with a rakish, flapping, Panama hat, come rapidly around the turn
and disappear over the long hills leading down to the falls.
There was no mistaking him; there never was another Abner
Simpson, with his lean height, his bushy reddish hair, the gay
cock of his hat, and the long, piratical, upturned mustaches,
which the boys used to say were used as hat-racks by the Simpson
children at night. The old Milltown road ran past Mrs. Fogg's
house, so he must have left Clara Belle there, and Rebecca's
heart glowed to think that her poor little friend need not miss
the raising.
She began to run now, fearful of being late for supper, and
covered the ground to the falls in a brief time. As she crossed
the bridge she again saw Abner Simpson's team, drawn up at the
watering-trough.
Coming a little nearer with the view of inquiring for the family,
her quick eye caught sight of something unexpected. A gust of
wind blew up a corner of a linen lap-robe in the back of the
wagon, and underneath it she distinctly saw the white-sheeted
bundle that held the flag; the bundle with a tiny, tiny spot of
red bunting peeping out at one corner. It is true she had eaten,
slept, dreamed red, white, and blue for weeks, but there was no
mistaking the evidence of her senses; the idolized flag, longed
for, worked for, sewed for, that flag was in the back of Abner
Simpson's wagon, and if so, what would become of the raising?
Acting on blind impulse, she ran toward the watering-trough,
calling out in her clear treble Mr.Simpson! Oh, Mr. Simpson, will
you let me ride a little way with you and hear all about Clara
Belle? I'm going over to the Centre on an errand." (So she was; a
most important errand,--to recover the flag of her country at
present in the hands of the foe !)