A Pair of Clogs by Amy Walton (best summer reads TXT) 📕

Unsuccessful, but full of zeal and compassion, the poodle next bethought himself of finding her a stick or a stone to throw for him; Bennie was never tired of playing this game with him, and perhaps the baby might like it too. He ran sniffing about with his nose to the ground, and presently caught sight of something that glistened, lying in the grass near the cart. It was the little clog. Quite unconscious of making a lucky hit, he took it in his mouth, carried it to her, and placed it with gentle care close to her ear. This time Mossoo had done the right thing, for when she saw what he had brought, a watery little smile gleamed through baby's tears, her sobs ceased, she sat up and seized the clog triumphantly. Waving it about in her small uncertain hands, she hit the friendly poodle smartly on the nose with it as he stood near; then leaning forward, grasped his drooping moustache and pulled it, which hurt him still more; but he did not cease to wag his tail with pleasure at his success.

From that day "Mossy," as she called the dog, was added to the number of baby's friends--the other two were Bennie and the little clog. To this last she confided, in language of her own, much that no one else understood, and Seraminta did not again attempt to take it from her. She was thankful that the child had something to soothe her in the stormy fits of crying which came when she was offended or thwarted in her will. At such times she would kick and struggle until her little strength was exhausted, and at last drop off to sleep with the clog cuddled up to her breast. Seraminta began to feel doubtful as to the advantages of her theft, and Perrin, the gypsy man, swore at his wife and reproached her in the strongest language for having brought the child away.

"I tell you what, my gal," he said one day, "the proper place for that child's the house, an' that's where she'll go soon as I git a chance. She've the sperrit of a duchess an' as 'orty in her ways as a queen. She'll never be no good to us in our line o' bizness, an' I'm not agoin' to keep her."

They wrangled and quarrelled over the subject continually, for Seraminta, partly from obstinacy, and partly because the child was so handsome, wished to keep her, and teach her to perform with the poodle in the streets. But all the while she had an inward feeling that Perrin would outwit her, and get his own way. And this turned out to be the case.

Travelling slowly but steadily along, sometimes stopping a day or so in a large town, where Seraminta played the tambourine in the streets, and Mossoo danced, they had now left the north far behind them. They were bound for certain races near London, and long before they arrived there Perrin had determined to get rid of the child whom he daily disliked more; he would leave her in the workhouse, and the burden would be off his hands. Baby's lucky star, however, was shining, and a better home was waiting for her.

One evening after a long dusty journey they came to a tiny village in a pleasant valley; Perrin had made up his mind to reach the town, two miles further on, before they stopped for the night, but by this time the whole party was so tired and jaded that he saw it would be impossible to push on. The donkey-cart came slowly down the hill past the vicarage, and the vicar's wife cutting roses in her garden stopped her work to look at it. At Seraminta seated in the cart with her knees almost as high as her nose, and her yellow handkerchief twisted round her head; at the dark Perrin, striding along by the donkey's side; at Mossoo, still adorned with his last dancing ribbon, but ragged and shabby, and so very very tired that he limped along on three legs; at the brown children among the bundles in the cart; and finally at baby. There her eyes rested in admiration: "What a lovely little child!" she said to herself. Baby was seated between the two boys, talking happily to herself; her head was bare, and her bush of golden hair was all the more striking from its contrast with her walnut-stained skin. It made a spot like sunlight in the midst of its dusky surroundings.

"Austin! Austin!" called out the vicar's wife excitedly as the cart moved slowly past. There was no answer for a moment, and she called again, until Austin appeared in the porch. He was a middle-aged grey-haired clergyman, with bulging blue eyes and stooping shoulders; in his hand he held a large pink rose. "Look," said his wife, "do look quickly at that beautiful child. Did you ever see such hair?" The Reverend Austin Vallance looked.

"An ill-looking set, to be sure," he said. "I must tell Joe to leave Brutus unchained to-night."

"But the child," said his wife, taking hold of his arm eagerly, "isn't she wonderful? She's like an Italian child."

"We shall hear of hen-roosts robbed to-morrow," continued Austin, pursuing his own train of thought.

"I feel perfectly convinced," said his wife leaning over the gate to look after the gypsies, "that that little girl is not theirs--she's as different as possible from the other children. How I should like to see her again!"

