the woodchuck bake in the grove behind the old school house, which dorothy and tavia used to attend, was pronounced
a success by the three youngsters. of course, there were not many invited guests, for aside from three woodchucks
and a half bushel of sweet potatoes, there were but half a dozen squirrels baked in the ashes of a huge campfire.
these were not sufficient to supply a regiment, as tavia herself said—and tavia was a generous body.
besides the two girl friends and the three small boys, there were the four freshmen, three of whom had frankly come
down here to dalton for this spring vacation just because dorothy and tavia were here.
these individuals could not really be counted as guests—any of them. so tom moran was really the only guest at the
bake. he had recovered dorothy’s hat and jacket and other possessions from the daggetts and their friends, and233
when he brought them to tavia’s, dorothy and her chum made tom come along with them to the picnic.
ned white had gone to mr. rouse, the farmer, and paid for the burned fodder stack.
“eight dollars, young gentlemen,” said ned, rather grimly, to joe and roger dale and tavia’s brother. rather a
high price to pay per pound for woodchuck meat; and nat figured it out to cost something like sixty or seventy cents
per pound.
“oh! don’t talk about it that way, nat,” begged joe. “it will taste so of money that none of us kids will want
to eat it.”
they all got pretty well acquainted with tom moran that day. and he really was a fine young fellow. although his
book learning might not be extensive, he had traveled much and was one of those fortunate persons who remember, and
can talk of, what they have seen.
tom moran was going back with the girls the next day, for the vacation was close upon its end. at first he was not
decided what he should do after getting little celia from mrs. hogan. but tavia and dorothy fixed that.
“tom,” said mr. travers, when the party returned from the woodchuck bake, “i’ve been talking with my partners
and we want you to settle down here in dalton and work for us.”
“i don’t know, mr. travers,” said the young234 man, undecidedly. “you see, i had some words with simpson——”
“oh, you won’t be under simpson—and we won’t put a mechanic like you to driving an ox-team, either. there is a
better job than that here for you,” and mr. travers talked seriously with the red-haired youth for an hour.
“the trouble with you is, you have never settled down. you haven’t had an anchor. now, celia can’t travel about
with you, and she’s got to be your care for some years to come.”
“i know. if i can get her away from that hogan woman. i may have trouble there—if the foundling asylum folk let
mrs. hogan adopt her.”
“if you want help in that matter, you trust to major dale, dorothy’s father. he’ll see you through, tom. and so
will your friends here in dalton. we want you to come back here and go to work.”
thus it was arranged. tom, the next day, appeared at the railroad station in a neat suit and with a new grip in his
hand. the grip was practically empty, he told dorothy; but he proposed to get it filled up with nice clothes for
celia if he could get the child away from her taskmistress at once.
the white boys and abe perriton and bob niles traveled back to college in the firebird, so235 dorothy and tavia said
good-bye to them before they left dalton. bob niles tried to get tavia off by herself to talk on the last evening
they were together; but tavia was suddenly very strict with him.
“you are nothing but a college freshman,” she told him, coolly, “and a very fresh freshman at that! don’t you
think for a minute that you are a grown-up young man—you are not. and i am only three months, or so, older than i
was when we parted in new york. it’s going to be a long, long time before either doro or i will begin to think
seriously of young men. besides—you’re not a twin,” she added, and ran away from him, leaving poor bob greatly
puzzled by her final phrase.
they were going back to glenwood a day early, because of tom’s anxiety. when the train reached the school station
only tavia got off; dorothy went on to belding with celia’s brother.
at the station they hired a carriage and an hour later drove into the lane leading to mrs. hogan’s home.
it was the first real spring day. the grass “was getting green by the minute,” so tom said; the trees were budding
bountifully; every little rill and stream was full and dancing to its own melody over the pebbles; the early
feathered comers, from236 swamp and woodland, were splitting their throats in song.
and when the two drove into the yard there were sounds of altercation from the house—the first harsh sounds they
had heard since starting from belding.
