The Adopting of Rosa Marie Read online

  CHAPTER IV

  An Unusual Evening

  MABEL looked in dismay at Rosa Marie.

  "Where do you s'pose your mother is?" she demanded.

  It was useless, however, to question Rosa Marie. That stolid youngperson was as uncommunicative as what Marjory called "the littlestuffed Indians in the Washington Museum." The Indians to whom Marjoryreferred were made of wax. Rosa Marie seemed more like a little woodenIndian. The countenance of little Anne Halliday changed with everymoment; but Rosa Marie's wore only one expression. Perhaps it had onlyone to wear.

  "I say," said Mabel, gently shaking her small brown charge by theshoulders, "where does your mother usually go when she isn't home?"

  A surprised grunt was the only response.

  Rosa Marie, too suddenly released, sat heavily on the ground,thoughtfully scratched up the surface and filled her lap with handfulsof loose, unattractive earth.

  "Goodness! What an untidy child!" cried Mabel, snatching her up andshaking her, although Rosa Marie's weight made her youthful guardianstagger. "I wanted your mother to see you clean, for once. Here, siton this stick of wood. I s'pose we'll just have to wait and wait untilsomebody comes. Well, _sit_ in the sand if you want to. I'm tired ofpicking you up."

  Rosa Marie's home was in rather an attractive spot. The big, quiet lakewas smooth as glass, and every object along its picturesque bank wasmirrored faithfully in the quiet depths. The western sky was faintlytinged with red. Against it the spires and tall roofs of the town stoodout sharply; but at this quiet hour they seemed very far away.

  Mabel, seated on the wooden box that she had placed under the window,leaned back against the house and clasped her hands about her knees,while she gazed dreamily at the picture and listened with enjoyment tothe faint lap of the quiet water on the pebbled beach.

  Both Mabel and Rosa Marie had had a busy day. Both had taken unusualexercise. And now all the sights and sounds were soothing, soothing.

  You can guess what happened. Both little girls fell asleep. Rosa Marie,flat on her stomach, pillowed her head on her chubby arms. Mabel'shead, drooping slowly forward, grew heavier and heavier until finallyit touched her knees.

  An hour later, the sleepy head had grown so very heavy that it pulledMabel right off the box and tumbled her over in a confused, astonishedheap on the ground.

  "My goodness!" gasped Mabel, still on hands and knees. "Where am I,anyway? Is this Saturday or Sunday? Why! It's all dark. This--thisisn't my room--why! why! I'm outdoors! How did I get outdoors?"

  Mabel stood up, took a step forward, stumbled over Rosa Marie and wentdown on all-fours.

  "What's that!" gasped bewildered Mabel, groping with her hands. Shefelt the rough black head, the plump body, the round legs, the barefeet of her sleeping charge. Memory returned.

  "Why! It's Rosa Marie, and we're waiting here by the lake for hermother. It--ugh! It must be midnight!"

  But it wasn't. It was just exactly twenty minutes after seven o'clockbut, with the autumn sun gone early to bed, it certainly seemed verymuch later. The house was still deserted.

  "I guess," said Mabel, feeling about in the dark for Rosa Marie'sfat hand, "we'd better go home--or some place. Come, Rosa Marie, wakeup. I'm going to take you home with me. Oh, _please_ wake up. There'snobody here but us. It's way in the middle of the night and there mightbe _any_thing in those awfully black bushes."

  But Rosa Marie, deprived of her noontide nap, slumbered on. Mabel shookher.

  "Do hurry," pleaded frightened Mabel. "I don't like it here."

  It was anything but an easy task for Mabel to drag the sleepingchild to her feet, but she did it. Rosa Marie, however, immediatelydropped to earth again. During the day she had seemed stiff; but now,unfortunately, she proved most distressingly limber. She seemed, infact, to possess more than the usual number of joints, and discouragedMabel began to fear that each joint was reversible.

  "Goodness!" breathed Mabel, when Rosa Marie's knees failed for theseventh time, "it seems wicked to shake you _very_ hard, but I've gotto."

  Even with vigorous and prolonged shakings it took time to get RosaMarie firmly established on her feet, and the children had walked morethan a block of the homeward way before Rosa Marie opened one blinkingeye under the street lamp.

  If it had been difficult to make the uphill journey in broad daylightwith Rosa Marie wide awake and moderately willing, it was now a doublydifficult matter with that young person half or three-quarters asleepand most decidedly unwilling.

  "I wish to goodness," grumbled Mabel, stumbling along in the dark,"that I'd borrowed a real baby and not a heathen."

  The longest journey has an end. The children reached DandelionCottage at last. Mabel found the key, unlocked the door, tumbled RosaMarie, clothes and all, into the middle of the spare-room bed; waitedjust long enough to make certain that the Indian baby slept; then,reassured by gentle, half-breed snores, Mabel, still supposing thetime to be midnight, ran home, climbed into her own bed nearly an hourearlier than usual and was soon sound asleep. Her mind was too full ofother matters to wonder why the front door was unlocked at so late anhour.

  Mrs. Bennett, dressing to go to a party, heard her daughter come in.

  "How fortunate!" said she. "Now I shan't have to go to Jean'sand Marjory's and Bettie's to hunt for Mabel. She must be tiredto-night--she doesn't often go to bed so early."