Little Prudys Dotty Dimple | Page 9

and the house was quite still, Dotty stood at the window, looking down street. It was a lovely day; the clouds were "softer than sleep."
"O, my suz!" said Dotty Dimple; "there they go, way off, way off, Susy and Prudy. Bof of 'em are all gone. Nobody at home but me. Didn't ask me to her party, Fanny Harlow didn't."
Dotty heaved a deep sigh, took her black baby out of its cradle, and shook it with all her might.
"What you lookin' to me for, Phib? I wasn't a 'peakin' to you. I'm goin' to cover you all up, Phib, so you won't hear me think."
Then Dotty looked out of the window again. "What a good little girl I am," thought she, "not to be a cryin'! Prudy'd cry! There goes the blacksmif's shop." Dotty meant the blacksmith. "His mother lets him go everywhere. Everybody's mother lets 'em go everywhere."
A prettily dressed little girl passed the window.
"How do you do, little girl?" whispered Dotty, in a voice so low that even the cat did not hear. "O, what a booful hat you've got! Would your mamma make you wear a rainy dress, like mine? No, she wouldn't. Your mamma lets you go to parties all the days only Sundays. My mamma has sticked me into the nursery, and nothin' but a dar'needle to sew with! O, hum! And I haven't runned away since forever'n ever! They don't 'low me to run away. Wish Fanny Harlow'd asked me to her party. I know why she never! 'Cause she forgot I was born."
Presently there was a sound of little feet. Dotty was pattering up stairs.
"Didn't know I was sewing with a dar'needle--did you, mamma? Mayn't I go to Fanny Harlow's party?"
Mrs. Parlin was busy with visitors, and did not pay much heed to her little daughter. So Dotty crept close to her mother's side, and buried her roguish face behind her head-dress.
"Wish you'd please to punish me, mamma," said she; "punish me now; I'm _a-goin_' to be naughty?"
Mrs. Parlin smiled, and reminded Dotty that it was not polite to whisper in company. Then she went on talking with her friends, and Miss Dimple slipped quietly out of the room.
"I know I don't ought to," mused the child; "I'm a-goin' to do wicked, and get punished; but I want to do wicked, and get punished. I've been goody till I'm all tired up!"
Having made this decision, she went to Prudy's closet, and looked at the dresses hanging wrong side outward on the pegs.
"This is a booful one," said she, pulling down a scarlet merino. She put on the dress, forgetting, in her guilty haste, to take off her own blue one.
"O, my suz! I never did see!" said Dotty, puffing and tugging in her efforts to fasten the frock. "My mother must make Prudy's clo'es bigger'n this; yes, she must. It chokes."
However, by dint of much hard work she succeeded in squeezing her round little figure into the red merino, and fastening two of the buttons. "O, hum!" sighed she; "this dress is so tight I shan't grow to-day!"
Dotty had a great admiration for her mother's purple breakfast shawl, which she now threw over her little shoulders with tremulous delight. Nono's Sunday bonnet she next laid her naughty hands upon. Very charming was this bonnet in Dotty's eyes, as it was made of claret-colored silk, and was all on fire inside with scorching red and yellow flames. It was so huge and so deep that Dotty's small face under it looked as if it had got lost in Mammoth Cave.
"Now I've got every single clo'es on me. Guess there won't anybody think I'm a boy this time," mused she, giving a last glance at the mirror; "there won't anybody laugh, and say, 'How d'ye do, my fine little fellow?'"
Very well pleased with herself, Dotty dressed "brother Zip" in Prudy's water-proof cloak, and they both stole out by the side door, without being seen. But which way to go Dotty could not tell.
"Where is the-girl-that-has-the-party's house?" thought she, under her bonnet. "Well, it's by the stone lions, 'most up to the North Pole. Now, Zippy, if we keep a-goin' we shall get there, and we'll see some girls out by the door."
Zip wagged his faithful tail, which was quite hidden under the cloak, and they both trudged on, Dotty's heart quivering with wicked delight.
She happened to go in the right direction, and at last did really reach the "house by the stone lions." Several young girls were indeed playing in the yard.
"What little image is that, traveling this way?" cried Florence Eastman, holding up both hands.
"A beggar child, perhaps," replied Fanny Harlow. "'Sh! 'sh! don't laugh!"
"I don't see anything but a walking bonnet," tittered one of the girls; "don't it look like a chaise top?