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Five Little Peppers and How They Grew

by Margaret Sidney · English · Gutenberg #2770 · 408,209 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Five Little Peppers and How They Grew

Author: Margaret Sidney


        
Release date: August 1, 2001 [eBook #2770]
                Most recently updated: February 19, 2025

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2770

Credits: Produced by David Reed, and David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS AND HOW THEY GREW ***




FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS AND HOW THEY GREW

By Margaret Sidney




     To the Memory of MY MOTHER;
     wise in counsel--tender in judgment, and in all charity
     --strengthful in Christian faith and purpose
     --I dedicate, with reverence, this simple book.




CONTENTS


     A HOME VIEW

     MAKING HAPPINESS FOR MAMSIE

     MAMSIE'S BIRTHDAY

     TROUBLE FOR THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

     MORE TROUBLE

     HARD DAYS FOR POLLY

     THE CLOUD OVER THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

     JOEL'S TURN

     SUNSHINE AGAIN

     A THREATENED BLOW

     SAFE

     NEW FRIENDS

     PHRONSIE PAYS A DEBT OF GRATITUDE

     A LETTER TO JASPER

     JOLLY DAYS

     GETTING A CHRISTMAS FOR THE LITTLE ONES

     CHRISTMAS BELLS!

     EDUCATION AHEAD

     BRAVE WORK AND THE REWARD

     POLLY IS COMFORTED

     PHRONSIE

     GETTING READY FOR MAMSIE AND THE BOYS

     WHICH TREATS OF A GOOD MANY MATTERS

     POLLY'S DISMAL MORNING

     POLLY'S BIG BUNDLE




FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS




A HOME VIEW


The little old kitchen had quieted down from the bustle and confusion
of mid-day; and now, with its afternoon manners on, presented a holiday
aspect, that as the principal room in the brown house, it was eminently
proper it should have. It was just on the edge of the twilight; and the
little Peppers, all except Ben, the oldest of the flock, were enjoying
a “breathing spell,” as their mother called it, which meant some
quiet work suitable for the hour. All the “breathing spell” they could
remember however, poor things; for times were always hard with them
nowadays; and since the father died, when Phronsie was a baby, Mrs.
Pepper had had hard work to scrape together money enough to put bread
into her children's mouths, and to pay the rent of the little brown
house.

But she had met life too bravely to be beaten down now. So with a stout
heart and a cheery face, she had worked away day after day at making
coats, and tailoring and mending of all descriptions; and she had seen
with pride that couldn't be concealed, her noisy, happy brood growing
up around her, and filling her heart with comfort, and making the little
brown house fairly ring with jollity and fun.

“Poor things!” she would say to herself, “they haven't had any bringing
up; they've just scrambled up!” And then she would set her lips together
tightly, and fly at her work faster than ever. “I must get schooling for
them some way, but I don't see how!”

Once or twice she had thought, “Now the time is coming!” but it never
did: for winter shut in very cold, and it took so much more to feed and
warm them, that the money went faster than ever. And then, when the way
seemed clear again, the store changed hands, so that for a long time she
failed to get her usual supply of sacks and coats to make; and that
made sad havoc in the quarters and half-dollars laid up as her nest egg.
But--“Well, it'll come some time,” she would say to herself; “because it
must!” And so at it again she would fly, brisker than ever.

“To help mother,” was the great ambition of all the children, older
and younger; but in Polly's and Ben's souls, the desire grew so
overwhelmingly great as to absorb all lesser thoughts. Many and vast
were their secret plans, by which they were to astonish her at some
future day, which they would only confide--as they did everything
else--to one another. For this brother and sister were everything to
each other, and stood loyally together through “thick and thin.”

Polly was ten, and Ben one year older; and the younger three of the
“Five Little Peppers,” as they were always called, looked up to them
with the intensest admiration and love. What they failed to do, couldn't
very well be done by any One!

“Oh dear!” exclaimed Polly as she sat over in the corner by the window
helping her mother pull out basting threads from a coat she had just
finished, and giving an impatient twitch to the sleeve, “I do wish we
could ever have any light--just as much as we want!”

“You don't need any light to see these threads,” said Mrs. Pepper,
winding up hers carefully, as she spoke, on an old spool. “Take care,
Polly, you broke that; thread's dear now.”

“I couldn't help it,” said Polly, vexedly; “it snapped; everything's
dear now, it seems to me! I wish we could have--oh! ever an' ever so
many candles; as many as we wanted. I'd light 'em all, so there! and
have it light here one night, anyway!”

“Yes, and go dark all the rest of the year, like as anyway,” observed
Mrs. Pepper, stopping to untie a knot. “Folks who do so never have any
candles,” she added, sententiously.

“How many'd you have, Polly?” asked Joel, curiously, laying down his
hammer, and regarding her with the utmost anxiety.

“Oh, two hundred!” said Polly, decidedly. “I'd have two hundred, all in
a row!”

“Two hundred candles!” echoed Joel, in amazement. “My whockety! what a
lot!”

“Don't say such dreadful words, Joel,” put in Polly, nervously, stopping
to pick up her spool of basting thread that was racing away all by
itself; “tisn't nice.”

“Tisn't worse than to wish you'd got things you haven't,” retorted Joel.
“I don't believe you'd light 'em all at once,” he added, incredulously.

“Yes, I would too!” replied Polly, reckessly; “two hundred of 'em, if I
had a chance; all at once, so there, Joey Pepper!”

“Oh,” said little Davie, drawing a long sigh. “Why, 'twould be just like
heaven, Polly! but wouldn't it cost money, though!”

“I don't care,” said Polly, giving a flounce in her chair, which snapped
another thread; “oh dear me! I didn't mean to, mammy; well, I wouldn't
care how much money it cost, we'd have as much light as we wanted, for
once; so!”

“Mercy!” said Mrs. Pepper, “you'd have the house afire! Two hundred
candles! who ever heard of such a thing!”

“Would they burn?” asked Phronsie, anxiously, getting up from the floor
where she was crouching with David, overseeing Joel nail on the cover of
an old box; and going to Polly's side she awaited her answer patiently.

“Burn?” said Polly. “There, that's done now, mamsie dear!” And she put
the coat, with a last little pat, into her mother's lap. “I guess they
would, Phronsie pet.” And Polly caught up the little girl, and spun
round and round the old kitchen till they were both glad to stop.

“Then,” said Phronsie, as Polly put her down, and stood breathless after
her last glorious spin, “I do so wish we might, Polly; oh, just this
very one minute!”

And Phronsie clasped her fat little hands in rapture at the thought.

“Well,” said Polly, giving a look up at the old clock in the corner;
“deary me! it's half-past five; and most time for Ben to come home!”

Away she flew to get supper. So for the next few moments nothing was
heard but the pulling out of the old table into the middle of the floor,
the laying the cloth, and all the other bustle attendant upon the
being ready for Ben. Polly went skipping around, cutting the bread,
and bringing dishes; only stopping long enough to fling some scraps of
reassuring nonsense to the two boys, who were thoroughly dismayed at
being obliged to remove their traps into a corner.

Phronsie still stood just where Polly left her. Two hundred candles! oh!
what could it mean! She gazed up to the old beams overhead, and around
the dingy walls, and to the old black stove, with the fire nearly out,
and then over everything the kitchen contained, trying to think how it
would seem. To have it bright and winsome and warm! to suit Polly--“oh!”
 she screamed.

“Goodness!” said Polly, taking her head out of the old cupboard in the
corner, “how you scared me, Phronsie!”

“Would they ever go out?” asked the child gravely, still standing where
Polly left her.

“What?” asked Polly, stopping with a dish of cold potatoes in her hand.
“What, Phronsie?”

“Why, the candles,” said the child, “the ever-an'-ever so many pretty
lights!”

“Oh, my senses!” cried Polly, with a little laugh, “haven't you
forgotten that! Yes--no, that is, Phronsie, if we could have 'em at all,
we wouldn't ever let 'em go out!”

“Not once?” asked Phronsie, coming up to Polly with a little skip, and
nearly upsetting her, potatoes and all--“not once, Polly, truly?”

“No, not forever-an'-ever,” said Polly; “take care, Phronsie! there goes
a potato; no, we'd keep 'em always!”

“No, you don't want to,” said Mrs. Pepper, coming out of the bedroom in
time to catch the last words; “they won't be good to-morrow; better have
them to-night, Polly.”

“Ma'am!” said Polly, setting down her potato-dish on the table, and
staring at her mother with all her might--“have what, mother?”

“Why, the potatoes, to be sure,” replied Mrs. Pepper; “didn't you say
you better keep them, child?”

“Twasn't potatoes--at all,” said Polly, with a little gasp; “twas--dear
me! here's Ben!” For the door opened, and Phronsie, with a scream of
delight, bounded into Ben's arms.

