Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 November 1879 — JIMMIE’S MESSAGE. [ARTICLE]

JIMMIE’S MESSAGE.

Aunt Lizzie was papa’s only sister, and when the telegram came, saying that she was very nek, he felt that be must go to her at once. This was very hard, as mamma was also very sick, ana he conld not bear to leave her. Pulled two ways, what was poor papa to do? Dear, unselfish mamma decided the question for him. “Yon must go, George,” said she. “lam in the miast of friends, and shall want for nothing. Lizzie is all alone. She needs yon most. Yon must go.” Jimmie wondered why papa looked so funny when he bade him good-bye. He wasn’t crying, of course, because papas never cried; still, the sight of his face filled his little son with a vague apprehension, and quite arrested tne flow of certain briny drops which were all ready to fall from a pair of bright bine eyes. , “ Are you sick, too, papa?” “ No, my son. Take good care of mamma.” And he was off.

Jimmie was lonesome. He told Eddie Wheelock, privately, that he felt like “ a norphan boy.” He had one {ileasure, however, to which he always ooked forward with delight. It was the taking of a “ letter” each day to the telegraph office. Every day, Jimmie, accompanied by his little friend, trotted off upon his important mission. Every day he ostentatiously handed his “ letter” to the “ roperator,” and every day his small brain was puzzled anew with wondering how the paper conld get over the wires “ without anybody seeing it go. How did the man make it stick on?” There was a delightful mystery about the whole proceeding, and it was no small gratification to the child to feel that he was in it.” Jimmie didn’t want it to rain until his father came home; but it did rain, nevertheless. Moreover, it rained so hard one morning that he couldn’t even set over to “ Eddie Wheelock’s ouse.” He was disconsolate, for Margaret didn’t want him in the kitchen, and the other rooms were too still for little boys. Somehow he didn’t like still rooms; they made him think of so many things. He went softly up stairs ana peeped in at mamma’s door. She was awake. “ O mamma,” said he, “Pm awful tired ofi you being up here.” “So am I, deary,” she answered. ** But we won’t forget to be good, will we, Jimmie!” Then she stretched out her arms, and Jimmie crept into the bed beside her. “ I love you, love you, love you,” he cried, ecstatically, with a succession of little hugs. “ You’re the nicest, goodest”— But just here Nurse Grey made her appearance with a covered bowl in her hand. “ Little scamp,” she said, looking laughingly, at Jimmie. “How did he get m there?” “ I crawled in,” he patting mamma’s thin face. “ Then you must just crawl out again, sir. Mother must have her bee? tea •while its hot.” “ Oh, dear!” Jimmie crept out with a quivering lip, which of coarse did not escape mamma’s pitying eyes. “ What do you suppose Margaret is doing?” she asked, with sudden animation.

“ S’pose she's skinnin’ rhubarb,” replied Jimmie, dolefully. “I saw her skin the skin off. I don’t like rhubarb.” “ I do,” said Nurse Grey, decidedly. “You don’t, do you, mamma?” “ Not much,” answered mummit, wearily. “ Run out now, darling, and —let me see—couldn’t you write a little letter to papaP Mrs. Grey will copy it for you by-and-by, and we’ll send it through the office. “ What’ll I write.” “ Anything you happen to think of. Go now, there's a gooa boy.” Jimmie hunted up his slate and pencil, and took his seat at the kitchen window. He felt keenly the importance of writing a letter, but what to say was the puzzling question. He looked up and down, but sky and earth were alike uncommunicative. Margaret, seeing that he was quietly disposed, gave him an approving smile. She was still “skinnin’ rhubarb.”

“ Sure he’s the little man that can write a be-autiful letter,” she said, encouragingly. “Isit to papa, justP” “ Yes, answered Jimmie. “It’s to papa. I know how to write a letter very well, Margaret.” “ To be sure. “ But I can’t think what to put in it.” Margaret laughed. ‘Tm just that way meself, dariin’,” she saia. “Just that very self-same way, for all the world.” It was evident that he must expect no help from Margaret. Poor Jimmie! His forehead was wrinkled, and his eyebrows “all scowled up,” with the earnestness of his efforts. “Do you like rhubarb, Margaret?” he asked, suddenly. “I’veno objection to it when the sugar’s plenty.” “•But do you like it? Say ‘yes’ or ‘no.’”“Yes, then.” Jimmie went to his work with renewed energy. “ Nurse Grey and Margaret —there’s two that does; and me and mamma—there’s two that don’t Two does and two don’t” he said, thoughtfully. And the stubby pencil

traveled rigorously over the slate, the red tongue keeping Ume with the dinapled fingers. i * It seemed to Jimmie that the longer he wrote, the more he loved his absent father. Before he had finished, his poor little heart was quite heavy with it# weight of affection. He ooula not have papa staring “away off there” any fongerTtle really couldn’t. So he added a few more words, and then took the letter up to Nurse Grey. His shite was eovered with queer, straggling hieroglyphics which it would be impossible to transcribe. Nurse Grey couldn’t make them out at aIL Jimmie had to tell her evary word. !He did this very slowly and distincUy that there might be no mistake, “ For this is to go iroo the office,” he said, complacently. “Isn’t it, mamma?”

