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"I never see that air Miller, no odds how well I be," she remarked mechanically to the tea-pot, "but what I feel weak creepin's come over me. He puts dye-stuff on his baird. An' when a man's whiskers is gray an' his head keeps black, it's a sign he uses his jaw more'n he does his brains. An' that yaller-headed doll-baby o' his'n the peert thing: I'll lay fifty cents she never washed a dish.
"Well, ma'am," Sylvester spoke again, "I never knowed the stars to turn their backs on anything. Barmaids or drunks or kings they all look about alike to the stars, I reckon. Say, Sheila, maybe you haven't got the pluck for real living. Maybe you're the kind of doll-baby girl that craves sheltering. I reckon I made a big mistake." Sheila moved slightly as though his speech had pricked her.
"I am of no use in the world, and everybody has forgotten me," he moaned. But he was mistaken. The next morning Betsey sat at the window holding her Christmas doll-baby, and she looked out at Jimmy Scarecrow standing alone in the field amidst the corn-stubble. "Aunt Hannah?" said she.
When they had picked their way down to the mouth of the cañon, he walking behind her, she turned back and said, "Of course you could marry that little yellow-haired girl with the blue eyes first, the one you're thinking so much about the little short, fat thing with a doll-baby face "
Virginia's sense of humour rallied somewhat as she viewed him eating the sandwiches. Once she had called them doll-baby sandwiches; now that seemed literal: tea-cups, petit gateau, the whole service gave the fancy of his sitting down to a tea-party given by a little girl for her dollies. But after a time he fell silent, looking around the room. And when he broke that pause his voice was different.
I was hurriedly explaining, amid much laughter, when McLane called out, "A nice doll-baby! Up with him!" And away he went, behind a trooper. At Third street bridge were two other officers who must have been tipsy overnight and have slept too late. At last, with our horses half dead, we walked them back to Front and High streets, and got off for a rest and a mug of beer at the coffee-house.
Something she saw in the poor harassed face caused her to change her position slightly, so that she could pat the listless hand of Diantha's mother while she spoke. "Life ain't cruel, you poor soul! It comes along with both hands full. It says to the little girl, 'Come, drop that doll-baby, I've got something better than that.
Jimmy Scarecrow stood in the corn-stubble, with the doll-baby under his coat and waited, and soon Betsey was back again with Aunt Hannah's crazy quilt trailing in the snow behind her. "Here," said she, "here is something to keep you warm," and she folded the crazy quilt around the Scarecrow and pinned it. "Aunt Hannah wants to give it away if anybody wants it," she explained.
Aunt Hannah's present was her old crazy quilt, remodelled, with every piece cut square and true, and matched exactly to its neighbour. "Why, it's my old crazy quilt, but it isn't crazy now!" cried Aunt Hannah, and her very spectacles seemed to glisten with amazement. Betsey's present was her doll-baby of the Christmas before; but the doll was a year older.
"Yes, I will," said Jimmy Scarecrow, and he tried hard to bring one of his stiff, outstretched arms around to clasp the doll-baby. "Don't you feel cold in that old summer coat?" asked Betsey. "If I had a little exercise, I should be warm," he replied. But he shivered, and the wind whistled through his rags. "You wait a minute," said Betsey, and was off across the field.
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