"No. Or you would not have failed to see the Curtises again. At least, I hope you'll see them. Mercy has never ceased talking about you."

"The lame girl, sir?" cried Ruth, in wonder. "Why, she spoke awfully unkindly to me, and I thought her mother only thought I would feel bad and wanted to smooth it over, when she asked me to come again."

"No," said the doctor, seriously, shaking his head. "n.o.body knows Mercy like her mother. That's not to be expected. She's a poor, unfortunate, cramp-minded child. I've done what I can for her back-- she has spinal trouble; but I can do little for Mercy's twisted and warped mind. She tells me she has cramps in her back and legs and I tell her she has worse cramps in her mind. Bright! Why, child, she knows more than most grown folks. Reads every book she can get hold of; there is scarcely a child in the Cheslow High School who could compete with her for a month in any study she had a mind to take hold of. But," and the doctor shook his head again, "her mind's warped and cramped because of her affliction."

"I pitied her," said Ruth, quietly.

"But don't tell her so. Go and see her again--that's all. And mind you don't come to town without turning in at the gate with the green eyes;" and so saying he let the eager mare out and she swiftly carried him away.

It was after this Aunt Alvirah seemed so confident that a way would be provided for Ruth to get the frocks that she so sadly needed. On the very next day, when Ruth came home from school, she found the little old lady in a flutter of excitement.

"Now, Ruthie," she whispered, "you mustn't ask too many questions, and I'll surely tell ye a gre't secret, child."

"It must be something very nice, Aunt Alviry, or you'd never be like this. What is it?"

"Now Ruthie, you mustn't ask too many questions, I tell you. But to make no secret of it, for secrets I do despise, somebody's made you a present."

"Made me a present?" gasped Ruth.

"Now, careful about questions," warned Aunt Alvirah. "I told you that a way would be pervided for you to have frocks. And it is true. You are a-goin' to have 'em."

"Auntie! New frocks!"

"Just as good as new. Ev'ry bit as good as new. Somebody that's-- that's seen ye, deary, and knows how badly you want to go to school, and that you need dresses, has given you three."

"My goodness me!" cried Ruth, clasping her hands. "Not three?"

"Yes, my dear. And they're jest as good as new--about. 'Cretia Lock won't be two days fixin' 'em over to fit you. And you won't mind, deary, if the little girl who wore them before you is--is--Well, deary, she won't never want them any more."

"Oh, my dear!" cried Ruth. "Three frocks all at once! And--and I'm not to ask who gave them to me?"

"That's it. You're not to ask that. I'll git 'em and show you--Oh, my back and oh, my bones! Oh, my back and oh, my bones!" the old lady added, starting from her chair and hobbling out of the room.

Ruth was so amazed that she hardly knew what her other feelings at the moment might be. But there had sprung into her mind, full-fledged, the suspicion that Doctor Davison had been the donor of the frocks.

Perhaps he had had a little girl sometime, who had died. For Ruth had quite decided, from what Aunt Alvirah said, that the girl who had formerly worn the frocks in question was no longer upon earth.

CHAPTER XVI

BEHIND THE GREEN LAMPS

Aunt Alvirah returned in a short time with such a pile of pretty colors over her arm that Ruth gasped with delight, she couldn't help it The dresses were all nice ginghams, each of a different color, nicely trimmed and delightfully made. They were not too fancy for school wear, and they were good, practical frocks.

Ruth had worn her little black and white frocks at school while she was still in Darrowtown, and had she remained longer Miss True Pettis would have helped her to make other frocks in colors. It is a sad thing to see a child in black, or black and white, and Ruth's father had been dead now six months.

"Ye needn't be scart at the colors, child," said old Aunt Alviry.

"Here's this pretty lavender. We'll make that over first. 'Cretia Lock will be here to-morrow and we'll make a big beginnin'."

"But what will uncle say?" gasped Ruth, almost bursting with questions, but being debarred from asking the most important ones.

"Don't you fret about your Uncle Jabez. He ain't got nothin' ter do with it," declared the little old woman, firmly. "Nor he won't say nothin'."

Which was very true. Uncle Jabez seldom spoke to his niece now. His moodiness grew upon him as time pa.s.sed. And in the evening, as he sat over his endless calculations at the kitchen table, the girl and the old woman scarcely dared speak to each other save in whispers.

Miss Lock worked three days, instead of two, at the Red Mill, helping Aunt Alvirah "dress-make." How she was paid, Ruth did not know; but she feared that the pennies Aunt Alvirah saved from her egg and chicken money had done this. However, the shabby black frock was put away and Ruth blossomed out into as pretty an appearance as any girl attending Miss Cramp's school.

But she did not make friends among her cla.s.smates. Julia Semple had such influence that she seemed to have set all the girls of the higher cla.s.s in the district school against Ruth. Julia herself could not pa.s.s Ruth without tossing her head and staring at her haughtily; and sometimes she would whisper to her companions and look at the girl from the Red Mill in so scornful a way that Ruth could not help feeling uncomfortable.

