George was in the carriage-house that had been made over into a garage. He was working on the car.
"Good morning, Miss," he said, as Mallory came bounding through the door.
"Good morning," returned Mallory. "Do you know where my toy-box is? Mother said it was out in the barn and that you'd open it for me. I'm very anxious to open it. I'm going to start a playhouse up in the attic. Will you get it for me? Or are you too awfully busy just now?" She hoped he was not.
"No, Miss," declared George. I'll come. All the boxes are in the big barn. Is the box marked?"
"Yes," said Mallory. "It's marked Toys Handle Carefully, Breakable.'"
"Then we can find it. There're no end of boxes there."
The two left the carriage-house and went over to the big barn where they poked about hunting. But something must have happened to the toy-box for most certainly it was not there.
"You know, Miss," George explained, "like as not, it may have been left behind somehow, or they might just have been careless when they unloaded and left it in the van covered with packing-covers.
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| It was such a perfect morning! |
"But it ought to be here" Mallory insisted. "You're quite sure it wasn't put anywhere else?"
George shook his head. "Everything's right here, Miss," he said. "They didn't put any boxes elsewhere. The furniture there was sent right into the house."
"Well, it isn't here. Maybe you'd better telephone down and ask. Oh, but they're in the city aren't they? I'll have Father do it. They ought to find the box right off and bring it up special delivery."
"So they should," agreed George. "I'm sorry, Miss. If that's all I'll be going back to the car."
"Yes," sighed Mallory. "If we can't find it, there won't be anything to open. It's too bad. It had the doll house in it in one big wooden box and the dolls and toy furniture were packed in another. Both were put into the wooden box and I saw the men pack them. It was done carefully. I don't see why they had to get lost."
"Nor I either, Miss," he said.
He went back to his car while Mallory stood there in the big barn still hopelessly peering around at the big crates. There were all Father's book boxes, there were the boxes and barrels of Mother's china; and there were her own books and her own crated bookshelf.
But the toy box simply was not to be found. Well, it might have been left on the sidewalk by the movers. "I shall just ask Father to let me get new ones, if they're lost. mused Mallory. No use to poke around here any more - and she slid through the crack of door George had left open and emerged into the full sunlight of outdoors.
There was Jane just coming down the path through the orchard wheeling a doll carriage. Mallory raced up the hill toward her.
"Oh" she cried. "I am so worried. My box of toys has gone astray somehow in moving. We can't find it anywhere. Oh, is this your doll? Isn't she pretty!"
"Too bad," murmured Jane. "Never mind. We can play without them for a while. I dare say your father will find out about it and you'll get the box sometime. Where shall we play?"
"We can go and plan the playhouse in the attic. Shall we?"
They agreed. Mallory examined Baby Edith and examined her little white baby-cap. She pulled the blue bead to hear her say "Papa" and the white bead at the end of the other string to make her say "Mama." When she had again tucked her under the carriage robe of soft blue blanketing, they went slowly down the hill over the orchard path under the apple and pear trees where robins, bluebirds, catbirds and orioles were also thinking of making houses for themselves.
But as the two came out upon the lawn, they were met by Mother. She was going out in the car.
"Don't you want to come along too?" she asked. "It'll be a fine ride. I'm going away out to the Chestnut Hill Greenhouses to see about the garden."
Jane looked at Mallory. Mallory looked at Jane.
"We can come back and play house after," Jane suggested. "I don't often have rides. It would be rather fun, and we can take the doll."
She lifted Baby Edith from the carriage. Mallory ran into the house for wraps. They were soon in the big comfortable car swinging out of the driveway and down the tree bordered avenue toward the open country of hills and woods, meadows and streams. Everything was blooming with spring freshness and there were orchards flowering everywhere.
When they came back, they stopped at Jane's home to make a little call and left her there. The morning had all gone and the playhouse in the attic had not even been planned yet. There was no chance to play with Jane that afternoon because she had to go to town with her mother to buy a pair of new shoes and select a spring coat.
Alone again, Mallory went to the attic to see just what furniture might be adapted to use for play-housekeeping. There were some broken chairs, a table, an old wooden cradle. She wedged them out of their corners and worked hard clearing a large space about the window that looked off over the lawn.
It grew quite warm in the attic by four o'clock. She sat down upon an old trunk to examine her work. It was fairly good; maybe it was just as well not to have had that toy furniture after all.
The chairs and table made a sweet room in that corner. The low slope of the attic roof with its heavy beams came down to the top of the little window and suggested some cozy little house. Mallory found an old red curtain and hung it upon nail heads so as to form a partition.
She was quite satisfied with the afternoon's work. If Jane had been there, they could have moved more things and made a bigger space. When Jane did come, they would do it. They would make another room, maybe.
