Sweethearts at Home

So I got up on tiptoe. I was still ever so much too short. Then I took a buffet – the one on which I listened to stories being told. And I mounted on that. I had very nearly got the cap off when the buffet slipped sideways, and – oh, it was dreadful – there on the carpet lay the Delhi Blue Vase all in shreds – no, "shards" is the proper word.

I couldn't think. I couldn't cry. I could not even pray. I forgot how. I grew ice-cold. For I had heard it said that of all the valuable things in the house that was the rarest. I knew it could never be put together again, and it was I who had done it.

For a moment I thought of running away altogether. It was not fear of being punished. No, if it had only been that, I should not have minded. At least not much. Punishments don't last long up at our house. But now I should never see the uncle from India, nor the elephant being unpacked end-foremost out of the cattle truck, nor the crimson carpet, nor the howdah, nor any of these fine things. Or even if I did I might be stamped to death by the elephant, after all. Oh, I was unhappy. I looked in the glass and, I declare, I hardly knew the white, frightened, peeky face I saw there for my own.

You see, I usually see my own face when my hair is being done, or when the soap is just washed off. Then it is shiny and red; but now, in the dusk of the room, it looked very small and pale, and my eyes very big and black, with rims round them.

Now our cat was there, and the thought came of itself that everything might be blamed on her. She was our only not-nice pussy, and if I said it was Mir-row who did it, nobody would be the worse. She was always knocking things down anyway. She would only get chased out, and she was always being chased out. So one extra time would not matter to Mir-row.

Well, I suppose that is what the ministers and grown-up people call temptation – when you think you can do a thing so as not to be found out. When you do a thing and don't care whether you are found out or not – that is different. That's like Sir Toady (he's my brother, as you shall hear) when he goes bird-nesting and has to watch out for the keeper. But he doesn't really care if he is catched.

But the Delhi Vase! Oh, it seemed as if I never could be happy again in this world!

I knew – I mean at the time – that I should have prayed. I had been often and often told that I ought. Still, you can't just always pray when you ought to. However, I did manage to kneel down and grab hold of Mir-row.

I knew that Mir-row was a bad cat, and did all sorts of things she ought not to do. So I took her to the place where the Delhi Vase had been broken, and asked her if she minded. And she said as plain as possible that she did not care a bit. I should get whipped, that was all, and she would be glad.

She was a hard-hearted Thing. For I was in dreadful trouble. But for all that Mir-row would not take a bit of the blame. And she might just as easily, seeing the number of tit-bits I had brought out for her. But cats have no gratitude – at least Mir-row had none. However, I think she must have been a foreign cat, because she could not even pronounce "Mee-ow" properly. And that is the reason why her name was "Mir-row." She said so herself.

So I said to her, "You, Mir-row, will you come up-stairs and 'fess'?"

And Mir-row said just "Fsssst-Mir-row!" to show that she was cross.

Then I said, "Mir-row, you are a horrid nasty cat, and you don't deserve that you should get off breaking that Delhi Vase. But I will take the blame on myself – yes, I will – just to show you what it is to be noble. I will go up-stairs and 'fess.'"

So I said, "Get thee behind me, Mir-row!" as I ought to have done at first. Because Mir-row had always been so naughty that she tempted me to blame her for breaking it. If she had been a good cat, then such a thing would never have entered my head. But her character was against her.

You see, I knew that I had only to say, "Mir-row did it," to get believed. Because she was always doing wicked things like that.

Then I went up-stairs, running as hard as I could to get away from the wicked Mir-row, who was tempting me to tell a story. I ran to find Somebody to 'fess' to. And I found Somebody. And Somebody listened, and then rose up looking quite grave, but very kind. Oh, I was shaking ever so, till Somebody took me in such nice strong arms, and said that as I had come at once, and had not even thought of trying to escape the blame or to put it on anybody else, I should not be punished – though it certainly was a great, great pity.

But I never told about Mir-row, or how nearly it had happened otherwise.

And as for Mir-row, she said nothing either. She just curled herself up on the carpet among the broken pieces of the vase, and when we went down was peacefully dreaming of catching mice. I knew she was by the way she had of thrusting out her claws and pulling them in again.

