Brother and Sister | Page 7

nice, though he was without his coat.
"I'm twenty minutes late now," growled Dick. "I've hunted everywhere
for my collar buttons and studs, and I can't find them."
CHAPTER V
DICK'S BUTTONS
Before Sister could say anything, in pranced Brother, very pink and
clean from his hot bath and treading on his gray bathrobe at every other
step.
"Have you been meddling with my things again?" demanded Dick.
"Mother, I've an engagement at eight o'clock and it's quarter past now;
every blessed collar button is gone from my chiffonier!"
Mother Morrison, who had followed Brother into the room, looked
anxiously at him.
"Brother, you haven't been in Dick's room today, have you?" she asked

him.
Then Sister, whose memory had been waking up, spoke.
"Please, Dick," she said in a very little voice. "Please, I had the
buttons."
"Oh, you did!" Dick quite forgot to smile at her. "What did you want
'em for? Where are they now?"
"You see, I was playing jackstones with Nellie Yarrow, and afterward
I--I left them in my pocket--" Sister's voice trailed off.
She recollected that the dress she had been wearing was now down the
laundry chute.
"Mother, something's got to be done!" fumed Dick. "I can't have the
kids going through my stuff and helping themselves to whatever they
want; those buttons were my solid gold ones and my good studs were
in the same box. There's the telephone!--Nina will be furious! Sister,
where did you say that dress was?"
Dick rushed downstairs to answer the telephone, leaving a sorrowful
Sister curled up in a forlorn little heap on the bed.
"My blue dress is way down in the laundry," she wailed. "The buttons
are in the pocket. Oh, Mother, it's awful far down there, and it's dark on
the stairs!"
"What's all the racket about?" inquired Ralph, coming to the door. "Is
Sister crying? And Dick is trying to smooth down Nina Carson, who
seems to be in a bad way. Want any help with these young ones,
Mother? Anyway, tell a fellow the cause of the excitement."
Sister smiled through her tears. "Young ones" was what Molly's
country sister had once called them, and Ralph always said it when he
meant to make her laugh.
"I really think Sister should go down and get the buttons from her dress

pocket," said dear Mother Morrison decidedly. "I have forbidden her,
time and again, to touch anything in Dick's room. Take your kimona
and slippers, Sister, and hurry; I'll have your bath ready for you when
you come back."
More tears ran down Sister's round cheeks. Her eyes were so full of salt
water she couldn't find the armholes of her pink kimona, and Ralph had
to help her.
"I'll go with her, Mother," he offered. "I'll sit on the stairs and wait
while she hunts for the buttons; and after this you--will leave Dick's
things alone, won't you, Sister?"
Sister promised joyfully, and paddled off downstairs with Ralph. The
dark stairs that led to the laundry didn't frighten her one bit, and while
Ralph sat on the last step and held the door open, Sister snapped on the
light and found the blue dress on top of the basket that stood under the
chute. Surely enough, the buttons were in the pocket just as she had left
them. She took the box and hurried back to Ralph. "Where's Dick
going?" she asked him, as they went upstairs.
"Oh, out somewhere, to see some girl," replied Ralph, who seldom
went to call on a girl. "Scoot now, Sister--I'm going out on the porch
and read. You've made poor old Dick half an hour late as it is."
Ralph went out on the screened front porch, where Daddy Morrison
was reading beside the electric lamp, and had just picked up his
magazine, when there was a patter of little feet and Sister threw her
arms around him breathlessly.
"I love you, Ralph!" she said quickly, hugging him and then turning to
run.
"Here, here!" cried Daddy Morrison in surprise. "Thought you were in
bed long ago. Don't I get any kissing?"
"Mother is waiting to bathe me," explained Sister hurriedly, "and Dick
wants his collar buttons, so I have to go, Daddy."

Her father caught her as she rushed past him and gave her a quick kiss.
"Sister!" called Mother Morrison. "Sister, are you coming?"
Sister, the box of buttons clutched tightly in her hand, ran upstairs.
Dick, glowering, met her at the top.
"For goodness' sake!" he ejaculated. "I'd about given up hope--and if
you ever touch one of my things again--"
"I won't!" promised Sister hastily. "Honest Injun, I won't. You aren't
mad, are you, Dick?"
Dick was wrestling with a stiff collar before the glass in the hall.
"No, I'm not mad, but