The Adventure by the Lagoon
“Do you think you two girls will be all right here while Hal and I sit over there and visit awhile?” asked Mrs. Merrill.
It was the late afternoon of the game and the Merrills, with Hal, had driven in to Boston with some friends of Hal’s and now were sitting in the Commons trying to keep the promise to Mary Jane to let her ride all she wished in the swan boats.
It seemed a hopeless promise to keep though, for no sooner had they taken one ride than Mary Jane was ready for another, and another and another. Finally Mrs. Merrill suggested that as she and Hal had many things to talk about, they might sit at the side of the lagoon and let the two girls ride by themselves; Alice was old enough to make such a plan perfectly safe and anyway there was no danger, for Mary Jane was big enough to look after herself on the boat.
“Surely!” said Alice replying to her mother’s question, “you sit right over there and we’ll be safe as safe can be.”
“And if we run out of money for rides,” added practical Mary Jane, “we’ll come and tell you.”
“I’ll save you the trouble,” said Uncle Hal, “I’ll buy a bunch of tickets that you never can use up!” And much to Mary Jane’s delight, he went over to the window where the tickets were sold and bought fifty cents’ worth—ten whole rides—five for each girl.
“Thank you ever so much, Uncle Hal,” said Mary Jane gratefully, “and if you change your mind and want to ride, I’ll let you have one of my tickets,” she promised as he handed her five all for herself.
“Yes,” added Alice, “and if mother wants to ride again, I’ll let her have one of mine.”
“Thanks awfully, ladies,” said Hal laughing, “but I think sister and I will enjoy the talking every bit as much as you enjoy the riding, so everybody will be happy.”
Mary Jane thought she never, never, never had had such a blissful time! The sun, halfway down in the west, was just warm enough; a soft June breeze blew the lagoon into tiny ripples and made the air cool and comfortable after the warm day; flowers blooming on the bank filled the air with dainty fragrance and, best of all, there were those magic boats—and five tickets all her own. She and Alice picked out the front seat in the boat they thought the prettiest and there they sat. They didn’t even trouble to get off when one ride was over; they simply sat still while the two or three other passengers stepped off at the dock and two or three other passengers stepped on, and then off the boat went again on its slow, stately journey around the little lake.
But at the end of the third ride they noticed some talking at the side of the dock furtherest away from where Mrs. Merrill and Hal were sitting, and Alice stood up to see what was the matter.
“Look at that child!” exclaimed Alice. “Look, Mary Jane, at what she’s doing! She’s trying to make her doll sit on the edge of the dock, and anybody would know a doll couldn’t do that!”
Evidently everyone around there except the little lady herself was of the same opinion as Alice, for the other children were trying to tell her that the doll couldn’t sit there; that she would fall in surely, surely, if such a thing was attempted.
“And it’s such a pretty doll too,” worried Mary Jane. “Come on, Alice, let’s get off and tell her not to do it. Maybe she’ll mind us ’cause she doesn’t know us.”
But they were too late. Just as they stepped off the swan boat ready to hurry over to the end of the dock where the children were, the little lady succeeded in getting the doll set stiff and straight at the very edge of the dock. For a breathless instant the doll sat there. Then, so quickly nobody could reach out a hand or do a thing, the prettily-dressed doll tumbled over on its face—splash!—into the lagoon.
For an instant the children all stood motionless in amazement. Then the little mother began to cry, “My dolly’s drowned! My dolly’s drowned! I didn’t want my dolly to drown!”
“Then what did you sit her on the edge of the dock for?” demanded an older boy who had tried with the others to tell her that the doll might fall in.
“’Cause I wanted her to sit there!” retorted the girl, “that’s why!” Then with a sudden recollection of her loss, the impudence left her and she sat down on the dock and began to cry.
“Let’s call for help,” suggested Mary Jane, and she looked around to see just where her mother and uncle were sitting.
“Call nothing!” exclaimed the big boy, “do you want to get us all run in? Ain’t you got no sense?”
Mary Jane looked at him in amazement. What was “run in” and why not call for help when a beautiful doll was drowned?
Alice, too, was surprised at the boy’s attitude but being his own age she wasn’t backward about asking for an explanation.
“Why not call for help?” she demanded. “How are you going to get the doll out?”
“Don’t you worry about that,” he said tartly, and then, more politely, he explained, “the park cop told us not to stay close by the water, and here she went and let her doll fall in and if we holler he’ll hear sure as shooting and come and order us on. You just stop crying now,” he said to the little mother who, frightened by his order to keep still was crying softly to herself, “we’ll get her out for you—you just wait!”
“Is she your sister?” asked Alice.
“Sister—nothing!” replied the boy, “think my sister would have such a fine doll? That’s my sister,” he added, jerking his thumb toward a ragged little girl on the edge of the group, “my sister ain’t got no doll—but she ain’t a cry baby either!” he added.
Alice looked interestedly at the child thus pointed out. She was a bright, pretty looking little girl with oh, such a poor dress—and no doll? Why she was just Mary Jane’s age—but this was no time to stand looking at other folks, and she turned to the water to see what could be done.
Mary Jane, in the meantime, had crept up to the edge of the dock and was peering down into the clear water.
“There it is,” she said, pointing, “see? It’s right down there! Now, don’t you cry, we’re going to get it out in a jiffy. I wish I had a long stick to poke with.”
“You don’t need a stick,” said the big boy, peering over beside her. “See how shallow it is? And a stick would just stir up mud and get its clothes all dirty.”
