CHAPTER 12
A Lively Afternoon
It happened one day that Mrs. Milligan was obliged to spend a longafternoon at the dentist's, leaving Laura in charge of the house.Unfortunately it happened, too, that this was the day when the sewingsociety met, and Mrs. Tucker had asked Bettie to stay home for theafternoon because the next-to-the-youngest baby was ill with a croupycold and could not go out of doors to the cottage. Devoted Jean offeredto stay with her beloved Bettie, who gladly accepted the offer. Beforegoing to Bettie's, however, Jean ran over to Dandelion Cottage to tellthe other girls about it.
"Mabel," asked Jean, a little doubtfully, "are you quite sure you'll beable to turn a deaf ear if Laura should happen to bother you? I'm halfafraid to leave you two girls here alone."
"You needn't be," said Mabel. "I wouldn't associate with Laura if I werepaid for it. She isn't my kind."
"No," said Marjory, "you needn't worry a mite. We're going to sit on thedoorstep and read a perfectly lovely book that Aunty Jane found at thelibrary--it's one that she liked when _she_ was a little girl. We'regoing to take turns reading it aloud."
"Well, that certainly ought to keep you out of mischief. You'll be safeenough if you stick to your book. If anything _should_ happen, justremember that I'm at Bettie's."
"Yes, Grandma," said Marjory, with a comical grimace.
Jean laughed, ran around the house, and squeezed through the hole in theback fence.
Half an hour later, lonely Laura, discovering the girls on theirdoorstep, amused herself by sicking the dog at them. Towser, however,merely growled lazily for a few moments and then went to sleep in thesunshine--he, at least, cherished no particular grudge against thegirls and probably by that time he recognized them as neighbors.
Then Laura perched herself on one of the square posts of the dividingfence and began to sing--in her high, rasping, exasperating voice--asong that was almost too personal to be pleasant. It had taken Lauraalmost two hours to compose it, some days before, and fully another hourto commit it to memory, but she sang it now in an offhand, haphazard waythat led the girls to suppose that she was making it up as she wentalong. It ran thus:
There's a lanky girl named Jean, Who's altogether too lean. Her mouth is too big, And she wears a wig, And her eyes are bright sea-green.
Of course it was quite impossible to read even a thrillingly interestingbook with rude Laura making such a disturbance. If the girls had beenwise, they would have gone into the house and closed the door, leavingLaura without an audience; but they were _not_ wise and they _were_curious. They couldn't help waiting to hear what Laura was going to singabout the rest of them, and they did not need to wait long; Laurapromptly obliged them with the second verse:
There's another named Marjory Vale, Who's about the size of a snail. Her teeth are light blue-- She hasn't but two-- And her hair is much too pale.
Laura had, in several instances, sacrificed truth for the sake of rhyme,but enough remained to injure the vanity of the subjects of her songvery sharply. Marjory breathed quickly for a moment and flushed pink butgave no audible sign that she had heard. Laura, somewhat disappointed,proceeded:
There's a silly young lass called Bet, Thinks she's ev'rybody's sweet pet. She slapped my brother, Fibbed to my mother-- I know what _she's_ going to get.
Mabel snorted indignantly over this injustice to her beloved Bettie andstarted to rise, but Marjory promptly seized her skirt and dragged herdown. Laura, however, saw the movement and was correspondingly elated.It showed in her voice:
But the worst of the lot is Mabel, She eats all the pie she's able. She's round as a ball, Has no waist at all, And her manners are bad at the table.
Marjory giggled. She had no thought of being disloyal, but this versewas certainly a close fit.
"You just let me go," muttered Mabel, crimson with resentment andstruggling to break away from Marjory's restraining hand. "I'll push heroff that post."
"Hush!" said diplomatic Marjory, "perhaps there's more to the song."
But there wasn't. Laura began at the beginning and sang all the versesagain, giving particular emphasis to the ones concerning Mabel andMarjory. This, of course, grew decidedly monotonous; the girls got tiredof the constant repetition of the silly song long before Laura did.There was something about the song, too, that caught and held theirattention. Irresistibly attracted, held by an exasperating fascination,neither girl could help waiting for her own special verse. But whilethis was going on, Mabel, with a finger in the ear nearest Laura, wasindustriously scribbling something on a scrap of paper.
