W. A. G.'s Tale

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My name is William Ainsworth Gordon, and my initials spell W.A.G. That is why Aunty May and I call this book "W.A.G.'S TALE." If it was about a dog it would be "Tail Wags." So it's true and a joke too.

I am ten years old and my father and mother are in Heaven, and I have only Uncle Burt to take care of me. Uncle Burt isn't my real uncle, but he was my father's chum when they were at West Point, and he promised father to take care of me. And he does, only he had to go to the Philippines with his soldiers; so his sister, Aunty Edith, is taking care of me until he comes back. Everybody else calls me William, but he calls me "Billy," so I am the one this chapter is named after.

Aunty May says I can begin with the very day Aunty Edith brought me down here. That was the day Uncle Burt went away to join his regiment, and everybody was sort of quiet, and even the big people cried a little. I cried a good deal, when nobody was looking, and when Uncle Burt caught me at it in the corner of the room, he didn't say a word, but just picked me up and held me so tight that one of his buttons got stamped on my cheek like a seal. He said he'd give way and cry, too, for it was good for the eyes, only his Colonel had expressly ordered him not to, saying he would leave all red-eyed men home, which would be terrible for a soldier. So I begged him not to give way, and he said he wouldn't if I'd stop, because one fellow bawling makes it hard for the other fellow not to. So I stopped and we laughed a little, and then he showed the mark on my cheek to Aunty Edith, and said, "This shows that this young man belongs to me, so be careful of Uncle Burt's Billy and return him in good condition, for there will be a dreadful time if I find him chipped or broken, when I come back."

Then the lady I call Aunty May, though she isn't any relation to me either, but is just Aunty Edith's friend, laughed and said she would be careful to treat me nicely. And she has. I like her best next to Uncle Burt. She didn't cry. She laughed a lot, and every time Uncle Burt got sad and tried to talk to her, she laughed more, and she took me on her lap and kept me there all the time Uncle Burt was saying good-bye to her.

He looked more like crying then than any other time. He said, "Good-bye, May; won't you change your mind?" and she said, "Oh, no, Burt, I can't." Then he was going to say something else when I said, "Remember the Colonel, Uncle Burt, and don't get your eyes too red to go," and then they both laughed. Uncle Burt said, "Look after Miss Heath for me, Billy, while I'm gone," and I said, "Sure I will. I'm going to adopt her as my Aunty, too." She put her arms round me and hugged me and Uncle Burt said, "Lucky Billy," and then the door closed, and Aunty Edith began to cry and Aunty May looked queer for a minute and went to the door. I thought she'd run after him, but she stopped and said, "Come along, Sir William, and we'll pack our bags, 'cause we're all going to the country on the 3.10." And I took hold of her hand, and we went upstairs together, and packed my bag and put in my gun, my soldiers, my books and my paint-box. Then Aunty Edith stopped crying and tied a veil over her face. If she'd been a soldier she'd been left home all right.

We got in a taxi with a lot of bags and things and went to the Pennsylvania Station, which is miles and miles long, I think, but there are lots of kind black men who wear red caps and run up and take your bags and carry them for you just as easy, One of them took my bag and Aunty May's suitcase, but Aunty Edith had another one—a fat one—all alone for her things.

We just had time for our train, so we had to hurry right through the waiting-room, and I couldn't stop and see all the things there are to see, or watch the people coming down the stairs. People's legs are funny if you watch them coming down—like things made with hinges.

Then we got into a nice big train with chairs in it that swung round. They call it a "Pullman" which is a good name for a car, only it's the engine that pulls the man and the car, too, really. Then we got all comfortable, with another nice colored man who showed his teeth at us, and put our bags up on a rack, and Aunty May gave me some sweet chocolate and a magazine with pictures in it, and Aunty Edith said. "I wish we didn't have to change at Trenton,"—and—then—I fell asleep.

The next thing I knew Aunty May was saying to me, "Wake up, Billy, dear, it's Trenton now." She put on my jacket and the man took our bags again and we stepped out on a big platform, and then another man took all our bags and we went up one stair, and down another, and waited on a long platform, where trains kept shooting up every minute.

I couldn't understand what the man in uniform said, until at last a funny little train—all short, only half as long as our New York one, and with funny, hard straight seats—came, and we climbed in. Aunty Edith and Aunty May and me had to carry our own bags and fix 'em. The train waited a long time, but at last it moved, and Aunty May put her arm round me and sat me next the window, only it wasn't open, because it was only April and wasn't warm enough yet, and said, "Now we're off to East Penniwell."

The train just crawled along, and there was a big canal on the one side. I saw a canal boat with two men and a dog on it, and they were cooking something in a big pot on the top of a stove that stood right out of doors, on top of the boat, with a stovepipe that didn't go into any chimney, but right up into the air—with smoke coming out of it!

I showed it to Aunty May and she said, "You will see them every day when we get to the towpath," and I felt awful glad at that, because though the boat moved slow, the train moved fast, and I didn't get a good look at the boy who was driving the mules. I couldn't be sure whether he'd made a face at me or not, but I think he did.

Then by and by on the other side of the train came a great big river, all fast and running along and some bubbling-up places in it where rocks stood up. Aunty May said those were rapids and this was the Delaware River, the one Washington crossed.

