The Bobbsey Twins Megapack

by Laura Lee Hope

  “You ought to see our poor children eat,” remarked the matron. “We have just as much as we can do to serve them, they have such good appetites from the country air.”

  “We must send you some fresh vegetables,” said Aunt Sarah, “and some fruit for Sunday.”

  “We would be very grateful,” replied Mrs Manily, “for of course we cannot afford much of a variety.”

  Next to the dining room was the dormitory or sleeping tent.

  “We have a little boys’ brigade,” said the matron, “and every pleasant evening they march around with drums and tin fifes. Then, when it is bedtime, we have a boy blow the ‘taps’ on a tin bugle, just like real soldiers do.”

  Freddie and Sandy had joined the sightseers now, and Freddie was much interested in the brigade.

  “Who is the captain?” he asked of Mrs. Manily.

  “Oh, we appoint a new captain each week from the very best boys we have. We only let a very good boy be captain,” the matron told him.

  In the dormitory were rows and rows of small white cots. They looked very clean and comfortable, and the door of this tent was closed with a big green mosquito netting.

  “How old are your babies?” asked Aunt Sarah.

  “Sandy is our baby!” replied the matrons patting the little boy fondly, “and he is four years old. We cannot take them any younger without their mothers.”

  “Freddie is four also,” said Mrs. Bobbsey. “What a dear sweet child Sandy is!”

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Manily, “he has just lost a good mother and his father cannot care for him—that is, he cannot afford to pay his board or hire a housekeeper, so he brought him to the Aid Society. He is the pet of the camp, and you can see he has been well trained.”

  “No mother and no home!” exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey. “Dear little fellow! Think of our Freddie being alone in the world like that!”

  Mrs. Bobbsey could hardly keep her tears back. She stooped over and kissed Sandy.

  “Do you know my mamma?” he asked, looking straight into the lady’s kind face.

  “Mrs. Manily is your mamma, isn’t she?” said Mrs. Bobbsey.

  “Yes, she’s my number two mamma, but I mean number one that used to sleep with me.”

  “Come now, Sandy,” laughed Mrs. Manily. “Didn’t you tell me last night I was the best mamma in the whole world?” and she hugged the little fellow to make him happy again.

  “So you are,” he laughed, forgetting all his loneliness now. “When I get to be a big man I’m goin’ to take you out carriage riding.”

  “Can’t Sandy cone home with us?” asked Freddie. “He can sleep in my bed.”

  “You are very good,” said the matron. “But we cannot let any of our children go visiting without special permission from the Society.”

  “Well,” said Aunt Sarah, “if you get the permission we will be very glad to have Sandy pay us a visit. We have a large place, and would really like to have some good poor child enjoy it. We have company now, but they will leave us soon, and then perhaps we could have a little fresh-air camp of our own.”

  “The managers have asked us to look for a few private homes that could accommodate some special cases,” replied Mrs. Manily, “and I am sure I can arrange it to have Sandy go.”

  “Oh, let him come now,” pleaded Freddie, as Sandy held tight to his hand. “See, we have room in the wagon.”

  “Well, he might have a ride,” consented the matron, and before anyone had a chance to speak again Freddie and Sandy had climbed into the wagon.

  Nan and Mildred had been talking to some of the older girls, who were very nice and polite for girls who had no one to teach them at home, and Nan declared that she was coming over to the camp to play with them some whole day.

  “We can bring our lunch,” said Mildred, “and you can show us all the pleasant play-places you have fixed up in stones over the mountain-side.”

  One girl, Nellie by name, seemed very smart and bright, and she brought to Mrs. Bobbsey a bunch of ferns and wild flowers she had just gathered while showing Nan and Mildred around.

  “You certainly have a lovely place here,” said Mrs. Bobbsey, as they got ready to leave, “and you little girls will be quite strong and ready for school again when you go back to the city.”

  “I don’t go to school,” said Nellie rather bashfully.

  “Why?” asked Aunt Sarah.

  “Oh, I go to night school,” said the little girl. “But in the daytime I have to work.”

  “Why, how old are you?” asked Aunt Sarah.

