"Go up the village road and take the first turn," said Mother in a whisper. "Walk along until you come to something that doesn't look one bit like a shoemaker's shop. You will know it by the flowers, and by the trademark over the door. The shoemaker's name is Mr. Jolly."

So Lydia skipped up the road with her old shoes under her arm.

"Cobbler, cobbler, mend my shoe, Have it done at half-past two, St.i.tch it up and st.i.tch it down, And see if now my shoe is found,"

she sang over and over to herself as she went.

Up the side road the houses were few, and Lydia peered carefully at each for special flowers and the shoemaker's trademark over the door. But only the usual garden flowers nodded in the breeze, so Lydia kept on until she saw a blaze of color down the road before her. She could see the scarlet and white of flowers and the bright green of leaves, but they seemed to be growing on top of the house instead of on the ground, and it was not until she drew very near that she saw it was not a house at all, but a carriage drawn up at the side of the road, an old-fashioned black coach that had certainly been turned into a shoemaker's shop, for out of the open window floated Rap-i-tap-tap!

Rap-i-tap-tap! Rap-i-tap-tap! that told of some one hard at work within.

Over the door on a nail hung a pair of baby's pale-blue kid shoes, the cobbler's trademark, and as for the flowers-Lydia wished her own little garden-bed looked one quarter as well. For gorgeous ma.s.ses of scarlet and white bloom covered the carriage roof, flowered in the coachman's box, and grew in little window-boxes cunningly fastened on the doors.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _SUCH A COBBLER'S SHOP HAD NEVER BEEN SEEN BEFORE_]

Such a cobbler's shop had never been seen before, and Lydia was staring at it in amazement when a head popped out of the doorway, and a voice said:

"Flowers or shoes?"

"W-what?" stammered Lydia, taken by surprise.

"I said 'flowers or shoes'?" repeated the voice, that belonged to Mr.

Jolly, the cobbler, Lydia felt sure, for he wore a leather ap.r.o.n, and held a small hammer in one hand and a shoe in the other. "Some folks come to me for flowers, some folks come to me for shoes. Which are you?"

"Shoes," answered Lydia, taking them from under her arm and handing them up to Mr. Jolly. "My mother wants to know whether you can mend them."

Mr. Jolly looked them over with his head on one side like a bird. Then he nodded.

"Yes, I can," said he. "Done to-morrow this time. Don't you like flowers?"

Lydia was no longer startled by his abrupt questions.

"Yes, I do," she answered, as sparing of words as he.

"Have you a garden?" he asked.

"Yes," said Lydia, "but not so nice as yours."

"Take good care of it?" inquired Mr. Jolly, with a keen look. "Ever forget to water it? Dry weather we're having. Plenty of care, plenty of water; that's what makes a good garden."

"I take pretty good care of it," answered Lydia truthfully. "Sometimes I forget. I'll come to-morrow for my shoes." And she turned to go.

"Wait," called Mr. Jolly. "Don't you want to know why I have a shop like this?"

"Yes, I do want to know," answered Lydia, wondering whether he read the question in her eye.

"Too polite to ask, eh?" said Mr. Jolly. "Well, most folks ask, and I tell them it's for 'hedloes to catch medloes.' You're Mr. Blake's little girl, aren't you? He's a nice man. Well, I'll tell you because you didn't ask. I have my shop out here because she can't stand the noise of the hammer"-and Mr. Jolly nodded toward the nearest house. "Twenty years she's been lying in that bed and never touched a foot to the floor, and two years ago last spring she said to me, 'Jolly, I can't bear another tap of that hammer.' And so I bought the old coach-springs are gone-and moved out here. Gives the town something to talk about, too. Everybody comfortable all round." And Mr. Jolly with a chuckle drew in his head and fell to work again.

Above the taps of his hammer Lydia called out, "I'll come to-morrow for my shoes. Good-bye!" and then home she ran as fast as she could go.

"Father!" she cried, climbing upon Mr. Blake's lap as, refreshed by his nap, he sat reading the newspaper, "Mr. Jolly knows you. He says you are nice. Who is 'she'?"

"She?" repeated the puzzled Mr. Blake. "You will have to tell me something more about her before I can answer that question, I'm afraid.

Is it a puzzle?"

"She has been in bed for twenty years, and never touched a foot to the floor, and she can't bear the sound of the hammer," explained Lydia in an excited burst.

"Oh, that's Mrs. Jolly," said Mr. Blake. "She has something the matter with her back and can't walk. Mr. Jolly and I are old friends. He's a good fellow."

"He's going to mend my shoes for me," went on Lydia. "He told me to take good care of my garden, and I must go to-morrow and get my shoes."

Lydia could talk of nothing for the rest of the day but Mr. Jolly and his strange little shop.

The next morning she was impatient to be off on her errand, but Mrs.

Blake woke with a bad headache, and there were many odds and ends that Lydia could do about the house to save her mother steps. At last Mrs.

Blake went to lie down, and Lydia, after spreading a shawl over the invalid's feet, and pressing a kiss into the palm of the hand that lay so limply on the bed, hurried up the road after her shoes.

The tap of Mr. Jolly's hammer reached her ears soon after she came in sight of the flowery shop, but Lydia was intent upon a little figure seated upon the step of the coach. It was that of a small boy, perhaps four years old, whose hair was as black as Lydia's was golden, whose face was streaked with the mark of tears and dirt, and who held in his hand a slice of bread and b.u.t.ter.

"I wonder if it's Mr. Jolly's little boy?" thought Lydia.

But when Mr. Jolly looked up from his hammering, he gave a bird-like nod at Lydia, and then one at the little boy.

"Look what I found in my shop this morning," said he.

The little boy's brown eyes filled with tears, and he put his slice of bread and b.u.t.ter on the gra.s.s beside him.

"I won't go back," said he, his lip quivering. "I won't go back."

"No, sonny, that you won't, if I can help it," returned Mr. Jolly, with an emphatic tap of his hammer. "They didn't serve you right, and that's a fact. It's the little Bliss boy," he explained to Lydia. "What did you say your name was?"

"Roger," murmured the child huskily.

"His father and mother just died, and there's no one to take care of him, so Farmer Yetter said he'd take him and bring him up with his own boy sooner than see him go to the poorhouse. But he says he didn't have much to eat, and they worked him hard for such a little feller, and the big boy plagued him. So last night he up and run away, and this morning I found him asleep in my shop."

"I won't go back," insisted Roger, as Mr. Jolly paused for breath. "I won't go back. He pinched me. He hit me with the harness." And pushing back his sleeve, he showed great black-and-blue spots on his thin little arm.

"No, sonny, you shan't go back," repeated Mr. Jolly soothingly. "I'll take you to a nice place, Robin Hill. I guess they'll make room for you somehow. This little girl will tell you how nice it is there. Won't you?"

"Are there any boys?" asked Roger anxiously. "I won't go if there are."

"But they are nice boys," said Lydia, eager for the good name of her special friends, Sammy and Tom. "They wouldn't hurt you for anything.

They are lots of fun to play with. And you will like Miss Martin, she is so good to you."

Roger shook his head.

"I don't like boys," said he. "Do you live there?"

"I used to," answered Lydia, "but I don't now."