by Oliver Optic
"I didn't mean to," said Brother sorrowfully. "Only I didn't wantBrownie to get hurt. I hardly ever dash among traffic, do I, Sister?"
"No, he doesn't," declared Sister loyally, while Nellie stood silentlyby. "Mother always makes us promise to be careful 'bout dashing."
The three men laughed.
"Well, as long as you don't make it a practice, we won't count thistime," said the man who had told them not to stand talking in the road."Now scoot back to the sidewalk--or, here, George, you take them over.That's a nice dog you have."
George, it proved, was the driver, and he took Sister by one hand andBrother by the other. Nellie held Sister's other hand and Brothercarried Brownie, and in this order they made their way safely back tothe pavement on the other side of the street.
"Good-bye, and don't forget about keeping out of the street," said thetruck-driver cheerfully, when he had them neatly lined up on the curb.
They watched him run back to his machine--as Brother observed, hedidn't look to see whether any motor-cars were likely to run him down,but then, of course, he was grown up and used to them--saw him mount tothe high seat, and waved good-bye to all three men. Then they walkedon, for the sand-toys were still to be bought.
Brother and Sister were the most careful of shoppers, and with Nellieto help them by suggestions, they managed to find a set of tinsand-dishes, a windmill that pumped sand, a little iron dumpcart thatwould be very useful to carry loads, and a string of tin buckets thatwent up and down on a chain and filled with sand and emptied again aslong as anyone would turn the handle.
"Come over after lunch and we'll play," said Sister as Nellie left themat her own hedge.
Nellie did come over and the three children had a wonderful time withthe new toys and the clean white sand, while Brownie slept comfortablyunder the tree. Before Nellie was ready to go home, however, a thunderstorm came up and her mother called her to come in. Mother Morrisoncame out and helped Brother and Sister to carry their box into thebarn, where the sand would not get wet.
"You don't want to play with the sandbox all the time, dearies," shesaid, leading the way back to the house. "If you play too steadily withanything, presently you will find that you are growing tired of it. Nowplay on the porch, or find something nice to do in the house, andtomorrow Jimmie will put the box under the tree again for you."
It was very warm and sticky, and Sister tumbled into the comfortableporch swing, meaning to stay there just a few minutes. She fell asleepand slept all through the storm, waking up a little cross, as one isapt to do on a hot summer afternoon. The rain had stopped and Brotherhad gone over to see Grandmother Hastings.
"Hello, Sister," Louise greeted her when she raised a flushed, warmface and touseled hair from the canvas cushions. "You've had a finenap. Want me to go upstairs with you and help you find a clean dress?"
"No," said Sister a bit crossly.
"You'll feel much better, honey, when your face is washed and you haveon a thinner frock," urged Louise, putting down her knitting. "Comeupstairs like a good girl, and I'll tell you what I saw Miss Putnamdoing as I came past her house this afternoon."
Sister toiled upstairs after Louise, feeling much abused. She had notintended to take a nap, and now here she had slept away good playtimeand was certainly warmer and more uncomfortable than she had beenbefore she went to sleep.
But after Louise had bathed her face and hands in cool water and hadbrushed her hair and buttoned her into a pretty white dress with bluespots, Sister was her own sunny self. She had not been thoroughlyawake, you see, and that was the reason she felt a little cross.
"What was Miss Putnam doing?" she asked curiously, watching Louise foldup the frock she had taken off.
"She was out in her yard nailing something on the fence," said Louise."I saw her when I was a block away, hammering as though her lifedepended on it. A crowd of boys were watching her--at a safedistance--and when I came near enough I saw she had a roll of wire inthe yard. She was nailing barbwire along the fence pickets!"
"How mean!" scolded Sister. "No one wants to climb over her old fence,or swing on her gate."
"Well, I think it is a shame the way the boys torment her," declaredLouise severely. "Jimmie says he caught a little red-headed boy theother day throwing old tin cans over her fence. You know what Daddywould say if he ever thought you or Brother did anything like that."
