W. A. G.\'s Tale
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Margaret Turnbull >> W. A. G.\'s Tale
Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Rebekah Inman
and the PG Distributed Proofreaders
W.A.G.'S TALE
EDITED BY
MARGARET TURNBULL
WITH ZOBZEE ILLUSTRATIONS
BY THE AUTHOR
CONTENTS
PREFACE BY AUTHOR
I. UNCLE BURT'S BILLY
II. OUR HOUSE
III. OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOR
IV. ON THE TOWPATH
V. ON THE DELAWARE
VI. GEORGE
VII. LEFT ALONE
VIII. AT TURNER'S
IX. THE WHITE TENT
ILLUSTRATIONS
I STARTED TO GET BETTER AND WRITE THIS BOOK (p. 153) (colored)
_Frontispiece_ From a drawing by M.L. Kirk
A ZOBZEE
ON THE BRIDGE
HE JUMPED OUT AND TOOK A ROPE AND PULLED THE BOAT CLOSE
SHE WASHED AND I DRIED
HE TURNED AND WENT INTO THE WHITE STONE HOUSE, AND ALL THE CATS RAN
AFTER HIM
HE SMOKED A PIPE, AND I PLAYED WITH ALL HIS TEDDY-CATS
BRINGS HIM DOWN, PERSIMMONS AND ALL
SO I TOOK MY FISHING-ROD AND FLICKED IT AT HIM
NEVER YOU MIND, BABY DEAR, COME ON
WHAT'S AN ABSENT-MINDED BEGGAR?
HEY, ROBINSON CRUSOE, HERE'S YOUR MAN FRIDAY
HE HAD TO TAKE A CAN-OPENER AND CUT AUNTY EDITH'S FOOT OUT
WE ALL WORKED WITH HOSE AND EVERYTHING
AUNTY MAY GOT A HATCHET AND MADE A CHOP AT THE SNAKE
I BELIEVED THEY HAD REALLY GONE AWAY, AND LEFT ME ALL ALONE
I TOLD HIM ALL ABOUT AUNTY MAY
SLID DOWN WITHOUT A BIT OF NOISE
I WOKE UP AND FOUND MYSELF LYING ON THE PORCH
AND IT WAS UNCLE BURT
W.A.G.'S TALE
PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR
I have been sick. Now I am better the Doctor makes me lie in bed because
of all that Anti-toxin he put in me, which weakens the heart. Anti-toxin
isn't a lady, it's a medicine for diphtheria. Aunty May is a lady. She
reads me books and plays games with me. But I am tired of books written
about nature, and animals, and Indians, and fairies, and I wished out
loud that somebody would write a book about a boy, just like me. So
to-day Aunty May brought me a big, thick blank book with red covers, and
with rings at the back to let me add more paper when I want to, and she
told me to write my own story, a little every day.
[Illustration: "Zobzee"]
So that's what I am going to do, and illustrate it with "Zobzees."
"Zobzees" are thin dancing people--like this. I invented that name, and
a country and a language for them, which only Aunty May and I know. But
I am not going to write my book in that. I am going to print it, like
other books, but draw "Zobzees" because they are easy; and if nobody
else reads it except me and Uncle Burt when he comes home, it will be
fun for us, anyway.
CHAPTER I
UNCLE BURT'S BILLY
My name is William Ainsworth Gordon, and my initials spell W.A.G. That
is why Aunty May and I call this book "W.A.G.'S TALE." If it was about a
dog it would be "Tail Wags." So it's true and a joke too.
I am ten years old and my father and mother are in Heaven, and I have
only Uncle Burt to take care of me. Uncle Burt isn't my real uncle, but
he was my father's chum when they were at West Point, and he promised
father to take care of me. And he does, only he had to go to the
Philippines with his soldiers; so his sister, Aunty Edith, is taking
care of me until he comes back. Everybody else calls me William, but he
calls me "Billy," so I am the one this chapter is named after.
