Lydia of the Pines | Page 4

cup of milk toward the dining-room. From where he sat he could see her kneel before little Patience, and hold the cup, while the baby drank thirstily. Little motes of the sunset light danced on the two curly golden heads. He looked from the children toward the dusty kitchen table.
"What a hell of a mess Liz does keep going," he muttered. "Patience would break her heart, if she knew. Oh! Patience, Patience!--"
Lydia came back with the empty cup. "Now for the steak," she exclaimed. "Gosh, what a fire--"
She attacked the greasy stove with enthusiasm and in a short time a savory smell of steak filled the house. Amos went into the dining-room and sat in a rocking chair with little Patience and the balloon in his lap. Old Lizzie hummed as she finished setting the table and Lydia whistled as she seasoned the potatoes Lizzie had set to frying.
"Where'd she get the balloon?" asked Amos as Lydia brought in the platter of meat.
"Margery gave it to her," answered the child. "Supper's ready."
"Got it at the circus, I suppose. I wish I could 'a' let you go, Lydia, but at a dollar and a half a day, I swan I--"
"I didn't want to go," returned Lydia, sitting the baby in her high chair. "I'm getting too big for circuses."
"Too big for a circus!" Her father looked at her with understanding eyes. "I guess heaven is paved with lies like yours, Lydia. John Levine will be over to-night. Get some of the mess dug out of the parlor, will you, Lizzie?"
"Sure," said Lizzie, good-naturedly. Lydia sat opposite her father and poured tea. The ancient maid of all work sat beside Patience and dispensed the currant sauce and the cake.
The baby was half asleep before the meal was ended. "She didn't finish her nap this afternoon," said Lydia. "I'll take her up to bed now and finish my cake afterward."
She tugged the baby out of the high chair that was becoming too close a fit and toiled with her up the narrow stairs that led from the entry.
The little sisters slept together in a slant-ceilinged bedroom. Here again was dust and disorder, the floor covered with clothing and toys, the bed unmade, the old fashioned mahogany bureau piled high with books, brushes, and soiled teacups that had held the baby's milk.
There was still light enough to see by. Lydia stood Patience on the bed and got her into her nightdress after gently persuading the baby to let her fasten the balloon to the foot of the bed. Then she carried her to the little rocker by the window and with a look that was the very essence of motherhood began to rock the two year old to sleep. Presently there floated down to Amos, smoking his pipe on the front step, Lydia's childish, throaty contralto:
"I've reached the land of corn and wine With all its riches surely mine, I've reached that beauteous shining shore, My heaven, my home, for ever more."
A little pause, during which crickets shrilled, then, in a softer voice:
"Blow him again to me While my little one, while my pretty one sleeps."
Another pause--and still more softly:
"Wreathe me no gaudy chaplet; Make it from simple flowers Plucked from the lowly valley After the summer showers."
The coolness of the August wind touched Amos' face, "Oh! Patience, Patience--" he murmured.
Lydia sat for a moment or two with the sleeping baby in her arms, looking down on her with a curious gentle intentness. Then she rose carefully, and as carefully deposited little Patience on the bed. This done, she untied the balloon and carried it out with her to the little landing. There was a window here into which the August moon was beginning to shine. Lydia sat down with the balloon and felt of it carefully.
"Aren't balloons the most wonderful things, almost as wonderful as bubbles," she murmured. "I love the smell of them. Think what they can do, how they can float, better than birds! How you want to squeeze them but you don't dast! I'd rather have gone to the circus than to heaven."
In a moment she heard steps and greetings and her father leading his friend into the house. Then she slipped down the stairs and into the night. A dozen times she ran up and down the yard, the balloon like a fettered bird tugging at her wrist.
"I love it as much as little Patience does," she murmured. "Oh, I wish it was mine."
Finally, she ran out of the gate and up the street to the one fine house of which the street boasted. She stole up to the door and fastened the string of the balloon to the door bell, gave the bell a jerk and fled.
As she ran down the street, a boy, leaning against the gate-post