The cover image was modified by the transcriber to add the title and author and is placed in the public domain.

The Two Ways.

DOWN THE SNOW STAIRS;

OR,

FROM GOOD-NIGHT TO GOOD-MORNING.

By ALICE CORKRAN,

Author of “Margery Merton’s Girlhood,” etc., etc.

WITH SIXTY ILLUSTRATIONS BY GORDON BROWNE.

NEW YORK:

A. L. BURT, PUBLISHER.

CONTENTS.

CHAP. PAGE
I. Christmas Eve [1]
II. Kitty and Johnnie [17]
III. Down the Snow Stairs [34]
IV. Naughty Children Land [48]
V. “To Daddy Coax’s House” [67]
VI. Daddy Coax [85]
VII. On the Other Side of the Stream [112]
VIII. Pictures in the Fog [122]
IX. Love Speaks [151]
X. In the Wood [162]
XI. Kitty Dances with Strange Partners [177]
XII. “Eat or Be Eaten” [192]
XIII. Play-Ground, and After [206]
XIV. “I and Myself” [215]
XV. Was it Johnnie’s Face? [229]
XVI. At the Gate [242]

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE
The Two Ways [Frontispiece].
Restless Kitty [1]
Johnnie and His Art Treasures [5]
The Snow-Man [16]
Down the Wide Staircase [16]
Kitty’s Tears [22]
Sliding Down the Balusters [28]
The Snow-Man Visits Kitty [35]
Following the Snow-Man [39]
The Drollest Creature [40]
Kitty and the Elf [45]
Broken Toy Land [49]
A Dismal Chorus [51]
“A black creature glared at her” [54]
A Disagreeable Acquaintance [56]
Little Cruel-Heart [61]
A Good Fight [64]
The Song of the Sillies [69]
“I am not vain” [73]
A Jam-Tart Too Many [78]
Kitty and Daddy Coax [87]
A Lively Wig [89]
Sweetening the Fury [95]
All Jam and No Powder [98]
Little Spitfire [100]
The Fight for the Flute [108]
The Shadow of the Rod [111]
“Peering out of the mist” [114]
The White-Robed Stranger [119]
Entangled in the Web [123]
The Tramp of Weary Feet [126]
Ice-Children [130]
The Right One to Kick [133]
A Hard Lesson [139]
“Oh, to be hungry again!” [141]
Faces! Faces!—a World of Faces! [145]
The Cry for the Kiss [152]
Kitty’s Guardian Child [155]
Kitty’s Naughty-Self Goblin [161]
The Hanging Dwarf [166]
Goblin Sloth [169]
“Real yawning” [172]
“At one bound she sprang across” [176]
The Frog-Like One [178]
Step, Wriggle, and Bow [181]
The Little Courtiers [185]
Kitty’s Musings [188]
Apple-Pie Corner [193]
The Boy with the Suetty Voice [199]
Struggling Onward [204]
I and Myself [217]
Mr. Take-care-of-himself [220]
“A cripple like Johnnie” [226]
A Merry Game [232]
The Goblin Crew [236]
Out of the Mist [241]
At the Locked Gate [244]
The Mist of Punishment Land [248]
Home Again [251]
“It is a secret” [254]

CHAPTER I
CHRISTMAS EVE.

Toss! toss! from one side to the other; still Kitty could not sleep.

The big round moon looked in at the window, for the curtain had not been drawn, and it made a picture of the window on the wall opposite, and showed the pattern on the paper; nosegays of roses, tied with blue ribbon; roses and knots of blue ribbon; like no roses Kitty had ever seen, and no blue ribbon she had ever bought.

Toss! toss! toss! she shut her eyes not to see the picture of the window on the wall or the roses and the blue ribbon, yet she could not go to sleep. It was always toss! toss! from one side to the other.

It was Christmas Eve, and outside the world was white with snow.

“It had been a dreadful day,” Kitty said to herself. “The last nine days had been dreadful days, and this had been the dreadfulest of all.”

Her brother Johnnie was very ill; he was six years old, just two years younger than herself; but he was much smaller, being a tiny cripple. Next to her mother Kitty loved him more than anybody in the whole world.

All through those “dreadful” nine days she had not been allowed to see him. She had many times knelt outside his door, and listened to his feeble moan, but she had not been permitted to enter his room.

That morning she had asked the doctor if she could see Johnnie, as it was Christmas Eve. The doctor had shaken his head and patted her hair. “He must not be excited; he is still very ill. If he gets better after to-night—then—perhaps!” he said.

She had overheard what he whispered to Nurse. “To-night will decide; if he pulls through to-night.”

All day Kitty had thought of those words.

“To-night, if he pulls through to-night.” What did they mean? did they mean that Johnnie might die to-night?

She had waited outside Johnnie’s room; but her mother had said, “No; you cannot go in;” and Nurse had said, “You will make Johnnie worse if you stand about, and he hears your step.”