She looked at herself and saw her clean red dress was all dusty and her hands were fairly black.
"Goodness" she sighed. "I ought to have put on an apron and her eyes roved about among the old attic trunks, and boxes, and chairs and nobody-knows-what, searching for other things that might be put into the corner of the play-house by the window. She tried to open some of the old trunks to see what was in them. The table needed a table cover and the cradle needed something for the mattress and spread. But the trunks were held fast by their locks. There was no use trying to open them.
She decided to wait till Jane came and go on with the play housekeeping then. So with a backward glance at her work and a long inspection of the young robins who seemed to have grown larger and stronger even in a day, she ran singing below to her room to change to clean things and wash off attic dustiness. Mother was out in the garden with Peter, the gardener. They were talking things over and going about from place to place where daffodils, tulips, crocuses already made the borders pretty.
Mallory followed after them and was allotted a bit of garden space where she might herself plant seed under Peter's supervision and have a garden of her own to care for. It was to be quite an intricate one - a round flower-bed in the centre and a path about this. At the end of the gravel path there was to be a trellis with a seat under it. Mallory had never before had a garden of her own so she enjoyed planning her first.
When Mother went back into the house, Peter brought the seeds of morning-glories to plant. They were to be trained up over the little arbor. Besides these, there were other curious little seeds of various kinds. They looked dry and dead but Peter assured her that they would all come up as fine plants for her new delightful little garden.
The afternoon was gone in no time at all. Jane did not come. Probably she, too, had things to keep her busy after the downtown trip to the shops was accomplished. It was night and bedtime very soon. Somehow, as Mallory's head sank into the pillow that last rather curious little trunk up in the attic came back to her mind. The lock had been just a little loose; maybe tomorrow, she and Jane could pry it open. Then they would dress up with the things that were in the little old trunk and play they were both old-fashioned ladies of long ago. And Baby Edith would be their child. Jane could be the mother and she would be the father.
Mallory fell asleep dreaming of the playhouse up in the attic. She dreamt that she and Jane were taking a voyage on the little model schooner and that Baby Edith had come to life. She walked about and talked like a real person, she seemed to have grown up.
The dream was very confused for the toy-box came suddenly to light in the cabin of the little ship. How it got there, nobody knew. She also dreamt that Father had telephoned to the city after supper and they had said that the box had been brought and put in the barn. The firm of movers quite insisted on this. But everybody knew it hadn't.
Father said they'd just have to accept the loss; and here in the dream was the lost toy-box upon the little ship. Mallory wanted to open it at once but it turned into a garden trellis; and the garden trellis all covered with morning-glories was so pretty that she and Jane decided they would have a picnic for fun right away on the bench under it. They forgot all about the toy-box.
The dream went right on with other absurdities and was finally forgotten as Mallory drifted into a deep dreamless sleep.
Mallory was wakened early in the morning by Jane's call from the rocks upon the hill. She jumped like a flash from the bed and poked her tousled head out of the window. "I'll be there in a little while" she called.
"Sleepyhead" Jane called back and sat down upon a rock to wait for Mallory.
Mallory rushed through the process of dressing. She was soon sitting on the rock beside Jane.
"I had to call you," declared Jane. "I know it's very early."
"I'm glad you did. You know, yesterday afternoon, I started to arrange the corner by the window in the attic. I made a darling room there. We don't need the toy furniture at all. Just wait till you see it! We'll play there after breakfast, shall we?"
Jane nodded. "I got the shoes" she said "and a brown coat, ever so pretty. And Mother bought a hat to trim for me too. It's going to have a wreath of roses and forget-me-nots."
But Mallory wasn't very much interested in the clothes. She was all bubbling over with what she had done in the attic: about the table, and the chairs, the old wooden cradle, about the mysterious little trunk that had the loose lock, and her curiosity about what might be inside.
We'll get a hammer and open it after breakfast," she said. "I think we ought to be able to get it open. It's the only trunk that we can open, I'm afraid. The others are locked tight except some that have Aunt Esther's things in them. Mother told me not to touch those."
"Supposing it should contain a treasure!" Jane suggested. "Bags of gold!"
"They wouldn't be in a trunk. They'd be hidden somewhere. Nobody locks bags of gold up in a trunk, Jane! They put them in the bank." She laughed.
"But there might be something fine."
"No doubt there is."
"How big is the trunk?"
"Oh, just about so," explained Mallory measuring with hands. "It's all decorated with little brass knobs of tack-heads and it's black. It looks very old indeed."
"Fun to peek inside! I dare say we will find something."
It was a splendid mystery. No doubt that little old trunk with the loose lock held some sort of old treasure.
"There probably isn't anything in it but just old letters," Jane said finally. "That's what one always finds in attics, you know."
