South Venice Ferry

South Venice Ferry Register and receive 188K At last she looked up and pointed a startling finger at May Nell. “Mary Ellen Smith, my familiars, who guard the portals of futurity, declare that you shall be the first honored. Minions, depart! Slaves, guard the door!”,The frenzied cries of the child were distinctly audible in the kitchen where sat Mrs. Mifsud and Mrs. Wopp, the latter busily engaged in mending a pile of socks. Both ladies sprang to their feet and hurried through the open door towards the garden, Mrs. Wopp still wearing a half-darned sock on her left hand and scattering others as she ran. They were followed by Betty, who had been filling her watering-can from the rain-barrel and had also heard the cries of the frightened child.,“Oh Miss Gordon,” cried Betty, her dark brown eyes sparkling with delight, “the flowers can talk to each other across them telfone wires, can’t they?”,He ran back a few steps and found a loose board he had climbed over when coming up. This he carried to the edge of the wall. “When I call,” he spelled out, “break window, use chair, come across on board.”,A liberal application of shoe paste furnished the unfortunate victim with a startling pair of jet-black eyebrows, nearly an inch in depth. Appalled at what he saw, Moses drew from his pocket a grimy handkerchief. Dampening one corner of it in his mouth, the most expeditious thing to do under the circumstances, he carefully wiped around the outside of these funereal bands, reducing them slightly in size but also straightening their edges.，Upstairs the lightning filled Betty’s room with a weird intermittent radiance. The child had become increasingly drowsy and asked Howard to sing her to sleep.，“Please,” answered the discomfited youth, “I aint never seen a ship of no kind.”，It was apparent to the most casual observer that Mannel’s whole wardrobe consisted of one grey shirt, one pair of faded blue overalls and a pair of braces. To the uninitiated his occasional absences from school for an entire day would have seemed most mysterious. Leading questions as to the cause having been put to other members of the family who were present elicited only a reluctant reply that Mannel was not ill. Further than this they would not go. At last even on the most obtuse one, light would dawn. Mannel was being laundered.“She’ll be all right. May Nell and me—I—we took our lunch and went over to Potter’s pasture. Shoot! She’s waiting now! I hope the poor little kiddie—little girl—eats, don’t wait for me,—she an’ Bouncer.”

As the evening wore on Mrs. Wopp, Mrs. Stephens and a few other ladies adjourned to a box stall where the refreshments were stored. Pleased with the prospect of dispensing lavish hospitality from the combined larders of the neighborhood, Mrs. Wopp’s face radiated cheerfulness.,“Mebbe you’re right, Moses; mebbe the seed was no good,” sighed Mrs. Wopp. “Anyhow, it’s too late now to put in any more. We carnt know ef the heart o’ a seed is good no more nor we kin know the heart o’ our next-door neighbor. The seed may ’pear to be good enough from the outside, yet arter all be mighty lackin’.”,All were silent for a little. Most of them had been more than once to San Francisco’s celebrated dealer in sweets.,Norah clutched a fat smiling doll in one arm. As the result of a puncture from a nail in the fence the doll was bleeding sawdust badly at the knee. However a surgical operation with needle and thread would restore health, and Norah stanched the wound with her pinafore and prepared to enjoy life to the full. The doll continued to smile gaily as though Spartan sawdust ran in her veins.,He obeyed, talking whimsically to his pets as he went.,“Fer the love o’ Mike, kid, how did you git here?” said Moses, rousing the small sleeper. “Gosh, but yer face needs warshin’.”,“You never give my cats a chance,” Billy complained.,“Worse! She said soon I’d have to be very brave—that ain’t bad—but I’m goin’ to be—to be a minister—a preacher!” The last word came with a woe-begone vehemence that made his mother laugh.,“In a minute I heard the teentiest little mew. I looked and there was Tom crouched against the side of the house. He was shivering with fright, and that old tramp cat was eating up his breakfast.”,Howard led Nell through the intricacies of a square dance.,“Hold your grouch, Sour,” Harold expostulated.,The door opened and Betty, who had stayed in school to clean the blackboard for “teacher,” appeared. She came in bringing with her the very essence of outdoor freshness and buoyancy..