“It's just jolly,” said Ben, coming in, his chubby face all aglow, and
his big blue eyes shining so honest and true; “it's just jolly to get
home! supper ready, Polly?”

“Yes,” said Polly; “that is--all but--” and she dashed off for
Phronsie's eating apron.

“Sometime,” said Phronsie, with her mouth half full, when the meal was
nearly over, “we're going to be awful rich; we are, Ben, truly!”

“No?” said Ben, affecting the most hearty astonishment; “you don't say
so, Chick!”

“Yes,” said Phronsie, shaking her yellow head very wisely at him, and
diving down into her cup of very weak milk and water to see if Polly had
put any sugar in by mistake--a proceeding always expectantly observed.
“Yes, we are really, Bensie, very dreadful rich!”

“I wish we could be rich now, then,” said Ben, taking another generous
slice of the brown bread; “in time for mamsie's birthday,” and he cast a
sorrowful glance at Polly.

“I know,” said Polly; “oh dear! if we only could celebrate it!”

“I don't want any other celebration,” said Mrs. Pepper, beaming on
them so that a little flash of sunshine seemed to hop right down on the
table, “than to look round on you all; I'm rich now, and that's a fact!”

“Mamsie don't mind her five bothers,” cried Polly, jumping up and
running to hug her mother; thereby producing a like desire in all the
others, who immediately left their seats and followed her example.

“Mother's rich enough,” ejaculated Mrs. Pepper; her bright, black eyes
glistening with delight, as the noisy troop filed back to their bread
and potatoes; “if we can only keep together, dears, and grow up good, so
that the little brown house won't be ashamed of us, that's all I ask.”

“Well,” said Polly, in a burst of confidence to Ben, after the table had
been pushed back against the wall, the dishes nicely washed, wiped, and
set up neatly in the cupboard, and all traces of the meal cleared away;
“I don't care; let's try and get a celebration, somehow, for mamsie!”

“How are you going to do it?” asked Ben, who was of a decidedly
practical turn of mind, and thus couldn't always follow Polly in her
flights of imagination.

“I don't know,” said Polly; “but we must some way.”

“Phoh! that's no good,” said Ben, disdainfully; then seeing Polly's
face, he added kindly: “let's think, though; and perhaps there'll be
some way.”

“Oh, I know,” cried Polly, in delight; “I know the very thing, Ben!
let's make her a cake; a big one, you know, and--”

“She'll see you bake it,” said Ben; “or else she'll smell it, and that'd
be just as bad.”

“No, she won't either,” replied Polly. “Don't you know she's going to
help Mrs. Henderson to-morrow; so there!”

“So she is,” said Ben; “good for you, Polly, you always think of
everything!”

“And then,” said Polly, with a comfortable little feeling at her heart
at Ben's praise, “why, we can have it all out of the way splendidly, you
know, when she comes home--and besides, Grandma Bascom'll tell me how.
You know we've only got brown flour, Ben; I mean to go right over and
ask her now.”

“Oh, no, you mustn't,” cried Ben, catching hold of her arm as she was
preparing to fly off. “Mammy'll find it out; better wait till to-morrow;
and besides Polly--” And Ben stopped, unwilling to dampen this
propitious beginning. “The stove'll act like everything, to-morrow! I
know 'twill; then what'll you do!”

“It sha'n't!” said Polly, running up to look it in the face; “if it
does, I'll shake it; the mean old thing!”

The idea of Polly's shaking the lumbering old black affair, sent Ben
into such a peal of laughter that it brought all the other children
running to the spot; and nothing would do but they must one and all, be
told the reason. So Polly and Ben took them into confidence, which
so elated them that half an hour after, when long past her bedtime,
Phronsie declared, “I'm not going to bed! I want to sit up like Polly!”

“Don't tease her,” whispered Polly to Ben, who thought she ought to go;
so she sat straight up on her little stool, winking like everything to
keep awake.

At last, as Polly was in the midst of one of her liveliest sallies, over
tumbled Phronsie, a sleepy little heap, upon the floor.

“I want--to go--to bed!” she said; “take me--Polly!”

“I thought so,” laughed Polly, and bundled her off into the bedroom.




MAKING HAPPINESS FOR MAMSIE


And so, the minute her mother had departed for the minister's house next
morning, and Ben had gone to his day's work, chopping wood for Deacon
Blodgett, Polly assembled her force around the old stove, and proceeded
to business. She and the children had been up betimes that morning to
get through with the work; and now, as they glanced around with a look
of pride on the neatly swept floor, the dishes all done, and everything
in order, the moment their mother's back was turned they began to
implore Polly to hurry and begin.

“It's most 'leven o'clock,” said Joel, who, having no work to do
outside, that day, was prancing around, wild to help along the
festivities; “it's most 'leven o'clock, Polly Pepper! you won't have it
done.”

“Oh, no; 'tisn't either, Joe;” said Polly, with a very flushed face, and
her arms full of kindlings, glancing up at the old clock as she spoke;
“tisn't but quarter of nine; there, take care, Phronsie! you can't lift
off the cover; do help her, Davie.”

“No; let me!” cried Joel, springing forward; “it's my turn; Dave got the
shingles; it's my turn, Polly.”

“So 'tis,” said Polly; “I forgot; there,” as she flung in the wood,
and poked it all up in a nice little heap coaxingly. “It can't help but
burn; what a cake we'll have for mamsie!”

“It'll be so big,” cried Phronsie, hopping around on one set of toes,
“that mamsie won't know what to do, will she, Polly?”

“No, I don't believe she will,” said Polly, gayly, stuffing in more
wood; “Oh, dear! there goes Ben's putty; it's all come out!”

“So it has,” said Joel, going around back of the stove to explore; and
then he added cheerfully, “it's bigger'n ever; oh! it's an awful big
hole, Polly!”

“Now, whatever shall we do!” said Polly, in great distress; “that
hateful old crack! and Ben's clear off to Deacon Blodgett's!”

“I'll run and get him,” cried Joel, briskly; “I'll bring him right home
in ten minutes.”

“Oh, no, you must not, Joe,” cried Polly in alarm; “it wouldn't ever be
right to take him off from his work; mamsie wouldn't like it.”

“What will you do, then?” asked Joel, pausing on his way to the door.

“I'm sure I don't know,” said Polly, getting down on her knees to
examine the crack; “I shall have to stuff it with paper, I s'pose.”

“'Twon't stay in,” said Joel, scornfully; “don't you know you stuffed it
before, last week?”

“I know,” said Polly, with a small sigh; and sitting down on the floor,
she remained quite still for a minute, with her two black hands thrust
out straight before her.

“Can't you fix it?” asked Davie, soberly, coming up; “then we can't have
the cake.”

“Dear me!” exclaimed Polly, springing up quickly; “don't be afraid;
we're going to have that cake! There, you ugly old thing, you!” (this
to the stove) “see what you've done!” as two big tears flew out of
Phronsie's brown eyes at the direful prospect; and the sorrowful faces
of the two boys looked up into Polly's own, for comfort. “I can fix it,
I most know; do get some paper, Joe, as quick as you can.”

“Don't know where there is any,” said Joel, rummaging around; “it's all
tore up; 'xcept the almanac; can't I take that?”

“Oh dear, no!” cried Polly; “put it right back, Joe; I guess there's
some in the wood-shed.”

“There isn't either,” said little Davie, quickly; “Joel and I took it to
make kites with.”

“Oh dear,” groaned Polly; “I don't know what we shall do; unless,” as a
bright thought struck her, “you let me have the kites, boys.”

“Can't,” said Joel; “they're all flew away; and torn up.”

“Well, now, children,” said Polly, turning round impressively upon them,
the effect of which was heightened by the extremely crocky appearance
she had gained in her explorations, “we must have some paper, or
something to stop up that old hole with--some way, there!”

“I know,” said little Davie, “where we'll get it; it's upstairs;” and
without another word he flew out of the room, and in another minute he
put into Polly's hand an old leather boot-top, one of his most treasured
possessions. “You can chip it,” he said, “real fine, and then 'twill go
in.”

“So we can,” said Polly; “and you're a real good boy, Davie, to give it;
that's a splendid present to help celebrate for mamsie!”

“I'd a-given a boot-top,” said Joel, looking grimly at the precious bit
of leather which Polly was rapidly stripping into little bits, “if I'd
a-hed it; I don't have anything!”

“I know you would, Joey,” said Polly, kindly; “there now, you'll stay,
I guess!” as with the united efforts of the two boys, cheered on by
Phronsie's enthusiastic little crow of delight, the leather was crowded
into place, and the fire began to burn.

