Caddie Woodlawn's Family by Carol Ryrie Brink Read Free Book Online Page B

were slow and gentle in their movements, so that he would not frighten it. He could hear Warren crashing through the brush near by.
    He said in a quiet, warning voice,
“Warren!”
    “What? Did you find it, Tom? Did you find the fawn?”
    “Quiet,” Tom said.
    “Oh, Tom!” whispered Warren, coming to stand beside him and look at the perfect little creature which lay trembling on its bed of leaves and flowers and ferns.
    “The mother’s dead,” said Tom in a low voice. “I guess it hasn’t anybody but us. Like Caddie’s lamb.”
    “Can we raise it on a bottle, Tom, do you think?”
    “Ya. George Custis raised one.”
    “What if the hunters get it, like they got its Ma?” whispered Warren fiercely, wiping his eyes and nose upon his sleeve.
    “We’ll put a red flannel band around its middle,” Tom said, “so they’ll know not to shoot.”
    Gently he lifted it and wrapped his coat around it.
    “I guess we got our pet now, Tom,” Warren said. “You guess so?”
    “Ya, I guess so,” said Tom.
    They walked very softly through the woods carrying the fawn by turns, and their eyes shone with a new brightness.

SIX

Emma Went Too
    C ADDIE , L IDA S ILBERNAGLE , and Emma McCantry all started early to walk into Eau Galle to see the Medicine Show. They were going to have supper at Lida’s Grandma’s, and Mr. Woodlawn was going to drive them home after the show was over. Caddie’s brothers had gone to Eau Galle with Father in the morning.
    Caddie had on her good blue dress and Lida a new bonnet with artificial cherries on it. Emma didn’t have anything new to wear, but she felt lucky enough to be getting to go at all. There were always so many things to do at home which Mrs. McCantry didn’t like to do because they spoiled her hands. But neither Emma nor Mrs. McCantry cared how Emma’s hands looked, so it was often hard to get away. Of course Emma had the eggs to deliver to the crossroads store on the way, and the candle mold to return to Grandma Butler at the second farm before the crossroads, and the Star of Bethlehem quilt pattern to borrow from the blacksmith’s wife; but she did
not
have to take a baby along to mind, and that was something. Emma sighed. It wasn’t that she minded looking after the younger children or running her mother’s errands; but it was so nice to have a day to herself once in a while, and time to go somewhere with the other girls.
    “They say it’s a dandy show,” said Caddie. “Robert Ireton saw it in Durand last week. The man who runs it is called Dr. Hearty, and he sings and plays the banjo and does sleight-of-hand tricks. He has an old spotted horse and he carries his show along with him in his wagon.”
    “Does he have a trick dog, too?” asked Lida.
    “Oh, yes. That’s about the best part. They say his medicine cures everything that you could have, but I guess Dr. Nightingale doesn’t think much of it. Most people go to see the show, not to buy the medicine.”
    “I’m sure I don’t want any medicine,” said Lida, “but it will be fun to hear banjo singing and see magic. Did a medicine show ever come out here before?”
    “Not that I ever heard of.”
    Emma jogged along beside them with the basket of eggs on one arm and the candle mold under the other, and she didn’t say a word but she kept smiling. She thought to herself that she had never seen a show at all and this was going to be quite wonderful. When they cut across the pasture a bobolink whistled at them, and Emma whistled back at it—a true bobolink call.
    “I wish I could do that,” said Caddie, puckering up her lips to try.
    “Emma can make lots of birds’ whistles, can’t you, Emma?” asked Lida.
    Emma smiled and pursed up her lips, and out came the sound the robins make just before rain.
    They turned in at Grandma Butler’s place. Caddie and Lida sat down in the hammock under the pines to waitwhile Emma took the candle mold around to the back door.
    “Oh, Emma,” said Grandma Butler.