"Look, Horace," said Grace; "you didn't jump when you ought to, and I'm going to _huff_ your man. See, I blow it, just this way; old Mr. Knight calls it _huffing_."
"Huff away then! but you stole one of those kings. I'll bet you stole it off the board after I jumped it."
"Now, Horace Clifford," cried Grace, with tears in her eyes, "I never did such a thing as to steal a king; and if you say so I won't play!"
"Horace," said Mrs. Clifford, who had been trying for some time to speak, "what do you play checkers for?"
"Ma'am? Why, to beat, of course."
"Well, do you consider it work, or play?"
"Work, or play? Why, it's a game, ma; so it's play."
"But Grace was so obliging that she wished to amuse you, my son. _Does_ it amuse you? Doesn't it make you cross? Do you know that you have spoken a great many sharp words to your kind sister?
"Shut the board right up, my child; and remember from this time never to play checkers, or any other game, when you feel yourself growing fretful! As you sometimes say, 'It doesn't pay.'"
Horace closed the board, looking ashamed.
"That's sound advice for everybody," said aunt Madge, stroking her little nephew's hair. "If children always remembered it, they would get along more pleasantly together--I know they would."
Grace had been looking ill all the morning, and her mother now saw symptoms of a chill. With all her tender anxiety she had not known how tired her little daughter was. It was two or three weeks before the child was rested; and whenever she had a chill, which was every third day for a while, she was delirious, and kept crying out,--
"O, do see to Horace, mamma! Mr. Lazelle will forget! O, Horace, now _don't_ let go my hand! I've got the bundles, mamma, and the milk for the baby."
And sometimes Mrs. Clifford would call Horace to come and take his sister's hand, just to assure her that he was not lying cold and dead in the waters of Lake Erie. It was really touching to see how heavily the cares of the journey had weighed on the dear girl's youthful spirits.
CHAPTER V.
CAPTAIN OF A COMPANY.
At first Mrs. Clifford thought she did not care about having the children go to school, as they had been kept at their studies for nearly nine months without a vacation, except Christmas holidays.
But what was to be done with Horace? Aunt Louise, who was not passionately fond of children, declared her trials were greater than she could bear. Grace was a little tidy, she thought; but as for Horace, and his dog Pincher, and the "calico kitty," which he had picked up for a pet!--Louise disliked dogs and despised kittens. Sometimes, as she told Margaret, she felt as if she should certainly fly; sometimes she was sure she was going crazy; and then again it seemed as if her head would burst into a thousand pieces.
None of these dreadful accidents happened, it is true; but a great many other things did. Hammers, nails, and augers were carried off, and left to rust in the dew. A cup of green paint, which for months had stood quietly on an old shelf in the store-room, was now taken down and stirred with a stick, and all the toys which Horace whittled out were stained green, and set in the sun to dry. A pair of cheese-tongs, which hung in the back room, a boot-jack, the washing-bench, which was once red,--all became green in a very short time: only the red of the bench had a curious effect, peeping out from its light and ragged coat of green.
The blue sled which belonged to Susy and Prudy was brought down from the shed-chamber, and looked at for some time. It would present a lovely appearance, Horace thought, if he only dared cross it off with green.
But as the sled belonged to his little cousins, and they were not there to see for themselves how beautiful he could make it look, why, he must wait till they came; and then, very likely, the paint would be gone.
Of course, Horace soiled his clothes sadly: "that was always just like him," his aunt Louise said.
This was not all. A little neighbor, Gilbert Brown, came to the house at all hours, and between the two boys there was a noise of driving nails, firing pop-guns, shouting and running from morning till night.
They built a "shanty" of the boards which grandpa was saving to mend the fence, and in this shanty they "kept store," trading in crooked pins, home-made toys, twine, and jackknives.
"Master chaps, them children are," said Abner, the good-natured hired man.
"Hard-working boys! They are as destructive as army-worms," declared grandpa, frowning, with a twinkle in his eye.
Horace had a cannon about a foot long, which went on wheels, with a box behind it, and a rammer lashed on at the side--not to mention an American flag which floated over the whole. With a stout string he drew his cannon up to the large oilnut tree, and then with a real bayonet fixed to a wooden gun, he would lie at full length under the shade, calling himself a sharpshooter guarding the cannon. At these times woe to the "calico kitty," or Grace, or anybody else who happened to go near him! for he gave the order to "charge," and the charge was made most vigorously.
Upon the whole, it was decided that everybody would feel easier and happier if Horace should go to school. This plan did not please him at all, and he went with sulky looks and a very bad grace.
His mother sighed; for though her little boy kept the letter of the law, which says, "Children, obey your parents," he did not do it in the _spirit_ of the commandment, "_Honor_ thy father and thy mother."
In a thousand ways Mrs. Clifford was made unhappy by Horace, who should have been a comfort to her. It was sad, indeed; for never did a kind mother try harder to "train up a child" in the right way.
It did not take Horace a great while to renew his acquaintance with the schoolboys, who all seemed to look upon him as a sort of curiosity.
"I never knew before," laughed little Dan Rideout, "that my name was Dan-yell!"
"He calls a pail a bucket, and a dipper a _tin-kup_," said Gilbert Brown.
"Yes," chimed in Willy Snow, "and he asks, 'Is school _took up_?' just as if it was knitting-work that was on needles."
"How he rolls his r's!" said Peter Grant. "You can't say hor-r-se the way he does! I'll bet _the ain't_ a boy can do it, unless it's a Cahoojack." Peter meant _Hoosier_.
"Well, I wouldn't be seen saying _hoss_," returned Horace, with some spirit; "that's _Yankee_."
"I guess the Yankees are as good as the Cahoojacks: wasn't your mother a Yankee?"
"Yes," faltered Horace; "she was born up north here, in the Frigid Zone; but she isn't so much relation to me as my father is, for her name wasn't Clifford. She wouldn't have been _any_ relation to me if she hadn't married my father!"
One or two of the larger boys laughed at this speech, and Horace, who could never endure ridicule, stole quietly away.
"Now, boys, you behave," said Edward Snow, Willy's older brother; "he's a smart little fellow, and it's mean to go to hurting his feelings. Come back here, Spunky Clifford; let's have a game of _hi spy_!"
Horace was "as silent as a stone."
"He don't like to be called Spunky Clifford," said Johnny Bell; "do you, Horace?"
"The reason I don't like it," replied the boy, "is because it's not my name."
"Well, then," said Edward Snow, winking to the other boys, "won't you play with us, _Master Horace_?"
"I'll not go back to be laughed at," replied he, stoutly: "when I'm home I play with Hoosier boys, and they're politer than Yankees."
"'Twas only those big boys," said Johnny Bell; "now they've gone off.
Come, let's play something."
"I should think you'd be willing for us to laugh," added honest little Willy Snow; "we can't help it, you talk so funny. We don't mean anything."
"Well," said Horace, quite restored to good humor, and speaking with some dignity, "you may laugh at me one kind of a way, but if you mean _humph_ when you laugh, I won't stand it."