  “Twelve,” said Nellie shyly.

  “Working at twelve years of age!” exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey in surprise. “What do you do?”

  “I’m a cash-girl in a big store,” said Nellie with some pride, for many little girls are not smart enough to hold such a position.

  “I thought all children had to go to school,” Aunt Sarah said to Mrs. Manily.

  “So they do,” replied the matron, “but in special cases they get permission from the factory inspector. Then they can work during the day and go to school at night.”

  “I think it’s a shame!” said the mother. “That child is not much larger than Nan, and to think of her working in a big store all day, then having to work at night school too!”

  “It does not seem right!” admitted the matron; “but, you see, sometimes there is no choice. Either a child must work or go to an institution, and we strain every point to keep them in their homes.”

  “We will drive back with Sandy,” said Aunt Sarah as they got into the wagon.

  “Can’t Nellie come too?” asked Nan. “There is plenty of room.”

  The matron said yes, and so the little party started off for a ride along the pretty road.

  “I was never in a carriage before in all my life,” said Nellie suddenly. “Isn’t it grand!”

  “Never!” exclaimed the other girls in surprise.

  “No,” said Nellie. “I’ve had lots of rides in trolley cars, and we had a ride in a farm wagon the other day, but this is the first time I have ever been in a carriage.”

  Aunt Sarah was letting Sandy drive, and he, of course, was delighted. Freddie enjoyed it almost as well as Sandy did, and kept telling him which rein to pull on and all that. Old Bill, the horse, knew the road so well he really didn’t need any driver, but he went along very nicely with the two little boys talking to him.

  “We will stop and have some soda at the postoffice,” said Mrs. Bobbsey. For the postoffice was also a general store.

  This was good news to everybody, and when the man came out for the order Aunt Sarah told him to bring cakes too.

  Everybody liked the ice cream soda, but it was plain Nellie and Sandy had not had such a treat in a long time.

  “This is the best fun I’ve had!” declared the little cash-girl, allowing how grateful she was. “And I hope you’ll come and see us again,” she added politely to Mildred and Nan.

  “Oh, we intend to,” said Mildred. “You know, we are going to have a sewing school to make aprons for the little ones at the camp.”

  Old Bill had turned back to the fresh-air quarters again, and soon, too soon, Sandy was handed back to Mrs. Manily, while Nellie jumped down and said what a lovely time she had had.

  “Now be sure to come, Sandy,” called Freddie, “’cause I’ll expect you!”

  “I will,” said Sandy rather sadly, for he would rather have gone along right then.

  “And I’ll let you play with Snoop and my playthings,” Freddie called again. “Good-bye.”

  “Good-bye,” answered the little fresh children.

  Then old Bill took the others home.

  CHAPTER XIX

  Sewing School

  “Let’s get Mabel and all the others,” said Nan to Mildred. “We ought to take at least six gingham aprons and three nightgowns over to the camp.”

  Aunt Sarah had turned a big long attic room into a sewing school where Nan and Mildred had full charge. Flossie was to look af
ter the spools of thread, keeping them from tangling up, and the girls agreed to let Freddie cut paper patterns.

  This was not a play sewing school but a real one, for Aunt Sarah and Mrs. Bobbsey were to do the operating or machine sewing, while the girls were to sew on tapes, buttons, overhand seams, and do all that.

  Mildred and Nan invited Mabel, Nettie, Marie Brenn (she was visiting the Herolds), Bessie, and Anna Thomas, a big girl who lived over Lakeside way.

  “Be sure to bring your thimbles and needles,” Nan told them. “And come at two o’clock this afternoon.”

  Every girl came—even Nettie, who was always so busy at home.

  Mrs. Bobbsey sat at the machine ready to do stitching while Aunt Sarah was busy “cutting out” on a long table in front of the low window.

  “Now, young ladies,” said Mrs. Bobbsey, “we have ready some blue gingham aprons. You see how they are cut out; two seams, one at each side, then they are to be closed down the back. There will be a pair of strings on each apron, and you may begin by pressing down a narrow hem on these strings. We will not need to baste them, just press them down with the finger this way.”