As everybody knows, the poetic muse doesn't always work when it is mostneeded, and Mabel was sadly handicapped at that moment. She was notsatisfied with her hasty scrawl but, in the circumstances, it was thebest she could do. Suddenly, before Marjory realized what was about tohappen, Mabel was shouting back, to an air quite as objectionable asthe one Laura was singing:
There's a very rude girl named Laura, Whose ways fill all with horror. She's all the things she says _we_ are; All know this to their sorrow.
"Yah! yah!" retorted quick-witted Laura. "There isn't a rhyme in yourold song. If I couldn't rhyme better 'n that, I'd learn how. Come overand I'll teach you!"
For an instant, Mabel looked decidedly crushed--_no_ poet likes hisrhymes disparaged. Laura, noting Mabel's crestfallen attitude, went intogales of mocking laughter and when Mabel looked at Marjory for sympathyMarjory's face was wreathed in smiles. It was too much; Mabel hated tobe laughed at.
"I _can_ rhyme," cried Mabel, springing to her feet and giving vent toall her grievances at once. "My table manners _are_ good. I'm _not_ fat.I've got just as much waist as _you_ have."
"You've got more," shrieked delighted Laura.
Faithless Marjory, struck by this indubitable truth, laughed outright.
"You--you can't make Indian-bead chains," sputtered Mabel, trying hardto find something crushing to say. "You can't make pancakes. You can'tdrive nails."
"Yah," retorted Laura, who was right in her element, "you can't throwstraight."
"Neither can you."
"I can! If I could find anything to throw I'd prove it."
Just at this unfortunate moment, a grocery-man arrived at the Milliganhouse with a basketful of beautiful scarlet tomatoes. In another second,Laura, anxious to prove her ability, had jumped from the fence, seizedthe basket and, with unerring aim, was delightedly pelting herastonished enemy with the gorgeous fruit. Mabel caught one full in thechest, and as she turned to flee, another landed square in the middle ofher light-blue gingham back; Marjory's shoulder stopped a third beforethe girls retreated to the house, leaving Laura, a picturesque figure onthe high post, shouting derisively:
"Proved it, didn't I? Ki! I proved it."
Marjory, pleading that discretion was the better part of valor, beggedMabel to stay indoors; but Mabel, who had received, and undoubtedlydeserved, the worst of the encounter, was for instant revenge. Rushingto the kitchen she seized the pan of hard little green apples thatGrandma Pike had bequeathed the girls and flew with them to the porch.
Mabel's first shot took Laura by surprise and landed squarely betweenher shoulders. Mabel was surprised, too, because throwing straight wasnot one of her accomplishments. She hadn't hoped to do more thanfrighten her exasperating little neighbor.
Elated by this success, Mabel threw her second apple, which, alas, flewwide of its mark and caught poor unprepared Mr. Milligan, who was comingin at his own gate, just under the jaw, striking in such a fashion thatit made the astonished man suddenly bite his tongue.
Nobody likes to bite his tongue. Naturally Mr. Milligan was indignant;indeed, he had every reason to be, for Mabel's conduct was disgracefuland the little apple was very hard. Entirely overlooking the fact thatLaura, who had failed to notice her father's untimely arrival, was stillvigorously pelting Mabel, who stood as if petrified on the cottage stepsand was making no e
ffort to dodge the flying scarlet fruit, Mr. Milliganshouted:
"Look here, you young imps, I'll see that you're turned out of thatcottage for this outrage. We've stood just about enough abuse from you.I don't intend to put up with any more of it."
Then, suddenly discovering what Laura, who had turned around in dismayat the sound of her father's voice, was doing, angry Mr. Milligandragged his suddenly crestfallen daughter from the fence, boxed her earssoundly, and carried what was left of the tomatoes into the house; forthat particular basket of fruit had been sent from very far south andexpress charges had swelled the price of the unseasonable dainty to avery considerable sum.