“Now, boys,” said Polly, getting up, and drawing a long breath, “I'm
going over to Grandma Bascom's to get her to tell me how to make the
cake; and you must stay and keep house.”

“I'm going to nail,” said Joel; “I've got lots to do.”

“All right,” said Polly, tying on her hood; “Phronsie'll love to watch
you; I won't be gone long,” and she was off.

“Grandma Bascom,” wasn't really the children's grandmother; only
everybody in the village called her so by courtesy. Her cottage was over
across the lane, and just a bit around the corner; and Polly flew along
and up to the door, fully knowing that now she would be helped out of
her difficulty. She didn't stop to knock, as the old lady was so deaf
she knew she wouldn't hear her, but opened the door and walked in.
Grandma was sweeping up the floor, already as neat as a pin; when she
saw Polly coming, she stopped, and leaned on her broom.

“How's your ma?” she asked, when Polly had said “good morning,” and then
hesitated.

“Oh, mammy's pretty well,” shouted Polly into the old lady's ear; “and
to-morrow's her birthday!”

“To-morrow'll be a bad day!” said grandma. “Oh, don't never say that.
You mustn't borrow trouble, child.”

“I didn't,” said Polly; “I mean--it's her birthday, grandma!” this last
so loud that grandma's cap-border vibrated perceptibly.

“The land's sakes 'tis!” cried Mrs. Bascom, delightedly; “you don't say
so!”

“Yes,” said Polly, skipping around the old lady, and giving her a small
hug; “and we're going to give her a surprise.”

“What is the matter with her eyes?” asked grandma, sharply, turning
around and facing her; “she's been a-sewin' too stiddy, hain't she?”

“A surprise!” shouted Polly, standing upon tiptoe, to bring her mouth on
a level with the old lady's ear; “a cake, grandma, a big one!”

“A cake!” exclaimed grandma, dropping the broom to settle her cap, which
Polly in her extreme endeavors to carry on the conversation, had knocked
slightly awry; “well, that'll be fine.”

“Yes,” said Polly, picking up the broom, and flinging off her hood
at the same time; “and, oh! won't you please tell me how to make it,
grandma!”

“To be sure; to be sure;” cried the old lady, delighted beyond measure
to give advice; “I've got splendid receets; I'll go get 'em right off,”
 and she ambled to the door of the pantry.

“And I'll finish sweeping up,” said Polly, which grandma didn't hear;
so she took up the broom, and sent it energetically, and merrily flying
away to the tune of her own happy thoughts.

“Yes, they're right in here,” said grandma, waddling back with an old
tin teapot in her hand;--“goodness, child! what a dust you've kicked
up! that ain't the way to sweep.” And she took the broom out of Polly's
hand, who stood quite still in mortification.

“There,” she said, drawing it mildly over the few bits she could scrape
together, and gently coaxing them into a little heap; “that's the way;
and then they don't go all over the room.

“I'm sorry,” began poor Polly.

“'Tain't any matter,” said Mrs. Bascom kindly, catching sight of Polly's
discomfited face; “tain't a mite of matter; you'll sweep better next
time; now let's go to the cake;” and putting the broom into the corner,
she waddled back again to the table, followed by Polly, and proceeded
to turn out the contents of the teapot, in search of just the right
“receet.”

But the right one didn't seem to appear; not even after the teapot was
turned upside down and shaken by both grandma's and Polly's anxious
hands. Every other “receet” seemed to tumble out gladly, and stare them
in the face--little dingy rolls of yellow paper, with an ancient odor
of spice still clinging to them; but all efforts to find this particular
one failed utterly.

“Won't some other one do?” asked Polly, in the interval of fruitless
searching, when grandma bewailed and lamented, and wondered, “where I
could a put it!”

“No, no, child,” answered the old lady; “now, where do you s'pose 'tis!”
 and she clapped both hands to her head, to see if she could possibly
remember; “no, no, child,” she repeated. “Why, they had it down to my
niece Mirandy's weddin'--'twas just elegant! light as a feather; and
'twan't rich either,” she added; “no eggs, nor--”

“Oh, I couldn't have eggs;” cried Polly, in amazement at the thought of
such luxury; “and we've only brown flour, grandma, you know.”

“Well, you can make it of brown,” said Mrs. Bascom, kindly; “when the
raisins is in 'twill look quite nice.”

“Oh, we haven't any raisins,” answered Polly.

“Haven't any raisins!” echoed grandma, looking at her over her
spectacles; “what are you goin' to put in?”

“Oh--cinnamon,” said Polly, briskly; “we've got plenty of that,
and--it'll be good, I guess, grandma!” she finished, anxiously; “anyway,
we must have a cake; there isn't any other way to celebrate mamsie's
birthday.”

“Well, now,” said grandma, bustling around; “I shouldn't be surprised
if you had real good luck, Polly. And your ma'll set ever so much by it;
now, if we only could find that receet!” and returning to the charge she
commenced to fumble among her bits of paper again; “I never shall forget
how they eat on it; why, there wasn't a crumb left, Polly!”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, to whom “Mirandy's wedding cake” now became the
height of her desires; “if you only can find it! can't I climb up and
look on the pantry shelves?”

“Maybe 'tis there,” said Mrs. Bascom, slowly; “you might try; sometimes
I do put things away, so's to have 'em safe.”

So Polly got an old wooden chair, according to direction, and then
mounted up on it, with grandma below to direct, she handed down bowl
after bowl, interspersed at the right intervals with cracked teacups and
handleless pitchers. But at the end of these explorations, “Mirandy's
wedding cake” was further off than ever.

“Tain't a mite o' use,” at last said the old lady, sinking down in
despair, while Polly perched on the top of the chair and looked at her;
“I must a-give it away.”

“Can't I have the next best one, then?” asked Polly, despairingly,
feeling sure that “Mirandy's wedding cake” would have celebrated the day
just right; “and I must hurry right home, please,” she added, getting
down from the chair, and tying on her hood; “or Phronsie won't know what
to do.”

So another “receet” was looked over, and selected; and with many
charges, and bits of advice not to let the oven get too hot, etc., etc.,
Polly took the precious bit in her hand, and flew over home.

“Now, we've got to--” she began, bounding in merrily, with dancing eyes;
but her delight had a sudden stop, as she brought up so suddenly at
the sight within, that she couldn't utter another word. Phronsie was
crouching, a miserable little heap of woe, in one corner of the mother's
big calico-covered rocking-chair, and crying bitterly, while Joel hung
over her in the utmost concern.

“What's the matter?” gasped Polly. Flinging the “receet” on the table,
she rushed up to the old chair and was down on her knees before it, her
arms around the little figure. Phronsie turned, and threw herself into
Polly's protecting arms, who gathered her up, and sitting down in the
depths of the chair, comforted her as only she could.

“What is it?” she asked of Joel, who was nervously begging Phronsie not
to cry; “now, tell me all that's happened.”

“I was a-nailing,” began Joel; “oh dear! don't cry, Phronsie! do stop
her, Polly.”

“Go on,” said Polly, hoarsely.

“I was a-nailing,” began Joel, slowly; “and--and--Davie's gone to get
the peppermint,” he added, brightening up.

“Tell me, Joe,” said Polly, “all that's been going on,” and she looked
sternly into his face; “or I'll get Davie to,” as little Davie came
running back, with a bottle of castor oil, which in his flurry he had
mistaken for peppermint. This he presented with a flourish to Polly, who
was too excited to see it.

“Oh, no!” cried Joel, in intense alarm; “Davie isn't going to! I'll
tell, Polly; I will truly.”

“Go on, then,” said Polly; “tell at once;” (feeling as if somebody
didn't tell pretty quick, she should tumble over.)

“Well,” said Joel, gathering himself up with a fresh effort, “the old
hammer was a-shaking and Phronsie stuck her foot in the way--and--I
couldn't help it, Polly--no, I just couldn't, Polly.”

Quick as a flash, Polly tore off the little old shoe, and well-worn
stocking, and brought to light Phronsie's fat little foot. Tenderly
taking hold of the white toes, the boys clustering around in the
greatest anxiety, she worked them back and forth, and up and down.
“Nothing's broken,” she said at last, and drew a long breath.

“It's there,” said Phronsie, through a rain of tears; “and it hurts,
Polly;” and she began to wiggle the big toe, where around the nail was
settling a small black spot.

“Poor little toe,” began Polly, cuddling up the suffering foot. Just
then, a small and peculiar noise struck her ear; and looking up she saw
Joel, with a very distorted face, making violent efforts to keep from
bursting out into a loud cry. All his attempts, however, failed; and
he flung himself into Polly's lap in a perfect torrent of tears. “I
didn't--mean to--Polly,” he cried; “'twas the--ugly, old hammer! oh
dear!”