  Mrs. Bobbsey then took up a pair of the sashes and turned in the edges. Immediately the girls followed her instructions, and very soon all of the strings were ready for the machine.

  Nan handed them to her mother, and then Aunt Sarah gave out the work.

  “Now these are the sleeves,” said Aunt Sarah, “and they must each have little gathers brought in at the elbow here between these notches. Next you place the sleeve together notch to notch, and they can be stitched without basting.”

  “Isn’t it lively to work this way?” said Mildred. “It isn’t a bit of trouble, and see how quickly we get done.”

  “Many hands make light work,” replied Mrs. Bobbsey. “I guess we will get all the aprons finished this afternoon.”

  Piece by piece the various parts of the garments were given out, until there remained nothing more to do than to put on buttons and work buttonholes, and overhand the arm holes.

  “I’ll cut the buttonholes,” said Mrs. Bobbsey, “then Nan and Mildred may work the buttonholes by sticking a pin through each hole. The other girls may then sew the buttons on.”

  It was wonderful how quickly those little pearl buttons went down the backs of the aprons.

  “I believe I could make an apron all alone now,” said Nan, “if it was cut out.”

  “So could I,” declared Mildred. “It isn’t hard at all.”

  “Well, here’s my patterns,” spoke up Freddie, who with Flossie had been busy over in the corner cutting “ladies” out of a fashion paper.

  “No, they’re paper dolls,” said Flossie, who was standing them all up in a row, “and we are going to give them to the fresh-air children to play with on rainy days.”

  It was only half-past four when Nan rang the bell to dismiss the sewing school.

  “We have had such a lovely time,” said Mabel, “we would like to have sewing to do every week.”

  “Well, you are welcome to come,” said Aunt Sarah. “We will make night dresses for the poor little ones next week, then after that you might all bring your own work, mending, fancywork or tidies, whatever you have to do.”

  “And we might each pay five cents to sew for the fresh-air children,” suggested Mildred.

  “Yes, all charity sewing classes have a fund,” Mrs. Bobbsey remarked. “That would be a good idea.”

  “Now let us fold up the aprons,” said Nan. “Don’t they look pretty?”

  And indeed the half-dozen blue-and-white ginghams did look very nice, for they were carefully made and all smooth and even.

  “When can we iron them out?” asked Flossie, anxious to deliver the gifts to the needy little ones.

  “To-morrow afternoon,” replied her mother. “The boys are going to pick vegetables in the morning, and we will drive over in the afternoon.”

  Uncle Daniel had given the boys permission to pick all the butter-beans and string-beans that were ripe, besides three dozen ears of the choicest corn, called “Country Gentleman.”

  “Children can only eat very tender corn,” said Uncle Daniel, “and as that is sweet and milky they will have no trouble digesting it.”

  Harry looked over every ear of the green corn by pulling the husks down and any that seemed a bit overripe he discarded.

  “We will have to take the long wagon,” said Bert, as they began to count up the baskets. There were two of beans, three of corn, one of lettuce, two of sweet apples, besides five bunches of Freddie’s radishes.

  “Be sure to bring Sandy back with you,” called Freddie, who did not go to the camp this time. “Tell him I’ll let him be my twin brother.”

  Nan and Aunt Sarah went with the boys, but how disappointed they were to find a strange matron in charge of the camp, and Sandy’s eyes red from crying after Mrs. Manily.

  “Oh, I knowed you would come to take me to Freddie,” cried he, “’cause my other mamma is gone too, and I’m all alone.”

  “Mrs. Manily was called away by sickness in her family,” explained the new matron, “and I cannot do anything with this little boy.”

  “He was so fond of Mrs. Manily,” said Aunt Sarah, “and besides he remembers how lonely he was when his own mother went away. Maybe we could bring him over to our house for a few days.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Manily spoke of that,” said the matron, “and she had received permission from the Society to let Edward pay a visit to Mrs. Daniel Bobbsey. See, here is the card.”

  “Oh, that will be lovely!” cried Nan, hugging Sandy as tight as her arms could squeeze.

