CHAPTER III.

THE STORY OF POOR ROBIN.

Flora waited until they had turned the corner. When they looked back, she waved her hand, and, before pa.s.sing out of sight, Charley threw a farewell kiss.

"It was not for you," she said to the black baby, "so you need not look so pleasant about it. It was for me. And now we will go in and write on the white slate; but you must not touch it, for somebody has clumsy fingers and black fingers. It isn't me--my fingers are white; and it isn't Amy. It is you. Dolls don't know so much as other folks, and dolls break things. I don't. If you break that slate, Amy will cry. She said I might take it; she didn't say nothing to you. Will you 'member?"

They went in, but they soon came out again. The sunny morning called so loudly that Flora could not stay in doors. Not even the white slate had power to keep her. She played with it a while, and then it was cast aside, because Dinah wanted to take a walk. How she knew it, I am sure I cannot tell. Perhaps the black baby whispered her wishes in the ear of her mistress, and Flora was quite willing to oblige her. When they went out, the steps of the porch were dry, and there was no longer any mist; so Flora was at liberty to go where she pleased. That is to say, she was at liberty to go wherever mamma pleased. Down to the barn, over to auntie's, where Charley and Bertie lived, or in to see Grandma; but she was not to wander away or play in the public street, and she was on no account to go where she could not keep home in view. She might roam about the grounds all day if she liked; and there was the big tree down in the garden, with a broad seat around it, where she could play house or picnic, or anything that could be played with only Dinah to help her.

But it often happened that she did not care to go to any of these places. She would have liked to open the big gate (but that was forbidden,) and follow the noisy ducks down to the pond, and now she looked with longing eyes to a group of merry boys who ought to have been in school, but were playing in the muddy street instead. She thought how nice it would be to have one's own way always, and not be obliged to ask mamma everything. She was strongly tempted to join the party of rough, rude boys. There was not a girl among them.

"I think it is too bad," she complained to Dinah, "and it ought to be a pity. Big girls know where they want to go better than mamma does. Don't they? Course they do. Did you say no? That is what mamma says. So you may turn your head round. If you don't look that way, you will forget all about it. And I will."

Flora was right. She turned her head and forgot all about it. There was something else to think of. Somebody was getting over the wall at the foot of the garden. Who was it? She ran to the other end of the porch to see.

"Is that you?" she called. No answer. "Is that _you_, I say?"

Bertie (for it was Bertie,) looked up and nodded. He came across the beds that were covered with the dry stalks and stems of last year's flowers, and up the path, quite slowly.

"Hurry," cried Flora, impatiently.

Bertie shook his head to signify that he could not hurry, and then she saw that he carried something in both hands, and he carried it carefully.

"What is it," she demanded.

"Hush!" said Bertie. "It is a timid little thing, and you must not make a noise. You can come up softly and look."

He cautiously parted his hands, and Flora looked in; but the s.p.a.ce was very narrow, and she was so eager that she could not see very well. So he separated his hands a little more, and then she saw the bright eyes and round head of a bird.

"Oo!" she exclaimed.

"Robin," said Bertie.

"Alive?"

"Can't you see?"

He stopped, and Flora took another look.

"It _is_ alive. I am so glad."

"But you must not clap your hands. That makes a wind, and he is awfully afraid of a wind. It makes him shake like everything. I wish you could feel his heart beat."

Flora eagerly held out her hands.

"Do let me," she pleaded, earnestly. But Bertie said, "Not yet; wait till he gets acquainted."

"Will he, do you think?"

"Oh, yes. He knows me first rate now. I have had him ever since last night. I was home yesterday, sick. I am home sick to-day. That is why I am here. I didn't go to school. I got my feet wet."

"Through your rubber boots?"

"Over them. I went in knee deep, filled my boots full. Took them off, and emptied out the water; but that didn't do any good. The cold stayed in. I had caught it, you know, and there was no shaking it out. When you once catch a cold, it sticks. There is something growing in my throat.

Tonsils, mother calls it, I believe; but I guess it won't amount to much."

"Does it hurt?"

"Oh, no! It was awful in the night, though. You see I could not get out yesterday for the rain."

"No more could I."

"It was precious dull staying in the house with the tonsils, so I kept looking out of the window, and wishing it would clear off."

"Just like me," said Flora, gleefully.

"And I got awful tired of that window!"

"Me, too."

"I wanted to smash my fist through it, but that would not have been doing the proper thing, so I kept my feelings to myself. By-and-by I heard something go, peep! peep! I couldn't think at first what it was."

"It was the robin."

"Yes, but I did not know it was the robin. I thought it was some other bird up in a tree. By-and-by it came again. Peep! peep! right under the window, and then I began to look about me. But I did not see anything for a long time. At last I opened the window, and there, hopping about the wet piazza, was Mr. Robin. I went out and got him in a twinkling."

"Did he want to be caught?"

"Couldn't help himself."

"I should have flied away."

"With that?" Bertie pointed to a broken wing.

"With two of them."

"You could not fly if you had a dozen wings like that. It is broken."

"Oh!"

"And that accounts for his being on our piazza. I don't know what lamed him, but I think it was the gale or a stone."

"I guess it was something," said Flora, eagerly.

"And it was lucky that I happened to hear him when he cried peep, peep, instead of puss. If puss had been round, wouldn't she have snapped at him?"