A Little Girl in Old New York, Amanda Minnie Douglas [e book reader for pc txt] 📗

Polly was sulky. "Mind your business!" was all she would say. Dan soon began to be quite sociable, declaring "He was glad to see them, and would like to have some grapes."

"You shut up!" screamed Polly.

"I'll talk as much as I like."

"No, you won't. I'll come and choke you."

"Do if you dare!"

Then they shrieked at each other with the vigor of fighting cats. Polly rustled around her cage as if she would be out the next moment. Hanny clung to Lu and was pale with fright.

"They can't get out. They'd tear each other to pieces when they're mad, and sometimes they're sweet as honey. Pa's going to sell one of them, but we can't decide which must go. Polly talks a lot when she's in the mood. I don't know what's ruffled her so. Polly, my pretty Polly, sing for me, and the first time I go out I'll buy you some candy with lots of peanuts in it--lots--of--peanuts," lingeringly.

"Polly sing! Oh, ho! ho! Polly can't sing no more'n a crow," squeaked out Dan.

"Can too, can too!"

"Pretty Polly! Polly want a cracker. Polly sing for her dear Dan. Oh, boo hoo!"

Polly screamed in a tearing rage.

The young colored lad entered. "Miss Lu, de birds disturb yer gramper. Lemme take Polly. You bad bird, you're goin' in a dungeon."

With that he whisked Polly off. Dan laughed gleefully. The boys came, and Dan went through his stock accomplishments, much to their delight.

"But Polly's a sight the funniest," declared Lu. "Only she has such a horrid temper and it just grows worse. We had a monkey and that got to be so awful bad. Now let's go and see the guinea-pigs."

They were up on the top floor. "We had them down cellar," explained one of the boys, "but some of them died. 'Gene said 'twas too dark and damp."

The children trudged up-stairs. There was a pen in a small room which seemed a receptacle for all sorts of broken toys. Ah, how pretty the little things were; black-and-yellow-spotted, bright-eyed, and soft-coated, with a tiny sort of squeak, and tame enough to be caught. Lu offered one to Hanny, but she drew back in half fear. Then they brought in the squirrel, and he was a handsome fellow with beady eyes and a bushy tail, and when they let him out he ran up on any one's shoulder.

"If it was only warm, we'd go out and have a swing. Oh, don't you want a ride? Here's our horse. We don't care much for it now, though in summer we have it out-of-doors."

Hanny was speechless with amaze. She had never seen so large a one in the stores. He was covered with real hair, had a splendid mane and tail and beautiful eyes. His silver-mounted red trappings were extremely gorgeous.

"He's magnificent!" declared Ben. "Hanny, just try him. Don't be a little 'fraid-cat!" as she hung back.

"See here!" Lu sprang on and took an inspiriting gallop. The horse worked with springs and seemed fairly alive. Afterward Hanny ventured and found it exhilarating. Oh, if she could only have one!

"I suppose it cost a good deal," she questioned timidly.

Jeffrey laughed. "'Gene picked it up at an auction where people were being sold out, and he got it for a song," he said. "But we've outgrown it. I'd like a real pony. I wish pa'd keep a horse."

"We have two," said the little girl.

"Pshaw now! you're joking."

"No," rejoined Ben quietly. "We brought them down from the farm. Father and Steve needed them."

"Do you own a farm, too?" Jeffrey asked in amaze. "Why, you must be all-fired rich!"

"No, we're not so very rich," said Ben soberly. "Our house in First Street isn't nearly as big and as handsome as this. But we did have a big one in the country. Uncle lives there now, and we have a hundred acres of land."

"Jiminy!" ejaculated the young boy.

"Chillen! Chillen, please bring de company down to your gramper."

"Oh, I'm 'fraid you're going away," said Lu. "You're awful sweet! I just wish I had a little sister. I wish you'd come and stay a week. But I s'pose you'd feel like a cat in a strange garret. I'd be real good to you, though."

She caught Hanny in her arms and fairly ran down-stairs with her.

"You're the littlest mite of a thing! Why, you're never nine years old! You're just like a doll!"

"Oh, please let me walk," entreated Hanny.

Their mother stood in the lower hall.

"You boys go down-stairs or in the parlor. So many children confuse grandpa. Lu, you look too utterly harum-scarum. Do go and brush your hair."

Between the parlor and the back room was a space made into a library on one side and some closets on the other. Sliding doors shut this from the back room. This was large, with a splendid, high-post bedstead that had yellow silk curtains around it, a velvet sofa, and over by the window some arm-chairs and a table. And out of one chair rose a curious little old man, who seemed somehow to have shrunken up, and yet he was a gentleman from head to foot. His hair was long and curled at the ends, but it looked like floss silk. His eyes were dark and bright, his face was wrinkled, and his beard thin. Hanny thought of the old man at the Bowling Green who had been in the Bastille. His velvet coat, very much cut away, was faced with plum-colored satin, his long waistcoat was of flowered damask, his knee-breeches were fastened with silver buckles, and his slippers had much larger ones. There really were some diamonds in them. His shirt frill was crimped in the most beautiful manner, and the diamond pin sparkled with every turn.