Kitty’s heart was full of misery. “It was unkind not to let me in to see Johnnie,” she said again and again to herself. She loved him so much! She loved him so much! Then there was a “dreadful” reason why his illness was worse for her to bear than for any one else. Kitty remembered that ten days ago there had been a snow-storm; when the snow had ceased she had gone out and made snowballs in the garden, and she had asked her mother if Johnnie might come out and make snow-balls also.

“On no account,” her mother had answered; “Johnnie is weak; if he caught a cold it would be very bad for him.”

Kitty remembered how the next morning she had gone into the meadow leading out of the garden. There the gardener had helped her to make a snow-man; and they had put a pipe into his mouth. She had danced around the snow-man, and she had longed for Johnnie to see it.

Kitty remembered how she had run indoors and found Johnnie sitting by the fire in his low crimson chair, his tiny crutch beside him, his paint-box on the little table before him. He was painting a yellow sun, with rays all round it.

It was Johnnie’s delight to paint. He would make stories about his pictures; he told those stories to Kitty only. They were secrets. He kept his pictures in an old tea-chest which their mother had given him, and it had a lock and key. Johnnie kept all his treasures there—all his little treasures, all his little secrets. They were so pretty and so pitiful! They were his tiny pleasures in life. Johnnie was painting “Good Children Land” and “Naughty Children Land.” Good Children Land he painted in beautiful yellow gamboge; Naughty Children Land in black India ink.

Kitty in her bed to-night seemed to see the whole scene, and to hear her own and Johnnie’s voices talking. She had rushed in, and Johnnie had looked up, and he had begun to tell her the story of his picture.

“Look, Kitty!” he had said; “this is the portrait of the naughtiest child, the very, very naughtiest that ever was; and he has come into Good Children Land—by mistake, you know. Look! he has furry legs like a goat, and horns and a tail, just because he is so naughty; but he is going to become good. I will paint him getting good in my next picture.”

Kitty remembered how she had just glanced at the picture; “the naughtiest child that ever was” looked rather like a big blot with a tail, standing in front of the yellow sun. But she had been so full of the thought of the snow-man that she had begun to speak about him at once.

“Oh, Johnnie!” she had said, skipping about first on one foot, then on the other. “The gardener and I have made such a snow-man. He’s as big as the gardener, and ever so much fatter; and he’s got hands, but no legs, only a stump, you know; and we’ve put a pipe into his mouth.”

The Snow-Man.—Page 6.

At this description Johnnie’s eyes had sparkled, and he had cried, “Oh! I wish I could see him!”

Then she had gone on to say, still skipping about: “He has two holes for his eyes, and they seem to look at me; and his face is as round as a plate; he just looks like the man in the moon smoking a pipe.”

This description had roused Johnnie’s excitement, and he had stretched an eager little hand toward his crutch.

“Please take me to see him! please take me to see him!” he had entreated.

Kitty remembered that she had hesitated. “I am afraid it would give you a cold,” she had said, looking at Johnnie with her head on one side.

“I shall put on my hat and comforter,” Johnnie had replied, grasping his crutch.

Still, she remembered, she had hesitated.

Her mother had said, “Johnnie must not go out in the snow.” But then Kitty had thought: “The sun is shining; and it will be for a moment only.” She did so long for Johnnie to see the snow-man, and he wished it so much. She remembered she had thought: “It can do him no harm just for a moment.”

She had helped Johnnie on with his overcoat, and wrapped his comforter round him, and put on his hat, and together they had gone out. There was no one in the hall, or on the stairs; they had gone out unobserved.

Johnnie had not a notion he was disobeying his mother. His tiny crutch danced merrily along with a muffled thud in the snow. He swung his small body as he hopped along; and he laughed as he looked round on the glistening white garden. So brisk and joyous was his laugh that Kitty had thought it was like the crow of a little cock. When Johnnie saw the snow-man he shouted a feeble hurrah! and he laughed more and more merrily as Kitty danced about and pelted the snow-man with snow-balls. Kitty remembered how she had gone on dancing awhile. Then all at once she noticed that Johnnie looked pinched and blue. She had run up to him, just in time to catch him as he was falling; his arm had lost its power, and his crutch had dropped. She had held him tight; but he looked so pale and thin that she thought he was going to die. Her screams had brought the gardener to the rescue, and Johnnie had been carried indoors. That night Johnnie’s illness had begun, and ever since the doctor had come twice a day.

Kitty had never been able to tell any one of the load that had been weighing on her heart during those nine “dreadful days.” Once she had tried to say it to her mother; but she burst into such a fit of sobbing that the words refused to come. No one had reproached her for having taken Johnnie out, no one had even mentioned it to her; but she knew it was she who had brought all this suffering on him. She who loved him so much! she who loved him so much!

As she was thinking of all this a voice sounded by her bedside; it said:

“Now, missy dear, you must not take on so. You must not fret. Look what old cooksie-coaxy has brought you—a mince-pie—a big—beautiful mince-pie—all for missy—alone.”

It was cook who had stolen softly into the room. She was a fat, good-natured soul, and she spoilt Kitty terribly. All during that sad week cook had petted her, giving her cakes and sweets. She had kept assuring Kitty she was the dearest, best little girl in the world—“Cooksie-coaxy’s little angel-darling, and that Johnnie would soon get quite well.”

