Leppard, Lois Gladys - [Mandie 04] (11 page)

Mandie smiled back at him. “I’ll do my best not to.”

Later, when Mandie, Celia, and Mrs. Taft returned home, Snowball sat on the front porch waiting for them.

Mandie picked him up and stroked his fur. “You’re a smart kitten!” she laughed.

Mandie and Celia enjoyed playing with Snowball during the rest of their stay at Mrs. Taft’s. It hadn’t turned out to be so bad after all.

The day the girls returned to school, they were packed and dressed, waiting in the parlor for Mrs. Taft to join them. She was going with them to have a little talk with Miss Prudence, she said.

Uncle Cal came from the school to pick them up. After loading their belongings, he waited in the surrey outside.

Snowball rubbed around Mandie’s ankles as the girls waited impatiently for Mrs. Taft. They were excited about going back to school. Mandie picked up her kitten and gave him stern instructions. “Snowball, you be a good kitten for Grandmother, and I’ll see you soon,” she said, smoothing the fur on his head.

The kitten purred in response.

“Come, Amanda and Celia,” Mrs. Taft called from the doorway. “We’re ready.”

Mandie put Snowball down. She and Celia quickly joined
her grandmother in the hallway, then walked out to the waiting surrey. As Celia closed the front door behind them, she didn’t notice the white flash of fur darting outside.

When the surrey arrived at the school, Miss Prudence welcomed them. “Please come in,” she said, leading the way into the house. She called over her shoulder to Uncle Cal, “You know where to take their things—to their old room.”

Mrs. Taft stopped Uncle Cal and said, “When you finish unloading, would you wait for me, please? I will only be a few minutes, but I need a ride back home.”

“Yessum, I sho’ will,” Uncle Cal replied with a smile.

The schoolmistress led them into the little alcove where she had taken them on Mandie’s first day at school. The girls sat down with the two women.

“Miss Heathwood, I have come to say a few things that I think ought to be made clear,” Mrs. Taft said emphatically.

Miss Prudence glanced nervously at the girls. “Maybe the young ladies would like to go on up to their room,” she suggested.

Mrs. Taft raised a gloved hand. “No, Miss Heathwood, I want them to hear what I have to say. I think it is very possible that the school made a serious mistake in suspending these two girls. They are now ten days behind their classmates in their studies because of a silly rule. And I don’t think it would be to the school’s advantage to engage in such punishment again.”

The girls looked at each other in astonishment.

Miss Prudence straightened her skirts. The worry lines in her face deepened. “That’s what I was expecting from you,” she said. “However, the girl’s mother put her in this school, and she is the one who should consult me. Not you.” She paused for a moment, then continued. “I’m very sorry they are behind with their schoolwork, but it’s their own fault. I
must have my rules obeyed, no matter who is breaking them.”

Mrs. Taft stood to her feet. “We’ll see about that!” she exclaimed. “I’d say you’d better remember who your patrons are.” She turned to Mandie and Celia. “Study hard and catch up, girls, and I’ll see you next Sunday for dinner.”

“Good-bye, Grandmother, and thank you for everything.” Mandie almost felt like giving her a hug, but she didn’t know how her grandmother would react.

“Thank you for letting me stay in your beautiful home, Mrs. Taft,” Celia said.

“You’re both welcome,” Mandie’s grandmother replied. “Now go up to your room and get on with your lessons.” In a moment she was gone.

Mandie and Celia stood in the hallway, staring after her.

Miss Prudence came up behind them. “Get your things unpacked, young ladies, and be in the dining room in time for dinner,” she said. Without saying anything more, she walked away.

Mandie took a deep breath. “Well, I guess that’s that,” she said.

“Let’s go,” Celia urged.

As they unpacked in their room, Mandie bent down to push an extra box under the bed. “I can’t imagine why Grandmother did that,” she said. Then she did a double take. What was that white thing she saw under there?
Oh, no. It couldn’t be
, she thought. Lying on her stomach, she gave it a pull. Out came a ruffled, protesting Snowball. The girls burst into laughter.

“Snowball, how could you do this? You’re going to get us into more trouble!” she giggled. “I know Miss Prudence won’t allow you here.” Mandie shook the kitten gently and looked into his blue eyes. He tried to lick her fingers.

Celia sat down on the floor, rolling with laughter. “He
must have hidden in our baggage,” she said.

“Maybe we can hide him here in the room. Then on Sunday we could take him back to Grandmother’s,” Mandie said.