“Yes,” answered mamma, absently. “I want it fixed like papa’s letters are fixed,” he continued, eagerly. * “So, to please the little fellow. Nurse Grey wrote the address, just as she had written it for the dispatches. “ Take good care of it, Jimmie,” said she, “ and when we are ready to —” But Jimmie didn’t wait to near her last words. His delighted eyes had beheld from the window a tiny patch of blue sky. They had also seen Eddie Wheelock coming toward the house “as fast as ever he could.” He ran quickly down stairs to meet his little favorite. Strangely enough, neither mamma nor Norse Grey suspected for a moment that the “office” which Jimmie had in his mind was no other than the telegraph office, to which his small feet had taken him nearly every day for a fortnight; but so it was. Hand in hand the two children started upon their errand, chattering as they went along like a couple ofyoung magpies. Jimmie wslked up to the “square hole,” and boldly pint bis letter through. “That’s mine,” he said, proudly, to the clerk. But what made the “roperator” look at him so? He couldn’t imagine. “Is this to go?” asked the clerk, in what seemed a terrible voice. Jimmie trembled a little, but he answered bravely: “Yes, sir; that’stogo. That’s my letter.” “ Mother know ttF’

“Yes, sir; she said—” “All right. Helps the cause along. Pay at the other end, of coarse?” Jimmie looked puzzled, bid as the “click-click,” began to sound just then, the man turned away, and he had no chance to reply. He didn’t see Nurse Grey again until dinner-time; but when Margaret brought in a crisp, flaky rhubarb pie for dessert, be suddenly remembered. “I sent it. None Grey,” he cried, exultantly. “I sent it” “Sent what?" f “My letter. The one you writed off.” “ But you didn’t have any envelope, and it needed a stamp.” “No, it didn't need a stamp,” said Jimmie, his bright face all aglow with excitement. “It’s pay at the other end. The man said so.” Nurse Grey dropped ber pie-knife and held up both ber hands. “You don't mean to say you’re telegraphed that nonsense.” she exclaimed, in amazement. . “ ’Twasn’t nonsense. ’Twas my letter. I—I—” Such a grieved little face! Such a sadden clouding of the sunshine in rite bine eyes! Nurse Grey was not a hardhearted woman. She remorsefully essayed to comfort him. “Never mind, Jimmie. It can’t be helped now. We’ll—” Bat Jimmie had left the table, and was half way up the stairs, crying as if his heart would break. It was not until he had breathed his story into mamma’s pitying ear that he could be consoled. ;}

' “ Papa will be very glad to hear from his little boy,” she said, reassuringly; “ bat next time we’ll put the letter m a nice envelope, and Jimmie shall stamp it himself. That will be better, won’t it, dear?” She wiped away his tears as she spoke, and Jimmie was comforted. As papa had been informed that do more telegrams would be sent him while mamma continued to improve, he was not a little disturbed when Jimmie’s message was pnt into his hand. He hastily tore open the envelope, and read with a puzzled countenance the-, following communication: Dear Papa: Two likes rhubarb, two don’t. Come home quick. Jimmie. “ Conciseness itself,” he thought, mechanically counting the words. “ Jimmie does well for abeginner. Bat what can it mean?” he continued, anxiously. “ Has an epidemic broken out in the family that they are taking sides for and against this valuable drngP” It was very perplexing certainly, until all atonoe tne thought of the inoffensive pie-plant occurred to him as a partial solution of the mystery. This relieved him somewhat, and the next day came a short letter, written by mamoia’s own hand, which set his fear quite at rest, and over which he laughed heartily. A week later papa held his little boy in his arms again, and was eagerly drinking in every word of his childish prattle, when suddenly the conversation turned upon the mysteries of the telegraph. “ A horse couldn’t keep up with the ‘click-click,’ could he, papaP” “ No, my boy.” “ A el’phant couldn’t neither, could itP” “ I should think not.” “ D’you have to pay for my letter at the other end!” “ Yes, Jimmie.” “How much?” “ Fifty cents 1 .” * . “ Fifty cents!” cried Jimmie, in astonishment. “ Fifty cents just for such a little piece of writing as that! Why, you can get a whole printed newspaper down at Newman’s for five.”—lf. C. Bartlett, in Christian Register.