ENTERTAINING ALICE

It was sprung on me without any pretence of a fair warning. Rob Currier, Ed Mason, and I had just rounded up a herd of buffaloes in the back of my garden, and we were busily engaged in lassoing separate members of the herd before they should slip through the fence into Mr. Tilton's vegetable patch. Once let them get there and it would be well-nigh impossible, among the lettuce and tomatoes, ever to reduce them to submission. Your buffalo is tractable and decent on even turf, but when he gets all mixed up with vegetables he becomes a perfect nuisance.

At the most exciting moment came a voice which had to be obeyed:—

"Sam!"

I ran, with my lasso in my hand, toward the house.

"Sam, go right upstairs and wash your hands and face, and brush your hair. Leave that old rope outside,—don't bring it in here."

That old rope!

Before I could make any inquiries, any explanations, I was hustled in, rushed upstairs, forcibly cleaned, lacerated with Dr. Kaltblut's steel-pronged tomahawk (falsely called a hair-brush) and shoved downstairs again.

Here, I was dragged—a whited sepulchre—into a front room, where sat a lady,—a perfect stranger to me, and a little girl.

Toward the smaller and younger of these beings I was propelled.

"Here, Alice, this is Sam. Sam, this is little Alice Remick, who is going to be your neighbor. I want you to be nice to her, and play with her this afternoon, and entertain her."

The concentrated perfidy of it! The unmitigated baseness! What more could Lucrezia Borgia have contrived?

Entertain her! Entertain this spindle-legged, pig-tailed creature who was sucking her thumb in lively embarrassment! Was I a dancing bear, or a mountebank, that I should be called upon to furnish amusement to this? Reflect that I had been called from high and mighty pursuits, that I was roping a gigantic and ferocious bull buffalo at the very moment when I was interrupted. That even as I stood there in the house the blackberry bushes were in danger from the rest of the herd, since the band of hunters had been deprived of one unerring hand and bold spirit. And all for the purpose of "entertaining" this hopeless product of civilization!

There was just one thing to do, and that was to bolt out of the room without an instant's delay.

I did so, but only succeeded in getting to the front door. This was locked, and in a second I had been recaptured. Then I was taken back to the room, where I had to stand the humiliation of hearing myself apologized for, in the presence of the little girl.

"Why, I do not know what made him behave so! I never knew him to do anything like it before. Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Sam? Now, you must be polite to Alice, for she is a stranger. You'll do it to please me, Sam."

This was certainly playing it pretty low down. I had been trapped by a combination of force and guile, and now an appeal was uttered in terms that made a refusal difficult, as well as useless.

But what could I do with her? I had no experience with them, except very seldom, and then in groups. To have a lone specimen like this thrust upon me was simply preposterous. Many of the boys had sisters,—both Rob and Ed were provided for in that respect. Very little profit, that I could see, did they ever get out of them. When the sisters were older, they were simply additions to the household tyrants who thronged in every family. They assumed an air of authority; gave orders, administered punishments, and reported to higher quarters what they were pleased to consider serious misdemeanors.

As for the younger ones,—they were so many millstones about the neck. Sadie Currier and Louise Mason were always tagging on behind, spying here and interfering there. The two Kittredges,—Susy and Minnie,—were worse than all the rest. Minnie's spotless behavior, clean hands, correct pronunciation, and generally immaculate existence was a continual reproach to all of us who were merely human. Susy's tongue was never quiet, and she divided her time between chanting her own merits, and predicting woe for the rest of the world.

So it was with a not altogether unprejudiced eye that I gazed on this small interloper, and wondered what I had done that I should be treated like this. Doubtless she reciprocated the feeling heartily, but I had no means of knowing that. I could not go forth again to the buffalo hunt, carrying this bit of impedimenta with me. When I even suggested taking her outdoors, a veto was pronounced promptly.

Alice was dressed too nicely to go and play outdoors.

Dressed indeed she was,—starched and cleaned and combed distressingly.

