








SOMEBODY'S LITTLE GIRL

by Martha Young



Dedication

  To
  Two Little Elizabeths:
  Elizabeth Young
  and
  Elizabeth Magruder




SOMEBODY'S LITTLE GIRL


If I were just to tell the things that Bessie Bell remembered I should
tell you some very strange things.  Bessie Bell did not know whether
she remembered them, or just knew them, or whether they just grew,
those strange things in some strange country that never was anywhere in
the world; for when Bessie Bell tried to tell about those strange
things great grown wise people said: "No, no, Bessie Bell, there is
nothing in the world like that."

So Bessie Bell just remembered and wondered.

She remembered how somewhere, sometime, there was a window where you
could look out and see everything green, little and green, and always
changing and moving, away, away--beyond everything little, and green,
and moving all the time.  But great grown wise folks said: "No, there
is no window in all the world like that."

And once when some one gave Bessie Bell a little round red apple she
caught her breath very quickly and her little heart jumped and then
thumped very loudly (that is the way it seemed to her) and she
remembered: Little apple trees all just alike, and little apple trees
in rows all just alike on top of those and again on top of those until
they came to a great row of big round red apples on top of all.

Rut great grown people said: "No, no, Bessie Bell, there are no apple
trees in all the world like that."

And one time Bessie Bell was at a pretty house and somebody sat her on
a little low chair and said: "Keep still, Bessie Bell."

She kept still so long that at last she began to be afraid to move at
all, and she got afraid even to crook up her little finger for fear it
would pop off loud,--she had kept still so long that all her round
little fingers and her round little legs felt so stiff.

Then one, great grown person said: "She seems a very quiet child." And
the other said: "She is a very quiet child--sometimes."

But just then Bessie Bell turned her head, and though her round little
neck felt stiff it did not pop!--and she saw--something in a corner
that was blue, green, and brown, and soft, and she forgot how afraid to
move she was, and she forgot how stiff she thought she was, and she
forgot how still she was told to be, and she jumped up and ran to the
corner and cried out: "Pretty! Pretty! Pretty!"

One grown person took up the Thing that was blue, and green, and brown,
and soft, and waved it to and fro, to and fro in front of Bessie Bell.

And Bessie Bell clapped her hands, and jumped for joy, and laughed, and
cried: "Boo! boo! boo!"

And Bessie Bell ran right into the Thing that was blue, and green, and
brown, and soft, and she threw out her round little arms and clasped
them about the Thing that was blue, and green, and brown, and soft!

And she pulled it over her face, and she laughed and cried for
joy--because she remembered--

But the great grown person who had brought Bessie Bell to the pretty
house said: "Oh, Bessie Bell! Why, Bessie Bell!  For shame, Bessie
Bell!  How could you do so to the beautiful peacock-feather-fly-brush!"

So Bessie Bell could only cry--and that very softly--and feel ashamed
as she was bid, and forget what it was that she remembered.

Bessie Bell might have remembered one time when a great house was all
desolate, and when nobody or nothing at all breathed in the whole great
big house, but one little tiny girl and one great big white cat, with
just one black spot on its tail.

The nurse that always had played so nicely with the tiny little girl
was lying with her cheek in her hand over yonder.

The Grandmother who had always talked so much to the tiny little girl
was not talking any more.

The tiny little girl was so sick that she only just could breathe
quickly, just so--and just so--.

If Bessie Bell could remember that, it was only that she remembered the
big white cat like a big soft dream.  And she might have remembered
how, now and then, the big cat put out a paw and touched the little
girl's cheek, like a soft white dream-touch.

And that little girl had on a night-gown that was long, and soft, and
white, and on that little white night-gown was worked, oh so carefully,
in linen thread: "Bessie Bell."

Then the few people who walked about the world in Fever-time came in to
that big house, and they took up that little tiny girl that breathed so
softly and so quickly--just so!

And they read on her little white night-gown the words written with the
linen thread: "Bessie Bell."

And they said: "Let us take this little girl with us."

They put a big soft white blanket around the little girl and walked out
of the big house with her, someone carrying her in strong arms.

And the big white cat got down off the big white bed and rubbed himself
against the bedpost, and went round and round the bed-post, and rubbed
himself round and round the bed-post.

And the tiny little girl never saw the big house, or the big soft white
cat any more.

And now when it happened that she remembered something, great grown
people said: "No, no, Bessie Bell, there is nothing in the world like
that."

So she just wondered and remembered, and almost forgot what it was that
she did remember.

  * * *
  * *
  *


Sister Mary Felice had all the little tiny girls playing in the sand:
that was the place that was meant for the little girls to play in.

All the little girls had on blue checked aprons.  All the aprons had
straps and buttons behind.

For just one hour every day all the little tiny girls played in the
sand, and while they played Sister Mary Felice sat on a willow-wrought
bench and watched them play.

Then when that hour was exactly passed Sister Angela always came with a
basket of netted canes, an Indian basket, on her arm.  In the Indian
basket were little cakes--such nice little cakes--always they had
caraway seeds in them.

One day Sister Mary Felice said: "Sister Angela, did Sister Ignatius
put too many caraway seeds in the cakes this time?"

Sister Angela said: "I think not, Sister Mary Felice.  Will you try
one?"

Sister Mary Felice said: "I thank you, Sister Angela."

Then Sister Mary Felice took one to try.

Then always Sister Angela, with the Indian basket on her arm, took all
the little girls to the long back gallery that was latticed in.

On a low shelf close against the lattice sat a row of white basins.

Then all the little tiny girls washed their little tiny hands in the
white basins.  And while they washed their little tiny hands by twos
and by threes together, two little girls washing their hands in one
basin together, three little girls washing their hands together, they
all oftentimes laughed together and said:

  "Wash together!
  And be friends forever!
  Wash together!
  And be friends forever!"

Then Sister Angela held a long pink checked towel in her hands while
the little tiny girls came as their tiny hands were washed and wiped
them on the pink checked towel.

Then if two little girls took hold of the pink checked towel at once
they both laughed and sang:

  "Don't wipe together,
  Or we'll fight
  Before night."

And the other little girls that were still washing their hands in the
white basins on the low shelf by the back-gallery lattice sang over and
over again:

  "Wash together! We'll wash together!
  And we'll be happy forever!"

When all the pink clean tiny hands were wiped dry, or as nearly dry as
little girls do wipe tiny pink hands, on the pink checked towel held
for them by Sister Angela, then Sister Angela hung the pink checked
towel on the lowest limb of the arbor-vita tree.  Then the little girls
all ran to sit down in a row on the lowest step of the back gallery,
with their little feet on the gravel below.  Sister Angela walked the
length of the row, and gave to each little girl in the row a sweet tiny
cake, or maybe Sister Angela walked twice down the row and gave to each
little girl two cakes, or sometimes maybe she walked three times down
the row, and then each little girl had three cakes; but no one little
girl ever had more than every other little girl.

Always Sister Angela sat a little way off from the row of the little
girls.  She always sat on a bench under the great magnolia-tree and
watched the tiny girls as they ate their tiny cakes.

And always the pink checked towel waved itself ever so softly to and
fro on the lowest limb of the arbor-vitae-tree, for that was the way
that pink checked towels did to help to dry themselves after helping to
dry so many little pink fingers.  Often, so often, little brown
sparrows came hopping to the gravel to pick up any tiny crumbs of cake
that the little girls dropped, but you may be sure that they did not
drop so very many, many little brown crumbs for little brown birds to
find.

But if they were dropped, even if by rare chance were the crumbs so
large as to be nearly as large as half of a cake--why then, that crumb
had to stay for those little birds.  It was the law!