Aunty May says I can begin with the very day Aunty Edith brought me down
here. That was the day Uncle Burt went away to join his regiment, and
everybody was sort of quiet, and even the big people cried a little. I
cried a good deal, when nobody was looking, and when Uncle Burt caught
me at it in the corner of the room, he didn't say a word, but just
picked me up and held me so tight that one of his buttons got stamped
on my cheek like a seal. He said he'd give way and cry, too, for it was
good for the eyes, only his Colonel had expressly ordered him not to,
saying he would leave all red-eyed men home, which would be terrible for
a soldier. So I begged him not to give way, and he said he wouldn't if
I'd stop, because one fellow bawling makes it hard for the other fellow
not to. So I stopped and we laughed a little, and then he showed the
mark on my cheek to Aunty Edith, and said, "This shows that this young
man belongs to me, so be careful of Uncle Burt's Billy and return him in
good condition, for there will be a dreadful time if I find him chipped
or broken, when I come back."
Then the lady I call Aunty May, though she isn't any relation to me
either, but is just Aunty Edith's friend, laughed and said she would be
careful to treat me nicely. And she has. I like her best next to Uncle
Burt. She didn't cry. She laughed a lot, and every time Uncle Burt got
sad and tried to talk to her, she laughed more, and she took me on her
lap and kept me there all the time Uncle Burt was saying good-bye
to her.
He looked more like crying then than any other time. He said,
"Good-bye, May; won't you change your mind?" and she said, "Oh, no,
Burt, I can't." Then he was going to say something else when I said,
"Remember the Colonel, Uncle Burt, and don't get your eyes too red to
go," and then they both laughed. Uncle Burt said, "Look after Miss Heath
for me, Billy, while I'm gone," and I said, "Sure I will. I'm going to
adopt her as my Aunty, too." She put her arms round me and hugged me and
Uncle Burt said, "Lucky Billy," and then the door closed, and Aunty
Edith began to cry and Aunty May looked queer for a minute and went to
the door. I thought she'd run after him, but she stopped and said,
"Come along, Sir William, and we'll pack our bags, 'cause we're all
going to the country on the 3.10." And I took hold of her hand, and we
went upstairs together, and packed my bag and put in my gun, my
soldiers, my books and my paint-box. Then Aunty Edith stopped crying and
tied a veil over her face. If she'd been a soldier she'd been left home
all right.
We got in a taxi with a lot of bags and things and went to the
Pennsylvania Station, which is miles and miles long, I think, but there
are lots of kind black men who wear red caps and run up and take your
bags and carry them for you just as easy, One of them took my bag and
Aunty May's suitcase, but Aunty Edith had another one--a fat one--all
alone for her things.
We just had time for our train, so we had to hurry right through the
waiting-room, and I couldn't stop and see all the things there are to
see, or watch the people coming down the stairs. People's legs are funny
if you watch them coming down--like things made with hinges.
Then we got into a nice big train with chairs in it that swung round.
They call it a "Pullman" which is a good name for a car, only it's the
engine that pulls the man and the car, too, really. Then we got all
comfortable, with another nice colored man who showed his teeth at us,
and put our bags up on a rack, and Aunty May gave me some sweet
chocolate and a magazine with pictures in it, and Aunty Edith said. "I
wish we didn't have to change at Trenton,"--and--then--I fell asleep.
The next thing I knew Aunty May was saying to me, "Wake up, Billy, dear,
it's Trenton now." She put on my jacket and the man took our bags again
and we stepped out on a big platform, and then another man took all our
bags and we went up one stair, and down another, and waited on a long
platform, where trains kept shooting up every minute.
I couldn't understand what the man in uniform said, until at last a
funny little train--all short, only half as long as our New York one,
and with funny, hard straight seats--came, and we climbed in. Aunty
Edith and Aunty May and me had to carry our own bags and fix 'em. The
train waited a long time, but at last it moved, and Aunty May put her
arm round me and sat me next the window, only it wasn't open, because it
was only April and wasn't warm enough yet, and said, "Now we're off to
East Penniwell."