“There, there, Joey, dear,” said Polly, gathering him up in the other
corner of the old chair, close to her side; “don't feel bad; I know you
didn't mean to,” and she dropped a kiss on his stubby black hair.

When Phronsie saw that anybody else could cry, she stopped immediately,
and leaning over Polly, put one little fat hand on Joel's neck. “Don't
cry,” she said; “does your toe ache?”

At this, Joel screamed louder than ever; and Polly was at her wit's
end to know what to do; for the boy's heart was almost broken. That he
should have hurt Phronsie! the baby, the pet of the whole house, upon
whom all their hearts centered--it was too much. So for the next few
moments, Polly had all she could do by way of comforting and consoling
him. Just as she had succeeded, the door opened, and Grandma Bascom
walked in.

“Settin' down?” said she; “I hope your cake ain't in, Polly,” looking
anxiously at the stove, “for I've found it;” and she waved a small piece
of paper triumphantly towards the rocking-chair as she spoke.

“Do tell her,” said Polly to little David, “what's happened; for I can't
get up.”

So little Davie went up to the old lady, and standing on tiptoe,
screamed into her ear all the particulars he could think of, concerning
the accident that had just happened.

“Hey?” said grandma, in a perfect bewilderment; “what's he a-sayin',
Polly--I can't make it out.”

“You'll have to go all over it again, David,” said Polly, despairingly;
“she didn't hear one word, I don't believe.”

So David tried again; this time with better success. And then he got
down from his tiptoes, and escorted grandma to Phronsie, in flushed
triumph.

“Land alive!” said the old lady, sitting down in the chair which he
brought her; “you got pounded, did you?” looking at Phronsie, as she
took the little foot in her ample hand.

“Yes'm,” said Polly, quickly; “twasn't any one's fault; what'll we do
for it, grandma?”

“Wormwood,” said the old lady, adjusting her spectacles in extreme
deliberation, and then examining the little black and blue spot, which
was spreading rapidly, “is the very best thing; and I've got some to
home--you run right over,” she said, turning round on David, quickly,
“an' get it; it's a-hang-in' by the chimbley.”

“Let me; let me!” cried Joel, springing out of the old chair, so
suddenly that grandma's spectacles nearly dropped off in fright; “oh! I
want to do it for Phronsie!”

“Yes, let Joel, please,” put in Polly; “he'll find it, grandma.” So Joel
departed with great speed; and presently returned, with a bunch of dry
herbs, which dangled comfortingly by his side, as he came in.

“Now I'll fix it,” said Mrs. Bascom, getting up and taking off her
shawl; “there's a few raisins for you, Polly; I don't want 'em, and
they'll make your cake go better,” and she placed a little parcel on the
table as she spoke. “Yes, I'll put it to steep; an' after it's put on
real strong, and tied up in an old cloth, Phronsie won't know as she's
got any toes!” and grandma broke up a generous supply of the herb, and
put it into an old tin cup, which she covered up with a saucer, and
placed on the stove.

“Oh!” said Polly; “I can't thank you! for the raisins and all--you're so
good!”

“They're awful hard,” said Joel, investigating into the bundle with
Davie, which, however, luckily the old lady didn't hear.

“There, don't try,” she said cheerily; “an' I found cousin Mirandy's
weddin' cake receet, for--”

“Did you?” cried Polly; “oh! I'm so glad!” feeling as if that were
comfort enough for a good deal.

“Yes, 'twas in my Bible,” said Mrs. Bascom; “I remember now; I put it
there to be ready to give John's folks when they come in; they wanted
it; so you'll go all straight now; and I must get home, for I left some
meat a-boilin'.” So grandma put on her shawl, and waddled off, leaving a
great deal of comfort behind her.

“Now, says I,” said Polly to Phronsie, when the little foot was snugly
tied up in the wet wormwood, “you've got to have one of mamsie's old
slippers.”

“Oh, ho,” laughed Phronsie; “won't that be funny, Polly!”

“I should think it would,” laughed Polly, back again, pulling on the
big cloth slipper, which Joel produced from the bedroom, the two boys
joining uproariously, as the old black thing flapped dismally up and
down, and showed strong symptoms of flying off. “We shall have to tie it
on.”

“It looks like a pudding bag,” said Joel, as Polly tied it securely
through the middle with a bit of twine; “an old black pudding bag!” he
finished.

“Old black pudding bag!” echoed Phronsie, with a merry little crow; and
then all of a sudden she grew very sober, and looked intently at the
foot thrust out straight before her, as she still sat in the chair.

“What is it, Phronsie?” asked Polly, who was bustling around, making
preparations for the cake-making.

“Can I ever wear my new shoes again?” asked the child, gravely, looking
dismally at the black bundle before her.

“Oh, yes; my goodness, yes!” cried Polly; “as quick again as ever;
you'll be around again as smart as a cricket in a week--see if you
aren't!”

“Will it go on?” asked Phronsie, still looking incredulously at the
bundle, “and button up?”

“Yes, indeed!” cried Polly, again; “button into every one of the little
holes, Phronsie Pepper; just as elegant as ever!”

“Oh!” said Phronsie; and then she gave a sigh of relief, and thought no
more of it, because Polly had said that all would be right.




MAMSIE'S BIRTHDAY


“Run down and get the cinnamon, will you, Joey?” said Polly; “it's in
the 'Provision Room.”

The “Provision Room” was a little shed that was tacked on to the main
house, and reached by a short flight of rickety steps; so called,
because as Polly said, “'twas a good place to keep provisions in, even
if we haven't any; and besides,” she always finished, “it sounds nice!”

“Come on, Dave! then we'll get something to eat!”

So the cinnamon was handed up, and then Joel flew back to Davie.

And now, Polly's cake was done, and ready for the oven. With many
admiring glances from herself, and Phronsie, who with Seraphina, an
extremely old but greatly revered doll, tightly hugged in her arms was
watching everything with the biggest of eyes from the depths of the old
chair, it was placed in the oven, the door shut to with a happy little
bang, then Polly gathered Phronsie up in her arms, and sat down in the
chair to have a good time with her and to watch the process of cooking.

There was a bumping noise that came from the “Provision Room” that
sounded ominous, and then a smothered sound of words, followed by a
scuffling over the old floor.

“Boys!” called Polly. No answer; everything was just as still as a
mouse. “Joel and David!” called Polly again, in her loudest tones.

“Yes,” came up the crooked stairs, in Davie's voice.

“Come up here, right away!” went back again from Polly. So up the stairs
trudged the two boys, and presented themselves rather sheepishly before
the big chair.

“What was that noise?” she asked; “what have you been doing?”

“Twasn't anything but the pail,” answered Joel, not looking at her.

“We had something to eat,” said Davie, by way of explanation; “you
always let us.”

“I know,” said Polly; “that's right, you can have as much bread as you
want to; but what you been doing with the pail?”

“Nothing,” said Joel; “'twouldn't hangup, that's all.”

“And you've been bumping it,” said Polly; “oh! Joel, how could you! You
might have broken it; then what would mamsie say?”

“I didn't,” said Joel, stoutly, with his hands in his pockets, “bump it
worse'n Davie, so there!”

“Why, Davie,” said Polly, turning to him sorrowfully, “I shouldn't have
thought you would!”

“Well, I'm tired of hanging it up,” said little Davie, vehemently; “and
I said I wasn't a-goin' to; Joel always makes me; I've done it for two
million times, I guess!”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, sinking back into the chair, “I don't know
what I ever shall do; here's Phronsie hurt; and we want to celebrate
to-morrow; and you two boys are bumping and banging out the bread pail,
and--”

“Oh! we won't!” cried both of the children, perfectly overwhelmed with
remorse; “we'll hang it right up.”

“I'll hang it,” said Davie, clattering off down the stairs with a will.

“No, I will!” shouted Joel, going after him at double pace; and
presently both came up with shining faces, and reported it nicely done.

“And now,” said Polly, after they had all sat around the stove another
half-hour, watching and sniffing expectantly, “the cake's done!--dear
me! it's turning black!”

And quickly as possible Polly twitched it out with energy, and set it on
the table.

Oh, dear; of all things in the world! The beautiful cake over which so
many hopes had been formed, that was to have given so much happiness
on the morrow to the dear mother, presented a forlorn appearance as it
stood there in anything but holiday attire. It was quite black on the
top, in the center of which was a depressing little dump, as if to say,
“My feelings wouldn't allow me to rise to the occasion.”

“Now,” said Polly, turning away with a little fling, and looking at
the stove, “I hope you're satisfied, you old thing; you've spoiled our
mamsie's birthday!” and without a bit of warning, she sat right down in
the middle of the floor and began to cry as hard as she could.

“Well, I never!” said a cheery voice, that made the children skip.

