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Page 69
"It'll be for me and for you, Lucy, and for all the babies, and then
wont you be glad! And for mamma too, and for papa, cos we's all good
little chillen, if we _is_ poor. Yes, indeed, Ole Kriss is coming with
his reindeer. And he'll bring me a horse with pink shoes on; and you'll
have a piano--a _really_ piano, ye know; and mamma, she'll have two
little glass s'ippers, and--and--"
Little Scrubby stopped chattering just there, and laid her head down on
poor old Lucy's kind bosom.
"Oh dear!" she sighed, "I do _wish_ ole Kriss'd come with that pitty
tree!"
The kitten curled up on the hearth, and the little broken dog that lay
tipped over in the corner, and good old Lucy, and the three dolls
tucked up in mamma's basket, all heard the wish of the poor little
disappointed child.
II.
Everybody has noticed that the kittens and the dogs take a great many
naps in the day-time, and that the dolls and toy-animals let the
children do the most of the playing. That is because the pets and the
toys are tired out and sleepy after their doings the night before, when
the children were asleep and the grown people out of the way. They have
rare sprees all by themselves, but just as soon as any person comes
about, the fun stops,--the cat and the dog are sound asleep, the dolls
drop down anywhere still as a wood-pile, and the rocking-horse don't
even switch the ten hairs left in his tail.
As for talking, though, they might chatter all the time and nobody be
the wiser. People hear them, but not a soul knows what it is. Mamma
sticks paper into the key-hole to keep out the wind that whistles so,
papa takes medicine for the cold that makes such a ringing in his head,
and Bridget sets a trap to catch the mouse that "squales and scrabbles
about so, a body can't slape at all, 'most;" and all the while it is
the dolls and pets laughing and talking among themselves.
The bird in the cage and the bird out-of-doors know what it is. Very
tame squirrels and rabbits understand it; and the poor little late
chicken, which was brought into the kitchen for fear of freezing, soon
spoke the language like a native.
Scrubby understood all that any of them said, and they all understood
her and liked her immensely. Even the plants in the window would nod
and wink and shake out their leaves whenever she came about.
After little Scrubby and everybody else in the house had gone to bed
that night, Minx, the kitten, came out from behind the broom, and
prancing up to the little pasteboard and wool dog that lay tipped over
in the corner, pawed him about until he was as full of fun as herself.
Then she jumped upon the table and clawed the three dolls out of
mamma's work-basket, sending them all sprawling on the floor.
[Illustration: "OLE KRISS IS COMING WITH HIS REINDEER."]
They were a sad-looking lot of babies, anyway. There was Peg, knit out
of blue, red and yellow worsted, and with black beads for eyes. She was
a good deal raveled out, but there was plenty of fun in her yet, after
all.
Then there was Fran�aise. She was a French girl, who had been brought
from Paris for Scrubby before that bad time when papa "got poor." She
had been very elegant, but now her laces were torn, her hair would
never curl again, one arm swung loose, and her head wobbled badly; but,
for all that, she was still full of lively French airs. Lyd was the
last of the lot. Poor thing! She had been such a lovely wax blonde: but
now the wax had all melted off her cheeks, she was as bald as a squash,
one eye had been knocked out, and, worst of all, she had not a stitch
of clothes on. Scrubby had brought her to this plight; but, for all
that, Lyd loved the very ground Scrubby tumbled over; and so did all
the rest of them, for that matter, never caring how much she abused
them in her happy, loving way.
Very soon high fun was going on in that room, and it is a wonder the
neighbors did not come in to see what the uproar meant; but nobody
heard it.
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