The train just crawled along, and there was a big canal on the one
side. I saw a canal boat with two men and a dog on it, and they were
cooking something in a big pot on the top of a stove that stood right
out of doors, on top of the boat, with a stovepipe that didn't go into
any chimney, but right up into the air--with smoke coming out of it!
I showed it to Aunty May and she said, "You will see them every day when
we get to the towpath," and I felt awful glad at that, because though
the boat moved slow, the train moved fast, and I didn't get a good look
at the boy who was driving the mules. I couldn't be sure whether he'd
made a face at me or not, but I think he did.
Then by and by on the other side of the train came a great big river,
all fast and running along and some bubbling-up places in it where rocks
stood up. Aunty May said those were rapids and this was the Delaware
River, the one Washington crossed.
I think more of him than ever, now I've seen the river, for it's good
and wide and it must have been a cold job getting over it. I told Aunty
May I hoped it wasn't at the rapids he tried to cross, and she said,
"Oh, no," and "I'll show you," and presently the train stopped and the
conductor said, "Washington's Crossing," There was a big tree, where he
could have tied a boat if he'd wanted to. Aunty May said maybe he did;
and a white house where I guess the soldiers got something to eat and
drink. Anyway, I hoped so. Aunty May said she'd never asked, so she
couldn't say, positively, as it was so long ago, but it wouldn't hurt to
think they did. So I imagined it that way.
Then our train stopped at a station and we got out. I hadn't been ready
for its stopping, and I got so busy getting my things on, and getting my
bag in my hand, that I didn't hear the name of it, and I asked Aunty May
if it was East Penniwell, and she said, "Oh, no, this is Scrubbsville,
New Jersey, and East Penniwell is in Pennsylvania."
"Will we get into another train, then?" I asked, and Aunty May laughed
and said, "Oh, no, just wait and see." Then we got off and walked down,
carrying our bags, to a big bridge right over the Delaware.
There was a man sitting, at the end of the bridge, in a little house
with a window in it, and you paid him two cents apiece before you could
get on the bridge to go to Pennsylvania. He is the Toll-Man and it is a
Toll-Bridge, and it seemed to me very funny to have to pay to walk.
Aunty May said it was funny, too, but Aunty Edith said it was
a nuisance.
Aunty Edith asked the Toll-Man if we could leave our big suitcase
there, until Mr. Tree the grocer came over with a wagon for our trunks,
later, and he said, "Yes." He was a nice smiling man.
Then Aunty Edith and Aunty May and I, and Aunty Edith's bag and my
little one, which Aunty May carried because she said we had a long walk
ahead of us, went over the bridge.
[Illustration: On the Bridge]
The wind almost blew my cap away, but I caught it just in time, and on
the bridge we met a big man carrying a paint-box and a folding-up
stool, like Aunty Edith has, and he had an E-normous dog, as big as me,
and it galumphed at me, and I got behind Aunty Edith, for she is very
big both ways, and the man said, "Down, Pete," When the dog downed, he
shook hands with Aunty Edith, and she introduced him to Aunty May and
me, and he said he was glad to see us, and I could come and play with
his children up the towpath.
I said, "Yes, sir," but Aunty May and me kept away from Pete, because we
didn't know him then. We know him now and like him. The man said, "Wait
till I get back and I'll take you up in the launch." Then he went on to
Scrubbsville, and Aunty Edith said, "Such a pleasure to meet Mr. Turner.
Now William won't get tired walking up. Won't that be nice, William, to
go up the canal in the launch, instead of walking?" I said, "Yes, 'm,
Aunty Edith," to her, but to Aunty May I said, "Will that Pete be in the
boat, too?" and Aunty May whispered back, "Ow Gracious! I hope not. But
don't let him know we're afraid, old man." So I took her hand tight and
we followed Aunty Edith, who is an awful fast walker and always has so
many things to do.
