CHAPTER IX DOING RIGHT
Ladybird hated school. Not the lessons, they were learned quickly enough,and with but little study; but the out-of-doors child grew very restivein the restraint and confinement of the school-room, and her wholetouch-and-go nature rebelled at the enforced routine.
Many battles were fought before she consented to go at all; but thoughLadybird was strong-willed, Miss Priscilla Flint was also of no pliablenature, and she finally succeeded in convincing her fractious niece thateducation was desirable as well as inevitable.
So Ladybird went to school--to a small and not far distant districtschool--whenever she could not get up a successful excuse for staying athome.
With her sun-dial-like capability of marking the bright hours only, sheeliminated as much as was possible of the ugly side of school life.
She enjoyed the walks to and from the school-house, across the fields andthrough the lanes, and she enjoyed them so leisurely that she was ahalf-hour late nearly every morning, thus escaping the detestable"opening exercises."
During school hours, when not studying or reciting her lessons she readfairy-tales or else worked out puzzles. Though this was not exactly inline with the teacher's methods of discipline, yet it was overlookedafter several experimental endeavors which showed unmistakably what wasthe better part of valor.
Also, Ladybird always kept fresh flowers on her desk, and kept lying inher sight any new toy or trinket which she might have recently acquired.
She would have been fairly happy during school hours if she could havehad her dog with her; but the teacher's discretion did not extend as faras this, and so Cloppy was left at home each day to add to the gaiety ofPrimrose Hall.
One day after he had added gaiety with especial assiduity, Miss Priscillaannounced that she was at the end of her rope, and the dog must go.
It happened that Ladybird came in from school that day in an unusuallydocile frame of mind. To begin with, it was Friday afternoon and the nextday was a holiday. Furthermore, she had wrested a good half-hour from thelong school afternoon, with its horrid "general exercises," by the simplemethod of rising from her seat and walking out at the door. The teachersaw her do this, but allowed her feeling of relief to blunt her sense ofduty. Not but what she liked Ladybird: no one could know the child andnot like her; but when one is teaching a district school it is easier ifthe disturbing element be conspicuous by its absence.
And so, with her course unimpeded, Ladybird marched out of school intothe fields, and drawing a long breath, sauntered slowly and indirectlyhome.
"I had a beautiful time," she announced to her aunts. "There's theloveliest afternoon outdoors you ever saw, and I've walked all around it.Such a big, fair, soft afternoon, and the sunlight is raining down allover it, and it's full of trees, and sticks, and fences, and dry leaves;and where's Cloppy? I'm going out in the orchard."
"Wait a moment, Lavinia," said Miss Flint, "I wish to talk to you; sitdown in your chair."
"Yes, 'm," said Ladybird, dropping into a chair suddenly,
"And hurry up your talking For I want to go a-walking."
"That will do, Lavinia, I'm in no mood for foolishness; I want to saythat that wretched dog of yours can_not_ stay here any longer."
"Is that so, aunty?" said Ladybird, with her most exasperating air ofpolite interest. "Well, now I wonder where we _can_ stay? Would they takeus to board down at the hotel? I don't know. Or perhaps Mrs. Jacobs wouldtake us, if I helped her with the housework and sewing."
"That is enough nonsense, Lavinia. I tell you that dog is to be putaway."
"I understand that, Aunt Priscilla; I'm not stupid, you know; I'm onlywondering where we can go, for whithersoever Cloppy goest, I'm going, andthere will I be buried."
"Very well, you may go if you choose; but that dog shall not remain inthis house another day."
"You don't like him, do you aunty?" said Ladybird, leaning her chin onher hand and gazing thoughtfully at her aunt. "Now I wonder why."
"He's always under foot," said Miss Priscilla, "and he's such a moppy,untidy-looking affair!"
"He's a smart dog," said Ladybird, meditatively.
"That's just it," said Miss Flint, "he's too smart: he looks at you justlike a human. Why, when I scold him for anything, he sits up and staresat me, and those brown eyes of his blink through that ridiculous fringeof hair, and he never says a word, but sits there, and looks and looks atme until I feel as if I should just perfectly fly."
"Aunt Priscilla," said Ladybird, looking at Miss Flint very steadily,"you haven't been doing anything wrong, have you?"
"What do you mean?" said her aunt, angrily.
"Oh, nothing, but when _I_ think Cloppy's looking at me like that, it'sreally my conscience inside of me telling me I've done wrong, when Ithink it's only a little dog blinking."
Miss Flint sat quiet for a moment. Then the fact that there was a modicumof truth in her niece's remarks caused her annoyance to find vent insarcasm.
"I did not know, Lavinia, that you ever thought you had done wrong."
"Oh, aunty, what a foolishness! Of course I know when I've done wrong,and you know I know it; and you know I'm as sorry as sorry as sorry! Butsometimes I don't know it until I see that Cloppy-dog staring at me, andthen I realize what's up; and so you see, aunty, I have to keep my littleblinky doggy as a sort of a conscience. And now we'll consider thatmatter settled."
"_You_ may consider what you choose," said Miss Priscilla, looking at herniece very sternly; "_I_ consider it is not settled, and will not beuntil the dog is disposed of permanently, and if you don't attend to it,I shall."
"Aunt Priscilla," said Ladybird, rising from her chair with greatdignity, "I will go to my room and think this matter over."
