"What'd I tell you, Budd?" said Chi, triumphantly; then there was another shout, for Chi had broken the rules in speaking thus.
"Two cents' fine!" shouted Budd, "for speaking out of order in meeting."
"Sho! I forgot," said Chi, humbly; "well, proceed."
"Do you, Barbara Frietchie, pledge yourself to try to keep these by-laws?"
"Yes," said Hazel, but rather tremulously.
"Well, then, we 'll put you to the test. Molly Stark will extend the first hand of fellowship to Barbara Frietchie--No, hold out your hand, Hazel; way out--don't you draw it back that way!"
"I did n't," retorted Hazel.
"Yes, you did, I saw you!"
"You didn't, either."
"I did."
"You did n't."
"I did, too."
"He did n't, did he, Chi?" said Hazel, furious at this charge of apparent timidity.
"I don't believe you drew it back even if March does think he saw you,"
said Chi, pouring oil both ways on the troubled waters; "'n' I never thought 't was just the thing for a boy to tell a girl she was a coward before she'd proved to be one--specially if he belongs to this Society."
The Marquis de Lafayette hung his head at this rebuke; but in the action his cocked hat of black and gilt paper lurched forward and drew off with it his white cotton-wool wig. Budd and Cherry, forgetting all rules, fines, and sense of propriety, rolled over and over at the sight; Rose sat down shaking with laughter, and even Chi lost his dignity.
"I wish you would let me _see_, or do something," said Hazel, plaintively, when she could make herself heard.
"'T ain't fair to keep Hazel waiting so," declared Budd, and the president called the meeting to order again.
"Put out your hand, Hazel," said Rose. "Now shake."
Hazel grasped a hand, cold, deathly cold, and clammy. The chill of the rigid fingers sent a corresponding shiver down the length of her backbone, and the goose-flesh rose all over her arms and legs. She thought she must shriek; but she recalled Chi's words, set her teeth hard, and shook the awful thing with what strength she had, never uttering a sound.
"Bully for you, Hazel! I knew you 'd show lots of pluck," cried Budd.
"Got grit every time," said Chi, proudly. "Now let's have the other test and get down to business. Guess all three of you 'll have to have a finger in this pie. Hurry up, Marthy Washin'ton!" Cherry scuttled down the ladder, and in a few minutes labored, panting, up again.
"What did you bring two for?" demanded Budd.
"'Cause March said 't would balance me better on the ladder," replied Cherry, innocently. At which explanation Chi laughed immoderately, much to Cherry's discomfiture.
"Now, Hazel, roll up your sleeve and hold out your bare arm," said the Marquis. Hazel obeyed, wondering what would come next.
"Here, Budd, you hold it; all ready, Cherry?"
"Ye-es--wait a minute; now it's all right."
"This we call burning in the Society's brand,--N.B.B.O.O.;" the voice of the Marquis was solemn, befitting the occasion.
Hazel drew her breath sharply, uncertain whether to cry out or not.
There was a sharp sting across her arm, as if a hot curling-iron had been drawn quickly across it; then a sound of sizzling flesh, and the odor of broiled beefsteak rose up just under her nostrils.
There was a diabolical thud of falling flat-irons; Rose tore the bandage from Hazel's eyes, and the bewildered candidate for membership, when her eyes grew somewhat wonted to the dim light, found herself in a corner of the loft in the barn, with the elegant figure of the Marquis in cocked hat, white wig, yellow vest, blue coat, and yellow knee-breeches dancing frantically around her; Ethan Allen in white woollen shirt, red yarn suspenders, and red, white, and blue striped trousers, turning back-hand somersaults on the hay; Chi standing at salute with his great-great-grandfather's Revolutionary musket, his old straw hat decorated with a tricolor cockade, and Cherry in a white cotton-wool wig, a dark calico dress of her mother's and a white neckerchief, flat on the floor beside two six-pound flat-irons.
A piece of raw beef on a tin pan, some bits of ice, and a kid glove stuffed with ice and sawdust, lay scattered about. They told the tale of the initiation.
"Three cheers for Barbara Frietchie!" shouted Budd, as he came right side up. The barn rang with them.
"Now we 'll give the right hand of true fellowship," said Chi, rapping with the butt of his musket for order.
Rose gave Hazel's hand a squeeze. "I 'm so glad you 're to be one of us," she said heartily; and Hazel squeezed back.
March came forward, bowed low, and said, "I apologize for my distrust of your pluck," and held out his hand with a look in the flashing gray eyes that was not one of mockery; indeed, he looked glad, but never a word of welcome did he speak.
"I could flog that proud feller," muttered Chi to himself.
Hazel hesitated a moment, then put out her hand a little reluctantly.
March caught the gesture and her look.
"Oh, you 're not obliged to," he said haughtily, and turned on his heel.
But Hazel put her hand on his arm.
"I 'm afraid we are both breaking some of the by-laws, March. I do want to shake hands, but I was thinking just then that you did n't mean the apology--not really and truly; and if you did mean it, there was something else you needed to apologize for more than that!"
March flushed to the roots of his hair. Then his boy's honor came to the rescue.
"I do want to now, Hazel--and forgive and forget, won't you?" he said, with the winning smile he inherited from his father, but which he kept for rare occasions.
Hazel put her hand in his, and felt that this had been worth waiting for. She knew that at last March had taken her in.
Budd gripped with all his might, Cherry shook with two fingers, and Chi's great hand closed over hers as tenderly as a woman's would have done.
This was Hazel's initiation into the Nobody's Business But Our Own Society. It was the second meeting of the year.
"Now, March, I 'll make you chairman and ask you to state the business of this meetin', as you 've called it. Must be mighty important?"
"It is," replied March, gravely, all the fun dying out of his face.
"You remember, all of you,--don't you?--what mother told us that night she said Hazel was coming?"
"Yes," chorussed the children.
"Well, I 've been thinking and thinking ever since how I could help--"