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              pool. My sister and I on one side to get undressed in the bushes
and Charles on the other side. Suddenly a frantic shriek of, " Betty,
come here!" Horrors, he had stood on a very active ant hill to
undress and was covered with the creatures and they really do bite.
They were quickly washed off in the water but somehow our
swimming adventure had a sour note.
The spring he was five he wandered away once more
briefly in the pasture. We could hear him calling, giggling and
making quite a racket and rushed out to investigate. He had found a
batch of wild baby ducks in the grass and had picked them up in
his hat to come and show us. They were the cutest, softest,
squirmiest little creatures and had got down inside his shirt and
were scrambling round his waist tickling and scratching him as he
struggled along. What a sight and what a shot for a movie camera,
which didn't even exist then, of course. We quickly rescued the
ducklings and put them back in the grass where he thought they
had been. Another scolding but he maintained they were so cute
and cuddly and he wanted to keep them.
Charles was alone quite a lot while we were at school and
invented an imaginary little friend, Torgy', Dad made a small play
house in the tree border in the house yard and he and Porgy spent
hours together in the wonderful world of make- believe, he would
come to get cookies from Mother for them both- somehow they all
disappeared.
He started school in the little country school 1.5 miles from
home. Long before school busses and my sister and I were
finished public school and were taking our high school by
correspondence at home. He seemed so little trudging off by
himself and we would go part way with him, or go to meet him at
day's end. Two other little boys lived either side of our farm and
the three had great fun together and were affectionately called the
" Three Musketeers."
Mother suffered a heart attack the following fall and was
gone, We were all devastated to say the least Charles seemed so
young and lost and depended on me more than ever. I stopped
correspondence and agreed to manage the house as best a teenager
could. My sister continued on with lessons. The winter seemed
long and dreary and I felt sorry for my father. Being a widower
with three children to support was quite a task. Charles really
missed Mother and in the spring Dad got a tiny fox terrier puppy
from a breeder in town. Badger was his name and he was cute, all
white except black spots over his eyes. What a pair those two were
plus what mischief they managed to indulge in. Now Badger