“Well, yes: I think I can find something for you and Bessie to do,” said mamma: “you may take all these tapes, needles, spools, and so forth, into your own room, and see how neatly you can put them into this box; and all these ribbons may go into that one.”
“Oh! thank you, mamma: I will let Bessie do the ribbons, ’cause they are the prettiest;” and away ran generous Maggie with her sister to begin the pleasant task.
That done, mamma gave them leave to pack the clothes belonging to Miss Bessie Margaret Marian, and Miss Margaret Colonel Horace Rush Bradford, in another box; saying that since she did not feel as if she could do without her own little daughters, she would not ask them to leave the whole of their large family behind, and thought the dolls might prove a great diversion when they were tired, or perhaps shut up in some hotel on a rainy day.
They were busy deciding what dresses should be taken and what left, when Mrs. Norris came round to see Mrs. Bradford for a few moments, bringing Lily with her; and while the ladies talked in one room, the little girls chattered away in the other, Belle coming in about the same time.
“Oh!” said Lily, “is your mamma going to let you take your large dolls? my mamma will only let me take a tiny, weeny one that can go in a travelling-bag.”
“I wouldn’t take any then,” said Belle. “I’m going to take my largest, biggest one of all.”
“Not Belle Maggie Bessie?” questioned Maggie.
“Yes: Belle Maggie Bessie!” repeated Belle, in a tone of determined obstinacy and snappishness, which showed that the subject was a sore one with her.
“But your papa said last night that you could not take her, ’cause such a large doll would be too much trouble,” said Bessie.
“Well, anyhow, I’m going to: he said I could this morning,” answered Belle.
“Then you cried and cried and bothered him, till he said yes: I know you,” said Maggie, reproachfully.
“I don’t care,” said Belle; but she did care, and now was ashamed that her little playmates should guess how she had worried her too indulgent papa.
“You might repent yet and tell him you won’t take her,” said Bessie.
“Yes, do, and make a Rip Van Winkle of her,” said Maggie.
“I shan’t make her that ugly thing, and I shall take her,” said Belle, indignantly.
“You needn’t be so cross,” said Maggie: “Bessie and I made all our other dolls Rip Van Winkles and William Tells, and it was good fun. Don’t you want to see them, Lily?”
Lily assented; and, opening a deep drawer in the bureau, Maggie showed her all the various dolls belonging to herself and Bessie, lying with bandages on their eyes.
“I don’t see what you call them William Tells and that other name for,” said Lily. “William Tell was the man Miss Ashton told us about, who shot an apple off his son’s head.”
“Yes,” answered Maggie; “and we told Harry and Fred about it, but they knew before, and told us that the Swiss people believe that he and his companions went fast asleep in a cave for a great many hundred years, and some day they would wake up and rule over them.”
“And who was the Winkle man?” asked Belle.
“He was another old fellow who went up into the mountains and went to sleep for ever so many years; and when he woke up nobody knew him, and he did not know anybody. Harry told us about him. I don’t see how people can be so foolish as to sleep for so long; but it came into my head to make our dolls Rip Van Winkles and William Tells till we came back, and then we wouldn’t feel as if they were so lonely when they were asleep all the time.”
“It’s only pretend, you know, and one can make b’lieve about dolls even better than about people,” said Bessie. “And it’s a great relief to suffering to go to sleep and forget it,” she added, as gravely as though there were no “pretend” about it, and the dolls were real children, feeling deeply the separation from their little mammas.
“That’s a very nice thing to do. You do make such nice plays, Maggie,” said Lily, admiringly. “I shall do it with my dolls: you’d better too, Belle.”
“Well, I don’t know; but I’m going to think about it,” said Belle, in whose little heart Maggie’s reproach had awakened a feeling of remorse for the selfishness and obstinacy she had shown about her doll. “I b’lieve Belle Maggie Bessie is most too large. I can’t carry her much myself, and papa did say she’d be in everybody’s way. I guess I’ll make a William Tell of her, if Maggie and Bessie will let me put her with theirs.”
“Yes, we will; and you can take a doll of moderation,” said Maggie, meaning that Belle could take a doll of moderate size.
“Do you think you’ll be seasick on the steamer?” asked Lily.
“Pooh! no, I shan’t. I won’t be,” said Maggie.
“Perhaps you can’t help it,” said Belle. “I’m sure I didn’t mean to be seasick when I came here in the steamer, but I couldn’t help it; and oh dear! – it’s – it is horrid.”
“Is being seasick any thing like being homesick?” asked Bessie.
“Not exactly; but the two things very often go together, darling,” said Aunt Bessie, laughing, and speaking from the next room.
“Then I’m more determined than ever not to be it,” said Maggie, meaning seasick by “it.” “But then I couldn’t be homesick either, when I have so many of my own home people with me.”
But, in spite of her determination, Maggie had privately a great dread of this same seasickness. She could not bear to be sick; not that she was impatient or cross when this was the case with her, but that she thought sickness, like sleep, was “a great waste of being alive.” She wanted to be able to run about and amuse herself all the time; and it was “such fun” to go to sea, that she was very much afraid lest any thing should interfere with her enjoyment of it.
“They give people sour things when they are seasick,” said Belle, who, having once suffered in this way, thought herself entitled to give all necessary information on the subject. “That’s the only nice thing about it. They gave me lots of sour oranges and lemons.”
“But Bessie and I don’t like sour things, so that won’t make it any better for us,” said Maggie, soberly. Nevertheless, she treasured Belle’s remark; and not seeing her way clearly to a private stock of oranges and lemons, she watched her opportunity when her little playmates were gone, and taking Patrick into her confidence, begged him to give her “two pickles and a whole lot of vinegar,” not to eat herself, because mamma would not allow that, but to be prepared, when all the rest of the family were seasick and she had to take care of them.
The good-natured Irishman, expressing great admiration at the “forethought of her,” furnished her with what she wanted; and Maggie went off, rejoicing in her spoils.
The pickles were stowed away in the soup-tureen belonging to her doll’s dinner-set; and she contrived, when nurse and Jane were not looking, to slip them into a corner of one of the trunks. The vinegar she poured into a vial she had also obtained from Patrick; and as the cork did not fit very tightly, and she feared the liquid might run out if she put it into the trunk, she hid it in her bosom, heroically enduring the smell of the vinegar, which was exceedingly disagreeable to her, “for the sake of my family,” as she told Bessie.
For Bessie’s quick little nose soon smelt out the vinegar, which she also disliked very much; and after several sniffs and exclamations of disgust from her, and much wondering as to where that “horrid, vinegarish smell did come from,” Maggie felt forced to tell her the secret which she had meant to keep until they were safely on board the steamer.
But Bessie was by no means so struck with admiration as Patrick had been, and for once did not think Maggie’s plan a good one; at least not unless she could be persuaded