Susan Coolidge - What Katy Did

Katy came to meet them as they entered. Not on her feet: that, alas! was still only a far-off possibility; but in a chair with large wheels, with which she was rolling herself across the room. This chair was a great comfort to her. Sitting in it, she could get to her closet and her bureau-drawers, and help herself to what she wanted without troubling anybody. It was only lately that she had been able to use it. Dr. Carr considered her doing so as a hopeful sign, but he had never told Katy this. She had grown accustomed to her invalid life at last, and was cheerful in it, and he thought it unwise to make her restless, by exciting hopes which might after all end in fresh disappointment.

She met the girls with a bright smile as they came in, and said:

“Oh, Clovy, it was you I rang for! I am troubled for fear Bridget will meddle with the things on Papa’s table. You know he likes them to be left just so. Will you please go and remind her that she is not to touch them at all? After the carpet is put down, I want you to dust the table, so as to be sure that everything is put back in the same place. Will you?”

“Of course I will!” said Clover, who was a born housewife, and dearly loved to act as Katy’s prime minister.

“Sha’n’t I fetch you the pincushion too, while I’m there?”

“Oh yes, please do! I want to measure.”

“Katy,” said Elsie, “those mats of mine are most done, and I would like to finish them and put them on Papa’s washstand before he comes back. Mayn’t I stop practising now, and bring my crochet up here instead?”

“Will there be plenty of time to learn the new exercise before Miss Phillips comes, if you do?”

“I think so, plenty. She doesn’t come till Friday, you know.”

“Well, then it seems to me that you might just as well as not. And Elsie, dear, run into papa’s room first, and bring me the drawer out of his table. I want to put that in order myself.”

Elsie went cheerfully. She laid the drawer across Katy’s lap, and Katy began to dust and arrange the contents. Pretty soon Clover joined them.

“Here’s the cushion,” she said. “Now we’ll have a nice quiet time all by ourselves, won’t we? I like this sort of day, when nobody comes in to interrupt us.”

Somebody tapped at the door, as she spoke. Katy called out, “Come!” And in marched a tall, broad-shouldered lad, with a solemn, sensible face, and a little clock carried carefully in both his hands. This was Dorry. He has grown and improved very much since we saw him last, and is turning out clever in several ways. Among the rest, he has developed a strong turn for mechanics.

“Here’s your clock, Katy,” he said. “I’ve got it fixed so that it strikes all right. Only you must be careful not to hit the striker when you start the pendulum.”

“Have you, really?” said Katy. “Why, Dorry, you’re a genius! I’m ever so much obliged.”

“It’s four minutes to eleven now,” went on Dorry. “So it’ll strike pretty soon. I guess I’d better stay and hear it, so as to be sure that it is right. That is,” he added politely, “unless you’re busy, and would rather not.”

“I’m never too busy to want you, old fellow,” said Katy, stroking his arm. “Here, this drawer is arranged now. Don’t you want to carry it into Papa’s room and put it back into the table? Your hands are stronger than Elsie’s.”

Dorry looked gratified. When he came back the clock was just beginning to strike.

“There!” he exclaimed; “that’s splendid, isn’t it?”

But alas! the clock did not stop at eleven. It went on—Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen!

“Dear me!” said Clover, “what does all this mean? It must be day after to-morrow, at least.”

Dorry stared with open mouth at the clock, which was still striking as though it would split its sides. Elsie, screaming with laughter, kept count.

“Thirty, Thirty-one—Oh, Dorry! Thirty-two! Thirty-three! Thirty-four!”

“You’ve bewitched it, Dorry!” said Katy, as much entertained as the rest.

Then they all began counting. Dorry seized the clock—shook it, slapped it, turned it upside-down. But still the sharp, vibrating sounds continued, as if the clock, having got its own way for once, meant to go on till it was tired out. At last, at the one-hundred-and-thirtieth stroke, it suddenly ceased; and Dorry, with a red, amazed countenance, faced the laughing company.

“It’s very queer,” he said, “but I’m sure it’s not because of anything I did. I can fix it, though, if you’ll let me try again. May I, Katy? I’ll promise not to hurt it.”

For a moment Katy hesitated. Clover pulled her sleeve, and whispered, “Don’t!” Then seeing the mortification on Dorry’s face, she made up her mind.

“Yes! take it, Dorry. I’m sure you’ll be careful. But if I were you, I’d carry it down to Wetherell’s first of all, and talk it over with them. Together you could hit on just the right thing. Don’t you think so?”

“Perhaps,” said Dorry; “yes, I think I will.” Then he departed with the clock under his arm, while Clover called after him teasingly, “Lunch at 132 o’clock; don’t forget!”

“No, I won’t!” said Dorry. Two years before he would not have borne to be laughed at so good-naturedly.

“How could you let him take your clock again?” said Clover, as soon as the door was shut. “He’ll spoil it. And you think so much of it.”

“I thought he would feel mortified if I didn’t let him try,” replied Katy, quietly, “I don’t believe he’ll hurt it. Wetherell’s man likes Dorry, and he’ll show him what to do.”

“You were real good to do it,” responded Clover; “but if it had been mine I don’t think I could.”

Just then the door flew open, and Johnnie rushed in, two years taller, but otherwise looking exactly as she used to do.

“Oh, Katy!” she gasped, “won’t you please tell Philly not to wash the chickens in the rain-water tub? He’s put in every one of Speckle’s, and is just beginning on Dame Durden’s. I’m afraid one little yellow one is dead already—”

“Why, he mustn’t—of course he mustn’t!” said Katy; “what made him think of such a thing?”

“He says they’re dirty, because they’ve just come out of egg-shells! And he insists that the yellow on them is yolk-of-egg. I told him it wasn’t, but he wouldn’t listen to me.” And Johnnie wrung her hands.

“Clover!” cried Katy, “won’t you run down and ask Philly to come up to me? Speak pleasantly, you know!”

“I spoke pleasantly—real pleasantly, but it wasn’t any use,” said Johnnie, on whom the wrongs of the chicks had evidently made a deep impression.

“What a mischief Phil is getting to be!” said Elsie. “Papa says his name ought to be Pickle.”

“Pickles turn out very nice sometimes, you know,” replied Katy, laughing.

Pretty soon Philly came up, escorted by Clover. He looked a little defiant, but Katy understood how to manage him. She lifted him into her lap, which, big boy as he was, he liked extremely; and talked to him so affectionately about the poor little shivering chicks, that his heart was quite melted.

“I didn’t mean to hurt ’em, really and truly,” he said, “but they were all dirty and yellow—with egg, you know, and I thought you’d like me to clean ’em up.”

“But that wasn’t egg, Philly—it was dear little clean feathers, like a canary-bird’s wings.”

“Was it?”

“Yes. And now the chickies are as cold and forlorn as you would feel if you tumbled into a pond and nobody gave you any dry clothes. Don’t you think you ought to go and warm them?”

“How?”

“Well—in your hands, very gently. And then I would let them run round in the sun.”