Marjories Vacation | Page 9

try I think
you'll succeed, at least fairly well. Good-by now, dear; I must be off;
and do you go at once to your room and read over the list so as to start
the day right."
"I will," said Marjorie, and as soon as she had waved a last good- by,
and the carriage had disappeared from view, she ran to her room, and
sitting down at her pretty desk, unfolded the list her mother had given
her.

To her great surprise, instead of the long list she had expected to find,
there were only two items. The first was, "Keep your hands clean, and
your hair tidy"; and the other read, "Obey Grandma implicitly."
"Well," thought Marjorie to herself, "I can easily manage those two!
And yet," she thought further, with a little sigh, "they're awfully hard
ones. My hands just WON'T keep clean, and my hair ribbon is forever
coming off! And of course I MEAN to obey Grandma always; but
sometimes she's awful strict, and sometimes I forget what she told me."
But with a firm resolve in her heart to do her best, Marjorie went
downstairs, and went out to play in the garden.
Some time later she saw a girl of about her own age coming down the
path toward her. She was a strange-looking child, with a very white
face, snapping black eyes, and straight wiry black hair, braided in two
little braids, which stood out straight from her head.
"Are you Marjorie?" she said, in a thin, piping voice. "I'm Molly Moss,
and I've come to play with you. I used to know Kitty."
"Yes," said Marjorie, pleasantly, "I'm Marjorie, and I'm Kitty's sister.
I'm glad you came. Is that your kitten?"
"Yes," said Molly, as she held up a very small black kitten, which was
indeed an insignificant specimen compared to the Persian beauty
hanging over Marjorie's arm.
"It's a dear kitten," Molly went on. "Her name is Blackberry. Don't you
like her?"
"Yes," said Marjorie, a little doubtfully; "perhaps she can be company
for Puff. This is my Puff." Marjorie held up her cat, but the two animals
showed very little interest in one another.
"Let's put them to sleep somewhere," said Molly, "and then go and play
in the loft."

The kittens were soon deposited in the warm kitchen, and the two girls
ran back to the barn for a good play. Marjorie had already begun to like
Molly, though she seemed rather queer at first, but after they had
climbed the ladder to the warm sweet-smelling hay- loft, they grew
better acquainted, and were soon chattering away like old friends.
Molly was not at all like Stella Martin. Far from being timid, she was
recklessly daring, and very ingenious in the devising of mischief.
"I'll tell you what, Mopsy," she said, having already adopted Marjorie's
nickname, "let's climb out of the window, that skylight window, I mean,
onto the roof of the barn, and slide down. It's a lovely long slide."
"We'll slide off!" exclaimed Marjorie, aghast at this proposition.
"Oh, no, we won't; there's a ledge at the edge of the roof, and your
heels catch that, and that stops you. You CAN'T go any further."
"How do you get back?"
"Why, scramble back up the roof, you know. Come on, it's lots of fun."
"I don't believe Grandma would like it," said Marjorie, a little
doubtfully.
"Oh, pshaw, you're afraid; there's no danger. Come on and try it,
anyhow."
Now Marjorie did not like to be called afraid, for she really had very
little fear in her disposition. So she said: "Well, I'll go up the ladder and
look out, and if it looks dangerous I won't do it."
"Not a bit of danger," declared Molly. "I'll go up first." Agile as a sprite,
Molly quickly skipped up the ladder, and opened the trap-door in the
barn roof. Sticking her head up through, she soon drew her thin little
body up after it and called to Marjorie to follow. Marjorie was a much
heavier child, but she sturdily climbed the ladder, and then with some
difficulty clambered out on the roof.

"Isn't it gay?" cried Molly, and exhilarated by the lofty height, the
novel position, and the excitement of the moment, Marjorie thought it
was.
"Now," went on Molly, by way of instruction, "sit down beside me
right here at the top. Hang on with your hands until I count three and
then let go, and we'll slide straight down the roof."
Marjorie obeyed directions, and sat waiting with a delightful feeling of
expectancy.
"One, two, three!" counted Molly, and at the last word the two girls let
go their grasp and slid.
Swiftly and lightly the slender little Molly slid to the gutter of the eaves
of the