  “Freddie told us to be sure to bring you back with us.”

  “I am so glad to get these things,” the matron said to Aunt Sarah, as she took the aprons, “for everybody has been upset with Mrs. Manily having to leave so suddenly. The aprons are lovely. Did the little girls make them?”

  Aunt Sarah told her about the sewing school, and then she said she was going to have a little account printed about it in the year’s report of good work done for the Aid Society.

  “And Mrs. Manily has written an account of your circus,” the matron told Harry and Bert, for she had heard about the boys and their successful charity work.

  Some of the girls who knew Nan came up now and told her how Nellie, the little cash-girl, had been taken sick and had had to be removed to the hospital tent over in the other mountain.

  This was sad news to Nan, for she loved the little cash-girl, and hoped to see her and perhaps have her pay a visit to Aunt Sarah’s.

  “Is she very sick?” Aunt Sarah asked the matron.

  “Yes indeed,” the other replied. “But the doctor will soon cure her, I think.”

  “The child is too young to work so hard,” Aunt Sarah declared. “It is no wonder her health breaks down at the slightest cause, when she has no strength laid away to fight sickness.”

  By this time a big girl had washed and dressed Sandy, and now what a pretty boy he was! He wore a blue-and-white-striped linen suit and had a jaunty little white cap just like Freddie’s.

  He was so anxious to go that he jumped in the wagon before the others were ready to start.

  “Get app, Bill!” he called, grabbing at the reins, and off the old horse started with no one in the wagon but Sandy!

  Sandy had given the reins such a jerk that Bill started to run, and the more the little boy tried to stop him the harder he went!

  “Don’t slap him with the reins!” called Harry, who was now running down the hill as hard as he could after the wagon. “Pull on the reins!” he called again.

  But Sandy was so excited he kept slapping the straps up and down on poor Bill, which to the horse, of course, meant to go faster.

  “He’ll drive in the brook,” called Bert in alarm also rushing after the runaway. “Whoa, Bill! whoa, Bill!” called everybody, the children from the camp having now joined in following the wagon.

  The brook was
directly in front of Sandy.

  “Quick, Harry!” yelled Bert. “You’ll get him in a minute.”

  It was no easy matter, however, to overtake Sandy, for the horse had been on a run from the start. But Sandy kept his seat well, and even seemed to think it good fun now to have everybody running after him and no one able to catch him.

  “Oh, I’m so afraid he’ll go in the pond!” Nan told Aunt Sarah almost in tears.

  “Bill would sit down first,” declared Aunt Sarah, who knew her horse to be an intelligent animal.

  “Oh! oh! oh!” screamed everybody, for the horse had crossed from the road into the little field that lay next the water.

  “Whoa, Bill!” shouted Aunt Sarah at the top of her voice, and instantly the horse stood still.

  The next minute both Bert and Harry were in the wagon beside Sandy.

  “Can’t I drive?” asked the little fellow innocently, while Harry was backing out of the swamp.

  “You certainly made Bill go,” Harry admitted, all out of breath from running.

  “And you gave us a good run too,” added Bert, who was red in the face from his violent exercise.

  “Bill knew ma meant it when she said whoa!” Harry remarked to Bert. “I tell you, he stopped just in time, for a few feet further would have sunk horse, wagon, and all in the swamp.”

  Of course it was all an accident, for Sandy had no idea of starting the horse off, so no one blamed him when they got back to the road.

  “We’ll all get in this time,” laughed Aunt Sarah to the matron. “And I’ll send the boys over Sunday to let you know how Sandy is.”

  “Oh, he will be all right with Freddie!” Bert said, patting the little stranger on the shoulders. “We will take good care of him.”

  It was a pleasant ride back to the Bobbsey farm, and all enjoyed it—especially Sandy, who had gotten the idea he was a first-class driver and knew all about horses, old Bill, in particular.

  “Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted Freddie, when the wagon turned in the drive. “I knowed you would come, Sandy!” and the next minute the two little boys were hand in hand running up to the barn to see Frisky, Snoop, the chickens, ducks, pigeons, and everything at once.