No, Mir-row did not deserve all that I had done for her.

But, after all, honesty is a better policy than blaming things on Mir-row.

This is the story of my first temptation, and how I was saved from the wickedness of Mir-row.

II

PURPLE "THINKS"

June again. Aged ten. Afternoon of the Day when the first Strawberry was Half-ripe.

It will never be whole-ripe, owing to an accident which happened to it. However, none of the Grown-ups knew except Sandy the gardener, and he only tells us not to. But we don't really mind.

Which makes me wonder sometimes if Grown-ups have a world of their own, same as us Children. I don't think so. If they had, they wouldn't always be writing and reading, or paying calls and sitting on chairs, and looking Nim-Pim-Pimmany! They can't really have good times all by themselves, same as us. What do you think? I suppose it is account-books, and postmen, and having to understand the sermon that makes them look like that.

But at any rate they have not an idea that children really are thinking – nor how much they know. Perhaps that is just as well. For, as they say about the monkeys, if they only knew how we talk among ourselves, they might set us to work. At least they would not be so ready to believe in us when next they saw us with our "behaving faces" on.

Now I will tell you about our house. It is a nice one, and I have a bedroom with greeny paper, and out of the window you can see the Pentland hills and the flagstaff in front of them. The flagstaff is on the drying green, but the hills are a good deal farther away. Maid Margaret and I live there – that is, at nights, and I tell her stories if she will lie on her right side and not kick.

Sometimes we have fights, but not such ones as the boys have up above. Often we can hear them stamping and thumping, and then coming down with a huge "bang" that you would think would shake down the house. That is when they clutch and wrestle. Outside there is just the Low Garden and the High Garden, a road between big old yew-trees, and then you are at the library, which is made of wood. And mostly there is a ticking sound inside, which is the typewriter —tick-a-tack – tick-a-tack! Then a pause, a few growls, and then the noise of a book being pulled out, rustling leaves, more stamps, more growls, and again —tick-a-tack!

It goes on like that most of the time, except when the Animal inside must be fed, or on fine afternoons, when he comes out to play.

Then we have quite lovely times in the woods and hunting for things, or picnicking. And it is nice to see the white tablecloth, which Somebody has arranged on the green grass or under the shade, all covered with nice things for you to eat.

Then all about there are woods – oh! miles and miles of them. There is the Low Park, where there are lots of apples – rather crabby, but not much the worse for that when you are really hungry.

The Low Park is pretty big, and has a stream running through it, quite slowly and steadily. Then down below is the river-bed, all rocks and pools. Because the water is drawn off for the mills below. We can play there in the summer-time, and keep fish as safe as in an aquarium.

Of course there are nice places higher up – where Esk goes along lipping over the pebbles, tugging at the overhanging branches of trees, or opening out to make a mirror for the purple heather on the slopes above. But of all these you shall hear before I have done. Oh, yes, I mean that you shall.

And in the evening all is lovely dark purple except the hills, which are light purple and green in patches, the shape of cloud-shadows.

I wonder if ever you got to love words, colors, and things till they grew to be part of yourself? What do I mean? Well, I will try and explain.

When I was little, the word "purple" somehow nearly made me cry. Oh, no – I did not like dresses that color, nor even ribbons – much. Only just the word. Sometimes funnily, as in the line —

"A pleasant purple Porpoise,

From the Waters of Chili."

Sometimes seriously, as in two lines which have always brought the tears to my eyes – I do not know why. I think I must have put them together myself when I was thinking in sermon-time (which is a very good time to think in). Because the first is the line of a Scottish psalm, and the rest is – I know not what – some jingle that ran in my head, I suppose. But they made me cry – they do still, I confess, and it is the color-word that does it! – that, and the feeling that it is years and years ago since first I began to say them over to myself. It seems as if there would never again be such hues on the mountains, never such richness on the heather, never sunsets so arrogant (yes, I got the word that time) as those when I was little.

But what, you ask, are the lines? Well, you won't think anything of them. I know you will laugh.