“It's Mrs. Beebe; oh, it's Mrs. Beebe!” cried Davie; “see, Polly.”

Polly scrambled up to her feet, ashamed to be caught thus, and whisked
away the tears; the others explaining to their new visitor the sad
disappointment that had befallen them; and she was soon oh-ing, and
ah-ing enough to suit even their distressed little souls.

“You poor creeters, you!” she exclaimed at last, for about the fiftieth
time. “Here, Polly, here's some posies for you, and--”

“Oh, thank you!” cried Polly, with a radiant face, “why, Mrs. Beebe, we
can put them in here, can't we? the very thing!”

And she set the little knot of flowers in the hollow of the cake, and
there they stood and nodded away to the delighted children, like brave
little comforters, as they were.

“The very thing!” echoed Mrs. Beebe, tickled to death to see their
delight; “it looks beautiful, I declare! and now, I must run right
along, or pa'll be worrying;” and so the good woman trotted out to her
waiting husband, who was impatient to be off. Mr. Beebe kept a little
shoe shop in town; and always being of the impression if he left it for
ten minutes that crowds of customers would visit it. He was the most
restless of companions on any pleasure excursion.

“And Phronsie's got hurt,” said Mrs. Beebe, telling him the news, as he
finished tucking her up, and started the old horse.

“Ho? you don't say so!” he cried; “whoa!”

“Dear me!” said Mrs. Beebe; “how you scat me, pal what's the matter?”

“What?--the little girl that bought the shoes?” asked her husband.

“Yes,” replied his wife, “she's hurt her foot.”

“Sho, now,” said the old gentleman; “that's too bad,” and he began to
feel in all his pockets industriously; “there, can you get out again,
and take her that?” and he laid a small piece of peppermint candy, thick
and white, in his wife's lap.

“Oh, yes,” cried Mrs. Beebe, good-naturedly, beginning to clamber over
the wheel.

So the candy was handed in to Phronsie, who insisted that Polly should
hold her up to the window to thank Mr. Beebe. So amid nods, and shakings
of hands, the Beebes drove off, and quiet settled down over the little
brown house again.

“Now, children,” said Polly, after Phronsie had made them take a bite of
her candy all around, “let's get the cake put away safe, for mamsie may
come home early.

“Where'll you put it?” asked Joel, wishing the world was all peppermint
candy.

“Oh--in the cupboard,” said Polly, taking it up; “there, Joe, you can
climb up, and put it clear back in the corner, oh! wait; I must take
the posies off, and keep them fresh in water;” so the cake was finally
deposited in a place of safety, followed by the eyes of all the
children.

“Now,” said Polly, as they shut the door tight, “don't you go to looking
at the cupboard, Joey, or mammy'll guess something.”

“Can't I just open it a little crack, and take one smell when she isn't
looking?” asked Joel; “I should think you might, Polly; just one.”

“No,” said Polly, firmly; “not one, Joe; she'll guess if you do.” But
Mrs. Pepper was so utterly engrossed with her baby when she came home
and heard the account of the accident, that she wouldn't have guessed
if there'd been a dozen cakes in the cupboard. Joel was consoled, as his
mother assured him in a satisfactory way that she never should think
of blaming him; and Phronsie was comforted and coddled to her heart's
content. And so the evening passed rapidly and happily away; Ben
smuggling Phronsie off into a corner, where she told him all the doings
of the day--the disappointment of the cake, and how it was finally
crowned with flowers; all of which Phronsie, with no small pride in
being the narrator, related gravely to her absorbed listener. “And don't
you think, Bensie,” she said, clasping her little hand in a convincing
way over his two bigger, stronger ones, “that Polly's stove was very
naughty to make poor Polly cry?”

“Yes, I do,” said Ben, and he shut his lips tightly together.

To have Polly cry, hurt him more than he cared to have Phronsie see.

“What are you staring at, Joe?” asked Polly, a few minutes later, as her
eyes fell upon Joel, who sat with his back to the cupboard, persistently
gazing at the opposite wall.

“Why, you told me yourself not to look at the cupboard,” said Joel, in
the loudest of stage whispers.

“Dear me; that'll make mammy suspect worse'n anything else if you look
like that,” said Polly.

“What did you say about the cupboard?” asked Mrs. Pepper, who caught
Joe's last word.

“We can't tell,” said Phronsie, shaking her head at her mother; “cause
there's a ca----” “Ugh!” and Polly clapped her hand on the child's
mouth; “don't you want Ben to tell us a story?”

“Oh, yes!” cried little Phronsie, in which all the others joined with
a whoop of delight; so a most wonderful story, drawn up in Ben's best
style, followed till bedtime.

The first thing Polly did in the morning, was to run to the old
cupboard, followed by all the others, to see if the cake was safe; and
then it had to be drawn out, and dressed anew with the flowers, for they
had decided to have it on the breakfast table.

“It looks better,” whispered Polly to Ben, “than it did yesterday; and
aren't the flowers pretty?”

“It looks good enough to eat, anyway,” said Ben, smacking his lips.

“Well, we tried,” said Polly, stilling a sigh; “now, boys, call mamsie;
everything's ready.”

Oh! how surprised their mother appeared when she was ushered out to the
feast, and the full glory of the table burst upon her. Her delight in
the cake was fully enough to satisfy the most exacting mind. She
admired and admired it on every side, protesting that she shouldn't have
supposed Polly could possibly have baked it as good in the old stove;
and then she cut it, and gave a piece to every child, with a little posy
on top. Wasn't it good, though! for like many other things, the cake
proved better on trial than it looked, and so turned out to be really
quite a good surprise all around.

“Why can't I ever have a birthday?” asked Joel, finishing the last crumb
of his piece; “I should think I might,” he added, reflectively.

“Why, you have, Joe,” said Ben; “eight of 'em.”

“What a story!” ejaculated Joel; “when did I have 'em? I never had a
cake; did I, Polly?”

“Not a cake-birthday, Joel,” said his mother; “you haven't got to that
yet.”

“When's it coming?” asked Joel, who was decidedly of a matter-of-fact
turn of mind.

“I don't know,” said Mrs. Pepper, laughing; “but there's plenty of time
ahead.”




TROUBLE FOR THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE


“Oh, I do wish,” said Joel, a few mornings after, pushing back his chair
and looking discontentedly at his bowl of mush and molasses, “that we
could ever have something new besides this everlasting old breakfast!
Why can't we, mammy?”

“Better be glad you've got that, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper, taking another
cold potato, and sprinkling on a little salt; “folks shouldn't complain
so long as they've anything to eat.”

“But I'm so tired of it--same old thing!” growled Joel; “seems as if I
sh'd turn into a meal-bag or a molasses jug!”

“Well, hand it over, then,” proposed Ben, who was unusually hungry, and
had a hard day's work before him.

“No,” said Joel, alarmed at the prospect, and putting in an enormous
mouthful; “it's better than nothing.”

“Oh, dear,” said little Phronsie, catching Joel's tone, “it isn't nice;
no, it isn't.” And she put down her spoon so suddenly that the molasses
spun off in a big drop, that trailed off the corner of the table, and
made Polly jump up and run for the floor-cloth.

“Oh, Phronsie,” she said, reprovingly; “you ought not to. Never mind,
pet,” as she caught sight of two big tears trying to make a path in the
little molasses-streaked face, “Polly'll wipe it up.”

“Sha'n't we ever have anything else to eat, Polly?” asked the child,
gravely, getting down from her high chair to watch the operation of
cleaning the floor.

“Oh, yes,” said Polly, cheerfully, “lots and lots--when our ship comes
in.”

“What'll they be?” asked Phronsie, in the greatest delight, prepared for
anything.

“Oh, I don't know,” said Polly; “ice cream for one thing, Phronsie, and
maybe, little cakes.”

“With pink on top?” interrupted Phronsie, getting down by Polly's side.

“Oh, yes,” said Polly, warming with her subject; “ever and ever so much
pink, Phronsie Pepper; more than you could eat!”

Phronsie just clasped her hands and sighed. More than she could eat was
beyond her!

“Hoh!” said Joel, who caught the imaginary bill of fare, “that's
nothing, Polly. I'd speak for a plum-puddin'.”

“Like the one mother made us for Thanksgiving?” asked Polly, getting up
and waiting a minute, cloth in hand, for the answer.

“Yes, sir,” said Joel, shutting one eye and looking up at the ceiling,
musingly, while he smacked his lips in remembrance; “wasn't that prime,
though!”

“Yes,” said Polly, thoughtfully; “would you have 'em all like that,
Joe?”

“Every one,” replied Joe, promptly; “I'd have seventy-five of 'em.”