This sympathy had sometimes been very agreeable to Kitty, and she had accepted it and the sweet things it brought gratefully; but at other times she had repelled it, feeling angry with cook for saying what was not true only to please her.

Now Kitty buried her face deeper in the pillow, stopped her ears, and waved away cook and the mince-pie with an impatient elbow.

“Go away! go away!” she cried. “You spoil me; mamma says you spoil me. I would not be so naughty if you did not spoil me.”

Cook continued to hold out the mince-pie, but Kitty would not look round.

“Go away! go away!” she repeated.

Poor cook departed, leaving the mince-pie on a chair by Kitty’s bed. As she reached the door she looked round, and murmured: “Poor little dear, she doesn’t mean to be unkind to old cooksie-coaxy.”

Toss! toss! went Kitty again as soon as she was left alone. She had never been so wakeful.

It was as if some little creature was sitting on her pillow and talking to her. It was not a real voice; it was her memory that was wide awake.

“You have teased Johnnie,” it said. “He is so helpless. And how often when he has asked for his treasures you have brought him rulers, books, all sorts of things he did not want. Did you see the gush of tears in his eyes when you continued to tease, and when you ceased, the grateful, forgiving little lips put up to kiss you?”

As Kitty listened she tossed about even more restlessly.

Presently the voice that was her memory went on again: “There was that peach last summer; your mother gave it you to share with Johnnie. You gave him the smaller half; you kept the bigger one for yourself.”

Kitty tried not to hear, but the voice went on speaking: “How often you have run out to amuse yourself and left him pining alone. Do you remember that day when the Punch and Judy man brought his show into the garden, how impatient you were? Tap! tap! his eager little crutch could scarcely follow you. You dropped his hand suddenly and he fell to the ground. What a piteous, helpless little heap he looked. He could not raise himself; but when you lifted him he stroked your cheek and said: ‘Never mind, Kitsie,’ and he never told. Do you remember how pale he looked all day, as if he were in pain?”

Kitty could not bear listening to that voice any longer, so she sat up in bed. And there, on the wall opposite, there seemed written in the moonlight what the doctor had said: “If he pulls through to-night.”

Did it mean that Johnnie might die to-night?

She must see Johnnie—she must. She would be so gentle, so good. If he would only get well again she would never tease him again—she would never be impatient—she would always be good to him. She would put aside all her money and buy toys for him to put into his treasure-box.

If they would only let her in she would creep into his room, sit by his bedside, and hold his hand. She would tell him the story of the “Blue Rose,” which she had invented out of her own head and which he liked so much.

Kitty now went over the story to herself.

“There was a garden to which a fairy with blue wings and a blue hat had told her the way. It was very difficult to find, and it was a secret. But there was a rose in that garden, just like any other rose, only it was much bigger, and it had more leaves and a sweeter smell, and it was blue, and the fairy said if Johnnie smelt it he would get quite well. Then she and Johnnie [in the story] went off together, and they had a great many adventures. They had met robbers and giants, and they lost their way in a wood, and all sorts of terrible things had happened. But she had taken such care of Johnnie. She had protected him from the robbers, she had deluded the giants and sent them to sleep, and at last she and Johnnie had come to the garden. Such a garden—full of lovely flowers! and right in the middle of the garden there was a blue rose, exactly the color of the fairy’s wings and hat. It was set round with thorns, but Kitty did not care one bit. She pushed her arm right through the thorns. It would get all scratched, but she did not mind. She would pluck the blue rose and give it to Johnnie. He would smell it, and at the first whiff his leg would grow straight; he would smell it again and his leg would grow strong; he would smell it a third time and he would throw down his crutch, he would begin to jump about and dance. They would play games of hide-and-seek and run races, and Johnnie would run faster than she could. They would come home together, and everybody would wonder; but they would not say a word about the ‘blue rose.’ It was a secret.”

This story had been quite a little story when Kitty had first made it out of her own head; but Johnnie had added bits to it. He had put in about the giants, and about a tiger with glaring green eyes going to spring upon him just as they found the gate of the garden.

The more she thought of all these things the more Kitty felt she must see Johnnie.

Out went one bare foot from under the coverlid, and still there in the moonlight it seemed to be written: “To-morrow is Christmas Day and there may be no Johnnie.”

This might be Johnnie’s last night. Kitty felt she would cry out if she did not see him, and out of bed went the other bare foot.

The clock struck the half-hour; it was half-past nine. How silent the house was! Her mother was lying down. Nurse was with Johnnie. If only she would come out of his room! She wished with all the might of her little heart nurse would come out. But nothing stirred through the house. Yes, after awhile she heard a slight noise, a door was creaking below. It was Johnnie’s door. She heard a step. Out of bed dashed Kitty. She ran into the lobby; she looked over the balusters.

Yes, it was nurse going downstairs to the kitchen. She saw her white cap and apron distinctly. Kitty’s heart seemed to stop beating. The kitchen door closed after nurse. Hush!