They are just – but oh! I am ashamed to put them down to be printed. For they are just altogether mine – all little girls who have been lonely little girls will know what I mean. Boys are pigs and will laugh – except Hugh John.

However, I can't put off any longer, can I? Oh, yes, I could, but – it is better to be over and done with it.

MY POEMMade up when I was (about) Four."I to the hills will lift mine eyes —The purple hills of Paradise."

That's all! Now laugh! And if you do, I shan't ever love you again. Father smiles and says that very likely I did put them together, but that the last line is in a book of poems by a man named Trowbridge.

Well, what if it is? Can't I think it and Mr. Trowbridge too? I never saw his old book. Why, I could not read then, and he couldn't know what a little girl was thinking, sitting down by Esk-waterside and watching the purple hills – till I was told to come in and haste-me-fast, because the dew was falling.

But of course I don't tell this to everybody. They would call it sentiment. But I pity the little lonely girl who doesn't have "thinks" like that all to herself, which she would die sooner than tell to anybody except to her Dear Diary.

After the boys got bigger and could romp, I didn't have nearly so many thinks – not time enough, I suppose. Boys need a heap of watching. At first they have no soul – only a mouth to be silly with, teeth to eat with, and a Little Imp inside each to make them pesterful and like boys.

Well, little by little, I made a collection of things that were of my color – all in my head, of course.

"League upon rolling league of imperial purple!"

I think it was father who wrote that, and I believe his heart was pretty big and proud within him, seeing his own heathery country spread out before him when he did it. I wonder if something went cluck-cluck (like a hen) at the bottom of his throat? It does in mine sometimes.

Then there is "the Purple Wine of the Balkans," and "the wine-hearted sea" – but that last I only heard of at school.

And I liked a story about an Irish patriot who, when they brought him an address of honor with a green cover, told them to take it away and bind it in purple, the color of the heather.

Also I loved to read about heroines with "eyes like the purple twilight," though just at present these are scarce in our part of the country. One of our forbears (funny word – for we are the Four Bears, the little ones! Somebody I know is the Big Big Growly – only don't tell him!) well, one of our ancestors – immediate ancestors, I mean – left us blue eyes, but as we grew older they all turned gray, which I think unfair.

Later on, I loved to be told about the "purple Codex" – that is, the Gospels written out on purple vellum in letters all gold. That must be lovely. I tried to stain a sheet with Amethystine ink, and print on it in gold paint. But it only looked blotchy and stupid – you never saw such a mess. So I thought it was better just to dream about the Codex.

I wasn't born in the purple myself, but I resolved early never to marry anybody that wasn't. And I should have a purple nursery, and purple bibs, and a purple "prim-pram," and a nurse with purple strings to her caps, and baby should live exclusively on preserved violets (candied) and beautiful purple jelly.

Then wouldn't she be a happy child? Not commonplace like me, and compelled to wear a clean white pinafore. They don't half know how to bring up children now-a-days.

Oh, how I do wish that I had been "born in the purple!"

But I wasn't, and white soils so easily. You see, if the purple were only dark enough, you wouldn't get scolded half so much, and they wouldn't all the time be telling you that milk food is "so wholesome"! Oh, how tired I am of being told that!

Still, after all, chocolate isn't bad, and you can easily make believe that it is purple instead of brown.

At least I can. And it tastes just the same.

Good-by, Dear, my Diary. There's Nurse calling.

III

PRESENTS

Still the Same Age. But no Date.

I wish we could choose our own presents, don't you?

People give you surprises, or think they do. For mostly you can tell pretty well by keeping an eye on the parcels and things as they come in. Or one of the servants tells you, or you hear the Grown-ups whispering when they think you are not attending. Attending! Why, you are always attending. How could you learn else? They did just the same themselves, only they forget.

Of all presents, I hate most "useful" ones – "to teach you how to keep your things tidy," and what "you will be sure to need by and by, you know, dear!"

For when the time comes you've had it so long that you don't care a button about it. I suppose there are some Miss Polly Prinks who like things to put on. But I haven't got to that yet. Nor yet money that you are told you mustn't spend. There ought to be a "Misfit Presents' Emporium," where you could take all the presents you don't care about and get them exchanged for what you do.