“Seventy-five what?” asked Mrs. Pepper, who had gone into the bedroom,
and now came out, a coat in hand, to sit down in the west window, where
she began to sew rapidly. “Better clear up the dishes, Polly, and set
the table back--seventy-five what, Joel?”

“Plum-puddings,” said Joel, kissing Phronsie.

“Dear me!” ejaculated Mrs. Pepper; “you don't know what you're saying,
Joel Pepper; the house couldn't hold 'em!”

“Wouldn't long,” responded Joel; “we'd eat 'em.”

“That would be foolish,” interposed Ben; “I'd have roast beef and
fixings--and oysters--and huckleberry pie.”

“Oh, dear,” cried Polly; “how nice, Ben! you always do think of the very
best things.”

But Joel phoohed and declared he wouldn't waste his time “over old beef;
he'd have something like!” And then he cried:

“Come on, Dave, what'd you choose?”

Little Davie had been quietly eating his breakfast amid all this
chatter, and somehow thinking it might make the mother feel badly, he
had refrained from saying just how tiresome he had really found this
“everlasting breakfast” as Joel called it. But now he looked up eagerly,
his answer all ready. “Oh, I know,” he cried, “what would be most
beautiful! toasted bread--white bread--and candy.”

“What's candy?” asked Phronsie.

“Oh, don't you know, Phronsie,” cried Polly, “what Mrs. Beebe gave you
the day you got your shoes--the pink sticks; and--”

“And the peppermint stick Mr. Beebe gave you, Phronsie,” finished Joel,
his mouth watering at the remembrance.

“That day, when you got your toe pounded,” added Davie, looking at Joel.

“Oh!” cried Phronsie; “I want some now, I do!”

“Well, Davie,” said Polly, “you shall have that for breakfast when our
ship comes in then.”

“Your ships aren't ever coming,” broke in Mrs. Pepper, wisely, “if you
sit there talking--folks don't ever make any fortunes by wishing.”

“True enough,” laughed Ben, jumping up and setting back his chair. “Come
on, Joe; you've got to pile to-day.”

“Oh, dear,” said Joel, dismally; “I wish Mr. Blodgett's wood was all
a-fire.”

“Never say that, Joel,” said Mrs. Pepper, looking up sternly; “it's
biting your own nose off to wish that wood was a-fire--and besides it's
dreadfully wicked.”

Joel hung his head, for his mother never spoke in that way unless she
was strongly moved; but he soon recovered, and hastened off for his
jacket.

“I'm sorry I can't help you do the dishes, Polly,” said David, running
after Joel.

“I'm going to help her,” said Phronsie; “I am.”

So Polly got the little wooden tub that she always used, gave Phronsie
the well-worn cup-napkin, and allowed her to wipe the handleless cups
and cracked saucers, which afforded the little one intense delight.

“Don't you wish, Polly,” said little Phronsie, bustling around with a
very important air, nearly smothered in the depths of a big brown
apron that Polly had carefully tied under her chin, “that you didn't
ever-an'-ever have so many dishes to do?”

“Um--maybe,” said Polly, thoughtlessly. She was thinking of something
else besides cups and saucers just then; of how nice it would be to go
off for just one day, and do exactly as she had a mind to in everything.
She even envied Ben and the boys who were going to work hard at Deacon
Blodgett's woodpile.

“Well, I tell you,” said Phronsie, confidentially, setting down a
cup that she had polished with great care, “I'm going to do 'em all
to-morrow, for you, Polly--I can truly; let me now, Polly, do.”

“Nonsense!” said Polly, giving a great splash with her mop in the tub,
ashamed of her inward repinings. “Phronsie, you're no bigger than a
mouse!”

“Yes, I am,” retorted Phronsie, very indignantly. Her face began to get
very red, and she straightened up so suddenly to show Polly just how
very big she was that her little head came up against the edge of the
tub--over it went! a pile of saucers followed.

“There now,” cried Polly, “see what you've done!”

“Ow!” whimpered Phronsie, breaking into a subdued roar; “oh, Polly! it's
all running down my back.”

“Is it?” said Polly, bursting out into a laugh; “never mind, Phronsie,
I'll dry you.”

“Dear me, Polly!” said Mrs. Pepper, who had looked up in time to see the
tub racing along by itself towards the “Provision Room” door, a stream
of dish-water following in its wake, “she will be wet clear through; do
get off her things, quick.”

“Yes'm,” cried Polly, picking up the tub, and giving two or three quick
sops to the floor. “Here you are, Pussy,” grasping Phronsie, crying as
she was, and carrying her into the bedroom.

“Oh, dear,” wailed the child, still holding the wet dish towel; “I won't
ever do it again, if you'll only let me do 'em all to-morrow.”

“When you're big and strong,” said Polly, giving her a hug, “you shall
do 'em every day.”

“May I really?” said little Phronsie, blinking through the tears, and
looking radiant.

“Yes, truly--every day.”

“Then I'll grow right away, I will,” said Phronsie, bursting out
merrily; and she sat down and pulled off the well-worn shoes, into which
a big pool of dish-water had run, while Polly went for dry stockings.

“So you shall,” said Polly, coming back, a big piece of gingerbread in
her hand; “and this'll make you grow, Phronsie.”

“O-o-h!” and Phronsie's little white teeth shut down quickly on the
comforting morsel. Gingerbread didn't come often enough into the Pepper
household to be lightly esteemed.

“Now,” said Mrs. Pepper, when order was restored, the floor washed
up brightly, and every cup and platter in place, hobnobbing away to
themselves on the shelves of the old corner cupboard, and Polly had come
as usual with needle and thread to help mother--Polly was getting so
that she could do the plain parts on the coats and jackets, which
filled her with pride at the very thought--“now,” said Mrs. Pepper, “you
needn't help me this morning, Polly: I'm getting on pretty smart; but
you may just run down to the parson's, and see how he is.”

“Is he sick?” asked Polly, in awe.

To have the parson sick, was something quite different from an ordinary
person's illness.

“He's taken with a chill,” said Mrs. Pepper, biting off a thread, “so
Miss Huldy Folsom told me last night, and I'm afraid he's going to have
a fever.”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, in dire distress; “whatever'd we do, mammy!”

“Don't know, I'm sure,” replied Mrs. Pepper, setting her stitches
firmly; “the Lord'll provide. So you run along, child, and see how he
is.”

“Can't Phronsie go?” asked Polly, pausing half-way to the bedroom door.

“Well, yes, I suppose she might,” said Mrs. Pepper, assentingly.

“No, she can't either,” said Polly, coming back with her sun-bonnet in
her hand, and shutting the door carefully after her, “cause she's fast
asleep on the floor.”

“Is she?” said Mrs. Pepper; “well, she's been running so this morning,
she's tired out, I s'pose.”

“And her face is dreadfully red,” continued Polly, tying on her bonnet;
“now, what'll I say, mammy?”

“Well, I should think 'twould be,” said Mrs. Pepper, replying to the
first half of Polly's speech; “she cried so. Well, you just tell Mrs.
Henderson your ma wants to know how Mr. Henderson is this morning, and
if 'twas a chill he had yesterday, and how he slept last night, and--”

“Oh, ma,” said Polly, “I can't ever remember all that.”

“Oh, yes, you can,” said Mrs. Pepper, encouragingly; “just put your mind
on it, Polly; 'tisn't anything to what I used to have to remember--when
I was a little girl, no bigger than you are.”

Polly sighed, and feeling sure that something must be the matter with
her mind, gave her whole attention to the errand; till at last after a
multiplicity of messages and charges not to forget any one of them, Mrs.
Pepper let her depart.

Up to the old-fashioned green door, with its brass knocker, Polly went,
running over in her mind just which of the messages she ought to give
first. She couldn't for her life think whether “if 'twas a chill he had
yesterday?” ought to come before “how he slept?” She knocked timidly,
hoping Mrs. Henderson would help her out of her difficulty by telling
her without the asking. All other front doors in Badgertown were
ornaments, only opened on grand occasions, like a wedding or a funeral.
But the minister's was accessible alike to all. So Polly let fall the
knocker, and awaited the answer.

A scuffling noise sounded along the passage; and then Polly's soul sank
down in dire dismay. It was the minister's sister, and not gentle little
Mrs. Henderson. She never could get on with Miss Jerusha in the least.
She made her feel as she told her mother once--“as if I don't know what
my name is.” And now here she was; and all those messages.

Miss Jerusha unbolted the door, slid back the great bar, opened the
upper half, and stood there. She was a big woman, with sharp black eyes,
and spectacles--over which she looked--which to Polly was much worse,
for that gave her four eyes.

“Well, and what do you want?” she asked.

“I came to see--I mean my ma sent me,” stammered poor Polly.

“And who is your ma?” demanded Miss Jerusha, as much like a policeman as
anything; “and where do you live?”

