did she say?" insisted Ruth, with suspicion, knowing both Sammy and his mother pretty well.
"Why, she said: 'If you will only go out and stop bothering me for an hour I don't care what you do.' So, ain't that saying I can?" demanded Sammy.
"I should say she had given you carte blanche," chuckled Neale, while the older Corner House girls laughed.
"I think you may go as far as to get the wire, pulleys, and other things needed," Ruth said. "I will ask Sammy's mother myself when she is not so strenuously engaged."
Dot listened to this and gazed after the departing older sister in something like awe.
"What is it, Dottums?" asked Agnes, chucking the little fairy-like child under her soft chin.
"Oh, our Ruth does talk so beautifully," sighed the smallest Corner House girl. "What does 'strain – strain-u-ous-ly' mean, Aggie?"
"Exactly that," laughed her sister. "Mrs. Pinkney certainly was working under a 'strain.' You have hit the meaning of 'strenuously' better even than Mr. Dick."
"Who is Mr. Dick?" demanded Dot, the unappeasable.
"The man who knows everything," said Neale, throwing away the core of his apple and strolling to the gate on his way to the hardware store to purchase the materials for the Aeriel tramway.
"The dictionary, goosey," said Tess in explanation to Dot. "Don't you know yet what they mean when they are joking us?"
"I only wanted to know," said Dot rather grieved.
"Never mind," said Sammy, being left alone with the two smaller girls. "Let 'em laugh. We won't get mad at 'em till that wire's up and the car is running all right."
Oh, Sammy Pinkney was a practical lad.
Dot, unable long to keep any exciting happening or interest to herself, was disseminating the news of the proposed "airship line" throughout the Corner House household. Uncle Rufus, the brown black-man, who was working just then in the garden, was vastly astonished.
"Ma 'Lantic Ocean!" he gasped. "What will dese yere chillun be doin' next, I want to know! Puttin' up a trolley line, is they, fo' airships? Who ever heard de like?"
"Oh, air-re-ro-planes!" said Dot, having heard a new word and rather liking the rolling syllables of it. "Air-re-ro-planes are getting very common, so Aggie says. There is going to be one at the County Fair. Why, people will be riding in them just like trolley cars, pretty soon!"
"Ma goodness! No!" ejaculated the old man. "I don't want to wake up on dat day when dat dere comes to pass. Lookut, chile! If de airships was a steamin' around over our haids, we'd nebber be sure of our lives. Why, dey'd be throwin' over ashes, and de cooks would be emptyin' garbage pails over de rails like dey does aboard steamships. Wouldn't be no sharks dere to gobble down de leavin's – no, ma'am! On'y birds. And folks aboard would be droppin' t'ings out'n de airship. An' w'en a man fell overboard – ma mercy, chile! he'd come down plump on you' haid, mebbe! No, ma'am, dey won't never 'low it," and the old negro shook his head seriously.
These perfectly good objections to the practicability of airship flying impressed the smallest Corner House girl deeply. She intended to return to talk to Sammy and Tess about it; but on her way, as she came along the path next to the Willow Street fence, she suddenly saw Sammy's bandy-legged bulldog charging across the street, probably in search of his young master. The dog had slipped his chain in some way and being a ferocious-looking beast at best, it was no wonder that pedestrians gave him a wide berth.
Suddenly Dot, inside the fence, heard a stifled cry of fear outside the fence. Looking up from her Alice-doll she saw a woman clinging to the fence pickets as though she contemplated climbing the barrier to escape the dog; and the dog was standing before her wagging his stump of a tail slightly and showing two formidable rows of teeth while he "laughed" at her perturbation.
"Oh, don't be afraid of Sammy's dog," advised Dot. "He won't bite you."
"He won't bite?" demanded the woman, who was evidently of a nervous disposition. "What's he got all those teeth for? He doesn't bite?"
"Oh – oh, no, ma'am. He only nibbles."
Then she called the dog and the woman went on, relieved. But when her fright was past she probably confessed to herself that the smallest Corner House girl certainly had originality of ideas.
Dot would not let the bulldog into the yard, for he would have at once sought out Billy Bumps, the goat, to tease him. He and Billy were sworn and deadly enemies.
Sammy and Tess had disappeared. So, still feeling the necessity for discussing the airship matter with somebody, Dot went upstairs to Aunt Sarah's room.
Aunt Sarah Maltby was forever engaged in sewing or in fancy work; and, to tell the truth, Dot was not much interested in needlework. She was often seized upon by Aunt Sarah, however, and made to sit down to sew patchwork.
"Every little girl, when I was a little girl, had to learn to use her needle," declared the spinster. "When I was your age, Dorothy Kenway, I had pieced half a block bedquilt and was learning to do feather-stitching."
"Yes ma'am," said Dot, politely. "It must have been very int'resting." But she did not care for such amusement herself. On this occasion, before she could even broach the airship matter, Aunt Sarah seized upon a fault that Dot had not even noticed before.
"Look here!" exclaimed Aunt Sarah. "What have you done to your stocking?"
"I – I – I'm wearing it," confessed Dot, startled, but looking down at her neat little shins in their white hose.
"Wearing them! You're wearing them out!" ejaculated Aunt Sarah, pointing to a hole that Dot could not possibly see, for it was behind her. "And those stockings were put on fresh this afternoon."
"Yes, ma'am," admitted Dot, for it was of no use to argue with Aunt Sarah.
"When I was your age," (a favorite expression of Aunt Sarah's) "I darned my own stockings. And you don't even know what needles are for!"
"Oh, yes I do, please, Auntie. They're to make the talking machine play!" declared Dot, frightened by Aunt Sarah's manner into most unusual perversity. She was usually a gentle, obedient child.
Aunt Sarah was in no mood to listen to anything about airships after that; and Dot took her first lesson in darning, there and then. The old lady and the little girl came down to dinner that evening in a rather sober frame of mind, for the occasion had been wearing upon both of them.
The evening meal at the old Corner House was usually, however, a cheering event. Mrs. MacCall held sway at one end of the long table in the huge dining-room, while Aunt Sarah sat at the foot. The girls held places on either side, and if they had guests the latter were scattered between the Corner House girls and made to feel at home.
The table here was, in the truest sense, an "extension table." Uncle Rufus who, in a bobtail coat, white vest and spats, acted as butler, lengthened the table or shortened it, according to the number to be served.
Damask and bright silver and glass made the board attractive. The old-fashioned furniture as well as the table service were the special care of the old negro. His pride and his delight were in the years he had served at the old Stower table.
When the family was alone it is a fact that Uncle Rufus considered himself privileged to join in the children's conversation. And this made the meal no less