"Please, sir, can I have a nice lot of the newest books with the prettiest pictures for four Jack-in-the-boxes, eight dolls (three dressed), a windmill and a Noah's Ark, that only wants Noah and one of his son's wives' legs?"

"Let me see them, miss, please!"

"Can I look at the books on that shelf?"

"Oh, these are the adventure books for Grown-ups," says the man; "children don't read such thing now-a-days – something in the picture-book way, Miss —Little Sambo and the Seven Pious Pigs, or How many Blue Beans make Five?"

But I would know ever so much better, and would have down half-a-dozen Grown-up books that just make your eyes stand out of your head like currants in a ginger-bread bunny. That's what I like. No children's books for me. And I'd have them all chosen as soon as the Presents' Exchange man had made sure that none of the paws were knocked off the green kangaroo, and that the elephant still owned a trunk.

It is a good idea, isn't it? What do you think? About the Exchange, I mean.

Once my Uncle Tom got a birthday present from Aunt Margaret. It was a set of fire-irons for the drawing-room grate! And when her birthday came round Uncle Tom chose for her present —a pipe-rack for the smoking-room!

I think that was fine – and so does Hugh John.

Now I am not complaining. August the tenth is my birthday, and it is a good time for birthdays – being sufficiently long before Christmas. I pity the poor people who were born in early January. Also presents are good at our house, and there are enough of us to change round among ourselves if any mistakes do occur. But what I really want to tell you about is what happened to Little Sarah Brown, who lives just outside our gate.

Sarah's people are very poor and her father makes them poorer by going and drinking – as he says, "To drown Dull Care." My father says if he let Dull Care alone and drowned himself it would be better for every one all round. And that's a good deal for father to say, mind you, because he believes dreadfully in letting people alone.

Well, Little Sarah Brown's mother was ill most of the time. She had a cough and couldn't do washing, so Little Sarah came to our house to run messages and go to the post with big letters when father said so. It was pretty nice for Sarah too, because every second Saturday she got half-a-sovereign from father. He grabbled deep in his pocket until he found a piece of about the size, looked if it was gold, and handed it over to Little Sarah.

Just fancy carrying about real-for-true gold like that! Some people are dreadfully careless. Well, one time Little Sarah went up to the library to get her Saturday's money. Father was mooning about among his books, and shoved something at her, telling her gruffly to be off. He hadn't time to be thanked then, but would see about it on Monday!

And do you know – it was a whole big sovereign he had given her! Now of course he never knew. He wouldn't have found out in twenty centuries, and Little Sarah knew it. She did not notice till she was nearly home, and then she stopped under a lamp-post that was early lighted to look at what was in her hand.

Yes, it was a sovereign. Nothing less!

And, do you know, a bad, bad boy named Pete Bolton came behind Little Sarah and gave her hand a good knock up.

She would have lost it in about two ticks, because Pete Bolton was a perfectly horrid boy, and would have stolen it like nothing at all. Only Little Sarah was upon him with a bound like a tiger, and bit his hand (yes, it was nasty, being very dirty). Only she bit Pete's hand from a sense of duty, and made him let go. She had her face rubbed in the mud, her hair tugged, and all, but she never let go the sovereign – half of which wasn't hers.

There was a girl for you, and yet boys will say that only they are brave! Well, don't you think it was pretty hard for Sarah – harder, I think, after fighting for it than before? You see, she thought of all the nice things she could get for her mother with the extra ten shillings, besides new boots for herself that didn't let in the water, and – oh! a lot of things like that.

Worst of all, she knew that if she did take it back to father he would only shove it in his pocket without noticing. But she said over and over: "Honesty is the best! Honesty is the best!" You see, she could not remember the word "policy," which does not improve the sentiment anyway – to my mind, at least.

So back she went. Father was still mooning about among his books, and just as she expected he took the golden sovereign and shoved it back into his pocket right among pennies and pocket-knives and so on. But he quite forgot to give Sarah her own real half-sovereign. I believe he thought she had picked the coin up off the floor. For he just said, "Thank you," and went on with his work.