“I live in Primrose Lane,” replied Polly, wishing very much that she was
back there.

“I don't want to know where you live, before I know who you are,” said
Miss Jerusha; “you should answer the question I asked first; always
remember that.”

“My ma's Mrs. Pepper,” said Polly.

“Mrs. who?” repeated Miss Jerusha.

By this time Polly was so worn that she came very near turning and
fleeing, but she thought of her mother's disappointment in her, and the
loss of the news, and stood quite still.

“What is it, Jerusha?” a gentle voice here broke upon Polly's ear.

“I don't know,” responded Miss Jerusha, tartly, still holding the door
much as if Polly were a robber; “it's a little girl, and I can't make
out what she wants.”

“Why, it's Polly Pepper!” exclaimed Mrs. Henderson, pleasantly. “Come
in, child.” She opened the other half of the big door, and led the
way through the wide hall into a big, old-fashioned room, with painted
floor, and high, old side-board, and some stiff-backed rocking-chairs.

Miss Jerusha stalked in also and seated herself by the window, and began
to knit. Polly had just opened her mouth to tell her errand, when the
door also opened suddenly and Mr. Henderson walked in.

“Oh!” said Polly, and then she stopped, and the color flushed up into
her face.

“What is it, my dear?” and the minister took her hand kindly, and looked
down into her flushed face.

“You are not going to have a fever, and be sick and die!” she cried.

“I hope not, my little girl,” he smiled back, encouragingly; and then
Polly gave her messages, which now she managed easily enough.

“There,” broke in Miss Jerusha, “a cat can't sneeze in this town but
everybody'll know it in quarter of an hour.”

And then Mrs. Henderson took Polly out to see a brood of new little
chicks, that had just popped their heads out into the world; and to
Polly, down on her knees, admiring, the time passed very swiftly indeed.

“Now I must go, ma'am,” she said at last, looking up into the lady's
face, regretfully, “for mammy didn't say I was to stay.”

“Very well, dear; do you think you could carry a little pat of butter?
I have some very nice my sister sent me, and I want your mother to share
it.”

“Oh, thank you, ma'am!” cried Polly, thinking, “how glad Davie'll be,
for he does so love butter! only--”

“Wait a bit, then,” said Mrs. Henderson, who didn't seem to notice the
objection. So she went into the house, and Polly went down again in
admiration before the fascinating little puff-balls.

But she was soon on the way, with a little pat of butter in a blue bowl,
tied over with a clean cloth; happy in her gift for mammy, and in the
knowledge of the minister being all well.

“I wonder if Phronsie's awake,” she thought to herself, turning in at
the little brown gate; “if she is, she shall have a piece of bread with
lots of butter.”

“Hush!” said Mrs. Pepper, from the rocking-chair in the middle of the
floor. She had something in her arms. Polly stopped suddenly, almost
letting the bowl fall.

“It's Phronsie,” said the mother, “and I don't know what the matter is
with her; you'll have to go for the doctor, Polly, and just as fast as
you can.”

Polly still stood, holding the bowl, and staring with all her might.
Phronsie sick!

“Don't wake her,” said Mrs. Pepper.

Poor Polly couldn't have stirred to save her life, for a minute; then
she said--“Where shall I go?”

“Oh, run to Dr. Fisher's; and don't be gone long.”

Polly set down the bowl of butter, and sped on the wings of the wind for
the doctor. Something dreadful was the matter, she felt, for never had
a physician been summoned to the hearty Pepper family since she could
remember, only when the father died. Fear lent speed to her feet; and
soon the doctor came, and bent over poor little Phronsie, who still lay
in her mother's arms, in a burning fever.

“It's measles,” he pronounced, “that's all; no cause for alarm; you ever
had it?” he asked, turning suddenly around on Polly, who was watching
with wide-open eyes for the verdict.

“No, sir,” answered Polly, not knowing in the least what “measles” was.

“What shall we do!” said Mrs. Pepper; “there haven't any of them had
it.”

The doctor was over by the little old table under the window, mixing up
some black-looking stuff in a tumbler, and he didn't hear her.

“There,” he said, putting a spoonful into Phronsie's mouth, “she'll get
along well enough; only keep her out of the cold.” Then he pulled out a
big silver watch. He was a little thin man, and the watch was immense.
Polly for her life couldn't keep her eyes off from it; if Ben could only
have one so fine!

“Polly,” whispered Mrs. Pepper, “run and get my purse; it's in the top
bureau drawer.”

“Yes'm,” said Polly, taking her eyes off, by a violent wrench, from
the fascinating watch; and she ran quickly and got the little old
stocking-leg, where the hard earnings that staid long enough to be put
anywhere, always found refuge. She put it into her mother's lap, and
watched while Mrs. Pepper counted out slowly one dollar in small pieces.

“Here sir,” said Mrs. Pepper, holding them out towards the doctor; “and
thank you for coming.”

“Hey!” said the little man, spinning round; “that dollar's the Lord's!”

Mrs. Pepper looked bewildered, and still sat holding it out. “And the
Lord has given it to you to take care of these children with; see that
you do it.” And without another word he was gone.

“Wasn't he good, mammy?” asked Polly, after the first surprise was over.

“I'm sure he was,” said Mrs. Pepper. “Well, tie it up again, Polly, tie
it up tight; we shall want it, I'm sure,” sighing at her little sick
girl.

“Mayn't I take Phronsie, ma?” asked Polly.

“No, no,” said Phronsie. She had got mammy, and she meant to improve the
privilege.

“What is 'measles' anyway, mammy?” asked Polly, sitting down on the
floor at their feet.

“Oh, 'tis something children always have,” replied Mrs. Pepper; “but I'm
sure I hoped it wouldn't come just yet.”

“I sha'n't have it,” said Polly, decisively; “I know I sha'n't! nor
Ben--nor Joe--nor--nor Davie--I guess,” she added, hesitatingly, for
Davie was the delicate one of the family; at least not nearly so strong
as the others.

Mrs. Pepper looked at her anxiously; but Polly seemed as bright and
healthy as ever, as she jumped up and ran to put the kettle on the
stove.

“What'll the boys say, I wonder!” she thought to herself, feeling
quite important that they really had sickness in the house. As long
as Phronsie wasn't dangerous, it seemed quite like rich folks; and she
forgot the toil, and the grind of poverty. She looked out from time to
time as she passed the window, but no boys came.

“I'll put her in bed, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, in a whisper, as
Phronsie closed her eyes and breathed regularly.

“And then will you have your dinner, ma?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, “I don't care--if the boys come.”

“The boys'll never come,” said Polly, impatiently; “I don't
believe--why! here they are now!”

“Oh, dear,” said Joel, coming in crossly, “I'm so hungry--oh--butter!
where'd you get it? I thought we never should get here!”

“I thought so too,” said Polly. “Hush! why, where's Ben?”

“He's just back,” began Joel, commencing to eat, “and Davie; something
is the matter with Ben--he says he feels funny.”

“Something the matter with Ben!” repeated Polly. She dropped the cup she
held, which broke in a dozen pieces.

“Oh, whocky!” cried Joel; “see what you've done, Polly Pepper!”

But Polly didn't hear; over the big, flat door-stone she sped, and
met Ben with little David, coming in the gate. His face was just like
Phronsie's! And with a cold, heavy feeling at her heart, Polly realized
that this was no play.

“Oh, Ben!” she cried, flinging her arms around his neck, and bursting
into tears; “don't! please--I wish you wouldn't; Phronsie's got 'em, and
that's enough!”

“Got what?” asked Ben, while Davie's eyes grew to their widest
proportions.

“Oh, measles!” cried Polly, bursting out afresh; “the hate-fullest,
horridest measles! and now you're taken!”

“Oh no, I'm not,” responded Ben, cheerfully, who knew what measles were;
“wipe up, Polly; I'm all right; only my head aches, and my eyes feel
funny.”

But Polly, only half-reassured, controlled her sobs; and the sorrowful
trio repaired to mother.

“Oh, dear!” ejaculated Mrs. Pepper, sinking in a chair in dismay, at
sight of Ben's red face; “whatever'll we do now!”

The prop and stay of her life would be taken away if Ben should be laid
aside. No more stray half or quarter dollars would come to help her out
when she didn't know where to turn.

Polly cleared off the deserted table--for once Joel had all the bread
and butter he wanted. Ben took some of Phronsie's medicine, and
crawled up into the loft, to bed; and quiet settled down on the little
household.

“Polly,” whispered Ben, as she tucked him in, “it'll be hard buckling-to
now, for you, but I guess you'll do it.”




MORE TROUBLE


“Oh, dear,” said Polly to herself, the next morning, trying to get a
breakfast for the sick ones out of the inevitable mush; “everything's
just as bad as it can be! they can't ever eat this; I wish I had an
ocean of toast!”