First we went to the Post-Office, which is a little wooden building,
and the Postmaster knows everybody and looks at you over his glasses.
Then we went up a funny street with brick pavements, awful old. There
are houses on that very street built before the Revolution, and a big
cannon in the square. We went to Mr. Tree's, and he's a nice, big grocer
man, with everything in his shop, and he patted me on the head and gave
me a chocolate candy, which Aunty Edith said I might eat, if I ate it
slowly. He said he would bring our trunks and bags up right away. Aunty
Edith said, "Now I've got to order oil from Tryer and coal from Quick
and some thread from Miss Macfarland's notion store," and I said, "Why
don't the servants do all that, Aunty Edith?" She laughed and said,
"There are no servants for us at East Penniwell, William; we do the work
ourselves," Aunty May said, "But it will be fun, Billy. All the artists
like Aunty Edith live that way down here, and you and I will be the
writer people and we'll do lots of funny things together. Only, Edith,"
she said, "the boy and I are weary; where can we rest while you finish
your shopping?"
"Oh, very well," Aunty Edith said; "come and I'll show you the launch
and you can get in that and sit and wait for Mr. Turner."
We walked up a funny, hilly, crooked street, with partly brick
pavements again and partly stone, till we came to an old wooden bridge
over a canal, and then Aunty May squeezed my hand and said, "Billy, this
is our canal," We crossed the bridge, and went down a few steps and
there was Mr. Turner's launch. We got in and sat and watched the water
and made up stories to each other, till Aunty Edith and Mr. Turner came,
all full of bundles. Mr. Turner started the launch and we went
chug-chugging along. But Pete didn't get in. He swam part of the time
and ran and barked on the towpath the other part.
The canal boats came down past us, and they began to have lights on
them, and the trees were all green and hung down by the canal banks, and
I could see where the dogwood was beginning to come out in the woods.
There were some ducks swimming in the canal, and a farmhouse high above
us on the bank. Then nothing but the towpath, which is the path on one
side of the canal where the mules walk when they drag the canal boats.
By and by I saw two tiny white houses, with their roofs and chimneys
sticking up over the canal bank, and one of them had a funny green door,
and honeysuckle all growing over the fence. Mr. Turner never stopped
till Aunty Edith called, "Oh, we're going past," Then he stopped and
jumped out and took a rope and pulled the boat close to the bank, where
there were some stones placed like steps. I saw the two houses plainly
then, one a white stone one and one a white wooden one with a
green door.
[Illustration: He jumped out and took a rope and pulled the boat close]
We all stepped out, with our bags, and said good-bye to Mr. Turner, and
his launch went away up the canal past us, and Aunty Edith took a key
out of her pocket and went down a step, into the garden of the house
with the green door, and opened it, and said to Aunty May and me, "Come
in, children. This is OUR HOUSE."
[Illustration]
CHAPTER II
OUR HOUSE
Aunty May and I went inside, and we looked at each other and laughed. It
was small, like a doll's house, and the room we stepped into, through
the doorway, had a window the same side as the door, which looked out on
the towpath, and two windows at the back, and a stovepipe coming right
out of the floor and running up through the low ceiling.
When I went and looked out of the back windows, I called to Aunty May,
"Oh, see, it's the Delaware." And it was.
There, right at the foot of our back garden, under the willow trees, was
the Delaware River, running along, very fast.
I said, "Come on, let's go down to the river, Aunty May." But Aunty
Edith said, "First, look at the house."
We went through a little door into another long, narrow, low room, with
a window on the towpath and a window on the river, and a queer
old-fashioned bureau and two iron beds in it, and a clothes-horse, in
one corner, covered with muslin. When you opened one flap of it, it was
a closet. This was Aunty Edith and Aunty May's room.
In the other room, with the stovepipe in the middle of it, was a big
couch, and that was to be my bed at night. There was a big closet at one
end, made out of the place where the steps went up to the attic, and
that was where my clothes were to hang. One side of the room had
bookshelves, and on the wall were some of Aunty Edith's paintings; and
there was a doorway at one end without any door.
