"Yes, that will do. Now, hold still," and Cricket began again.
"Ninety-nine--one hundred--oh, _Billy_!" for an inquiring wasp came whizzing near, and Billy ducked suddenly to avoid it. "Now I've lost that, and I've got to begin again. Billy, you haven't any string in your pocket, have you? Then I could tie up your hair in bunches when I get to one hundred, and count the bunches afterward."
"I'll run up to the house and get some," said Cricket, darting away. She was back in a few minutes, with a small pasteboard box in her hand.
"This is better than string," she panted. "I got auntie's little box of rubber bands. Now we can count. Never mind holding your hand up, for I can begin anywhere."
She gathered up a lock of hair, counted to one hundred, and twisted an elastic band around it, close to the roots.
"That's one hundred. Now, for the next," she said, with much satisfaction. She counted on, industriously, and soon poor Billy's head bristled with queer-looking little bunches on one side. She was much too engrossed to notice the effect at first.
Some time later, grandmamma and Auntie Jean, strolling leisurely through the orchard, saw ahead of them a funny sight: Billy, sitting meekly on a hummock, his hands on his black broadcloth knees, while Cricket stood behind him, bending over his head, all over the top of which bristled plumy bunches of white hair, which stood up rampantly.
"What in the world is that child doing, making Billy look like a porcupine?" exclaimed grandma, standing still in amazement, unseen by the two.
"Playing Horned Lady, I should think. But I dare say she has purpose in her mind. Listen. Why, mother! she's actually counting Billy's hair!"
At this moment, Cricket, pausing to snap another elastic band around the last bunch, for the first time noticed the effect of her hair dressing.
"Oh, Billy! if you don't look just as if you had a lot of little feather dusters growing on your head!" she cried, holding on to her sides as she laughed.
Billy looked disturbed. He decidedly objected to being laughed at. He put up his hand to feel.
"Don't take them down," said Cricket, pushing his hand away. "I'm going on. My! what a lot of hair people have. Let's see how many bunches I have. Twenty-two--twenty-three. That makes twenty-three hundred, and there's lots more to do, yet. I don't wonder people mean so much when they say, as many as the hairs of your head, do you?"