"But there might be dresses for us to dress up in," Mallory argued. "Wouldn't it be fun to find an old dress to go over the hoop skirt that's hanging up there on that attic nail? We'll try on the hoop skirt. There ought to be a strange bonnet too. You know the kind they used to wear in Great-grandmother's time, with strings that tied under their chins and roses in a wreath around their faces under the poke of the brim. Haven't you seen pictures of them?"
Jane nodded. "We have one. It's black," she laughed. "Imagine wearing anything like that!"
"Funny!"
"Yes, ever so funny; but in those days that sort of thing was fashionable!" The two giggled.
"Someday, I suppose our clothes will look exactly as funny," said Jane. "Maybe my new hat will look ridiculous when some little girl that is my grandchild tries it on."
"Come on up to the attic and let's look at that trunk," Mallory suggested. "See if you think we can open it; we can tiptoe so as not to wake Mother. We needn't talk very loud. That corner is right over her room so we'll have to be careful."
Hand in hand they ran down the hill of the orchard, opened the side door and found the maid dusting the living-room; they turned up the backstairs softly and opened the latch of the attic door carefully. At the top of the stair, they stopped to watch the robins and then turned to the playhouse corner. Jane exclaimed over its perfection.
"Just like a real little room," she cried with hushed voice, mindful of not waking Mallory's mother below. :Oh, it's dear, Mallory! I think it's like a real house, and so cozy."
She sat down upon one of the cane-bottomed chairs and softly rocked the wooden cradle with her foot. "They used to knit or sew, you know, while they rocked the baby like this" she explained. "I wish we could get the spinning wheel over here. I'd like to see how it goes. Where's the trunk, Mallory?"
Mallory had been standing, looking pridefully at her afternoon's busy house making.
"Over there," said she pointing. "Come and see it!"
Jane jumped to her feet. Together they ran to the little trunk.
"You see how loose the lock is," said Mallory, moving it to and fro.
"Let me try!"
Yet try as she might, Jane could not budge the lock an inch more than had Mallory.
"It looks ever so interesting," she kept saying. "I wish we could open it."
"I could get a hammer only we'd wake Mother!"
"We'll have to wait. After breakfast we can try again. You can bring a hammer and break the lock. Will your mother let you? Have you asked her?"
"I forgot to," said Mallory. "But I'll ask her."
"I think I would,." said Jane. "You see, it might be better."
"I suppose so."
"It won't possibly open without a hammer?" Again she tried the lock. But the old lock held fast.
"Mother said I could peep into things if I put everything back all right, only I was not to touch Aunt Esther"s trunks or the boxes over in that corner."
She pointed to the spot where the model of the little schooner was pushed against old leather trunks and a queer old carpet-bag hung upon a nail overhead. The little strange old trunk was not so very far away from there, yet it could not be said to belong to that special place. It was wedged in behind a modern-looking trunk. A big basket-trunk showed on its other side.
"Let's see. We can't move it, can we?"
"Not without making a noise."
"We'll have to wait. I'll come back as soon as I can after I've done my practicing," sighed Jane. "Don't you open it till I come, will you?"
"No" promised Mallory. "And to be quite sure, I'll ask Mother about it. I know, though, she won't mind our opening it if we put things back carefully afterwards."
The two knelt beside the little trunk and tugged at the lock. "See, there's a nail that's gone," said Jane. "If we only had a hammer."
But it was useless. The little trunk guarded its treasure and was still tightly closed when the breakfast gong suddenly sounded below and brought the two little girls suddenly to their feet.
"Oh," cried Jane. "I have to go right home. And I promised to be back in time to set the breakfast table for Mother. Oh, dear! We did get up so very early."
As Jane's feet flew toward home, Mallory came into the dining-room.
"Hello," she greeted. "I've been up since six o'clock! Jane and I've been up in the attic. We want to open that funny, little old trunk that's up there, may we, Mother?"
"I don't believe I know which one," said Mother absently as she poured out Father's hot coffee into the big blue Willow cup. "It isn't any of Aunt Esther's trunks, is it? I want to take care of those myself."
"No," said Mallory. "It isn't with the very old things in their corner either; you didn't want me to touch them But this trunk isn't there. It's just a small trunk; it looks ever so interesting and the lock is loose; we'll put everything back where we found it. We won't hurt anything."
"Well, that's all right, dear," mused Mother, stirring the cream into her own cup. "But be very careful of any old things you might find and put everything back with care."
"Oh, yes, Mother" promised Mallory.
She could hardly wait for breakfast to be over and for Jane to come back and play in the attic: they were really going to open that mysterious old trunk and find out what might be inside. As soon as Mother and Father rose from the table, she went out to the tool house to find a hammer. Then she ran up the path toward the meadows to meet Jane coming down.
