Dotty Dimples Flyaway | Page 8

the stick of candy out of her pocket and nibbled it to celebrate
the occasion. "A little hump-backed bumblebee" saw her do it. He
wanted some too, and followed Flyaway as if she had been a moving
honeysuckle. For half a mile or more she "gaed" and she "gaed," all the
while nibbling the candy; but now she was growing very tired, and did
it to comfort herself. Suddenly she remembered it was Charlie's candy.
She held it up to her tearful eyes.
"O dee," said she, "it was big, but it keeps a-gettin' little!"
The hungry bumblebee, who was just behind her, thought this was his
last chance: so he pounced down upon Charlie's candy; and being cross,

and not knowing Flyaway from any other little girl, he stung her on the
thumb. Then how she cried, "'Orny 'ting me! 'Orny 'ting me!" for she
had been treated just so before by a hornet. "O my dee mamma! My
dee mamma!"
But her "dee" mamma could not hear her; she was in the city of
Augusta; and as for the rest of the family, they supposed Flyaway was
playing "catch" with Dotty Dimple in the barn.
CHAPTER IV.
"A RAILROAD SAVAGE."
It now occurred to little Flyaway, with a sudden pang, that she must
have come to the end of the world. "Yes, cerdily!" The world was full
of folks and houses,--this place was nothing but trees. The world had
horses and wagons in it,--this place hadn't. "O dee!"
Where was the hill gone, on the top of which stood that big house they
called heaven,--the house where Charlie lived and played in the garden?
Why, that hill had just walked off, and the house too! She parted the
bushes and peeped through. Nothing to be seen but trees. Flyaway
began to cry from sheer fright, as well as pain. "'Tis a defful day! I can't
stay in this day!"
More trouble had come to her than she knew how to bear; but worst of
all was the cruel stab of the bumblebee. She pitied her aching "fum,"
and kissed it herself to make it feel better; but all in vain; "the pain kept
on and on;" the "fum" grew big as fast as the candy had grown little.
"Somebody don't take 'are o' me," wailed she; "somebody gone off, lef'
me alone!"
She was dreadfully hungry. "When was it be dinner time?" She would
not have been in the least surprised, but very much pleased, if a bird
had flown down with a plate of roast lamb in his bill, and set it on the
ground before her. Simple little Flyaway! Or if her far-away mother
had sprung out from behind a tree with a bed in her arms, the tired baby

would have jumped into the bed and asked no questions.
But nothing of the sort came to pass. Here she was, without any heaven
or any mother; and the great yellow sun was creeping fast down the
sky.
"I'm tired out and sleepy out," wailed the young traveller, the tears
rolling over the rims of her "spetty-curls,"--"all sleepy out; and I can't
get rested 'thout--my--muvver!"
She sat down and hid her head in her black dolly's bosom.
"Diny, you got some ears? We wasn't here by-fore!"
This was all the way she had of saying she was lost.
The sky suddenly grew dark; a shower was coming up.
"Where has the bwight sun gone?" said Flyaway, with a shudder.
She was answered by a peal of thunder,--wagon-wheels, she supposed.
"Here I is!" shouted she.
Some one had come for her. Perhaps it was Charlie, and they meant to
give her a ride up to heaven. A flash of light, and then another crash.
Flyaway understood it then. It was logs. People were rolling logs up in
the sky, on the blue floor. She had seen logs in a mill. Such a noise!
Then she dropped fast asleep, and somebody came right down out of
the clouds and gave her a peach turnover as big as a dinner basket, or
so she thought. Just as she was about to cut it, she was awakened by the
rain dripping into her eyes. She started up, exclaiming, "If you pees um,
I want some cheese um."
But the turnover had gone! Then the feeling of desolation swept over
her again. She had come to the end of the world, and dinner, and
mother, and heaven had all gone off and left her.

"O, Diny," sobbed she, turning to her unfeeling dolly for sympathy. "I's
free years old, and you's one years old. Don't you want to go to heaven,
Diny, and sit in God's lap? What a great big lap he must have!"
A gust of wind lifted the frizzles on Dinah's