Marjory, in the cottage kitchen, was alternately scolding and laughingat woebegone Mabel when Jean and Bettie, released from their charge, ranback to Dandelion Cottage. Mabel, crying with indignation, sat on thekitchen stove rubbing her eyes with a pair of grimy fists--Mabel's handsalways gathered dust.
"Oh, Mabel! how _could_ you!" groaned Jean, when Marjory had told theafternoon's story. "I'll never dare to leave you here again without somesensible person to look after you. Don't you _see_ you've beenalmost--yes, quite--as bad as Laura?"
"I don't care," sobbed unrepentant Mabel. "If you'd heard thoseverses--and--and Marjory _laughed_ at me."
"Couldn't help it," giggled Marjory, who was perched on the corner ofthe kitchen table.
"But surely," reproached gentle-mannered Jean, "it wasn't necessary tothrow things."
"I guess," said Mabel, suddenly sitting up very straight and disclosinga puffy, tear-stained countenance that moved Marjory to fresh giggles,"if you'd felt those icy cold tomatoes go plump in your eye and everyplace on your very newest dress, _you'd_ have been pretty mad, too.Look at me! I was too surprised to move after I'd hit Mr. Milligan--Inever saw him coming at all--and I guess every tomato Laura threw hit mesome place."
"Yes," confirmed Marjory, "I'll say that much for Laura. She cancertainly throw straighter than any girl I ever knew--she throws justlike a boy."
Jean, still worried and disapproving, could not help laughing, forLaura's plump target showed only too good evidence of Laura's skill.Mabel's new light-blue gingham showed a round scarlet spot where eachjuicy missile had landed; and besides this, there were wide muddycircles where her tears had left highwater marks about each eye.
"But, dear me," said Jean, growing sober again, "think how low-down andhorrid it will sound when we tell about it at home. Suppose it shouldget into the papers! Apples and tomatoes! If boys had done it it wouldhave sounded bad enough, but for _girls_ to do such a thing! Oh, dear, I_do_ wish I'd been here to stop it!"
"To stop the tomatoes, you mean," said Mabel. "You couldn't have stoppedanything else, for I just _had_ to do something or burst. I've felt allthe week just like something sizzling in a bottle and waiting to havethe cork pulled! I'll _never_ be able to do my suffering in silence theway you and Bettie do. Oh, girls, I feel just loads better."
"Well, you may _feel_ better," said irrepressible Marjory, "but youcertainly look a lot worse. With those muddy rings on your face you lookjust like a little owl that isn't very wise."
"Oh, dear," mourned Bettie, "if Miss Blossom had only stayed we wouldn'thave had all this trouble with those people."
"No," said Marjory, shrewdly, "Miss Blossom would probably have madeLaura over into a very good imitation of an honest citizen. I don'tthink, though, that even Miss Blossom could make Laura anything morethan an imitation, because--well, because she's Laura. It's differentwith Mabel--"
Mabel looked up expectantly, and Marjory, who was in a teasing mood,continued.
"Yes," said she, encouragingly, "Miss Blossom _might_ have succeeded inmaking a nice, polite girl out of Mabel if she'd only had time--"
"How much time?" demanded Mabel, with sudden suspicion.
"Oh, about a thousand years," replied Marjory, skipping prudently behindtall Jean.
"Never mind, Mabel," said Bettie, who always sided with the oppressed,slipping a thin arm about Mabel's plump shoulders. "We like you prettywell, anyway, and you've certainly had an awful time."
"Do you think," asked Mabel, with sudden concern, "that Mr. Milligan_could_ get us turned out of the cottage? You know he threatened to."
"No," said Bettie. "The cottage is church property and no one could doanything about it with Mr. Black away because he's the senior warden.Father said only this morning that there was all sorts of churchbusiness waiting for him."
"Well," said Mabel, with a sigh of relief, "Mr. Black wouldn't turn usout, so we're perfectly safe. Guess I'll go out on the porch and sing myMilligan song again."