"We don't," Sister assured her earnestly. "We never bother Miss Putnam."
CHAPTER XIII
A BIG DISAPPOINTMENT
Fourth of July, always a glorious holiday in the Morrison household,came and was celebrated by a family picnic which gave Brother andSister something to talk about for days afterward. Their sandbox, too,kept them busy and for a long time Jimmie never had to warn them not totouch the gymnasium apparatus in the barn.
Daddy Morrison and Dick and Ralph continued to go every day to the cityand Jimmie worked faithfully at his books, determined to begin the fallschool term without a condition. As captain of the football team it wasnecessary for him to make a good showing in his lessons as well as inathletics.
Louise and Grace perhaps enjoyed the vacation time more than any othermembers of the family. They would be sophomores when they returned tohigh school in September, and while they were willing to study hardthen, they meant to have all the fun they could before they were bounddown to books and lessons again.
"Where you going?" Sister asked one night, finding Louise prinkingbefore the hall mirror and Grace counting change from her mesh bag.
"Out," answered Louise serenely, pulling her pretty hair more over herears.
"I know--to the movies!" guessed Brother. "Can't we go? Oh, please,Louise--you said you'd take us sometime!"
"Oh, yes, Louise, can't we go?" teased Sister. "I never went to themovies at night," she added pleadingly.
"You can't go," said Louise reasonably enough. "We didn't go when wewere little like you. Don't hang on me, please, Sister; it's too hot."
"I think you're mean!" stormed Brother. "Mother, can't we go to themovies?"
Mother Morrison, who had been upstairs to get her fan, was going withLouise and Grace. She shook her head to Brother's question.
"My dearies, of course you can't go at night," she said firmly. "I wantyou to be good children and go to bed when the clock strikes eight.Ralph promised to come up and see you. Kiss Mother good-night, Sister,and be a good girl."
Left alone, Brother and Sister sat down on the front stairs. Molly wasout and Daddy Morrison and Dick had gone to a lodge meeting. Jimmie wasstudying up in his room and Ralph was out in the barn putting somethings away.
"There's that old clock!" said Brother crossly as the Grandfather'sclock on the stair landing boomed the hour.
Eight slow, deep strokes--eight o'clock.
Sister settled herself more firmly against the banister railings.
"I'm not going to bed," she announced flatly. "If everybody can go tothe movies 'cept me, I don't think it's fair, so there!"
Just how she expected to even things up by refusing to go to bed Sisterdid not explain. Perhaps she didn't know. Anyway, Brother said hewasn't going to bed either. Ralph came in at half-past eight to findthem both playing checkers on the living-room floor.
"Thought you went to bed at eight o'clock," said Ralph, surprised."Mother say you might stay up tonight?"
"No, she didn't," admitted Brother, "but she went to the movies withLouise and Grace. Everybody is having fun and we're not."
Ralph didn't scold. He merely closed up the checkerboard and put itaway in the book-case drawer with the box of checkers. Then he liftedSister to his lap and put an arm around Brother.
"Poor chicks, you do feel abused; don't you?" he said comfortably. "ButI'll tell you something--you wouldn't like going to the movies atnight; you would go to sleep after a little while and lose half thepictures. Now suppose I take you this Saturday afternoon. How will thatdo?"
"Will you take us, Ralph?" cried Sister. "Down to the Majest
ic?"
This was the largest motion picture theatre in Ridgeway.
"I'll take you both to the Majestic next Saturday afternoon," promisedRalph, "if you will go to bed without any more fuss tonight."
Both children were delighted with the thought of an afternoon'senjoyment with Ralph and they trotted up to bed with him as pleasantlyas though going to bed were a pleasure. Grownups will tell you it is,but when you are five and six this is difficult to believe.
Unfortunately Brother and Sister were doomed to another disappointment.Before Saturday afternoon came, Ralph remembered that he had promisedto play tennis with a friend and he could not break the engagement,because to do so would spoil the afternoon for eight or ten people whocounted on him for games.
