As soon as Maggie had opened the door she called up to Johnnie Jones:  “There’s a beautiful valentine down here for you.  I’ll bring it up.  Tom sent it.  I caught him at the door, so I’ll bring him up, too.”

Johnnie Jones ran to the head of the staircase as fast as he could run.  How he did laugh when Maggie placed Sarah before him, and showed him the address on the envelope.

“It’s a doll valentine,” Tom explained, “and it has a phonograph in it.  I’ll wind it up.”

He knelt down and pretended to turn a crank.  Then Sarah, who had not smiled or spoken a word before, said: 

  “If you love me as I love you,
  No knife can cut our love in two.”

Tom turned the crank again, and this time she danced.

“Let me wind it,” begged Johnnie Jones, who was very much pleased.  He did, and the valentine said: 

  “Roses red and violets blue,
  Sugar is sweet and so are you.”

Mother joined the children in the hall, and was delighted with the valentine, which each one wound up until it had said all the rhymes that Sarah knew, and had danced until she was tired.  Then the doll changed into a little girl for a while, and she had some milk and cookies with the other children.

“We shall have to go now,” Tom said at last, looking out of the window.  “The other children have gone into their houses and I must send them each a valentine.”

So Mother made a new envelope and addressed it to Miss Elizabeth Elkins.

“Thank you for my valentine,” said Johnnie Jones.  “It’s the loveliest one I have had all day, only I wish I could keep it as I can the others.”

All the children who received the little Valentine in turn, made exactly the same remark, so Tom and Sarah were very happy over the success of their plan.

* * * * *

When Johnnie Jones was a Cry-Baby

All his life Johnnie Jones had been a bright, happy little fellow who seldom cried even when he was hurt.  Therefore, everyone who knew him was surprised when suddenly, just before he was five years old, he became a cry-baby.

The trouble began with some of the older boys in the neighborhood.  There were three of them who were several years older than Johnnie Jones, and a year older than the other children.  Lately these big boys had commenced to tease the smaller ones, and especially Johnnie Jones.  They did not intend to be unkind, but would often make him cry by rolling him off his sled, pelting him with snowballs, or calling him nicknames.

Of course, there was no reason for crying, since, although the boys were rather rough, they never really hurt Johnnie Jones.  Indeed, they loved him, and were only in fun when they teased him.  If Johnnie Jones had been brave enough to laugh at them he would soon have been left in peace; but as he always cried instead, the boys began to call him “crybaby.”