"I guess you won't," said Jean. "There's a very good tub in the Bennetthouse and I'd advise you to go home and take a bath in it--you look asif you needed _two_ baths and a shampoo. Besides, it's almost suppertime."
Laura's version of the story, unfortunately, differed materially fromthe truth. There was no gainsaying the tomatoes--Mr. Milligan had seenthose with his own eyes; but Laura claimed that she had been compelledto use those expensive vegetables as a means of self-defense. Accordingto Laura, whose imagination was as well trained as her arm, she had beenthe innocent victim of all sorts of persecution at the hands of thefour girls. They had called her a thief and had insulted not only herbut all the other Milligans. Mabel, she declared, had opened hostilitiesthat afternoon by throwing stones, and poor, abused Laura had only usedthe tomatoes as a last resort. The apple that struck Mr. Milligan was,she maintained, the very last of about four dozen.
Had the Milligans not been prejudiced, they might easily have learnedhow far from the truth this assertion was, for the porch of DandelionCottage was still bespattered with tomatoes, whereas in the Milliganyard there were no traces of the recent encounter. This, to be sure, wasno particular credit to Mabel for there _might_ have been had Mr.Milligan delayed his coming by a very few minutes, since Mabel's panstill contained seven hard little apples and Mabel still longed to usethem.
The Milligans, however, _were_ prejudiced. Although Laura was often rudeand disagreeable at home, she was the only little girl the Milliganshad; in any quarrel with outsiders they naturally sided with their ownflesh and blood, and, in spite of the tomatoes, they did so now. In hermother Laura found a staunch champion.
"I won't have those stuck-up little imps there another week," said Mrs.Milligan. "If you don't see that they're turned out, James, I will."
"They stick out their tongues at me every time they see me," fibbedLaura, whose own tongue was the only one that had been used forsticking-out purposes. "They said Ma was no lady, and--"
"I'm going to complain of them this very night," said Mrs. Milligan,with quick resentment. "I'll show 'em whether I'm a lady or not."
"Who'll you complain to?" asked Laura, hopefully.
"The church warden, of course. These cottages both belong to thechurch."
"Mr. Black is the girls' best friend," said Laura. "He wouldn't believeanything against them--besides, he's away."
"Mr. Downing isn't," said Mr. Milligan. "I paid him the rent last week.We'll threaten to leave if he doesn't turn them out. He's a sharpbusinessman and he wouldn't lose the rent of this house for the sake ofletting a lot of children use that cottage. I'll see him tomorrow."
"No," said Mrs. Milligan, "just leave the matter to me. _I'll_ talk toMr. Downing."
"Suit yourself," said Mr. Milligan, glad perhaps to shirk a disagreeabletask.
After supper that evening, Mrs. Milligan put on her best hat and went toMr. Downing's house, which was only about three blocks from her own. Theevening was warm and she found Mr. and Mrs. Downing seated on theirfront porch. Mrs. Milligan accepted their invitation to take a chair andbegan at once to explain the reason for her visit.
The angry woman's tale lost nothing in the telling; indeed, it was nothard to discover how Laura came by her habit of exaggerating. When Mrs.Milligan went home half an hour later, Mr. Downing was convinced thatthe church property was in dangerous hands. He couldn't see what Mr.B
lack had been thinking of to allow careless, impudent children whoplayed with matches, drove nails in the cottage plaster, and insultedinnocent neighbors, to occupy Dandelion Cottage.
"Somehow," said Mrs. Downing, when the visitor had departed, "I don'tlike that woman. She isn't quite a lady."
"Nonsense, my dear," said Mr. Downing. "If only _half_ the things shehints at are true, there would be reason enough for closing the cottage.The place itself doesn't amount to much, I've been told, but a firestarted there would damage thousands of dollars' worth of property.Besides, there's the rent from the house those people are in--we don'twant to lose that, you know."
"Still, there are always tenants--"
"Not at this time of the year. I'll look into the matter as soon as Ican find time."
"Remember," said Mrs. Downing, thinking of Mrs. Milligan's raspingtones, "that there are two sides to every story."
"My dear," said Mr. Downing, complacently, "I shall listen with thestrictest impartiality to both sides."