That plan only lasted part of the day. When the girls left the room to go down to supper that night, Snowball made a beeline through the open doorway and disappeared down the hall toward the main staircase. The girls ran after him, but they couldn’t find him.

“I guess we’d better forget about Snowball until after we eat,” Mandie said. “If we’re late for dinner, we’ll really be in trouble.”

“We can come back up and look for him as soon as Miss Prudence dismisses us,” Celia suggested.

In the dining room the girls looked to see if April Snow had returned, but her place was vacant.

After supper, some of the girls who had never been friendly before, welcomed Mandie and Celia back. The pair must have seemed abrupt in their conversations, but they were anxious to hunt for the kitten.

When Mandie and Celia reached the upstairs hallway they ran into Aunt Phoebe.

“Lawsy mercy, Missies! Y’all sho’ in a hurry,” the old woman said. “I put food for dat white cat in yo’ room.”

Mandie looked puzzled. “Aunt Phoebe, how did you know about my kitten?”

“Cal, he say cat sittin’ theah ’tween boxes when he unload de surrey. He know cat belong to Missy, so he tuk it up wid de rest, an’ shut him up in de room. I lef’ milk and food fo’ de cat.”

“But he isn’t in our room. When we came out for supper, he ran out and disappeared,” Mandie told her.

“Den we hafta hunt him. Miz Prudence she kill dat cat if she find him in dis house.”

They searched everywhere but still couldn’t find Snowball.

Mandie and Celia went to their room. It looked as though the kitten had really disappeared this time.

“Let’s leave the door open just a crack in case he comes back this way. Maybe he’ll come in,” Mandie said.

But at that moment, Snowball had plans of his own. He wasn’t about to give up the nice lap he was curled up in, or the soft hand rubbing his fur. He was completely happy.

Even though Snowball hadn’t been found by bedtime, the girls had to close their door. Mandie knelt by the bed to say her nightly prayers.

“Dear Lord, please send Snowball back to me,” she prayed aloud through her tears. “I love him, and I don’t want anything to happen to him,” she said, raising her face toward the ceiling. “I thank you for your help, dear Lord. Amen.”

Celia joined her. “Yes, dear God, please send Snowball back to Mandie. He’s such a good little kitten. Please send him back,” she prayed.

Instead of getting into bed, the girls put out the lamp and went to sit in the window seat. Even after the ten o’clock bell rang, they still sat there.

“You know, in a way I’m glad to be back at school,” Mandie told her friend. “I want the time to hurry up and pass. At Thanksgiving, my mother is coming to take me home for a whole week!”

“You’re going home for Thanksgiving?” Celia was surprised.

“Aren’t you going home then, too?”

“I don’t know. My mother hasn’t said anything about it in her letters,” Celia replied.

“Don’t forget to write and tell her that my mother went to school with her. And be sure and ask her if you’re going home for Thanksgiving week.”

“All right,” Celia agreed. “I’ll write her a letter tomorrow.”

Suddenly they heard the noise. The metal clanged and the boards squeaked. Both girls jumped up.

“Now!” Mandie exclaimed. She reached for their new lamp and the matches. Quickly lighting the lamp, she rushed to the door. Celia stayed right behind her. The noise continued as they cautiously climbed the stairway to the attic.

At the top of the steps, Mandie held the lamp in one hand, slowly turned the doorknob with the other, and pushed the door open.

This time the lamplight illuminated an unbelievable sight. A young girl with big brown eyes and long, tangled brown hair, and wearing Mandie’s pink chiffon dress, was sitting on the floor with an iron poker in her hand. She was hammering at the lock on an old trunk.

When the girl saw Mandie and Celia, she froze in fear. Dropping the poker, she backed into a corner. And as the poker hit the floor, Snowball came bounding out of the darkness. Mandie quickly handed the lamp to Celia and picked up the kitten.

For a few minutes all three girls stood there, silently eyeing each other.

Then Mandie stepped forward in anger. “Why are you wearing my dress?” she asked.

The girl merely whined and cowered in the corner.

“I suppose you took my other dress, and my shawl, and my nightgown and broke my beads, too, didn’t you?” Mandie accused. “What are you doing up here, anyway? You don’t go to this school.”

The girl did not speak but watched them fearfully.

All of a sudden Mandie realized that the girl looked sick and hungry. She felt sorry for her. “Are you hungry?” Mandie asked.

