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Page 46
There, standing on its hind legs in the door, was an enormous bear,
taller than any man they had ever seen. Its mouth was open, and a long
red tongue hung out between its gleaming teeth. Trailing behind him was
a heavy rope, that showed that he had broken away from some place of
confinement.
[Illustration: "THERE WAS ONE WILD SCREAM AFTER ANOTHER."]
There was one wild scream after another, as the girls sprang up,
spilling the four Bobs out of their laps to the floor. Eugenia rolled
under the bed in such mad haste that she bumped her head against the
footboard, crying in an imploring tone as she disappeared, "Oh, don't
eat me! Don't eat me!" Joyce scrambled up on a high chest of drawers,
and from there to the top of the wardrobe, where she sat panting and
looking down at the bear, who seemed surprised at his reception. After
one frightened scream, Betty buried her head in a sofa pillow like a
little ostrich, and made no attempt to escape. She seemed glued to her
chair.
The Little Colonel, who had stumbled over all of the four Bobbies in her
confusion, and fallen on top of them as she tried to scramble up from
her knees, gave one more startled look at the intruder, and then sprang
up with an angry cry. "It's that old tramp beah that belongs to Malcolm
and Keith," she exclaimed, in a great passion. The girls had never seen
her in such a fury.
"Get out of heah, mistah!" she shrieked, stamping her foot and scowling
darkly. "This is the second time you have neahly frightened me to death!
Get out of heah, I say, or I'll break every bone in yo' body!" She had
been so startled by Eliot's appearance and then the general outcry, that
her nervousness passed into a rage. Picking up the book that Betty had
been reading, she hurled it at the astonished bear with all her force.
Eliot's work-basket followed next, and the pillows from the bed and
sofa. Next she tore off her slippers, and sent them flying against the
brown furry back now turned toward her. Not knowing what to make of such
a shower of spools and needles, scissors, buttons, and wearing apparel,
old Bruin dropped on all fours and ambled out of the doorway just as
Lloyd caught up the water pitcher.
A panting little coloured boy met him on the stairs and caught up the
rope trailing behind him. "He won't hurt you, Miss Lloyd," he called,
assuringly. "He b'long to Mistah Keith an' Mistah Malcolm. They done
tole me to lead him up heah, and I stopped to shet the gate an' he broke
away from me. They comin' 'long theyselves, toreckly, I b'lieve that's
them a-comin' now. The beah ain't gwine to hurt you."
"Oh, I am not afraid of the beah," answered Lloyd, "but I hate to be
surprised. It came walkin' in on us so easy that I didn't have time to
see that it was only an old tame beah. It stood up on its hind legs
lookin' twice as big as usual, and when everybody screamed and carried
on so, I didn't know what I was doin'. As soon as I realised that it was
the boys' pet I wasn't afraid, but it made me mad to be startled that
way. And that's the second time it has happened."
"Is he gone?" asked Eugenia, poking her head slowly out from under the
bed like a cautious turtle.
"Yes, Wash has him," answered the Little Colonel, laughing hysterically
now that her temper had spent itself. "You girls look too funny for any
use. Come down off your perch on that wardrobe, Joyce. It was only an
old pet that the boys bought from a tramp one time. They keep it up at
'Fairchance,' the home that Mr. MacIntyre founded for little waifs and
strays. I s'pose that is what Malcolm meant by a travellin' show. I
might have thought of that, for they are always makin' it show off its
tricks."
Eliot had found her voice by this time, and was sitting limply back in
her chair with her hand over her heart. "If that is their travelling
show," she said, weakly, "I wish they'd choose another road. I was that
scared I couldn't have spoken a word if my life had depended on it; and
all the time I was trying my hardest to scream. I thought it was a wild
beast that had walked in from the woods to devour us all."
"But, Eliot," said the Little Colonel, still laughing, "you know we
don't have wild beasts in these woods nowadays. There hasn't been any
for yeahs and yeahs."
But Eliot shook her head doubtfully, and when the boys came up with a
banjo and French harp to put the bear through his performances, she
watched the dancing at a respectful distance. She was not at all sure
about her safety after that, as long as she was in sight of the Kentucky
woods. She could not be convinced that all sorts of ravenous beasts were
not lurking in their shadows, and would not have been surprised at any
time to have met a live Indian in war-paint and feathers.
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