the other day—but all this time you're standin', Mr. Reed. Won't you walk in, sir? Well, certainly, sir, it ain't to be 'xpected you could take time goin' by so, as you are—Well, my 'Mandy, sir, only the other day was a-comin' out into the shed with a pan o' dish-water, and she sees a rainbow. 'Ma!' says she, a-callin' me, 'take this 'ere dish-water!' and before I knowed it, she was a writin' down with her lead-pencil the beautifullest ideas that ever was,—all about that rainbow. In the evening, when her Pa come, I just up and showed it to him, an' he says, says he, 'Them's the grandest thoughts I ever see put to paper!'"
"Ah!" said Mr. Reed, with an expression of hearty interest and amusement on his honest face, yet evidently ready to take advantage of the first opportunity to go on his way.
"Yes, indeed," promptly assented Mrs. Danby, "and she ain't all. Our children, if I do say it, seem to have more brains than they've a fair right to—bein' poor folks' children, as you may say. It don't tire 'em one bit to learn: their Pa says every study they tackle gets the worst of it,—they use it up, so to speak. I dreamed th' other night I see the four English branches, 'rithmetic, writin', readin', and hist'ry, standin' exhausted, waiting for them children to get through with them. But I see you're shifting yourself, sir, for going, and I ought to be ashamed to detain you this way clacking about my own flesh and blood. I've been poorly lately, I didn't tell you, Mr. Reed" (looking at him plaintively).
"No; indeed, I'm very sorry to hear it," said Mr. Reed, sympathetically. "Nothing serious, I hope?"
"Oh, no. One o' my billerous attacks; the spine o' my back seemed to give out somehow, and I was dreadful bad for a couple o' days. But my Thomas an' the children—bless their hearts!—got me up again. You're looking well, Mr. Reed. Good-morning, sir—good-morning!—(Sakes! he went off so sudden I forgot)."
And thus exclaiming to herself, the dear old talker went back into the house.
"Forgot what, Ma?" asked Amanda, who stood in the doorway trying to think of a rhyme for olives.
"Why, to tell Mr. Reed about that queer kind of a man, who's just engaged to lodge with us. I don't feel like trustin' him somehow, and yet it isn't for plain folks to be refusing a real boarder who wants a plain family-table, and don't put on any airs. I told him," she continued, going farther into the house, and raising her voice as she increased the distance between herself and Amanda, "that if ours wasn't a family table (with ten children setting 'round it, includin' the baby, and Mr. Danby at the head), I didn't know what was. But he's to come back in an hour or two. Where in the world to tuck him is the question. Anyhow, you'd better go up, dear, and ready brother's room for him. Ben's got two rabbit-skins tacked outside the window which'll have to come down. Ben'll have to go in with Dan and Fandy to sleep.—Mercy! Here come the twins, 'cross-lots!—an' Fandy a preachin' there in the pump-shed!"
True enough, the twins were coming around by the back way. They approached softly, and made a motion of warning to Mrs. Danby, as they drew nearer, for they could hear Fandy Danby's voice, and wished to enjoy the fun. Mrs. Danby, smiling and nodding, pointed to a place where they could stand unobserved and hear the sermon.
It was the hour for the afternoon "cleaning-up." Eight of the little Danbys, including Charity with Baby Jamie in her arms, had assembled to wash their hands and faces at the battered green pump under the shed, where, on a long, low bench, were two yellow earthenware basins, and a saucer containing a few fragments of brown soap, while on the wall hung a roller-towel that already was on very familiar terms with Danby faces and hands. The general toilet had been rather a noisy one, owing partly to the baby objecting to having soap in its eyes, and partly to the fact that too many required the services of the Danby roller at the same instant, to say nothing of Miss Helen insisting upon slapping the water in a most unladylike way, and so splashing Master Gregory.
This combination having brought matters to a crisis, Fandy had been inspired to mount a small step-ladder, and, with many original gestures, address the crowd in the following fashion:—
"Chil'ren! I'm ashamed of you! I don't know when I've been so—so umpressed with the badness of this family. How often, my hearers, do you 'spect me to stop my dressing to extort you! I didn't mean to preach no more sermons this week, but you do behave so awful bad, I must.
"Now, first, don't you know speakin' saucy is a sin? Don't you know it? It makes us hateful, an' it makes us cross, an' it makes people tell Ma. It ain't right for Chrisshen chil'ren to do such things. It don't never say in our Bible-lesson that folks can call peoples 'mean uglies' just for wantin' the roller. An' it don't say that a good Chrisshen child can say 'Pshaw for you!' for havin' not to make quite so much noise, which you, my beloved 'Gory, said just now to Charity.