CHAPTER II
KITTY AND JOHNNIE.

Hush! The night-gowned, barefooted small figure crept down the wide staircase. Outside, the garden covered with snow glittered under the light of the big, beautiful full moon; it was so bright that it put out all the stars except those in far-away corners. There was a colored window on that staircase. As Kitty crept past it a bar of pink light, a square of lovely blue, a patch of orange shaped like a dragon fell upon her white night-gown. The trees outside were still, as if they were fast asleep under their eider-down covering of snow.

Hush! There was not a sound or a stir through the house, except the flap, flap of Kitty’s bare feet on the stairs. Suddenly a mouse ran across; Kitty saw its long tail quite distinctly. She was very much afraid of mice; the sight of one would give her a creepy feeling. But to-night she did not care for this mouse, nor for an army of mice. She was going to see Johnnie. She had no fear, except that of not being able to reach him.

Hush! Suddenly a stair creaked, and the creak sounded like a scream through the silence. Kitty huddled herself up, her shoulders to her ears, her elbows and hands pressed close against her sides and chest. She stood a moment or two staring, and thump, thump went her heart; but everything remained silent as before, and the bare toes resumed their march—cautiously—down—down. Now she sees Johnnie’s door. It is not quite shut. Something is standing before it. What is it? Something white and small. Is it Johnnie’s spirit?

Flutter—flutter—thump—thump went her heart. She stood trembling with terror; but alive or dead she must see Johnnie. Her love is greater than her fear. Down—down she goes, keeping her eyes fixed on that white thing before the door. Then she almost laughs out, for she sees it is no spirit, but a white apron hanging just inside the door.

Hush! Just as Kitty reaches the last step a door opens below. It is the kitchen door. She hears the servant talking. Nurse’s voice reaches her quite plainly. Is she coming up? Beat—beat—beat goes Kitty’s heart, and she peers over the balusters.

The next moment the door is shut again, and once more there is not a stir or a sound through the house.

Hush! Cautiously—cautiously Kitty pushes Johnnie’s door wide enough open to let her pass in.

She stands now in the dear familiar room. A fire burning in the grate fills every corner with a ruddy glow. She sees the pictures on the walls, on the table the medicine bottles and a spoon, in its accustomed place the low red-cushioned chair and tiny crutch beside it. A little bed with white curtains stands in a corner.

Softly—softly Kitty makes her way toward the bed, and pauses when she approaches it.

Johnnie’s face is on the pillow, white as the snow in the garden; all around it a cloud of golden hair. His eyes are closed, and the long lashes look very dark against the pale cheeks.

Kitty remained quite quiet a moment looking at him; then she came closer within the curtains and laid her hand—a very warm brown plump one—on the wee white hand lying outside the red coverlid.

“Johnnie!” she whispered, and the name came as if the little heart would burst if it was not spoken.

Johnnie opened his eyes, looked blankly and queerly at her, then at once closed them again.

“Johnnie, speak to me!” urged Kitty with a sob.

Thus appealed to, Johnnie once more opened his eyes wider and wider, till the white wasted face seemed to become all blue eyes. Still he gazed blankly at his visitor in the night-gown; gradually his look brightened, he began to smile, the smile broadened into a laugh.

“Kitty!” he exclaimed in a glad feeble whisper.

“I ought not to have waked you,” said Kitty, in a quivering voice; “but they have not let me near you for nine days. I have counted them—nine

“Poor old Kitsy!” whispered Johnnie; and up went the tiny hot hand in an effort to stroke Kitty’s cheek.

“They will send me away now if they find me,” continued Kitty, shaking with a burst of tears. “Mother is lying down. I heard nurse go downstairs—and so—and so—” Here the heaving of the little bosom, and the quick motion of the chin up and down, checked further speech.

Johnnie panted a moment on his pillow before he said:

“I have sometimes fancied you were in the room, Kitsy. I saw you quite plain—your freckles and your dear little cocked nose.”

At this description of herself Kitty knelt in a delighted heap by Johnnie’s bed, and rubbed her face round and round on his red flannel sleeve, very much like an affectionate pussy.

“I have cried so much since you were ill,” she went on after awhile. “One day I wetted seven pocket handkerchiefs with my tears. I hung them up to dry. I counted them—there were seven.”

Johnnie’s eyes glistened with sympathy, and he repeated in his feeble voice:

“Poor old Kitsy!”

“It was the day,” went on Kitty, wishing to be exact, “that mother said I was to say in my prayers, ‘Pray God, leave us little Johnnie; but thy will be done.’ I prayed all day, I kept going down on my knees, and every time I waked up in the night I said ‘Leave us little Johnnie.’ I did not say ‘Thy will be done.’ I said ‘Leave us little Johnnie, leave us little Johnnie.’”

There was a silence; then Johnnie said in an odd sort of a way:

“I know what day that was. It was the day I saw my guardian child.”

“Your guardian child!” repeated Kitty curiously.

Johnnie nodded.

“What was he like?” asked Kitty, pressing nearer up against the bed.

