Produced by Colin Bell, Andrew Wainwright, Joe Free and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net THE CRICKET _Books by the Same Author_ BAMBI CINDERELLA JANE "DR. DAVID" THE DUAL ALLIANCE THE GIRL WHO LIVED IN THE WOODS THE THRESHOLD [Illustration: _"What do you mean by acting like this when I give you a birthday party? . . . All the children in the colony are asked to come and play with you, and you make a monkey of yourself"_] THE CRICKET BY MARJORIE BENTON COOKE [Illustration] _ILLUSTRATED BY_ _J. SCOTT WILLIAMS_ GARDEN CITY NEW YORK DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 1919 _Copyright, 1919, by_ DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY _All rights reserved, including that of translations into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian_ _Copyright, 1918, 1919, by_ THE INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE COMPANY (Harper's Bazar) LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS "What do you mean by acting like this when I give you a birthday party?" (_See page 6_) _Frontispiece_ FACING PAGE She watched Jerry and Althea pacing the deck together 162 "You've made my summer for me, little witch," Cartel said 182 "Ye're a comfortable cricket, when ye want to be. I'd like to capture ye, to sing on my hearth!" 240 THE CRICKET CHAPTER ONE "I won't have it! I won't have it! If they come, I'll run away and hide!" shouted the child, wildly. "That will be very rude. No one acts like that--no one except a barbarian," said Miss Wilder, calmly. "I want to be a bar----one of those things you said." "You act like one most of the time." The child brain caught at a new idea. "What _is_ that--that what you said?" "Barbarian? B-a-r-b-a-r-i-a-n," she spelled slowly. "It is a savage creature with no manners, no morals, no clothes even. It lives in a hut or a tree, and eats roots and nuts, and nearly raw meat," Miss Wilder remarked, none too accurately, but slowly, in order to distract Isabelle's attention from the late subject of unpleasantness. The little girl considered her words thoughtfully. "Do they have children?" "Yes."