I said to Aunty Edith, "How do we get to the river from this house? Do
we have to go out of the front door and run down? And where's the stove
that the pipe belongs to? Is it in a cellar?" Then both the aunties
laughed, and they went to this doorway without any door, and there was a
funny thing that looked like a clumsy ladder. Aunty Edith told me those
were our best stairs, and that once they were canal boat stairs.
Well, you climbed down them very carefully, for they tipped a little,
and you landed on a dark little landing with a door. You opened the door
and stepped down a step and there you were in the nicest old kitchen
you ever saw!
The top part of the house was wooden, but this under part was of stone
and cement, and the walls inside were cement, and the ceiling was just
wood with the big floor beams showing through. And there was a door with
glass in the top, that you could look through down to the river and the
willows; and there was a window with a deep window seat you could sit in
and look at the river; then there was a long window at the side, where
the outside steps came down from the towpath, and that opened in two
halves and had narrow panes of glass. It looked out on a garden.
A big cook-stove, with a kettle steaming on it, was at one end of the
room; and a nice big table, and there were some comfortable chairs, and
pots and pans hanging over and under the mantel back of the stove.
There was a rug on the floor, and a pantry with lots of good things to
eat in it, and a big couch that I sat down on, and looked around.
There was a little place in the wall, too, that had once been a window,
but was closed up and made into a little cupboard for dishes.
I said, "My! isn't this lovely?" Aunty May squeezed my hand and said it
was, and Aunty Edith looked around and said, "Well, Mrs. Katy Smith did
get my postal in time, after all. I'm so glad, because if she hadn't,
it wouldn't have been so nice and clean in here, and there would have
been no fire. Now, I'm going to take off my things and make a supper
for us all."
Aunty May said, "I'll help you," but Aunty Edith said, "Not this first
time, May. You take the boy out and show him the garden and the river,"
So Aunty May and I took hold of hands and went out, and there was a long
flower-bed running right down to the river-bank, on both sides of a long
grassplot; and beyond the grass and flowers was a lot of ploughed land
for vegetables and things; and beyond that there were a lot of woods.
There was a path between the grassplot and the flower-bed next the fence
of our neighbor, in the white stone house, and we went down that, and
when we came to the end of the flower-bed there was a big apple tree,
and then we went under that and stood on the river-bank, and there was
the Delaware!
Under the biggest willow tree there was a seat made of an old box, and
Aunty May and I sat down for a minute and looked at the river. It was so
clear that I could see the little fishes swimming along, and I threw a
stick in it, and it went by so fast that Aunty May said, "My! how swift
the current is. You must be careful, Billy-boy, and not go near the edge
when you are alone." I said, "Yes, 'm, but I am to go in wading when it
gets warmer."
We went along the bank a little farther, and there were more trees,
cherry trees, and willow trees, and buttonwood trees, and lots of nice
places for us to put our hammocks. Then we went back to the house, and
there was Aunty Edith in a big gingham apron toasting bread and making
chocolate. I laughed and said, "Oh, Aunty Edith, I never saw you look
like that in the city." Then we all laughed, and Aunty Edith said, "You
will see me look like this very often down here, for we all have to do
our share of the work. You, too, Billy. You will have to help us." I
said, "That will be bully."
Aunty May set the table, and we all sat down and ate our toast and ham
and eggs, and drank our chocolate, and I thought it was better than
anything I had ever eaten.
Just when we were in the middle of it, I heard footsteps crunching along
the walk, and down the steps at the side of the house from the towpath.
I called, "Some one's coming." Aunty Edith went to the door.
It was Mr. Tree with the trunks and the suitcase. He said, "Hullo,
young fellow. Have you come to take care of these ladies?" And I said,
"Yes, sir"; and he said, "That's right. Look after 'em. It'll be a load
off my mind to know they've got a man on the premises. It's right lonely
up here." And I told him we wasn't afraid. I asked him if he needed any
help, but he said no, and he was so terrible big and strong that he
lifted the trunks as if they were boxes.