“He was just like me,” answered Johnnie, looking straight before him, as if he were seeing there what he described; “only his two legs were both the same size—so he had no crutch, and he had a rosy face.”

“How was he dressed?” asked Kitty, growing more curious.

“He had a rainbow sort of a coat on,” replied Johnnie, “and he had two little pink wings. I thought he had come, perhaps, because I was going to die—and he wanted to show me that in heaven I was to have two legs the same size, and no crutch.”

“Oh—o-oh!” cried Kitty, her tears gushing out anew.

“Don’t cry, Kitsy,” the little panting voice resumed. “When I die I want you to have my cake of gamboge, my rose-pink, my India-ink, and my two sable brushes.”

“But you are not going to die,” cried Kitty, giving the bed a shake as she plumped against it. “To-morrow is Christmas Day, and you are to be much better to-morrow. Oh, Johnnie!” she added, wiping away her tears, “I have such a present for you: something you wanted ever, ever so much!”

“Is it another go-cart to take fancy drives in?” asked Johnnie eagerly.

“A go-cart! No!” answered Kitty scornfully.

“Is it a musical box with more than one tune?” asked Johnnie, a patch of red forming on one cheek.

“It is something ever so much more splendid,” cried Kitty; “but you are not to know till to-morrow. It is a secret. I’ll only just tell you”—and she nodded several times impressively—“that it sings and is alive.”

“Sings and is alive! Is it”—and now a red patch came on both Johnnie’s cheeks—“is it—no, it can’t be—is it—a bu—ull—finch?”

“Ye—es,” cried Kitty, jumping up and beginning to skip about, first on one bare foot and then on the other. “But you are to forget till to-morrow,” she went on, stopping her dance. “You must forget it, for it is a secret till Christmas Day.”

“Has it a tune?” whispered Johnnie, taking no notice of this order to forget.

“A lovely tune,” answered Kitty, her eyes sparkling. “‘Home, sweet home.’ He sings it with his tail up and his head on one side.”

As Johnnie laughed with joy, Kitty gave a sob of delight.

“I ran off to the shop by myself, the bird-fancier’s, you know; ever so far. Nurse scolded me dreadfully when I came back; she was so frightened, not finding me anywhere at home.”

“Oh, I did so long for a bullfinch, dear, good old Kitsy!” murmured Johnnie, looking very wide awake.

“I am not good. I am very naughty,” said Kitty slowly. “Oh, Johnnie, I am miserable when I have been naughty to you! It gives me a pain here,” and she thumped her chest.

“You are never naughty. You are a good, GOOD, GOOD Kitsy,” panted Johnnie with emphasis.

“I am not good to you. I tease you so often, and I am greedy. I take the largest half of things—when you—you—ought to have them all,” cried Kitty, too shaken by repentant sobs to particularize the speech. “I let you fall one day last summer.”

“Good Kitsy, good old Kitsy all the same,” insisted Johnnie, thumping the coverlid with his tiny fist.

Still Kitty’s sobs did not subside: they grew bitterer and bitterer. Then came the confession:

“I made you ill, Johnnie. I took you—out—in the snow.”

“I made you take me,” said Johnnie sturdily.

“Mother had said I was not to take you out in the sn—now,” went on Kitty, shaking with sobs. “You did not know she had said so. Oh, Johnnie, forgive me! Say you forgive me!”

“I made you take me out,” repeated Johnnie. Then, as Kitty’s sobs continued, he put his wee hand on her head, and said in a voice weak as the pipe of a wounded bird, “Don’t cry, Kitsy. I forgive you!”

There was a silence. Then Kitty dried her tears.

“I wonder what makes me so naughty!” she said.

“It is not naughtiness; it is having two legs the same size,” answered Johnnie comfortingly.

“But if you had two legs the same size, do you think you would be naughty, Johnnie?”

Johnnie thought awhile; his eyes glistened, and he shook his downy head.

“I would run all day long and nobody could stop me,” he said.

“Do you think you would run about and forget things, and often jump about at lesson time?” questioned Kitty.

“I think I should,” said Johnnie regretfully.

“Do you think you would slide down the balusters?” still cross-questioned Kitty.

“I might,” answered Johnnie very humbly.

“Johnnie, I wish I could give you my two legs. I wish I could. I would not give one just only to be good; but I would give you the two. I lo-o-ove you so much, Johnnie!” and Kitty shook the bed with her sobs as she took his hand in hers.

Johnnie looked wistfully before him: his face was crimson; his eyes shone like two tiny lamps; the little hand in Kitty’s seemed to burn. Then he said cheerily:

“It would not do for every one to have two legs. There would not be any one to sit down, and look on, and clap hands, and say hurrah! when the others were running matches, you know.”

“As you did when Cousin Charlie and I played in the hay that day last summer,” cried Kitty.

“Yes,” said Johnnie, and he began to mutter something Kitty did not understand.

“We’ll play again next summer, and you’ll look on,” said Kitty.

“Yes. How sweet the hay smells!” said Johnnie in a strange far-away voice.

“Miss Kitty!” said some one behind.

