The Cricket   By: Marjorie Benton Cooke (1876-1920)

Books by the Same Author

BAMBI

CINDERELLA JANE

"DR. DAVID"

THE DUAL ALLIANCE

THE GIRL WHO LIVED IN THE WOODS

THE THRESHOLD

[Illustration: "What do you mean by acting like this when I give you a birthday party? . . . All the children in the colony are asked to come and play with you, and you make a monkey of yourself" ]

THE CRICKET

BY

MARJORIE BENTON COOKE

[Illustration]

ILLUSTRATED BY J. SCOTT WILLIAMS

GARDEN CITY NEW YORK DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 1919

Copyright, 1919, by

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY

All rights reserved, including that of translations into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian

Copyright, 1918, 1919, by THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE COMPANY (Harper's Bazar)

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

"What do you mean by acting like this when I give you a birthday party?" ( See page 6 ) Frontispiece

FACING PAGE She watched Jerry and Althea pacing the deck together 162

"You've made my summer for me, little witch," Cartel said 182

"Ye're a comfortable cricket, when ye want to be. I'd like to capture ye, to sing on my hearth!" 240

THE CRICKET

CHAPTER ONE

"I won't have it! I won't have it! If they come, I'll run away and hide!" shouted the child, wildly.

"That will be very rude. No one acts like that no one except a barbarian," said Miss Wilder, calmly.

"I want to be a bar one of those things you said."

"You act like one most of the time."

The child brain caught at a new idea.

"What is that that what you said?"

"Barbarian? B a r b a r i a n," she spelled slowly. "It is a savage creature with no manners, no morals, no clothes even. It lives in a hut or a tree, and eats roots and nuts, and nearly raw meat," Miss Wilder remarked, none too accurately, but slowly, in order to distract Isabelle's attention from the late subject of unpleasantness. The little girl considered her words thoughtfully.

"Do they have children?"

"Yes."

"Where do they live?"

"Oh, strange places; Fiji Islands, for one."

"Are there any near here?"

"Not that I know of."

"I want to go live with the bar barbarians."

Miss Wilder's stern face underwent no change. She answered seriously:

"You would not like it; you would be very uncomfortable. The children have no pretty clothes, no nice homes with gardens to play in, no kind parents or patient teachers."

"Do they have horses?"

"I suppose so."

"Do they swim?"

"Probably. They have rude boats called dug outs," continued Miss Wilder, glad of an absorbing subject.

"Do the children go in the boats?"

"No doubt."

"They can't get their clothes spoiled if they don't wear any."

"Obviously. Come, now, Isabelle, put on your dress like a nice girl. The children will be coming to the party, and you won't be dressed."

"I won't put on that dress, and I'm not going to the party, I tell you; I hate them."