I think more of him than ever, now I've seen the river, for it's good and wide and it must have been a cold job getting over it. I told Aunty May I hoped it wasn't at the rapids he tried to cross, and she said, "Oh, no," and "I'll show you," and presently the train stopped and the conductor said, "Washington's Crossing," There was a big tree, where he could have tied a boat if he'd wanted to. Aunty May said maybe he did; and a white house where I guess the soldiers got something to eat and drink. Anyway, I hoped so. Aunty May said she'd never asked, so she couldn't say, positively, as it was so long ago, but it wouldn't hurt to think they did. So I imagined it that way.

Then our train stopped at a station and we got out. I hadn't been ready for its stopping, and I got so busy getting my things on, and getting my bag in my hand, that I didn't hear the name of it, and I asked Aunty May if it was East Penniwell, and she said, "Oh, no, this is Scrubbsville, New Jersey, and East Penniwell is in Pennsylvania."

"Will we get into another train, then?" I asked, and Aunty May laughed and said, "Oh, no, just wait and see." Then we got off and walked down, carrying our bags, to a big bridge right over the Delaware.

There was a man sitting, at the end of the bridge, in a little house with a window in it, and you paid him two cents apiece before you could get on the bridge to go to Pennsylvania. He is the Toll-Man and it is a Toll-Bridge, and it seemed to me very funny to have to pay to walk. Aunty May said it was funny, too, but Aunty Edith said it was a nuisance.

Aunty Edith asked the Toll-Man if we could leave our big suitcase there, until Mr. Tree the grocer came over with a wagon for our trunks, later, and he said, "Yes." He was a nice smiling man.

Then Aunty Edith and Aunty May and I, and Aunty Edith's bag and my little one, which Aunty May carried because she said we had a long walk ahead of us, went over the bridge.

The wind almost blew my cap away, but I caught it just in time, and on the bridge we met a big man carrying a paint-box and a folding-up stool, like Aunty Edith has, and he had an E-normous dog, as big as me, and it galumphed at me, and I got behind Aunty Edith, for she is very big both ways, and the man said, "Down, Pete," When the dog downed, he shook hands with Aunty Edith, and she introduced him to Aunty May and me, and he said he was glad to see us, and I could come and play with his children up the towpath.

I said, "Yes, sir," but Aunty May and me kept away from Pete, because we didn't know him then. We know him now and like him. The man said, "Wait till I get back and I'll take you up in the launch." Then he went on to Scrubbsville, and Aunty Edith said, "Such a pleasure to meet Mr. Turner. Now William won't get tired walking up. Won't that be nice, William, to go up the canal in the launch, instead of walking?" I said, "Yes, 'm, Aunty Edith," to her, but to Aunty May I said, "Will that Pete be in the boat, too?" and Aunty May whispered back, "Ow Gracious! I hope not. But don't let him know we're afraid, old man." So I took her hand tight and we followed Aunty Edith, who is an awful fast walker and always has so many things to do.

First we went to the Post-Office, which is a little wooden building, and the Postmaster knows everybody and looks at you over his glasses. Then we went up a funny street with brick pavements, awful old. There are houses on that very street built before the Revolution, and a big cannon in the square. We went to Mr. Tree's, and he's a nice, big grocer man, with everything in his shop, and he patted me on the head and gave me a chocolate candy, which Aunty Edith said I might eat, if I ate it slowly. He said he would bring our trunks and bags up right away. Aunty Edith said, "Now I've got to order oil from Tryer and coal from Quick and some thread from Miss Macfarland's notion store," and I said, "Why don't the servants do all that, Aunty Edith?" She laughed and said, "There are no servants for us at East Penniwell, William; we do the work ourselves," Aunty May said, "But it will be fun, Billy. All the artists like Aunty Edith live that way down here, and you and I will be the writer people and we'll do lots of funny things together. Only, Edith," she said, "the boy and I are weary; where can we rest while you finish your shopping?"

"Oh, very well," Aunty Edith said; "come and I'll show you the launch and you can get in that and sit and wait for Mr. Turner."

We walked up a funny, hilly, crooked street, with partly brick pavements again and partly stone, till we came to an old wooden bridge over a canal, and then Aunty May squeezed my hand and said, "Billy, this is our canal," We crossed the bridge, and went down a few steps and there was Mr. Turner's launch. We got in and sat and watched the water and made up stories to each other, till Aunty Edith and Mr. Turner came, all full of bundles. Mr. Turner started the launch and we went chug-chugging along. But Pete didn't get in. He swam part of the time and ran and barked on the towpath the other part.

The canal boats came down past us, and they began to have lights on them, and the trees were all green and hung down by the canal banks, and I could see where the dogwood was beginning to come out in the woods. There were some ducks swimming in the canal, and a farmhouse high above us on the bank. Then nothing but the towpath, which is the path on one side of the canal where the mules walk when they drag the canal boats.

By and by I saw two tiny white houses, with their roofs and chimneys sticking up over the canal bank, and one of them had a funny green door, and honeysuckle all growing over the fence. Mr. Turner never stopped till Aunty Edith called, "Oh, we're going past," Then he stopped and jumped out and took a rope and pulled the boat close to the bank, where there were some stones placed like steps. I saw the two houses plainly then, one a white stone one and one a white wooden one with a green door.

We all stepped out, with our bags, and said good-bye to Mr. Turner, and his launch went away up the canal past us, and Aunty Edith took a key out of her pocket and went down a step, into the garden of the house with the green door, and opened it, and said to Aunty May and me, "Come in, children. This is OUR HOUSE."