Under the Lilacs Read Online Free Page A

very thin, but clean and cool, and the black eyes were clear though hollow, for the poor lad was
     half starved.
    “I’m awful shabby, but I ain’t dirty. I had a washin’ in the rain last night, and I’ve jest about lived on water lately,”
     he explained, wondering why she looked at him so hard.
    “Put out your tongue.”
    He did so, but took it in again to say quickly—
    “I ain’t sick — I’m only hungry; for I haven’t had a mite but what Sanch brought, for three days; and I always go halves,
     don’t I, Sanch?”
    The poodle gave a shrill bark, and vibrated excitedly between the door and his master as if he understood all that was going
     on, and recommended a speedy march toward the promised food and shelter. Mrs. Moss took the hint, and bade the boy follow
     her and bring his “things” with him.
    “I ain’t got any. Some big fellers took away my bundle, else I wouldn’t look so bad. There’s only this. I’m sorry Sanch took
     it, and I’d like to give it back if I knew whose it was,” said Ben, bringing the new dinner pail out from the depths of the
     coach where he had gone to housekeeping.
    “That’s soon done; it’s mine, and you’re welcome to the bits your queer dog ran off with. Come along, I must lock up,” and
     Mrs. Moss clanked her keys suggestively.
    Ben limped out, leaning on a broken hoe-handle, for he was stiff after two days in such damp lodgings, as well as worn out
     with a fortnight’s wandering through sun and rain. Sancho was in great spirits, evidently feeling that their woes were over
     and his foraging expeditions at an end, forhe frisked about his master with yelps of pleasure, or made playful darts at the ankles of his benefactress, which caused
     her to cry, “Whish!” and “Scat!” and shake her skirts at him as if he were a cat or hen.
    A hot fire was roaring in the stove under the broth skillet and teakettle, and Betty was poking in more wood, with a great
     smirch of black on her chubby cheek, while Bab was cutting away at the loaf as if bent on slicing her own fingers off. Before
     Ben knew what he was about, he found himself in the old rocking chair devouring bread and butter as only a hungry boy can,
     with Sancho close by gnawing a mutton bone like a ravenous wolf in sheep’s clothing.
    While the newcomers were thus happily employed, Mrs. Moss beckoned the little girls out of the room, and gave them both an
     errand.
    “Bab, you run over to Mrs. Barton’s, and ask her for any old duds Billy don’t want; and Betty, you go to the Cutters, and
     tell Miss Clarindy I’d like a couple of the shirts we made at last sewing circle. Any shoes, or a hat, or socks, would come
     handy, for the poor dear hasn’t a whole thread on him.”
    Away went the children full of anxiety to clothe their beggar; and so well did they plead his cause with the good neighbors,
     that Ben hardly knew himself when he emerged from the back bedroom half an hour later, clothed in Billy Barton’s faded flannel
     suit, with an unbleached cotton shirt out of the Dorcas basket, and a pair of Milly Cutter’s old shoes on his feet.
    Sancho also had been put in better trim, for, after his master had refreshed himself with a warm bath, he gave his dog a good
     scrub while Mrs. Moss set a stitch here and there in the new old clothes; and Sancho reappeared, looking more like the china
     poodle than ever, being as white assnow, his curls well brushed up, and his tasselly tail waving proudly over his back.
    Feeling eminently respectable and comfortable, the wanderers humbly presented themselves, and were greeted with smiles of
     approval from the little girls and a hospitable welcome from the mother, who set them near the stove to dry, as both were
     decidedly damp after their ablutions.
    “I declare I shouldn’t have known you!” exclaimed the good woman, surveying the boy with great satisfaction; for, though still
     very thin and tired, the lad had a tidy look that pleased her, and a