Turning round Kitty saw nurse standing with her two hands raised and her eyes round with alarm and trouble. “Oh, Miss Kitty, what have you done? what have you done?”

“I am not going!” cried Kitty, stamping one bare foot. “I won’t go. Every one comes to Johnnie but me.”

“What is the matter?” asked another anxious voice. It was the children’s mother. “Kitty here!” she added, very much amazed.

“Yes, ma’am. Johnnie was sleeping like a lamb, he was. I slipped down just for a bit of supper. When I came up, there’s Miss Kitty, and there’s Johnnie, all awake and in a fever.”

“Oh, Kitty! what have you done? what have you done?” said the poor mother as she knelt down by the bedside and with straining eyes gazed at the little boy muttering and talking to himself.

A fear came over Kitty at her mother’s words and at the look in her eyes. She began to cry, but nurse in a moment had taken her in her arms, carried her upstairs, and put her into bed. She did not say a word, but she looked very grim.

“Oh, nurse, have I done Johnnie any harm?” cried Kitty, springing out of bed and clutching at nurse’s skirt as she was leaving the room.

“Harm!” repeated nurse, twitching her dress out of Kitty’s grasp. “The doctor said Johnnie might get well if he slept to-night and was kept quiet, and you went and waked him. It is the second time you—”

Nurse paused. Then she jerked out, “That is the harm you have done,” and left the room.

At those dreadful words Kitty felt cold: she stole back to bed, and turned her face to the wall. “Might Johnnie have got well if she had not waked him? Would he die now?” She did not sob, but she kept moaning to herself in the dark; and her heart sent up a prayer like a cry: “Pray God, do not let Johnnie die! Do not let Johnnie die!”

“Hush, Kitty!” said her mother’s gentle voice. “Johnnie seems to be going to sleep; he is quieter now. Perhaps he will be better to-morrow.”

“Oh, mamma! mamma!” cried Kitty, throwing herself into her mother’s arms. “I had so longed to see him! I had so longed to see him!”

Her mother made Kitty lie down: she sat down by her bedside, and taking her two hands she spoke soothingly to her little girl. When Kitty’s sobs were quieter she told her how easy it is to get naughtier and naughtier unless we resist temptation. In every little heart are the seeds of naughtiness that will grow and grow.

“But I was not so very naughty,” said Kitty with a big sob.

“You were naughty. I should not love you if I did not say you were naughty,” the sweet voice continued, talking in Kitty’s ear. She sometimes lost what it said, but she heard the sound like a lullaby.

“Punishment always follows naughtiness. It comes like the shadow that follows you in the sunshine. It may not be in pain to your body that it will come. It may come in grief for seeing another suffer for your fault; but punishment must follow wrong-doing.”

Then again the tender voice spoke:

“Your little heart tempted you to wake Johnnie. You ought to have resisted, to have said ‘No; what will comfort me may make Johnnie suffer.’” Then again the voice said: “We must resist temptation ... to win a blessing.”

CHAPTER III
DOWN THE SNOW STAIRS.

“Get up! get up! get up!” said another voice.

Kitty was wide awake and sitting up in a moment. Some one was standing by her bedside. Was it nurse? Her white cap and apron glimmered through the dusk.

“How is Johnnie?” cried Kitty, starting up.

It was not nurse; it was the snow-man staring at her with his blank eyes, and waving a great fingerless white hand to her in the moonlight.

Kitty did not feel frightened; she sat up and looked at him. He held his pipe in one hand; with the other he beckoned to her. She could see the formless hand quite distinctly waving backward and forward.

“Get up! get up! get up!” he repeated in a hoarse, muffled voice.

“Go away, naughty snow-man,” said Kitty; “it is your fault that Johnnie is ill.”

“Don’t you want to find the blue rose?” said the snow-man, with little pants between his words; he seemed very short of breath. His voice began with a rumble and a grumble, and ended in a squeak.

“The blue rose that will cure Johnnie! Oh! but where can I find it?” eagerly cried Kitty, standing up in bed, and pressing up both hands under her chin.

“Come away! come away! come away!” said the snow-man, moving off.

He had an extraordinary way of walking—a shuffling, shambling, sliding way, and as he moved he still waved that white formless hand, and gazed at Kitty with his blank eyeless sockets.

“I dare not go downstairs again,” said Kitty.

But the snow-man was gliding, shambling, shuffling toward the window. He opened it, passed out, put his head back into the room, and continued to beckon to her.

Kitty jumped down to see what it meant. “I must put something on, or I shall catch cold,” she remarked, glancing down at her night-gown; but as her feet touched the ground she perceived that she was ready dressed.

“How won—” she began; then she paused, with her mouth open, looking at something much more extraordinary. Just outside her window spread a spacious flight of steps. Lovely stairs, white as pearl! On one side they towered upward, gleaming brighter and brighter till they touched the moon; on the other, they reached downward, till it made her dizzy to look. Far down as she could see the great white stairs reached.

As Kitty stood on the ledge of her window, voices sounded around her; she thought she heard her mother’s voice, her father’s voice, nurse’s voice, calling: “Cure Johnnie! cure Johnnie!”

