Big Brother | Page 8

but Robin found no pleasure very long in solitary pursuits,
and soon abandoned them.
[Illustration]
Once he took a ball of yarn from the darning-basket to roll after the
white kitten. He did not mean to be mischievous any more than the
white kitten did, but the ball was part of Grandma Dearborn's knitting
work. When she found the needles pulled out and the stitches dropped,
she scolded him sharply. All her children had been grown up so long
she had quite forgotten how to make allowances for things of that sort.
There was a basket of stiff, highly colored wax fruit on the
marble-topped table in the parlor. Miss Barbara Dearborn had made it
at boarding-school and presented it to her sister-in-law many years
before. How Robin ever managed to lift off the glass case without
breaking it no one ever knew. That he had done so was evident, for in
every waxen red-cheeked pear and slab-sided apple were the prints of
his sharp little teeth. It seemed little short of sacrilege to Mrs. Dearborn,
whose own children had regarded it for years from an admiring
distance, fearing to lay unlawful fingers even on the glass case that
protected such a work of art.
He dropped a big white china button into the cake dough when Molly,
"the help," had her back turned. It was all ready to be baked, and she
unsuspectingly whisked the pan into the oven. Company came to tea,
and Grandpa Dearborn happened to take the slice of cake that had the

button in it. Manlike, he called everyone's attention to it, and his wife
was deeply mortified.
He left the pasture gate open so that the calves got into the garden. He
broke Grandpa Dearborn's shaving-mug, and spilled the lather all over
himself and the lavender bows of the best pin-cushion. He untied a bag
that had been left in the window to sun, to see what made it feel so soft
inside. It was a bag of feathers saved from the pickings of many geese.
He was considerably startled when the down flew in all directions,
sticking to carpet and curtains, and making Molly much extra work on
the busiest day in the week.
But the worst time was when Steven came home to find him sitting in a
corner, crying bitterly, one hand tied to his chair. He had been put there
for punishment. It seemed that busy morning that everything he
touched made trouble for somebody. At last his exploring little fingers
found the plug of the patent churn. The next minute he was a
woebegone spectacle, with the fresh buttermilk pouring down on him,
and spreading in creamy rivers all over the dairy floor.
These weekly trips were times of great anxiety for Steven. He never
knew what fresh trouble might greet him on his return.
One day they sold out much earlier than usual. It was only eleven
o'clock when they reached home. Grandma Dearborn was busy
preparing dinner. Robin was not in sight. As soon as Steven had helped
to unhitch the horses he ran into the house to look for him. There was
no answer to his repeated calls. He searched all over the garden,
thinking maybe the child was hiding from him and might jump out any
moment from behind a tree.
He was beginning to feel alarmed when he saw two little bare feet
slowly waving back and forth above the tall orchard grass. He slipped
over the fence and noiselessly along under the apple-trees. Robin was
lying on his stomach watching something on the ground so intently that
sometimes the bare feet forgot to wave over his back and were held up
motionless.

With one hand he was pulling along at a snail's pace a green leaf, on
which a dead bumble-bee lay in state. With the other he was keeping in
order a funeral procession of caterpillars. It was a motley crowd of
mourners that the energetic forefinger urged along the line of march.
He had evidently collected them from many quarters,--little green
worms that spun down from the apple boughs overhead; big furry
brown caterpillars that had hurried along the honeysuckle trellis to
escape his fat fingers; spotted ones and striped ones; horned and
smooth. They all straggled along, each one travelling his own gait, each
one bent on going a different direction, but all kept in line by that short
determined forefinger.
Steven laughed so suddenly that the little master of ceremonies jumped
up and turned a startled face towards him. Then he saw that there were
traces of tears on the dimpled face and one eye was swollen nearly
shut.
"O Robin! what is it now?" he cried in distress. "How did you hurt
yourself so dreadfully?"
"Ole bumble!" answered Robin, pointing