"I'm just as sorry as I can be," Ralph told Brother and Sisterearnestly. "I don't see how I could forget I promised Fred Holmes toplay with him. If you want to wait another week for me, I'll give youthe money for ice-cream sodas."
Grandmother Hastings and Mother Morrison had gone to the city, thegirls had company, Molly was lying down with a headache--there seemedto be no one to take the children to the matinee.
"I guess we'll have to go buy sodas," agreed Brother disconsolately."Only if I don't go to movies pretty soon, I'll--I'll--I don't knowwhat I'll do!"
"I know," said Sister, dimpling mischievously. "I'll tell you, Roddy."
"You be good, Sister," warned Ralph, eyeing her a bit anxiously. "Icouldn't take a naughty little girl to the movies, you know."
CHAPTER XIV
TWO IN TROUBLE
Ralph knew that Sister could put queer ideas into Brother's head, andhe hoped that the fun of going downtown, and buying ice-cream soda atthe drug store, might cause Sister to forget whatever she had in mind.
When he came home from his tennis game he found both children playingin the sandbox, and as they were very good the rest of that afternoonand evening and all day Sunday, Ralph decided that Sister was not goingto be naughty or get Brother to help her to do anything she should not.
Monday evening Mother and Daddy Morrison went through the hedge intoDr. Yarrow's house to visit the doctor and his wife. Brother and Sisterwere told to run in and visit Grandmother Hastings until eight o'clock,their bedtime.
"Can we take Brownie?" begged Sister. "Grandmother says he is thenicest dog!"
So Brownie, who was now three times the size he had been when Ralphbrought him home in the basket, was allowed to go calling, too.
"Grandma," said Sister, when Grandmother Hastings had answered theirknock on her screen door, and had hugged and kissed them both."Grandma, couldn't we go to the movies?"
Now Grandmother Hastings was a darling grandmother who loved to dowhatever her grandchildren asked of her. It never entered her dear headthat Mother Morrison might not wish Brother and Sister to go to themovies at night. She only thought how they would enjoy the pictures,and although she disliked going out at night herself, she said that shewould take Brother and Sister.
"We can't go downtown to the Majestic," she said, "for that is too farfor me to walk. We'll have to go over to the nice little theatre onDollmer Avenue. If we go right away, we can be home early."
Sister lagged a little behind her grandmother and brother as theystarted for the theatre. She was stuffing Brownie into her roomy middyblouse. He was rather a large puppy to squeeze into such a place, butSister managed it somehow. Grandmother Hastings supposed that the doghad been left on the porch.
The theatre was dark, for the pictures were being shown on the screenwhen they reached it, and Grandmother Hastings had to feel her way downthe aisle, Brother and Sister clinging to her skirts. The electric fanswere going, but it was warm and close, and Grandmother wished longinglyfor her own cool parlor. But Brother and Sister thought everythingabout the movie theatre beautiful.
"Do you suppose Brownie likes it?" whispered Brother, who sat next toSister. Grandmother was on his other side.
"He feels kind of hot," admitted Sister, who could not have been verycomfortable with the heavy dog inside her blouse. "But I think he likesit."
Brownie had his head stuck halfway out, and he probably wondered wherehe was. It was so dark that there was little danger of anyonediscovering him. A dog in a motion-picture house is about as popular,you know, as Mary's lamb was in school. That is, he isn't popular atall.
Brownie might have gone to the movies and gone home again withoutanyone ever having been the wiser, if there had not been a film shownthat night that no regular dog could look at and not bark.
"Oh, look at the big cat!" whispered Sister excitedly.
Surely enough, a large cat sat on the fence, and, as they watched, ahuge collie dog, with a beautiful plumy tail, came marching around thecorner.
He spied the cat and dashed for her. She began to run, on the screen,of course. The audience in the movie house began to laugh, for the dogin his first jump had upset a bucket of paint. The people in thetheatre were sure they were going to see a funny picture.