"Now, we must be good an' perlite, if we want to do right and have things Chrissmas, an' if we want to be loved on earth and in heaven. (No, sir, that ain't talkin' big, and I do know what I mean, too.) I say, we must be perlite. We mussent get mad unless we can't help it. It's natural for big folks to rub our noses the wrong way when they wash our faces, an' to comb hair hard—they're born so. An' all we can do is to be patient, an' wait till we get big an' have chil'ren of our own.
"But what I say—what I mean, what I—what I—(Now you, Gregory, give Helen back her dolly right away, or I'll come down to you!)—what I mean is, that we all ought to be good and perlite. It's wicked to be saucy. We ought to be able to stand one another. An' nudgin' is wicked, an' shovin' is wicked, an' makin' faces ain't the way to do. No more ain't bullyin', nor mockin', nor any of those things. I go in for bein' pleasant and kind, an' havin' fun fair; only, my beloved hearers, I can't do it all alone. If we'd all be good Chrisshen chil'ren, things would go better, an' there wouldn't be such a racket.
"Can't you cleanse your sinful hearts, my hearers?—cleanse 'em, anyhow, enough to behave? Can't you? (Stop your answerin', David; it puts me out, and, besides, you oughtn't to say that. You ought to say 'I'll try.') I notice you ain't none of you real quiet and peaceful, unless I'm preachin', or you're eatin' something good. I also can see two people lookin' through the crack, which I think they'd better come in, as I wouldn't mind it. Now I can't extort you no more this time."
To Fandy's great disgust, the audience applauded the conclusion of his sermon, and were about to become more uproarious than ever, when the sudden appearance of Donald and Dorothy put them upon their good behavior.
"Is Ben here?" asked Donald, after the usual "How-d'ye-do's" were over, and as Fandy was taking a hasty turn at the roller-towel.
"Don't know," said Fandy; "he was mendin' a trap, over there,"—pointing to an enclosed corner close by the house, that had been roughly boarded over and fitted up with bench and table by Master Ben, so as to make a sort of workshop.
They all went over, accompanied by Charity Cora, and were received in Ben's usual style, which consisted in simply ceasing to whistle aloud, though he still held his lips in whistling position while he proceeded with his work.
They watched him in silence for a moment (the young Danbys, at least, knowing that they would be firmly, but not unkindly, ordered off, if they interfered with the business in hand), and then, to their relief, Ben drove in the last nail and laid down the hammer.
"What's that for?—to catch yab-bits?" asked Gregory George, nicknamed 'Gory by his brothers, for the fun of the thing, he was so fair-haired and gentle.
"No; it's to catch little boys," answered Ben, whereat 'Gory grinned, and looked at Don and Dorry to see if they were foolish enough to believe it.
"Well, why don't you act perlite to your comp'ny?" asked Fandy, much shocked at Ben's unconscious want of ceremony.
"Ha, ha!" laughed Ben. "Hallo, Donald!"
Dorry was softly talking to Cora, and at the same time coaxing the baby from its sister's arms.
"Hallo yourself!" was Donald's quick response to Ben. "Did you have any luck last night?"
"Yes, two! Got the skins out drying. Beauties! I say, Donald, can you spare me your gun again, if you're not going to use it Thanksgiving Day?"
"Certainly," answered Don; "you can have it, and welcome. Tyler and I are going to fire at a mark in the afternoon, with Uncle and the girls. But we'll use the rifle for that."
"What girls?" asked Charity Cora, eagerly, hoping, from Donald's plural way of putting it, that she and Ella Elizabeth possibly were to have a share in the sport; whereat Daniel David, guessing her thoughts, answered for Donald, with a cutting, "Why, Queen Victoria and the royal princess, to be sure. Who else could it be?"
Cora made no reply, but, feeling rather ashamed, rubbed her arms (a habit of hers whenever the baby for the moment happened to be out of them), and looked at Donald.
"Josie Manning and Ed Tyler are coming over after dinner," said Donald.
"I should think they'd rather come to dinner," spoke up Ella Elizabeth, with hungry eyes. "Turkeys and things—Oh, my! Punkin pie!"
This called forth two exclamations in a breath:
Dan. David:"'Punkin pie! Oh, my!' We're getting poetical. Call 'Mandy, quick. Punkin pie—sky high."