“and that’s the way ye do ut—heh?” exclaimed mrs. hogan’s strident voice. “after all i been tellin’ yez. ye
air the most impident, useless, wasteful crature that ever i come across! an’ not a bit of gratichude have ye for
me takin’ yez out of the findling an’ givin’ ye a home, an’ sumpin’ to ate, an’ a place ter lie down in.’ bad
’cess ter yez, cely moran! sorry the day i ever tuk yez——”
“i—i’m so sorry,” interposed celia’s feeble little voice. “won’t—won’t you please take me back there,
ma’am?”
“tak’ ye back where?” demanded the woman, in an uglier tone, were that possible. “tak’ ye back where?”
“to the findling, ma’am. oh, dear me!” sobbed celia, “i was a great deal happier there!”
“ungrateful——”
“no, ma’am. it isn’t that,” declared the child, grown desperate at last, perhaps. “but you don’t love me. you
don’t love any little girls. and i’d go without a sup to eat, or a roof like you give me, or—or a bed, jes’ to
be loved a little.”
“plague o’ me life!” ejaculated the woman.
237 they heard her swift and heavy foot across the floor. the child cried out before she was struck. tom had helped
dorothy out of the carriage and was tying the horse. swift of foot, the girl from glenwood was before him at the
door.
“celia!” she cried, before the echo of the slap crossed the kitchen.
celia’s whimper was changed to a scream of delight. she rushed across the room into dorothy’s arms.
“how dare you, mrs. hogan?” exclaimed dorothy, her beautiful eyes fairly flashing with anger. “how dare you?”
“who are ye, now? what! come to make more trouble, heh?” exclaimed the woman, advancing in her rage in a very
threatening way toward dorothy.
but dorothy stood her ground, while the child cowered behind her. “you cannot scare me, mrs. hogan,” declared
dorothy. “you dare not strike me. nor shall you ever touch this little one again.”
“impidence!” gasped the woman. “i’ll show ye——”
“show me, missus,” growled tom moran, his face very much flushed and his red hair seeming to stand fairly on end.
he had entered, put dorothy and celia gently to one side, and stood before the ogress. “show238 me, missus,” he
said again. “i’m more like your size.”
“who are you?” demanded the farm woman, taken aback.
but celia’s voice was again heard—and this time it was no whimper. she suddenly bounded upon tom and clasped both
her tiny arms about one of his sturdy legs.
“i know him! i know him!” she shrieked. “my miss dorothy dale has kep’ her promise. it’s tom moran. i knowed i
’d know him. don’t you see his red hair?”
“and he kin take his red hair out o’ here,” declared mrs. hogan, standing with arms akimbo and a very red face.
“it’s quick enough i shall be doin’ so,” said tom moran, sternly. “and cely shall come with me.”
“not much!” ejaculated the woman. “i got her, bound hard and fast be the orphan asylum folks——”
tom seemed to swell until he was twice his usual size. his steely eyes flashed as dorothy’s had flashed.
“let me tell ye something, me lady,” he almost croaked, and shaking a finger in mrs. hogan’s face. “if ye had a
stack av papers from the foundling asylum, as high as yon tree, ye’d not kape me from takin’ away me own sister—
mind239 that now! and you call yourself an irishwoman? where’s yer hear-r-rt? where’s yer pity for the little wan
of yer own race, left to the tinder care of strangers? ah-h!”
like ned white, when he had tackled the daggett woman and her crony, tom moran heartily wished at that moment that
mrs. ann hogan were a man!
“i’m going to take me sister away from ye,” said tom, after a minute’s silence. “stay me if ye dare!”
he picked the child up suddenly and hugged her fiercely to his broad breast. celia, with a happy cry, put both arms
about his neck, and looked up into his red face.
“i’se so glad you comed for me like you did, tom moran. and you will keep me with you always?”
“please god i will, cely,” he said kissing her, hungrily.
the child laughed, and flung her head back so that she could see him the better.
“do you hear, dear dorothy dale?” she cried. “i am going with tom moran. why, maybe we’ll keep house together. i
can keep the house—jes’ as clean! an’ i can cook, an’ scrub, an’ wash—’cause you know, they say i’se jes’
the cutest little thing!”
