stood with her arm about tow-headed, eight-year-old Cora Parker and they both looked Walter over condescendingly. If it had not been for Alice Parker Walter might very conceivably have turned and fled.
Alice was seven; Alice had the loveliest little ripples of golden curls all over her head; Alice had eyes as blue and soft as the violets in the Hollow; Alice had pink, dimpled cheeks; Alice wore a little frilled yellow dress in which she looked like a dancing buttercup; Alice smiled at him as if she had known him all her life; Alice was a friend.
Fred opened the conversation.
"Hello, sonny," he said condescendingly.
Walter felt the condescension at once and retreated into himself.
"My name is Walter," he said distinctly.
Fred turned to the others with a well-done air of amazement. He'd show this country lad!
"He says his name is Walter," he told Bill with a comical twist of his mouth.
"He says his name is Walter," Bill told Opal in turn.
"He says his name is Walter," Opal told the delighted Andy.
"He says his name is Walter," Andy told Cora.
"He says his name is Walter," Cora giggled to Alice.
Alice said nothing. She just looked admiringly at Walter and her look enabled him to bear up when all the rest chanted together, "He says his name is Walter," and then burst into shrieks of derisive laughter.
"What fun the dear little folks are having!" thought Mrs. Parker complacently over her shining.
"I heard Mom say you believed in fairies," Andy said, leering impudently.
Walter gazed levelly at him. He was not going to be downed before Alice.
"There are fairies," he said stoutly.
"There ain't," said Andy.
"There are," said Walter.
"He says there are fairies," Andy told Fred.
"He says there are fairies," Fred told Bill … and they went through the whole performance again.
It was torture to Walter, who had never been made fun of before and couldn't take it. He bit his lips to keep the tears back. He must not cry before Alice.
"How would you like to be pinched black and blue?" demanded Andy, who had made up his mind that Walter was a sissy and that it would be good fun to tease him.
"Pig, hush!" ordered Alice terribly … very terribly, although very quietly and sweetly and gently. There was something in her tone that even Andy dared not flout.
"'Course I didn't mean it," he muttered shamefacedly.
The wind veered a bit in Walter's favour and they had a fairly amiable game of tag in the orchard. But when they trouped noisily in to supper Walter was again overwhelmed with homesickness. It was so terrible that for one awful moment he was afraid he was going to cry before them all … even Alice, who, however, gave his arm such a friendly little nudge as they sat down that it helped him. But he could not eat anything … he simply could not. Mrs. Parker, for whose methods there was certainly something to be said, did not worry him about it, comfortably concluding that his appetite would be better in the morning, and the others were too much occupied in eating and talking to take much notice of him.
Walter wondered why the whole family shouted so at each other, ignorant of the fact that they had not yet had time to get out of the habit since the recent death of a very deaf and sensitive old grandmother. The noise made his head ache. Oh, at home now they would be eating supper, too. Mother would be smiling from the head of the table, Father would be joking with the twins, Susan would be pouring cream into Shirley's mug of milk, Nan would be sneaking tidbits to the Shrimp. Even Aunt Mary Maria, as part of the home circle, seemed suddenly invested with a soft, tender radiance. Who would have rung the Chinese gong for supper? It was his week to do it and Jem was away. If he could only find a place to cry in! But there seemed to be no place where you could indulge in tears at Lowbridge. Besides … there was Alice. Walter gulped down a whole glassful of ice-water and found that it helped.
"Our cat takes fits," Andy said suddenly, kicking him under the table.
"So does ours," said Walter. The Shrimp had had two fits. And he wasn't going to have the Lowbridge cats rated higher than the Ingleside cats.
"I'll bet our cat takes fittier fits than yours," taunted Andy.
"I'll bet she doesn't," retorted Walter.
"Now, now, don't let's have any arguments over your cats," said Mrs. Parker, who wanted a quiet evening to write her Institute paper on "Misunderstood Children." "Run out and play. It won't be long before your bedtime."
Bedtime! Walter suddenly realized that he had to stay here all night … many nights … two weeks of nights. It was dreadful. He went out to the orchard with clenched fists, to find Bill and Andy in a furious clinch on the grass, kicking, clawing, yelling.
"You give me the wormy apple, Bill Parker!" Andy was howling. "I'll teach you to give me wormy apples! I'll bite off your ears!"
Fights of this sort were an everyday occurrence with the Parkers. Mrs. Parker held that it didn't hurt boys to fight. She said they got a lot of devilment out of their systems that way and were as good friends as ever afterwards. But Walter had never seen anyone fighting before and was aghast.
Fred was cheering them on, Opal and Cora were laughing, but there were tears in Alice's eyes. Walter could not endure that. He hurled himself between the combatants, who had drawn apart for a moment to snatch breath before joining battle again.
"You stop fighting," said Walter. "You're scaring Alice."
Bill and Andy stared at him in amazement for a moment, until the funny side of this baby interfering in their fight struck them. Both burst into laughter and Bill slapped him on the back.
"It's got spunk, kids," he said. "It's going to be a real boy sometime if you let it grow. Here's an apple for it … and no worms either."
Alice wiped the tears away from her soft pink cheeks and looked so adoringly at Walter that Fred didn't like it. Of course Alice was only a baby but even babies had no business to be looking adoringly at other boys when he, Fred Johnson of Montreal, was around. This must be dealt with. Fred had been into the house and had heard Aunt Jen, who had been talking over the telephone, say something to Uncle Dick.
"Your mother's awful sick," he told Walter.
"She … she isn't!" cried Walter.
"She is, too. I heard Aunt Jen telling Uncle Dick … " Fred had heard his aunt say, "Anne Blythe is sick," and it was fun to tack in the "awful." "She'll likely be dead before you get home."
Walter looked around with tormented eyes. Again Alice ranged herself by him … and again the rest gathered around the standard of Fred. They felt something alien about this dark, handsome child … they felt an urge to tease him.
"If she is sick," said Walter, "Father will cure her."