Fandy:"Don't be so unproper. It's pumpkun pie. Dorothy said so. And, besides, we ought to let the comp'ny do the talking."
"Humph! By this time, we've made them forget what they were talkin' about."
"Not I, Charity," laughed Donald, turning to the latest speaker. "In the first place, Josie and Ed didn't feel like leaving home on Thanksgiving Day till after dinner, and we two fellows are going to teach Josie and Dorry to shoot straight. And" (now addressing Ben, who by this time was wedging the handle of a hammer) "as for the gun, Ben, you're always welcome to it, so long as you return it in as good order as you did last time. You cleaned it better than I do."
"I found the rags," said Helen, slyly,—"ever so many. Didn't I, Ben?"
Ben nodded at her, and Helen, made happy for the whole day, ran off hugging a broken dolly in exact imitation of Charity and Baby Jamie; meanwhile her big brother, pleased at Don's compliments, remarked, "It's a prime gun, and never fails."
"Never fails you, Ben, you may as well say. It often fails me, never mind how carefully I aim."
"That's just it, Donald," said Ben. "There's no good in aiming so particular."
"Well, what's a fellow to do?" replied Donald. "You must take aim, and by the time you get a bird well sighted, he's gone."
"Sight? I never sight," said Ben. "I just fire ahead."
"You don't mean to say you shoot a bird without aiming at him?"
"Oh, well, I aim, of course; but I don't look through the sight, or any such nonsense."
"I don't understand," said Donald, doubtingly.
"Don't you? Why, it's just this: if the bird's flying he'll go ahead, won't he? Well, you fire ahead and meet him,—that's the whole of it. You know how an Indian shoots an arrow. He doesn't look along the line of the arrow for ten minutes, like a city archer; he decides, in a flash, what he's going to do, and lets fly. Practice is the thing. Now, when you're after a wild duck, you can aim exactly at him and he's safe as a turnip; but see a strip of water ahead betwixt the muzzle of your gun and him, and he's a gone bird, if you fire straight. You have to allow for diving—but practice is the thing. Learn by missing."
"Oh, that's good!" shouted Daniel David; "'learn by missing.' I'm going to try that plan in school after this. Don't you say so, Fandy?"
"No, I don't," said the inflexible Fandy, while he gazed in great admiration at the two big boys.
At this point, the mother appeared at the door with an empty pail in each hand, and before she had time to call, David and Fandy rushed toward her, seized the pails, and would have been off together for the well, if Mrs. Danby had not said, "Let David get the water, Fandy, and you bring me some light wood for boiling the kettle."
"You can't boil the kettle, Ma," called out one of the children. "You boil the water."
"No more you can't," assented Mrs. Danby, with an admiring laugh.
All this time, Dorry had been tossing the struggling baby, and finally winning it to smiles, though every fibre in its plump little body was squirming in the direction of Charity Cora. Meanwhile, that much-enduring sister had made several pungent remarks, in a low tone, to her visitor, concerning babies in general and Jamie in particular.
"Now you see how nice it is! He keeps up that wriggling all day. Now it's to come to me; but when I have him, it's wriggling for the chickens, and for Mother, and for everything. And if you set him down out-of-doors he sneezes; and if you set him down in the house he screams; and Ma calls out to know 'if I can't amuse that baby!' I tote him round from morning to night—so I do!"
Here the baby's struggles became so violent and noisy that Charity Cora savagely took him from Dorry; whereat he threw his plump little arms about his sister's neck with such a satisfied baby-sigh that she kissed him over and over, and looked in placid triumph at Dorothy, apparently forgetting that she ever had made the slightest complaint against him.
"Have you begun with your new teacher yet?" she asked, hugging Jamie, and looking radiantly at Dorothy.
"Oh, no!" answered Dorry. "How did you know Dr. Lane was going?"
"Ma heard it somewhere! My, don't I wish I had a teacher to come every day and put me through! I'm just dying to learn things. But something always interferes with my getting to school. There's so much to do in the house; and now that we're to have a boarder there'll be more to do than ever. It's nice to be useful, I s'pose, but I'm really as ignorant, Dorothy Reed, as a—as a baby" (this simile was suggested by little Jamie's busy efforts to pull off her linen collar); "why, do you know, I can't even—"
And here the girls sauntered off together to sit down on a tree-stump, and have a good long talk, if the baby would allow it.