A bell pealed from the church steeple; it seemed to call out: “Cure Johnnie!”

Then other voices came again, floating along down or up the white stairs, she could not tell which, whispering:

“Find the blue rose! Find the blue rose!”

Was she to go up, or was she to go down those white stairs?

The snow-man began to go down; Kitty followed him.

“Hurry! hurry!” he panted impatiently. “I am beginning to melt. There is a great drop on my nose.”

He descended with a certain stateliness of gait—gliding; then letting himself drop noiselessly over each step. Kitty perceived that this way of getting along was due to his having no feet—that his figure ended in a stump.

Down, down they went, the snow-man going before, Kitty following.

How still it was! Their footsteps made no noise. Not a breath stirred. Nothing was to be seen but those white stairs glimmering. Down—down.

Every now and then the snow-man panted.

“Hurry! hurry! I am melting!” and a morsel of him would disappear.

His nose went; his pipe went; one after another his features went, till the face he occasionally turned toward Kitty was a flat white face like a plate. One arm went. Still gliding, dropping noiselessly over each step, down went the snow-man, and Kitty followed.

As she followed she began to feel very vague. The lower she descended the less she could remember what she was going for. She was looking for something—something for Johnnie. But what was it? “What am I looking for?” she asked herself, shaking her head to shake off that dreaminess. “Is it that cake of gamboge?” No, it was not that. It was something else. Something she must find for Johnnie.

After awhile she thought she was going down for something she wanted for herself—something she must find.

“Oh, what is it I am looking for?” puzzled Kitty. “Is it that mince-pie?”

She shook her head. “No, I don’t want that. It is something else.”

“Is it the naughtiest child?” Kitty went on dreamily.

“No, it cannot be that. I do not want to see the naughtiest child.”

Down, down they went, the snow-man melting till he had dwindled to a stump. Still gliding, dropping noiselessly over each step, went this stump before Kitty.

“Is it the moon I want?” she asked herself. As she said this drowsily the last bit of the snow-man melted away, and she found herself alone at the bottom of the stairs.

The snow had disappeared. She was standing in a meadow full of cowslips. At a little distance stood a wicket-gate, and beyond the gate there was a wood; one of the trees overshadowed the gate.

It was broad daylight. The summer had come; the trees were in full leaf. Kitty rubbed her eyes; but she did not feel surprised.

In front of the gate stood the drollest creature Kitty had ever seen, dancing to its own shadow. Down to the waist it looked like a pretty boy; but it had hairy goat legs, a curling tail, and tiny horns. A pair of pointed ears showed through its curly black hair. Its skin was a golden brown. On seeing Kitty the queer little creature stopped just as it was setting off to run a race with itself. It had the wildest, brightest, blackest eyes.

“Who are you?” he asked, fixing them upon her.

“I!” answered Kitty. “I—why, of course—I am—I am—” Then she stopped; she could not remember who she was. “Where is mamma?” she cried, frightened at forgetting.

“Mamma—you’ve no mamma—what was she like?” demanded the goat-legged creature, throwing back its goat-eared head and laughing.

“Mamma—she was—she was—talking to me—just now—why—I can’t—I can’t remember what—she was saying;” and Kitty looked blankly at the frisking being. It laughed louder and louder. Ha! ha! ha! ha! ho! ho! ho! It sniffed the air with delight; it tumbled and gamboled about, clattering its cloven feet.

“There was Johnnie, I know there was Johnnie,” said Kitty slowly.

“Johnnie! I am Johnnie!” cried the brown creature. It ran up the tree that overshadowed the gate, and peered through the branches at Kitty.

“No, you are not Johnnie,” she answered, shaking her head. She was quite sure of that.

Down it jumped and began marching backward and forward with high steps, keeping time as to the sound of music. Its pretty boy-head was thrown back—mischief and sportiveness peeped out of its bright eyes.

Kitty thought she had never seen anything so pretty, playful, and delightful as this elfish being with its pointed ears, its tiny horns, and bit of a tail. “Who are you?” she asked.

“I!” The creature paused in its marching, laughed and sniffed the air, frisking to a measure of its own, first on one horny foot, then on the other, chanting as it frisked:

“I am what makes the kids jump, the kittens tumble, and the children dance.”

“Are you then a sprite?” asked Kitty.

The elfish being laughed louder, showing all its white teeth. Kitty thought it now looked more like an imp, as he went on skipping and chanting.

“I make the magpies steal; I make the goats butt; I make the children disobey.”

Saying this it ran up the tree again, caught at one of the branches, and swung itself backward and forward.

Kitty felt a little afraid on hearing that last speech; but she began to laugh again as she watched the creature darting gay as the birds or the pretty wildlings of the wood.

The next moment it scampered down. “Catch!” it cried, tapping her on the shoulder, and starting off at a run.

Clack! clack! went its bounding heels. The sound set those of Kitty bounding in pursuit. It was the merriest race. She chased her elfish play-fellow round and round the meadow; but she could never catch him. He always escaped her; tossing back his curly black hair and tiny horns. Still they scampered about until Kitty was quite giddy with play.