But Brownie had seen the cat, too. He knew cats, and there were many inhis neighborhood he meant to chase as soon as he was old enough to makethem afraid of him. He scratched vigorously on Sister's blouse andwhined.
"Ki-yi!" he yelped, as though saying: "Ki-yi! I'll bet I could catchthat cat!"
Barking shrilly, he scrambled out from Sister's middy, shook himselffree of her arms, and tore down the aisle of the theatre, intent oncatching the fluffy cat.
"Ki-yi!" he continued to call joyously.
"Brownie! Here, Brownie!" called Sister frantically. "Brownie, comeback here!"
The theatre was in an uproar in a minute. Ladies began to shriek thatthe dog was mad, and some of them stood upon the seats and cried out.The men who tried to catch Brownie only made him bark more, and thelouder he barked the more the ladies shrieked. Finally they stopped thepicture and turned on the lights.
"Rhodes and Elizabeth Morrison!" said someone sternly. "What are youdoing here?"
There, across the aisle from Grandmother Hastings and Brother andSister, sat Daddy and Mother Morrison with Dr. and Mrs. Yarrow. Theyhad come to the movies, too!
"Is that dog Brownie?" asked Daddy Morrison, coming over to them.
Everyone had left his seat and the aisle was in confusion; peopletalking and arguing and advising one another.
Sister nodded miserably. She felt very small and unhappy.
"Rhodes, go down and get Brownie at once!" commanded Daddy Morrison.
When they were naughty, Brother and Sister were always called by their"truly" names, you see.
"I'll go get him," gulped Sister. "I brought him--Roddy didn't want meto."
Brownie came willingly enough to Sister and she gathered him up in herarms. He may have wondered, in his doggie mind, what all the fuss wasabout and what had become of the fluffy cat, but he was getting used tohaving his fun abruptly ended.
"I didn't know you brought the dog, dear," said Grandmother Hastings,breaking a grim silence as they walked home. "And did you know Motherwasn't willing to have you go at night when you asked me to take you?"
Poor little Sister had to confess that she had asked Grandmother totake them because she knew that in no other way could they get to themovies at night. Grandmother Hastings never scolded, but hergrandchildren hated to know that she was disappointed in them.
No one scolded Brother and Sister very much that night. They were putto bed, and the next morning Daddy Morrison called them into his "den"before he left for the office, and told them that for a week they couldnot go out of their own yard.
"And I s'pose we can't go with Ralph Saturday," wailed Sister.
CHAPTER XV
TROUBLE AGAIN
However, they were allowed to go with Ralph to the movies the nextSaturday. Ralph himself explained to Daddy Morrison that he hadpromised to take them and then found he had a previous engagement. Hethought, and Daddy Morrison did, too, that having to stay in the yardfor a whole week was punishment enough even if one exceptio
n waspermitted.
So Brother and Sister went down to the "big" theatre with Ralph thenext Saturday afternoon, and then they had to stay in their yard allday Sunday and all day Monday, and after that they might again go wherethey pleased.
"Let's go see if Norman Crane's aunt sent him a birthday present,"suggested Sister the first morning they were free to leave the yard.
Norman Crane was a little friend who lived several blocks away, andwhose aunt in New York City sent him wonderful presents at Christmastime and on his birthday. He had had a party a few days before, and ofcourse Brother and Sister could not go--all because they would go tothose unlucky movies!
Brother was willing to stop at Norman's house, but when they reachedthere they found Norman had gone to the city with his mother for aday's shopping.
"I smell tar," declared Brother, as they came down the steps and turnedinto the street where Miss Putnam lived in the haunted house--only itwasn't called that any longer. "Oh, look, Betty, they're mendingsomething."
There was a little group of children about a big pot of boiling tar andworkmen were mending the roofs of three or four houses that were builtexactly alike and were owned by the same man. These houses were alwaysrepaired and painted at the same time every year.