"This is grandpa," said Mrs. French. "We are all very proud of him that he has kept his faculties, and we want him to live an even hundred years."

The old man smiled and shook his head slowly. He took Hanny's hand, and his was as soft as a baby's. He said he was very glad to see them both; he and their father had been talking over old times and relationships.

His voice had a pretty foreign sound. It was a soft, trained voice, but the accent was discernible.

"And you were here through the War of the Revolution," said Ben, who had been counting back.

"Yes. My father had just died and left nine children. I was the oldest, and there were two girls. So I couldn't be spared to go. The British so soon took possession of New York. But in 1812 I was free to fight for liberty and the country of my adoption. We were never molested nor badly treated, but of course we could give no aid to our countrymen. It was a long, weary struggle. No one supposed at first the rebels could conquer. And all that is seventy years ago, seventy years."

He leaned back and looked weary.

"You must come down some Saturday morning when he feels fresh and he will tell you all about it," said Mrs. French. "His memory is excellent, but he does get fatigued."

"I wonder if you ever saw the statue of King George that was in Bowling Green," Hanny asked, with a little hesitation. "They made bullets of it."

"Ah, you know that much?" He smiled and leaned over on the arm of the chair. "Yes, my child. The soldiers met to hear the Declaration of Independence read for the first time. Washington was on horseback with his aides around him. The applause was like a mighty shout from one throat. Then they rushed to the City Hall and tore the picture of the king from its frame, and then they dragged the statue through the streets. Yes, its final end was bullets for the rebels, as they were called. As my daughter says, come and see me again, and I will tell you all you want to hear. You are a pretty little girl," and he pressed Hanny's hand caressingly.

Then they said good-by to him and went back to the parlor.

"He always dresses up on holidays," said Mrs. French smilingly, "though he continues to wear the old-fashioned costume. He has had a number of calls to-day. People are still interested in the old times. And believe me, I shall take a great deal of pleasure in continuing the acquaintance. You may expect me very soon."

Luella kissed Hanny with frantic fervor and begged her to come again. She was so used to boys, she cared nothing about Ben.

The little girl had so much to tell Jim, who had been skating. The quarrelling parrots, the beautiful house, the queer little guinea-pigs, and the splendid hobby-horse that they didn't seem to care a bit about. "And Lu is a good deal like Dele, only not so nice or so funny, and her hair is awful black. She ran down-stairs with me in her arms and I was 'most frightened to death. I don't believe I would want to be her little sister. And the grandpa is like a picture of the old French people. And to think that he doesn't read English very well and always uses his French Bible. There were so many foreign people in New York at that time, I s'pose they couldn't all talk English."

"And they had preaching in Dutch after 1800 in the Middle Dutch Church," said Jim. "And even after the sermons were in English the singing had to be in Dutch. Aunt Nancy said the place used to be crowded just to hear the people sing."

"It's queer how they could understand each other. Do you suppose the children had to learn every language?"

Jim gave a great laugh at that.


CHAPTER XIV

JOHN ROBERT CHARLES

The new President was inaugurated on the fourth of March. The little girl sighed to think how many Democratic people there were on her block. They put out flags and bunting, and illuminated in the evening. They had tremendous bonfires, and all the boys waived personal feeling and danced and whooped like wild Indians. No healthy, well-conditioned boy could resist the fragrance of a tar barrel.

Miss Lily Ludlow wore a red, white, and blue rosette with a tiny portrait of Mr. Polk in the centre. The public-school girls often walked up First Avenue and met Mrs. Craven's little girls going home. Lily used to stare at Hanny in an insolent manner. She and her sister could not forgive the fact that Miss Margaret had not called.

And now the talk was that Miss Margaret Underhill had a beau, a handsome young doctor.

"They do think they're awful grand," said Lily to some of her mates. "But they take up with that Dele Whitney, who sometimes does the washing on Saturdays. It's a fact, girls; and the sister works in an artificial-flower place down in Division Street. And the Underhills think they're good enough to company with."

But the fact remained that the Underhills kept a carriage, and that Mr. Stephen had married in the Beekman family, and Chris had heard that Dr. Hoffman was considered a great catch. She was almost twenty and had never kept company yet. Young men called at the house, to be sure, and attended her home from parties, but the most desirable ones seemed unattainable.

Her mother fretted a little that she didn't get