All at once the creature stopped short, and said:

“I know Johnnie. Come, let us look for Johnnie.”

“For Johnnie!” cried Kitty, bewildered. “Where shall we look for him?”

“In Naughty Children Land, of course!” he answered.

“Oh! Naughty Children Land! Naughty Children Land!” repeated Kitty, who vaguely felt as if she knew the place.

“I am sure Johnnie was naughty. You are naughty. I’ll bring you where all the naughty children are!” The elfin having stretched itself on the ground, put its elbows on the grass and its chin on its brown hands.

Kitty sat down opposite.

“Is the naughtiest child there?” she asked eagerly.

“The naughtiest!—yes, the very naughtiest. The greediest; the vainest; the mischievousest,” answered her elfin comrade, kicking up its heels.

“Are they punished?” asked Kitty.

“Punished! No, they are petted!” the queer creature replied, rolling itself round and round with laughing.

“I think I should like to go,” said Kitty.

“Come along; I’ll take you. It is the most comical place you ever saw;” and the goat-legged being sprang to its feet.

Kitty got up.

Her play-fellow opened the wicket-gate, and they passed out together into a broad and flowery path hand in hand.

Skip, skip, down the path they went together.

Skip, skip, through a lovely wood where grew all Kitty’s favorite flowers. Honeysuckles garlanded the way, and thrust out their waxen blossoms like fingers to catch them as they passed. Wild roses, that looked like fallen stars on the bushes; little pools of blue hyacinths, hosts of golden king-cups, ox-lips, and daisies lined the road.

Skip, skip, past a stream on which the water-lilies floated. Dragon-flies darted zigzag like jewels writing on the air. Butterflies hovered, birds sang. Red squirrels ran up trees and stopped cracking their nuts to look at them. A gray field-mouse peered out, moving its tiny mouth incessantly as if talking to itself. The trees rustled; the shadows waved as the breeze rocked the boughs.

Skip, skip, first on one cloven foot and one tiptoe, then on the other cloven foot and the other tiptoe, went Kitty’s guide and Kitty followed.

Suddenly they came to the oddest place Kitty had ever seen. It was right in the center of the wood on the other side of a ditch. They paused to look at it.

CHAPTER IV
NAUGHTY CHILDREN LAND.

It was an extraordinary looking place. Kitty thought it was the queerest place she had ever seen. It had a tumbled-about, pulled-about appearance, for the ground was all in mounds and holes, and the roots of the trees bulged bare from the sides of the banks. Presently there came a sound of screaming and shouting. Above these dismal cries Kitty fancied she heard the sound of smacking.

“Is that Naughty Children Land?” she asked.

Her play-fellow did not answer.

She turned to look for him, but the queer creature was gone. Kitty was alone. “Extraordinary!” muttered Kitty. “It must be Naughty Children Land,” she continued. It was not at all difficult to get into Naughty Children Land; just a step down a bank, a jump over a ditch, and Kitty was in it.

She made a few steps forward. The ground was covered with broken toys. Battered, smashed, noseless, eyeless, hairless dollies; tops without a spin in them; whips without handles, drums without heads; torn picture-books, blotted copy-books, mangled lesson-books, their pages miserably fluttering about.

Queer dull little birds, with one feather only for a tail, flew here and there, uttering melancholy chirps. “Tweet—tweet!” they cried. “Hi—ss—hiss” shrieked a cat, making an ∾ of his thin body, and waving a tail that appeared to have been pulled and pulled till it was more like a bell-rope than anything else.

But what attracted Kitty’s attention was a group of little girls, sitting with their shoulders up to their ears, their chins in their hands, their hair falling over their eyes. They would have been very pretty but for their frowning eyebrows, their puckered foreheads, their tumbled hair, their under lips, that had stuck out so long that now they always stuck out. Every now and then these dismal children gave a big spiteful sob, and their faces were smeared with dirty tears.

“What is the matter? Why do you look so miserable?” asked Kitty.

At first the woebegone children drew down their eyebrows more closely, and stuck their under lips further out. Then in a sing-song, sob-broken voice, raising their shoulders still nearer to their ears, burying their chins deeper in their hands, making wryer faces, they sang in a chorus:

“Yes, we can, we shall, we will.

Who’s to make us smile and play?

No—we must be wretched still.

Sulky are we?—So you say.

No, we will not, no, we shall not,

No, we will not laugh or play.

“Do we mope and do we scowl?

What a lot you seem to know.

P’r’aps you’d like to hear us howl;

Pray, if you don’t like it—go.

No, we will not, no, we shall not,

No, we will not laugh or play.

“If it suits us best to mutter,

Lift the shoulders, hang the head;

All that you will hear us utter

Is what we’ve already said.

No, we will not, no, we shall not,

No, we will not laugh or play.”

“Well, I never heard of any one yet liking to be miserable all the day long,” said Kitty with a smile that grew broader and broader as she looked at the dismal, dejected group. But they took no further notice of her. She stood hesitating and watching. Should she jump back over the ditch and go to look for that elf, or should she go on?