“See, Dan, I found them, and ran back to give them to you; aren’t
they beautiful ones?” panted Demi, all out of breath.
Dan laughed at the toad, and said he had no place to put him, but
the butterfly was a beauty, and if Mrs. Jo would give him a big pin,
he would stick it right up in the drawer.
“I don’t like to see the poor thing struggle on a pin; if it must be
killed, let us put it out of pain at once with a drop of camphor,”
said Mrs. Jo, getting out the bottle.
“I know how to do it Mr. Hyde always killed ’em that way but I
didn’t have any camphor, so I use a pin,” and Dan gently poured a
drop on the insect’s head, when the pale green wings fluttered an
instant, and then grew still.
This dainty little execution was hardly over when Teddy shouted
from the bedroom, “Oh, the little trabs are out, and the big one’s
eaten ’em all up.” Demi and his aunt ran to the rescue, and found
Teddy dancing excitedly in a chair, while two little crabs were
scuttling about the floor, having got through the wires of the cage.
A third was clinging to the top of the cage, evidently in terror of
his life, for below appeared a sad yet funny sight. The big crab had
wedged himself into the little recess where Polly’s cup used to
stand, and there he sat eating one of his relations in the coolest
way. All the claws of the poor victim were pulled off, and he was
turned upside down, his upper shell held in one claw close under
the mouth of the big crab like a dish, while he leisurely ate out of
it with the other claw, pausing now and then to turn his queer
bulging eyes from side to side, and to put out a slender tongue and
lick them in a way that made the children scream with laughter.
Mrs. Jo carried the cage in for Dan to see the sight, while Demi
caught and confined the wanderers under an inverted wash-bowl.
“I’ll have to let these fellers go, for I can’t keep ’em in the house,”
said Dan, with evident regret.
“I’ll take care of them for you, if you will tell me how, and they can
live in my turtle-tank just as well as not,” said Demi, who found
them more interesting even that his beloved slow turtles. So Dan
gave him directions about the wants and habits of the crabs, and
Demi bore them away to introduce them to their new home and
neighbors. “What a good boy he is!” said Dan, carefully settling the
first butterfly, and remembering that Demi had given up his walk
to bring it to him.
“He ought to be, for a great deal has been done to make him so.”
“He’s had folks to tell him things, and to help him; I haven’t,” said
Dan, with a sigh, thinking of his neglected childhood, a thing he
seldom did, and feeling as if he had not had fair play somehow.
“I know it, dear, and for that reason I don’t expect as much from
you as from Demi, though he is younger; you shall have all the
help that we can give you now, and I hope to teach you how to
help yourself in the best way. Have you forgotten what Father
Bhaer told you when you were here before, about wanting to be
good, and asking God to help you?”
“No, ma’am,” very low.
“Do you try that way still?”
“No, ma’am,” lower still.
“Will you do it every night to please me?”
“Yes, ma’am,” very soberly.
“I shall depend on it, and I think I shall know if you are faithful to
your promise, for these things always show to people who believe
in them, though not a word is said. Now here is a pleasant story
about a boy who hurt his foot worse than you did yours; read it,
and see how bravely he bore his troubles.”
She put that charming little book, “The Crofton Boys,” into his
hands, and left him for an hour, passing in and out from time to