"Perhaps Alice would like to see some of the things in your playroom, Sam,—why don't you take her out there?"

I had expected it. There only remained this final blow, and I knew it would fall. Admit this girl to my inner sanctum,—oh, well, the world was turned upside down this afternoon. What had to be, had to be, and there was an end to it.

"Come on!" I said, in a tone that mingled resignation and gruffness.

Alice did not evince any great amount of eagerness to follow me. Instead, she hung back,—exactly like a girl! Here was I, putting myself out to be pleasant and courteous, giving up my afternoon, in fact, for her amusement, and at my very first invitation she pretended reluctance.

Her mother urged her to accompany me, however, and pretty soon we reached my especial room.

"Do you like polliwogs?" I demanded, walking toward a glass jar in which several hundred of them swam about like animated quotation marks.

"Ugh! I hate 'em! Nathty squiggly things!" and she turned away abruptly.

Here was a nice beginning for you! My prized polliwogs, gathered at no small trouble, and already beginning to show the most interesting signs of froggishness, were dismissed as "nathty squiggly things!"

But I let the matter pass. I was determined to be polite,—polite and patient. I picked up a little box, covered with wire.

"Here is my snake box,—I've only got two now,—one green one and—"

I had no time to finish about the red one, nor to exhibit the snakes themselves. They were really the most harmless little fellows in the world,—neither of them over five inches long. One I had found under a fallen headstone in the old burying-ground, and the other I had obtained by swapping with Ed Mason,—giving a sinker, two fish-hooks, a turtle, and a piece of rock candy in exchange.

But as soon as I mentioned the snakes, this perverse female backed across the room, her eyes closed, and both ears stopped with the tips of her forefingers, as if she thought my pets might utter some fearful screech.

"Oh, snakth! Take 'em away! I don't want to thee 'em! I hate 'em. What do you have such nathty petth for? Why don't you have nice ones?"

This was insulting. I was far fonder of my pets than of this fussy little person. Moreover, I was doing my best to amuse her.

"I do have nice ones," I rejoined indignantly, "an' I've got a dog, an' a white rabbit, an' two guinea pigs out in the barn. Do you like any of those?"

"Not very much."

She was hopeless,—simply hopeless. Under the circumstances it seemed hardly worth while to show her my June bugs,—although I had seven or eight which I had caught the night before. They were of the superior golden-yellow variety, too,—not the common brown ones.

"Haven't you any pets?" I asked.

"Yeth; I've got a kitten."

A kitten! I might have known as much. Ordinarily I would have refrained from any comment on kittens, but now, "Kittens are no good," I announced.

"They are too; they're lovely."

"No, they ain't, either,—they grow up into cats."

"Catth are nice."

"They catch birds, and torture 'em," I remarked.

The little girl began to whimper.

I couldn't stand blubbering, at any rate. I must do something to stop that. What would appeal to her? There was the engine which would puff out steam when you lighted the lamp under its boiler. Instinctively I knew she would not care for that.

There was my bag of marbles,—including two "alleys," one of which had some beautiful substance that looked like checkerberry candy inside it.

I brought the marbles forward; she remained passive.

My railroad punch (which had once belonged to a real conductor on a train)—she might look at that. Nay, more, she might punch fascinating little holes in a piece of paper with it. In my determination to be hospitable I would leave no stone unturned.

But she laid the punch down, and wandered listlessly toward the door, her thumb once more in her mouth.

There was nothing for it but to play my highest trump; she should see my white mice! They were prosperous and interesting, and there were five new ones since last week.

"Come here," I said, and I took her to their box. We looked down into their home, and as we did so, an elder mouse poked his head above the straw, and sniffed the air curiously, his little eyes twinkling, and his whiskers quivering with excitement.

Miss Alice uttered a loud squeal, and dashed out of the room. I could hear her all along the passage:—

"Oh, mamma, mamma,—a mouth! a mouth!"

Well, I gave it up. I had made every effort,—there was no pleasing the creature. My conscience was clear at all events,—and that was the principal thing.