And Little Sarah stood there fit to cry.

By and by he noticed the girl and asked what she was waiting for – not unkindly, you know. But, as usual, he was busy and wanted to be left alone.

"Please, sir," said Little Sarah Brown, "my half-sovereign!"

"But I paid you your wages, did I not?"

"Oh, yes, sir; but – "

"Oh, you would like an advance on next week – very well, then." And he pulled out of his pocket the very identical piece of gold that had been Little Sarah's temptation – like mine about the Blue Vase and Mir-row, you remember.

"There!" he said; "now go away! I'm busy!"

"But, please, sir – !"

"WHAT?"

Then Little Sarah burst into tears, and father stared. But after a while he got at the truth – how he had given a whole sovereign in place of a half —

"Very likely – very likely!" said he.

And how Sarah had brought it back – all of her own accord.

"Very unlikely!" he muttered.

And how he had shoved it back into his pocket without noticing —

"Very likely!" he said – to himself this time.

So what did he do, when he had heard all about it, but promise to whack Pete Bolton with his stick the first time he got him. And Sarah began to cry all over again, saying that Pete had no mother and couldn't be expected to know any better.

"Well," said he, "that's as may be! But anyway, I'll be a father to Pete the next time I catch him. I'll teach him to let little girls alone. I've dealt with heaps of Pete Boltons before! Oh, often! Don't you trouble, little girl!"

And he actually got his hat and walked home with Little Sarah, growling all the time. I don't know what he gave her. But, anyway, what he said to her mother made the poor woman so happy that she nearly forgot to be ill. And on Monday I noticed that Little Sarah had new whole shoes and so had her brother Billy. So something must have happened, and though nothing was said, I can pretty well guess what.

So can Hugh John – and you too, my dear Diary. Only we won't tell. But the "Compulsory Man," who makes boys attend school, descended on wicked Pete Bolton, and then the schoolmaster fell on him, so that Pete became a reformed character – this is, so long as he was sore. Then, of course, he forgot, and began playing truant again.

Only after that he let Little Sarah alone. Because, you see, he never knew when, in a narrow lane, he might meet a big man, pulling at a big mustache, and carrying a very big stick. Because the sermons that big man preached with his stick were powerful, and Pete Bolton did not forget them easily.

The End – moral included free of charge, as Hugh John says.

IV

MISS POLLY PRETEND

End of June.

Of course there ought to be a story in all this – the story of my life. I have a Relative who can spin you the story of anybody's life if you only tell him what number of shoe he wears. Only I am just a little girl, and have neither been murdered nor married – as yet. So in my life there are no – what is the word? – ingredients for the pudding. Yes, that is it.

So it must just come anyhow, like things tumbling out of your pocket when you hang head down from a tree or haystack which you are climbing.

All the same I will try always to put one story or one subject into a chapter, though these won't be called "Printed in Gore," or "The House of Crime," or anything like that.

For, you see, the stories the boys read are just stuffed with such things. So it will be rather a change to write about "The Dirty Piece of Embroidery" and "The Colored-Silk Work-basket."

And that reminds me. Often Grown-ups "give it" to their children for the very identical things they used to do themselves when young. There is a friend of father's down at Dumfries whom he calls Mr. Massa. And once we bribed Mr. Massa to tell us all about when father was young – he was his earliest and dearest friend – though, by his telling, father pounded him shamefully and unmercifully for nothing at all, even after they had vowed eternal friendship. And do you know, the things that father did when he was a boy – well, he would thrash Hugh John and Sir Toady for now!

But I expect that all fathers and most mothers were like that. When I am a mother, I shan't be. Because, having kept a Diary, I shall only have to take it out and see how I felt. Don't you think that is a first-rate idea?

Besides, if it is printed, as Mr. Dignus says that it will be, it is bound to be true, and I shall have to believe it. Oh, just won't my children have a good time! Also Hugh John's. But Sir Toady Lion says he isn't going to have any – being married is ever such a swot, and children are all little pigs.