What Two Children Did | Page 3

and brother have gone."
"Yes," said their mother, helping them into their clothes. "It is one of
the ways."
"Tell us about this place, please," begged Ethelwyn, "and how we
happened to come to such a de-lic-ious place. Will you have to work so
hard, motherdy, here? And will the little lines come between your
eyes?" Whereupon Elizabeth at once abandoned to their fate, her
harness garters with their many buckles, and climbed up to see. Yes,
the lines had gone, and she kissed the place to make sure before she
climbed down again.
"Hoty potys is the twissedest things," she remarked, worse tangled than
ever.
"Hose supporters, dear child," corrected Ethelwyn with the
exasperating air that always roused Beth's wrath.
"This cottage," mother hastened to say, while she untangled the buckles
with one hand and buttoned Ethelwyn's waist with the other, "belongs
to Mrs. Stevens and her daughter, Dorothy. I have known them for
years. Recently they wrote asking me to bring you children and come
to them for the summer; they, too, were lonely, and they knew that I
needed rest, quiet, and time to plan for the future. There are few people
living here but fisher folk--"

"Christ's people?"
"Yes, like them in trade, at least. They are poor and need help--"
"Are we rich people now, and can we buy things for them?"
"Your grandfather left you a great deal of money, children, and you
must learn to use it generously. It was his wish, and mine, that you
should begin at once to think about such things before you learn to love
money for its own sake, and what it will buy."
"O, we don't care at all, do we, sister?" said Beth, stretching up on
tiptoe to get her "bawheady" from the bureau. "We'd just as lief give it
away as not, 'cause we've always you, mother dear."
"Is the money more than grandmother's gold dollar?" asked Ethelwyn.
"Much more."
"O, then we'll have fun spending it for folks; I'd like to. But, oh, I'm
hungrier than I ever was before."
"Me, too," said Beth. "I feel a great big appeltite inside me."
They decided at once that the dining-room also was charming, with its
cheery open fire of snapping pine knots, for the air outside was chilly.
Then, too, there was a parrot on a pole, who greeted them with, "Well,
well, well, what's all this? Did you ever?"
Miss Dorothy Stevens had the kind of face that children take to at once.
There never could be any question about Aunty Stevens, who laughed
every time they said anything, and who on top of their excellent
breakfast, brought them in some most delicious cookies--just the kind
you would know she could make, sugary and melty, entirely perfect, in
fact,--to take down on the beach for luncheon.
After breakfast was over they at once started for the beach. Sierra
Nevada, their colored nurse, following them with small buckets,
shovels, wraps, and cushions.

"Mother, this is the nicest place, and I love the Stevenses; but why are
they sad around the eyes, and dressed in black, like you? Has their
father gone to Paradise too?" asked Ethelwyn, as they walked along.
"Yes, dear. Besides, the young captain whom Dorothy was going to
marry went away last year and, his ship was wrecked and he has never
been heard from. So they fear he was drowned."
"O, mother, can this pretty sea do that? What was it they were saying
about a tide?"
Their mother tried to explain all she knew about the tides, and when
she had finished, Ethelwyn said:
"I think it would be easier to remember to call it tied, and then untied."

CHAPTER III Beth and Her Dolls
Dollie's poor mother is quite full of care, As she who lived in a shoe,
For this child is tousled, this one undressed-- Mother has all she can do.
More dollies there are, than possible clothes, Some of them must go to
bed. And some to be healed by mother with glue, Lacking an arm or a
head. Then others, wearing the invalid's clothes, Care not a fling or a
jot Nor know that to-morrow their own fate may be The bed, or the
mucilage pot.
The first Sunday that the children were at the seashore was warm and
beautiful.
Mrs. Rayburn and Mrs. Stevens went to church in the picturesque stone
chapel built by a sea captain, as a memorial to his daughter who was
drowned on the coast some years before this.
"We'll be really better girls to stay at home some of the church time,"
said Ethelwyn at breakfast, "we'll go this evening with Miss Dorothy."
"My dolls are needing a bath and their best clothes for Sunday-school,"

said Beth to Ethelwyn, who