After he had gone, Aunty Edith said she must unpack, and Aunty May said,
"Do, Edith; Billy and I will do the dishes."
So Aunty May tied a big clean towel around my waist, and she washed and
I dried. There was no running water, just a pump outside the kitchen
shed, right out of doors.
[Illustration: She washed and I dried]
I pumped for Aunty May and we had a lovely time. We played a game with
the dishes. Plates were ladies and saucers were little girls, and cups
were little boys, and knives and forks were policemen and spoons were
servants. We had a lot of fun, when the knives and forks marched round
the table, and ordered the other dishes into the cupboard.
After that was done, Aunty May said she must go upstairs and help Aunty
Edith, and unpack her own typewriter. Aunty May writes stories, too,
only she uses a typewriter and I use a pencil.
Aunty May asked me whether I'd sit in the window seat and read a
picture-book or would I explore the garden. I said I would do both; look
at pictures a little while and go in the garden. Aunty May made me
promise not to go too near the river, or too far down the towpath.
Then she went upstairs and I read a little till I had enough of
reading, and I thought I'd go to the towpath, but first, as I was
thirsty, I thought I'd get a glass and take a drink at the pump. But
when I tried to pump, the pump-handle just went up in the air, and
wouldn't pump up any water!
And just as I tried it again, I heard somebody say, "That pump handle
oughter been left up in the air. Say, young feller, you gotter pour some
water down first. That pump ain't been used stiddy for some little while
back. Ease it up and she'll go all right."
[Illustration: Turned and went into the house, and all the cats ran
after him]
I turned around, and there, leaning against the fence, was an old man
with big blue eyes and a white mustache, and a pipe, and a plaid vest
and a soft hat, and the biggest lot of cats I ever saw. Seven of them,
white and gray and black and mixed colors, all looking up at me.
I was so surprised that I didn't know what to say. But the old gentleman
said, "Wait here, and I'll fetch you a kittle of water," and he turned
and went into the white stone house, and all the cats ran after him. But
he shut the door tight, and the cats sat waiting and mewing on the back
porch, and I held on to the pump-handle and waited too.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER III
OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOR
In a minute he came out with a tin pail in his hand, and all the cats
ran after him, and he said, "Shoo, Teddy," and they ran away a little
bit, but came back and mewed and rubbed against his feet. He handed me
the pail across the fence, and I took it, and he said, "A little at a
time, boy." Then he went up to his porch and got a big dish and said,
"Here, Teddy, Teddy," and all the cats ran to him, and he fed them.
I stood watching him, and he said, "Why don't you ease the pump?" and I
said, "If you please, sir, which one of your cats is Teddy?" He said,
"Sho, boy, they're all named Teddy after President Roosevelt, and
because it saves trouble. When I calls, 'Here, Teddy,'--they all comes.
When I calls, 'Shoo, Teddy,'--they all shoos," And I said, "That's the
best idea I ever heard of--for cats."
He said, "Now, boy, you lift the handle of that pump high and throw some
water into her, and then keep a-pumping." And I did, and the water came,
and I pumped up a glassful, but he wouldn't take any.
Then I said I'd fill the pail and bring it round because I'd like to
see his cats close to, and he said, "Never mind the pail, young fellow,
jist hand it over and come round yourself,"
[Illustration: He smoked a pipe, and I played with all his Teddy-cats]
So I did, first calling to Aunty Edith to ask if I might, and she came
to the door and shook hands with him, over the fence, and said, "How do
you do, Mr. Taylor. This is William Gordon, the son of Captain Gordon, I
told you of." Then he said, "Sho, you don't meanter say it! I served
under his grandfather." And Aunty Edith said to me, "William, Mr. Taylor
was a soldier in the army all through the Civil War, and he can tell you
lots about it." So I went over to his house and we sat on his back
porch, and he smoked a pipe, and I played with all his Teddy-cats.