“I could pretty nearly reach it without a stick,” suggested Mary Jane as she sat on the pier and reached down into the water.
“That’s an idea,” exclaimed the boy, “that’s just what I’m going to do.” He proceeded to lie down flat on the narrow dock and stretch his hands down into the water.
“You almost touched it!” exclaimed Mary Jane excitedly, “just reach a little more—”
“But I can’t reach any more!” said the boy, “see?” And he looked up for a suggestion. “Oh, I’ll tell you what!” he added, “I’ll reach over farther and you hold my feet so I won’t fall in. Then I’ll reach down with one hand and I’ll bet I get it.”
He wormed himself closer to the edge of the dock and while Alice held tightly to his shoes, he reached down, down, down into the water.
“He’s got it,” reported Mary Jane, who was watching, “he’s touched it and he’s got it—look!”
Sure enough. The boy wiggled back a bit from the very edge and lifted the dripping doll out of the water.
“Oh, my dolly! My dolly!” cried the little mother, “but she’s all wet!”
“What did you expect after such a soaking?” chuckled the boy, “but water’ll dry. My coat’s wet but it’ll dry in this warm air.” He took off his coat and spread it out in the sun on the dock.
“And that’s what you must do to your doll,” said Mary Jane. She loved nothing so much as mothering folks—children, dolls—it didn’t matter which just so they needed something done for them. “Here, let me help you and we’ll have her fixed in a jiffy.”
She sat down on the dock, with the little mother beside her, and began to undress the soaked dolly. “Now we’ll take off her dress—so. And then her petticoat—so. And we’ll spread ’em all out in the sun—so.”
“Why don’t you spread ’em on a bush?” asked the boy practically, “that’s what I do when I go swimming.”
“Here, I’ll do it,” said his sister, and the shy little brown-eyed girl forgot all about herself and being afraid of strangers in her eagerness to touch the doll’s pretty wet clothes.
“Then you do it,” agreed Mary Jane. Very carefully she took off stockings, shoes, underclothes, every stitch the doll had on and the little Italian girl spread the things on the bushes in the sunshine.
“You ought to spread the doll too,” said Alice, “she’s so wet the clothes get wet as soon as you put them back on.”
“I’ll tell you,” suggested Mary Jane jumping up hurriedly, “let’s get mother and Uncle Hal to hold it in the sun while we take a ride on the swan boat.”
“Y’haf ta have money to ride those boats,” replied the boy, “and we ain’t got none.”
“You don’t have to have money if you have tickets,” answered Mary Jane, “and I’ve got plenty of those—see?” And proudly she displayed the tickets she had put in her pocket when she began undressing the doll. “Come on, lets!”
Holding the undressed doll in her hands, she ran around the lagoon to where her mother was sitting. “Mother!” she exclaimed suddenly, “will you please hold this doll in the sun so it’ll dry while I take these folks for a ride?”
“What in the world?” exclaimed Mrs. Merrill in amazement as she saw the strange children, the dripping doll and her own excited little girl.
“She drowned,” explained Mary Jane, pointing to the doll, “and he rescued her,” pointing to the boy, “and we’re all going to take a ride.”
Hal looked at the children and suspected that they were to be Mary Jane’s guests—with the exception of the little girl who owned the doll they were ragged and poor looking, so he asked, “Have enough tickets, Mary Jane?”
“Just enough,” replied Mary Jane, “with Alice’s and mine together.”
“Then we’ll hold the doll and watch you ride,” said Mrs. Merrill.
The children scampered over to the dock and got aboard a boat. The little Italian girl sat with Alice and Mary Jane and the others took the back seat.
“Oh!” exclaimed the child rapturously, as the boat slowly moved away from the shore, “ain’t it just like a fairy story?”
“You like stories too!” cried Mary Jane delightedly, “so do I and I feel just like a princess. I do every time I ride on ’em.”
“I never rode on one before,” said the stranger, “but I feel like a princess now, I do.”
“Never rode on a swan boat, never had a doll,” the thought kept running through Mary Jane’s head during the rest of the ride and while they were getting off and going back to her mother, “never had a doll—” How funny that would seem!
The rescued doll was not dry yet, of course, but Uncle Hal had procured a paper to wrap it in, so that it could be carried home safely.
“We’ll get the clothes and wrap them up too,” said Alice, and Mary Jane, and the mother of the doll ran and brought the clothes from the bush at the other side of the lagoon, and Alice wrapped them carefully so nothing could be lost out on the way home.
While she was doing that, Mary Jane whispered to her mother, “Won’t you please find out the name of that little girl with the brown eyes, and the boy, Mother dear, and where they live, and I’ll tell you why when we get home to the hotel?”
Mrs. Merrill pulled out her tiny notebook and tactfully asking the boy for his name and address, wrote them down in the book. Then they all said a good-by to their new friends, for it was now high time they were getting back to dress for dinner.
“Mother dear,” said Mary Jane as she skipped along beside her mother five minutes later, “that little girl never had a doll and she never went on the boats before though she lives right here in Boston. And as soon as we get home I want to send her a doll, all dressed in pretty clothes and everything—may I please?”
“Indeed yes, dear,” answered Mrs. Merrill, much pleased with the idea. “We’ll do it just as soon as we get home, and you and Alice may make the clothes and have it a really gift of your own.”
When, an hour or more after dinner that evening, Mary Jane snuggled down in her bed for a long night’s sleep, she said to Alice, “Didn’t we have fun to-day? Winning the game and going boat riding and rescuing the doll and everything? Now I wonder what’ll happen to-morrow?”