MISCHIEVOUS SHEILA.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 114, 15 May 1926, Page 26

MISCHIEVOUS SHEILA.

Sheila'i parents were Irish, and SheQg and her brother and Bister liked nothing better than to hear them tell tales of what they did when they were young. Her father was very fond of telling them about the time when he was at college in Dublin. He told them howf he used to race, hatlese, through the main streets of the city just to get the police or pursuers on his track, knowing he could dodge home finally and escape them, for he was a very quick runner. Then her mother told "delightful stories of her old home in Comity Gavan, where she and her brothers used to get up early, drop from the staircase • window on to the back of a dear old pony decoyed beneath, and play Red Indians round the paddock with the wildest of war whoops. But such stories always ended, "But you children must not think of doing such things here. The neighbours wouldbe much annoyed, and that would never do." Unnecessary warnings, for Daddy wai now a sober professional man, and the children lived in a prim, tall villa, with two others equally tall and prim on either hand, and the tiny garden was not large enough to play Red Indians in with a pony if one had tried. Grace, the eldest, and very pretty, with lovely brown eyes, was thirteen at the time of which I am writing, while Sheila, two years younger, was a pickle with green twinkling eyes and wide, humorous mouth, and little brother Brian was just a round comfortable podge. " What did Daddy want you for today?" asked Grace, when Sheil* appeared at the wide window, where she and little Brian sat swinging their feet and waiting. " For that nice woman at the dairy," replied Sheila with a chuckle. " I went there every day, and she always gave mc an apple. Mummy's account book looks so funny with a long tail 'Apple a penny, apple a penny, apple three ha'pence, apple twopence,' and bo on, again and again. And I thought it was her generosity!" concluded Sheila, going off into peals of laughter. "But you shouldn't have gone every day," expostulated Grace in her most elder-sisterly manner. Daddy was at home for lunch that day, and rebuked Sheila at table for pulling a mouth "from ear to ear." " Now, that's queer," remarked Sheila politely, regarding her stately parent with wide-eyed surprise. " You must be mistaken, Daddy. Down in the market this morning, old Mrs. Mudge said to Nanny, and pointing at mc, ' Why, that cheel's the living image of her father.'" And Daddy was eilenced, not naughty Sheila. After lunch Nanny reportedi "I wish you'd speak to Miss Sheila, sir. She would go into the museum, and I caught her signing the visitors' book, 'Miss Sheila McMore, DublSn City," and when I said McMore was not her name, and she did not live in Dublin she replied, ' People always sign visitors , books with a pen-name, and Dublin was Daddy's home, and I often do it, Nanny.' Sure, sir, when I looked back the book, fiat she had signed with all your family's names she could, think of. X wish you'd put a stop "to it, or I can** faceit round there again." So the museum was put out of oounde for Sheila for a great while, and she lost a new party dress. That she did not mind at all, for at Brian's birthday party-she amused the boy guests by taking deep breaths and making the buttons of her out-grown party dress fly. The birthday tea was served at a large oak gate-leg table, and Sheila was warned to be careful. She was until half-way through tea, when she gave the gate-leg a push, just to alarm Nanny. Then she gave another, and down went the side of the table, and away went the tea-table things sliding to the floor. Fortunately, only one was broken, and that was a glass dish, that had belonged to Sheila's granny. Sheila surveyed the wreckage, and then, turning to her mother with her most winning smile, said confidentially, "I am so glad it was your mother's dish, Mummy, and not Daddy's; that would have been awful!" I must truthfully add that her father was never told of this, and Sheik escaped the punishment that she really deserved.