Page:Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Volume 4.djvu/60

 "Don't worry, old fellows; time enough; sleep on it, and something capital will pop into somebody's noddle, see if it doesn't," counselled Alf, with a sage nod, as he went to discover who was sobbing in the hall.

Little Lotty sat on the fuzzy red mat, with a tortoise-shell kitten in her arms, her white pinafore full of candies, and her chubby face bedewed with tears.

"What's the matter, Toddlekins?" asked Alf, in such a sympathetic tone that the afflicted infant poured forth her woes in one breath, with the brown eyes flashing through their tears and a dramatic gesture of the small hands that told the tale better than her broken words.

"De naughty, naughty girls turned out my Torty 'cause she hopped on de table and drinked de tea, and I comed too, and we is doing to have a kitmouse tee all ourselfs up in de nursery, so now!"

Alf laughed at her indignation, but dried her tears, and sent her away happy with a sprig of hemlock from the decorations of the hall. "Virtue is its own reward" proved true in this case; for as Alf went back to his mates he had an idea—such a superb one that it nearly took his breath away and caused him to