Old Caravan Days | Page 5

Corinne
feared him. When he found that his kinspeople could not be prevailed
upon to return with him, he tied up his horses to the wagon in the
wood-shed where Zene unhitched, and took dinner with grandma
Padgett.
Aunt Corinne sat on a log beside him and ate currant pie. He went
himself to the nearest house and brought water. And when a start was
made, he told the children he still expected a visit from them, and put
as a parting gift a gold dollar as delicate as an old three-cent piece, into
the hand of each.
Bobaday felt his loss when the cream-colored horse could no longer be
discerned in the growing distance. Grandma Padgett smiled pleasantly
ahead through her blue glasses: she had received the parting good
wishes of a kinsman; family ties had very strong significance when this
country was newer. Aunt Corinne gazed on the warm gold dollar in her
palm, and wagged her head affectionately over it for cousin Padgett's
sake.
The afternoon sun sagged so low it stared into grandma's blue.
spectacles and made even Corinne shelter her eyes. Zene drove far
ahead with his load to secure lodgings for the night. Having left behind
the last acquaintance and entered upon the realities of the journey,
grandma considered it time to take off her Leghorn bonnet and replace
it with the brown barege one drawn over wire. So Bobaday drew out a
bandbox from under the back seat and helped grandma make the
change. The seat-curtain dropped over the Leghorn in its bandbox; and
this reminded him that there were other things beside millinery stowed
away in the carriage. Playthings could be felt by an appreciative hand
thrust under the seat; and a pocket in the side curtain was also stuffed.
"I think I'll put my gold money in the bottom of that pocket," said aunt
Corinne, "just where I can find it easy every day."

She drew out all the package and dropped it in, and, having stuffed the
pocket again, at once emptied it to see that her piece had not slipped
through some ambushed hole. Aunt Corinne was considered a flighty
damsel by all her immediate relatives and acquaintances. She had a
piquant little face containing investigating hazel eyes. Her brown hair
was cut square off and held back from her brow by a round comb. Her
skin was of the most delicate pink color, flushing to rosy bloom in her
cheeks. She was a long, rather than a tall girl, with slim fingers and
slim feet, and any excitement tingled over her visibly, so that aunt
Corinne was frequently all of a quiver about the most trivial
circumstances. She had a deep dimple in her chin and another at the
right side of her mouth, and her nose tipped just enough to give all the
lines of her face a laughing look.
But this laughing look ran ludicrously into consternation when, twisting
away from the prospect ahead, she happened to look suddenly
backward under the looped-up curtain, and saw a head dodging down.
Somebody was hanging to the rear of the carriage.
Aunt Corinne kneeled on the cushion and stretched her neck and eyes
out over a queer little old man, who seemed to carry a bunch of some
kind on his back. He had been running noiselessly behind the carriage,
occasionally hanging by his arms, and he was taking one of these
swings when his dodging eyes met hers, and he let go, rolling in the
'pike dust.
"You better let go!" scolded aunt Corinne. "Bob'day, there's a beggar
been hangin' on! Ma Padgett, a little old man with a bag on his back
was goin' to climb into this carriage!"
[Illustration: A QUEER LITTLE OLD MAN.]
"Tisn't a bag," said Bobaday laughing, for the little old man looked
funny brushing the dust off his ragged knees.
"_'Tis_ a bag," said aunt Corinne, "and he ought to hurt himself for
scarin' us."

"There's no danger of his doing us harm," said grandma Padgett mildly,
after she had leaned out at the side and brought her blue glasses to bear
upon the lessening figure of the little old man.
Yet Corinne watched him when he sat down on a bank to rest; she
watched him grow a mere bunch and battered hat, and then fade to a
speck.
The 'pike was the home of such creatures as he appeared to be. The
advance guard of what afterwards became an army of tramps, was then
just beginning to move. But they were few, and, whether they asked
help or not, were always known by the disreputable name of "beggars."
A beggar-man or beggar-woman represented to the minds of aunt
Corinne and her nephew such possible enemies as chained lions or
tigers. If