"Do," said Miss Priscilla, dryly, "and take your conscience with you."
"Come on, Conscience," said Ladybird to Cloppy, and swinging the dog upto her shoulder, she went to her room.
She was not in one of her stormy moods; she closed her chamber doorquietly behind her and gently deposited Cloppy on his favorite cushionedchair. She then seated herself on a low ottoman directly in front of him,and resting her chin on her hands and her elbows on her knees, she gazedintently at the dog.
"It seems to me, Cloppy," she began, "that something is going to happen.You heard what Aunt Priscilla said, and I have learned my Aunt Priscillawell enough to know that when she clicks her teeth and waggles her headover her glasses like that she's made up her mind most especial firmly,and it is ours but to do or die. Now, Clops, the whole question is, shallwe do or die?"
Save for an occasional blink, the dog's brown eyes gazed straight throughhis wispy locks of hair at Ladybird, who gazed steadily back at him alsothrough stray, straight wisps of hair, and also blinking now and then.
"You see, Cloppy-dog, it's a crisis; like the heroes in the history book,you've got to cross the Rubicon or cut the Gordian knot, or something. Ofcourse I sha'n't let you go away from me; you know that as well as I do.Why, I'd rather have _you_ than all the aunts in the world, yes, oruncles either, or man-servants, or maid-servants, or cattles or strangerswithin our gates. Why, Cloppy, if they tried to take you away from me,I'd--I'd kill them! Yes, I would! I'd kill them all, and burn the housedown, and I'd--oh, I'd even break the buds off of Aunt Priscilla's LadyWashington geranium! Cloppy, don't sit there staring at me like that!Don't you think so too? Wouldn't you kill and murder and massacre anybodythat tried to take me away from you? Stop it, Cloppy; _stop_ looking atme in that reproachful way! I'm not naughty; Aunt Priscilla is naughty:she says you've got to go--_go_, do you understand, GO!"
By this time Ladybird was on her knees in front of the dog, alternatelycaressing and shaking him to emphasize her remarks; but Cloppy, beingused to his emotional mistress, continued to gaze at her without sharingher excitement.
"Dog! if you don't stop looking at me like that I'll tie a bandage overyour eyes. I know perfectly well what you
mean, but I won't pay a bit ofattention to it: you mean that I ought not to let my angry passions rise;but I guess you would too if you had an Aunt Priscilla like mine! Supposeyou had an old aunt dog with gray hair and spectacles, who wouldn't letyou have _anything_ you wanted, wouldn't you get mad at her, I'd like toknow?
"Oh, I understand you; don't trouble yourself to put it into words: youmean that aunty does let me have some things that I want,--most things,in fact,--and you mean I'm a bad, ungrateful girl to act like this, andyou mean that no decent dog would act so. Well, I suppose they wouldn't;I suppose I _am_ worse than a dog, or a cat, or a hyena. But I'm sorry,Cloppy, I _am_ sorry, and I guess I'll be good. Yes, I believe I will begood!"
As this high and noble resolve formed itself in Ladybird's mind, theglory of it appealed to her, and she began at once to elaborate upon it.
"Now will you stop piercing me with those daggery eyes of yours? I'mgoing to do right; I'm going to honor and obey my Aunt Priscilla Flint;and though I shall be a martyr in the cause, I sha'n't mention that,because it would spoil all the goodness of my deed. Of course my duty isto my aunt--my dear aunt who feeds and clothes me, and lends me her roofto keep off the rain; and though she has asked me for the apple of my eyeand the apple-core of my heart, I will give them. I will sacrifice themon the altar of duty, even though they are my dear little dog. And now Ishall go right straight down and tell my aunt before I change my mind."
Buoyed up by the elation of her noble resolve, and enveloped in anatmosphere of conscious rectitude, Ladybird gathered up Cloppy andmarched down-stairs, with her head erect and her eyes shining.
"Aunty," she announced, "I am ready to obey you; I'm going to take Cloppyaway, and you will never see him again."
"What's that, child?" said Miss Priscilla, looking up from an article shewas reading, and in which she was deeply absorbed.
"I say," repeated Ladybird, with dignity, "that since you say Cloppy mustgo, he is going."
"That's a good girl," said Miss Priscilla, half absent-mindedly, and shereturned to her reading.
"I _am_ a good girl," said Ladybird; "but this is the goodest thing Ihave ever done, and I wish you appreciated it more."
But Miss Flint was again deep in her book, and made no reply.
Ladybird left the house, her enthusiasm somewhat impaired, but herpurpose strengthened by a certain contrary stubbornness which her aunt'sindifference had aroused.
"I'm a martyr, Cloppy," she said--"a perfectly awful martyr; but I'm notgoing to show it, for I detest people who act martyrish outside. Ofcourse you can't help what you feel inside.
"And, anyway, if I'm the martyr, Aunt Priscilla is the tyrant and theoppressor and the Spanish Inquisitor, and all those dreadful things, andthat's a great deal worse! I'm ground under her iron heel, and crushedbeneath her yoke, and chastised with her scorpions; but I'll bear it allcheerfully, and never even mention it. Because you see, Cloppy, we'redoing right; and it's a great thing to do right, and _very_ exciting."
The Staying Guest Page 10