The Story of Dago by Annie Fellows Johnston

The day that Phil was able to go back to school was an unlucky one for me. It was so dolefully quiet everywhere. After he had gone, I slipped down-stairs on the banister, but the blinds were drawn in the parlour and dining-room, and it was so still that the only sound to be heard was the slow ticking of the great clock in the hall. When it gave a loud br-r-r and began to strike, I was so startled by the sudden noise that I nearly lost my balance and turned a somersault over the railing.

Then I saw Miss Patricia pass through the hall with her bonnet on, going out for a morning walk, and I thought it would be a fine time for me to explore her room. It is full of interesting things that I had never been permitted to touch, for when the boys were allowed to take me into Miss Patricia's room, it was always on condition that I should be made to play little Jack Horner and sit in some corner under a chair or table.

So as soon as the door closed behind her I hurried up-stairs to her room. I had the best time that morning. There were all sorts of little bottles on her wash-stand with good-smelling stuff in them. I pulled out the corks and emptied some of the bottles into the bowl to make that smell good, too. Then I washed my teeth with her little silver-handled toothbrush, just as Phil does every morning, and put the sponges to soak in the water-pitcher.

After awhile I found the cut-glass vinaigrette that Miss Patricia carries around with her. I have seen her use it a hundred times at least, tipping back the silver lid, taking out the little glass stopper, and holding it to her nose with the remark that she never smelled more refreshing salts. I have wanted very much to try it myself. So now that I had the chance I did just as she does, -- tipped back the lid, pulled out the stopper, and took a long, deep smell. Whew! It almost upset me. I thought it must be fire and brimstone that she had bottled up in there. It brought the tears to my eyes, and took my breath for a minute so I had to sit and gasp. Then I dropped the vinaigrette in the slop-jar and jumped down from the wash-stand.

Her high, old-fashioned bureau tempted me next. There were rows and rows of pins in a big blue pincushion, put in as evenly as if it had been done by a machine. I pulled them out, one by one, and dropped them down behind the bureau. It took some time to do that, but at last the blue cushion was empty, and I sat down on it to examine the jewel-case at my leisure. I found the prettiest things in it; an open-faced locket, set around with pearls, with the picture of a beautiful young girl in it; a string of bright coral beads, and a little carnelian ring, and a gold dollar hung on a faded ribbon.

I forgot to tell you that Miss Patricia's bay window is full of flowers, and that she has a mocking-bird hanging in a cage above the wire stand that holds her ferns and foliage plants. The mocking-bird's name is Dick. Now Dick hadn't paid any attention to me until I opened the jewel-case. As I did so I knocked a hairbrush off the bureau to the floor, which must have frightened him, for he began to cry out as if something had caught hold of him. Then he whistled, as if he were calling a dog. You have no idea what a racket he made. I was afraid that some of the servants might hear him and come to see what was the matter. Then, of course, I would be turned out of the room before I had finished examining all the pretty things. I turned around and shook my fist at him and chattered at him as savagely as I knew how, but he kept on, first making that hoarse cry and then whistling as if calling to a dog.

I determined to stop him in some way or another, so, not waiting to put down the gold dollar or the little carnelian ring, which were tightly clenched in one hand, I sprang down from the bureau. Running up the wire flower-stand below the cage, I shook my fist directly under his beak. It only made him noisier than ever, and he flew about the cage like something crazy.

"Be still, won't you? you silly thing!" I shrieked, and in my desperation I made a grab through the bars at his tail-feathers. A whole handful came out, and that seemed to make him wilder than before. He beat himself against the top of the cage and screamed so loud that I thought it would be better to leave before any one heard him and came in.

So I jumped across to the cabinet near the window, where the big blue dragon sat. Then I remembered the sugar-plums inside and stopped for just one taste. I lifted off the dragon's ugly head and was reaching my hand down inside for one of those delicious sweetmeats, when in walked Miss Patricia. My! I was scared! I hadn't expected her back so soon.

I dropped the dragon's old blue head on the floor and was out of the window like a shot. There was a cedar-tree reaching up past the window, and I ran out on one of the limbs and hid myself among its thick branches. I could see her but she couldn't see me. She walked all around the room, and looked at the wash-stand and the bureau and at Dick's tail-feathers scattered among the window-plants and then at the blue dragon's head, smashed all to bits on the floor. Then she picked up the locket, lying face downwards on the rug, and began searching for the other things that had been in the jewel-case. I suppose it was the carnelian ring and the gold dollar with the hole in it that she missed. I opened my hand, remembering that I had had them when I went to hush up that noisy mocking-bird. I must have dropped them when I jumped from the window into the cedar-tree. While I was hanging over the limb, peering down to see if I could catch a glimpse of them on the ground below, the housemaid, Nora, came into the room in answer to Miss Patricia's ring. A few minutes after, Doctor Tremont followed.