"Well, my dear," said Austin, "for my part I decidedly hope you won't. The sooner that fellow is several miles away from here, the better I shall be pleased."

"She was a lovely little thing," repeated Mrs Vallance with a sigh.

"Well, well," said her husband; "I daresay. But here's something quite as lovely. Just look at this Captain Christie. It's the best rose I've seen yet. I don't believe Chelwood has a finer."

"Not one of the little Chelwoods was ever a quarter as pretty as that gypsy child, even when they were babies," continued his wife gazing absently at the rose, "and now they're getting quite plain."

She could not forget the beautiful child all that evening, though she did not receive the least encouragement to talk of her from her husband. Mr Vallance was not so fond of children as his wife, and did not altogether regret that he had none of his own. His experience of them, drawn from Squire Chelwood's family who lived a little further up the valley, did not lead him to think that they added to the comfort of a household. When they came to spend the day at the vicarage he usually shut himself into his study, and issuing forth after they were gone, his soul was vexed to find footmarks on his borders, his finest fruit picked, and fragments of a meal left about on his smooth lawn. But Mrs Vallance grudged them nothing, and if she could have found it in her heart to envy anyone, it would have been Mrs Chelwood at the White House, who had a nursery and school-room full of children.

On the morning after the gypsies had passed, the Reverend Austin Vallance was out even earlier than usual in his garden. He was always an early riser, for he liked time for a stroll before taking the service in his little church. Just now his roses were in full perfection, and the weather was remarkably fine, so that it was scarcely six o'clock before he was out of doors. It was certainly a beautiful morning. By and by it would be hot and sultry, only fit for a sensible man to sit quietly in his study and doze a little, and make extracts for his next sermon. Now, it was deliciously cool and fresh. The roses were magnificent! What a pity that the blaze of the sun would soon dim their glorious colours and scorch their dewy fragrance. It would be a good plan to cut a few at once before they were spoilt by the heat. He took his knife out of his pocket and hesitated where to begin, for he never liked to cut his roses; but, remembering that Priscilla would insist on having some indoors, he set to work on the tree nearest him, and tenderly detached a full-blown Baroness Rothschild. He stood and looked at it complacently.

"I don't believe," he said to himself, "that Chelwood, with all his gardeners, will ever come up to my roses. There's nothing like personal attention. Roses are like children--they want individual, personal attention. And they pay for it. Children don't always do that."

At this very moment, and just as he was turning to another tree, a little chuckling laugh fell on his ear. It was such a strange sound in the stillness of the garden, and it seemed so close to him, that he started violently and dropped his knife. Where did it come from? He looked vaguely up in the sky, and down on the earth--there was nothing living to be seen, not even a bird. "I must have been mistaken," he thought, "but it's very odd; I never heard anything more clearly in my life." He picked up his knife, and moved further along the turf walk, a good deal disturbed and rather nervous. At the end of it there was a rustic sort of shed, which had once been an arbour, but was now only used for gardening tools, baskets, and rubbish: over the entrance hung a mass of white climbing roses. Walking slowly towards this, and cutting a rose or two on his way, Mr Vallance was soon again alarmed by the same noise--a low laugh of satisfaction; this time it came so distinctly from within the shed, that he quickened his pace at once and, holding back the dangling branches, looked in with a half feeling of dread. What he saw there so astonished him that he stood motionless for some moments, as though struck by some sight of horror. On the floor was a large wooden marketing basket, and in this, wrapped in an old shawl, lay a little child of two years old. She had bright yellow hair, and a brown skin, and in her fat hands she held a queer little shoe with brass nails in it and brass clasps; she was making small murmuring sounds to herself, and chuckling now and then in perfect contentment. Mr Vallance stared at her in great perplexity; here was a puzzling thing! Where did the child come from, and who had left it there? Whoever it was must come and take it away at once. He would go and tell Priscilla about it--she would know what to do. But just as he let the creepers fall back over the entrance a tiny voice issued from the basket.

"Mossy," it said; "me want Mossy."

"Now, who on earth is Mossy?" thought the troubled vicar, and without waiting to hear more he sped into the house and told his tale to. Priscilla.

In a very short time Priscilla was on the spot, full of interest and energy. She knelt beside the basket and looked at the child, who stared back at her with solemn brown eyes.

"I suppose it's one of the village children," said her husband, standing by.

"Village children, Austin!" repeated his wife looking