Indeed, Ruth would have lacked almost all young company had it not been for Helen Cameron and Tom. Tom didn't think much of "playing with girls;" but he could always be depended upon to do anything Ruth and Helen wanted him to. Helen was at the Red Mill often after Ruth's school hours, and seldom did a Sat.u.r.day pa.s.s that the two chums did not spend at least half the day together. Aunt Alvirah declared Ruth should have Sat.u.r.day afternoons to herself, and often Helen came in her little pony carriage and drove Ruth about the country. There was a fat old pony named Tubby that drew the phaeton, and Tubby jogged along the pleasant country roads with them in a most delightfully gypsyish way.

One Sat.u.r.day afternoon they went to town. Ruth had never seen Cheslow save on the night of her arrival and on the following morning, when she had started directly after breakfast at the station master's house to walk to the Red Mill.

"Why, you'll like Cheslow," declared Helen, in her enthusiastic way.

"It's just as pretty as it can be--you'll love it! I often drive in to shop, and sometimes Mrs. Murchiston goes with me. Get up, Tubby!"

Tubby had to be urged incessantly; exertion was not loved by him. He would rather walk than trot; he would rather stand than walk; and he always had the appearance of being asleep--save when he was at his manger.

Ruth remembered that she had been warned not to go past "the gate with the green eyes" and she told Helen of her promise to Doctor Davison.

"Oh, splendid!" cried her chum. "I don't know anybody whom I like to call upon in Cheslow ahead of Doctor Davison. It's almost as good as having him come to see you when you're sick."

"But I don't think," Ruth objected, "that it's any fun to have any doctor come to see one on business."

"You don't half mind being ill when Doctor Davison calls," declared Helen, with unabated enthusiasm. "And when you call there! Well,"

concluded Helen, with a sigh of antic.i.p.ation, "you'll soon know what that means. He's got a colored Mammy for cook who makes the most wonderful jumbles and cakes that you ever tasted--they about melt in pour mouth!"

Ruth soon had the opportunity of judging Mammy 'Liza's goodies for herself, for the doctor was at home, and the girls had scarcely become seated in his consultation room when a little colored girl with her wool "done" in innumerable pigtails, like tiny horns, and sticking out all over her brown head in every direction, came in with a tray on which was a plate piled high with fancy cakes and two tall gla.s.ses of yellow-gold beaten egg and milk with a dust of nutmeg floating upon the surface of each gla.s.sful.

"'Liza done sez as how yo'-all might be hongry aftah yo' ride," said the child, timidly, and then darted out of the room before Ruth and Helen could thank her.

They were munching the goodies when Doctor Davison came smilingly in.

"That's Mammy 'Liza all over," he said, shaking his head, but with his dark eyes twinkling. "I try to keep my young folk in good digestion and she is bound to make a patient of everybody who comes to see me.

Cookies and cakes and sweets are what she believes girls live for; or else she is trying to make customers for my nasty drugs."

Doctor Davison seemed to have plenty of time to give to the society of young folk who called upon him. And he showed an interest in Ruth and her affairs which warmed our heroine's heart. He wanted to know how she got along at school, and if it was true that she was trying to "make" the High by the opening of the fall term.

"Not that I want any of my young folk to travel the road to knowledge too steadily, or travel it when their bodily condition is not the best. But you are strong and well, Ruthie, and you can do a deal that other girls of your age would find irksome. I shall be proud if you prepare to enter the High at your age."

And this made Ruth feel more and more sure that Doctor Davison had taken interest enough in her career at school to supply the pretty frocks, one of which she was then wearing. But Aunt Alvirah had warned her that the frocks were to remain a mystery by the special request of the donor, and she could not ask the good old doctor anything about them. His interest in her progress seemed to infer that he expected Ruth to accomplish a great deal in her school, and the girl from the Red Mill determined not to disappoint him.

When Helen told Doctor Davison where else they intended to call, he nodded understandingly. "That is," he added, "Ruth will call on Mercy while you do your shopping, Miss Cameron. Oh, yes! that is the better plan. You know very well that Mercy Curtis won't want to see you, Helen."

"I don't know why not," said Helen, pouting. "I know she never treats anyone nicely, but I don't mind. If it does her good to do what Tom calls 'bully-ragging,' I can stand it as well as Ruth--better, perhaps."

"No," said the doctor, gravely. "I have told you before why you shouldn't call there. You have everything that Mercy can possibly desire. Comparisons with poor Mercy certainly are odious. Ruth, she knows, is not so fortunately placed in life as yourself. She is not so fortunately placed, indeed, as Mercy is. And Mercy is in an extremely nervous state just now, and I do not wish her to excite herself beyond reason."

"Well, I declare," exclaimed Helen, but good-naturedly after all. "I don't like to be told I'm not wanted anywhere. But if you say so, I'll not go with Ruth to the house."

Doctor Davison opened a new topic of conversation by asking after Tom.