The girl still would not speak. Mandie turned to Celia. “Come on. We can get the food Aunt Phoebe left for Snowball and bring it up here. I think she looks hungry.”

They hurried back down the steps with Snowball and gave him the bowl of milk Aunt Phoebe had left. Then they took the plate with a piece of meat on it back up to the attic.

When they returned the girl was still in the corner. Mandie advanced toward her and held out the plate of meat. The girl looked at it, then at them, then grabbed the meat from the plate and devoured it. Mandie and Celia watched in amazement.

The poor girl must be starved
, Mandie thought. “Do you want to come down to our room with us?” she asked.

The girl ignored the question and kept eating.

“What do we do now?” Celia asked.

“I don’t know,” said Mandie. “Let’s go downstairs and talk. Maybe we can figure out something.” She waved to the girl. “We have to go now, but we’ll be back,” she promised.

When they got to their room, they sat down on the window seat again, and Snowball jumped up between them.

Suddenly Celia gasped. “God answered our prayers,” she said. “He sent Snowball back to you!”

Mandie hugged her kitten and looked up at the dark sky outside.

“Thank you, dear God. Thank you,” she whispered.

“That poor girl up there!” Celia exclaimed. “There’s something wrong with her.”

“I wonder why she won’t talk,” Mandie said. “Who is she? And how did she get up there in the first place? I’d also like to know what’s in that trunk she’s trying to open. Might be
something real interesting. But that will just have to wait.”

“Mandie, we’ve got to tell someone about her,” Celia reminded her friend.

Mandie stood up and paced the floor. “I know we can’t let her stay up there and starve. But if we bring her downstairs, then Miss Prudence will know we’ve broken the school rules again. This time she might dismiss us for good.”

“But we can’t leave her up there like that just to save our own skins. I really think she’s sick, don’t you, Mandie?”

“I’ll send for Dr. Woodard. He’ll know what’s wrong with her,” Mandie said.

“Too bad we didn’t find her that night we came over here from your grandmother’s. Dr. Woodard was already in town then.”

“I know,” Mandie agreed. “And now if we ask him to come, then everyone will know everything.”

Mandie continued to argue with herself. “But why should she suffer for our sins? We would get into trouble, but she needs help.” Mandie paused to think. “Oh, I have an idea! I’ll ask Aunt Phoebe if the girl can stay in her house until Dr. Woodard can get here and see what’s wrong with her.”

“Aunt Phoebe might not agree to that. She might get into trouble, too.”

“If I know Aunt Phoebe, she just might be willing to help.” Mandie’s eyes sparkled. “I’ll ask her first thing in the morning.”

At five-thirty the next morning, the girls shut Snowball in their room and made their way downstairs. Unbolting the back door, they went outside and hurried across the yard to the little cottage.

Aunt Phoebe, already up and dressed, came to the door. “Lawsy mercy, Missies! What y’all doin’ up and dressed dis early in de mawnin’? Git in dis heah house ’fo’ Miz Prudence
sees y’all.” She swung the door open and pulled them inside.

“Aunt Phoebe, we’ve got a problem,” Mandie began, and then explained about the girl in the attic and their idea of bringing her to Aunt Phoebe’s house.

“There’s something wrong with her,” Celia said. “She won’t talk.”

Aunt Phoebe put her hands on her hips and tapped her foot. “Y’all’s a-fixin’ to git yo’selves in mo’ trouble,” she said.

“We thought of that, Aunt Phoebe, but our troubles are not important compared to that girl’s. She needs help,” Mandie pleaded. “Please, Aunt Phoebe. We’ll get her over here without anyone seeing her. No one will know about it.”

“And tell me whut gonna happen if Miz Prudence find out ’bout dis?”

“I don’t know, but we have to help the girl, even though it may cause trouble for us. We can’t just ignore her,” Mandie told the woman.

“She’s almost starved to death,” Celia said with concern.

Aunt Phoebe wasn’t convinced. “Best y’all jes’ march right up to dat Miz Prudence and tells huh. Let huh take care o’ things.”

“There’s no telling what Miss Prudence might do,” Mandie argued. “But if you’ll let her stay here until Dr. Woodard comes, he can take her to the hospital or see that she gets medical attention. Please, Aunt Phoebe.”

At that moment a loud voice called from the next room. “Phoebe, you do whut dem girls want. I send a message today to dat doctuh,” Uncle Cal told her as he came into the room.