“Toast some of the bread in the pail, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper.

She looked worn and worried; she had been up nearly all night, back and
forth from Ben's bed in the loft to restless, fretful little Phronsie in
the big four-poster in the bedroom; for Phronsie wouldn't get into the
crib. Polly had tried her best to help her, and had rubbed her eyes
diligently to keep awake, but she was wholly unaccustomed to it, and her
healthy, tired little body succumbed--and then when she awoke, shame and
remorse filled her very heart.

“That isn't nice, ma,” she said, glancing at the poor old pail, which
she had brought out of the “Provision Room.” “Old brown bread! I want to
fix 'em something nice.”

“Well, you can't, you know,” said Mrs. Pepper, with a sigh; “but you've
got butter now; that'll be splendid!”

“I know it,” said Polly, running to the corner cupboard where the
precious morsel in the blue bowl remained; “whatever should we do
without it, mammy?”

“Do without it!” said Mrs. Pepper; “same's we have done.”

“Well, 'twas splendid in Mrs. Henderson to give it to us, anyway,” said
Polly, longing for just one taste; “seems as if 'twas a year since I
was there--oh, ma!” and here Polly took up the thread that had been so
rudely snapped; “don't you think, she's got ten of the prettiest--yes,
the sweetest little chickens you ever saw! Why can't we have some,
mammy?”

“Costs money,” replied Mrs. Pepper. “We've got too many in the house to
have any outside.”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, with a red face that was toasting about as much
as the bread she was holding on the point of an old fork; “we never have
had anything. There,” she added at last; “that's the best I can do; now
I'll put the butter on this little blue plate; ain't that cunning, ma?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, approvingly; “it takes you, Polly.” So Polly
trotted first to Ben, up the crooked, low stairs to the loft; and while
she regaled him with the brown toast and butter, she kept her tongue
flying on the subject of the little chicks, and all that she saw on the
famous Henderson visit. Poor Ben pretended hard to eat, but ate nothing
really; and Polly saw it all, and it cut her to the heart--so she talked
faster than ever.

“Now,” she said, starting to go back to Phronsie; “Ben Pepper, just as
soon as you get well, we'll have some chickens--so there!”

“Guess we sha'n't get 'em very soon,” said Ben, despondently, “if I've
got to lie here; and, besides, Polly, you know every bit we can save has
got to go for the new stove.”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, “I forgot that; so it has; seems to me
everything's giving out!”

“You can't bake any longer in the old thing,” said Ben, turning over and
looking at her; “poor girl, I don't see how you've stood it so long.”

“And we've been stuffing it,” cried Polly merrily, “till 'twon't stuff
any more.”

“No,” said Ben, turning back again, “that's all worn out.”

“Well, you must go to sleep,” said Polly, “or mammy'll be up here; and
Phronsie hasn't had her breakfast either.”

Phronsie was wailing away dismally, sitting up in the middle of the old
bed. Her face pricked, she said, and she was rubbing it vigorously with
both fat little hands, and then crying worse than ever.

“Oh me! oh my!” cried Polly; “how you look, Phronsie!”

“I want my mammy!” cried poor Phronsie.

“Mammy can't come now, Phronsie dear; she's sewing. See what Polly's got
for you--butter: isn't that splendid!”

Phronsie stopped for just one moment, and took a mouthful; but the toast
was hard and dry, and she cried harder than before.

“Now,” said Polly, curling up on the bed beside her, “if you'll stop
crying, Phronsie Pepper, I'll tell you about the cunningest, yes, the
very cunningest little chickens you ever saw. One was white, and he
looked just like this,” said Polly, tumbling over on the bed in a heap;
“he couldn't stand up straight, he was so fat.”

“Did he bite?” asked Phronsie, full of interest.

“No, he didn't bite me,” said Polly; “but his mother put a bug in his
mouth--just as I'm doing you know,” and she broke off a small piece of
the toast, put on a generous bit of butter, and held it over Phronsie's
mouth.

“Did he swallow it?” asked the child, obediently opening her little red
lips.

“Oh, snapped it,” answered Polly, “quick as ever he could, I tell you;
but 'twasn't good like this, Phronsie.”

“Did he have two bugs?” asked Phronsie, eying suspiciously the second
morsel of dry toast that Polly was conveying to her mouth.

“Well, he would have had,” replied Polly, “if there'd been bugs enough;
but there were nine other chicks, Phronsie.”

“Poor chickies,” said Phronsie, and looked lovingly at the rest of the
toast and butter on the plate; and while Polly fed it to her, listened
with absorbed interest to all the particulars concerning each and every
chick in the Henderson hen-coop.

“Mother,” said Polly, towards evening, “I'm going to sit up with Ben
to-night; say I may, do, mother.”

“Oh no, you can't,” replied Mrs. Pepper; “you'll get worn out; and then
what shall I do? Joel can hand him his medicine.”

“Oh, Joe would tumble to sleep, mammy,” said Polly, “the first
thing--let me.”

“Perhaps Phronsie'll let me go to-night,” said Mrs. Pepper,
reflectively.

“Oh, no she won't, I know,” replied Polly, decisively; “she wants you
all the time.”

“I will, Polly,” said Davie, coming in with an armful of wood, in time
to hear the conversation. “I'll give him his medicine, mayn't I, mammy?”
 and David let down his load, and came over where his mother and Polly
sat sewing, to urge his rights.

“I don't know,” said his mother, smiling on him. “Can you, do you
think?”

“Yes, ma'am!” said Davie, straightening himself up.

When they told Ben, he said he knew a better way than for Davie to
watch; he'd have a string tied to Davie's arm, and the end he'd hold in
bed, and when 'twas time for medicine, he'd pull the string, and that
would wake Davie up!

Polly didn't sleep much more on her shake-down on the floor than if she
had watched with Ben; for Phronsie cried and moaned, and wanted a drink
of water every two minutes, it seemed to her. As she went back into her
nest after one of these travels, Polly thought: “Well, I don't care, if
nobody else gets sick; if Ben'll only get well. To-morrow I'm goin' to
do mammy's sack she's begun for Mr. Jackson; it's all plain sew-in',
just like a bag; and I can do it, I know--” and so she fell into a
troubled sleep, only to be awakened by Phronsie's fretful little voice:
“I want a drink of water, Polly, I do.”

“Don't she drink awfully, mammy?” asked Polly, after one of these
excursions out to the kitchen after the necessary draught.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper; “and she mustn't have any more; 'twill hurt
her.” But Phronsie fell into a delicious sleep after that, and didn't
want any more, luckily.

“Here, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper, the next morning, “take this coat up to
Mr. Peterses; and be sure you get the money for it.”

“How'll I get it?” asked Joe, who didn't relish the long, hot walk.

“Why, tell 'em we're sick--Ben's sick,” added Mrs. Pepper, as the most
decisive thing; “and we must have it; and then wait for it.”

“Tisn't pleasant up at the Peterses,” grumbled Joel, taking the parcel
and moving slowly off.

“No, no, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, “you needn't do that,” seeing
Polly take up some sewing after doing up the room and finishing the
semi-weekly bake; “you're all beat out with that tussle over the stove;
that sack'll have to go till next week.”

“It can't, mammy,” said Polly, snipping off a basting thread; “we've got
to have the money; how much'll he give you for it?”

“Thirty cents,” replied Mrs. Pepper.

“Well,” said Polly, “we've got to get all the thirty centses we can,
mammy dear; and I know I can do it, truly--try me once,” she implored.

“Well.” Mrs. Pepper relented, slowly.

“Don't feel bad, mammy dear,” comforted Polly, sewing away briskly;
“Ben'll get well pretty soon, and then we'll be all right.”

“Maybe,” said Mrs. Pepper; and went back to Phronsie, who could scarcely
let her out of her sight.

Polly stitched away bravely. “Now if I do this good, mammy'll let me do
it other times,” she said to herself.

Davie, too, worked patiently out of doors, trying to do Ben's chores.
The little fellow blundered over things that Ben would have accomplished
in half the time, and he had to sit down often on the steps of the
little old shed where the tools were kept, to wipe his hot face and
rest.

“Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, “hadn't you better stop a little? Dear me!
how fast you sew, child!”

Polly gave a delighted little hum at her mother's evident approval.

“I'm going to do 'em all next week, mammy,” she said; “then Mr. Atkins
won't take 'em away from us, I guess.”

Mr. Atkins kept the store, and gave out coats and sacks of coarse linen
and homespun to Mrs. Pepper to make; and it was the fear of losing the
work that had made the mother's heart sink.

“I don't believe anybody's got such children as I have,” she said; and
she gave Polly a motherly little pat that the little daughter felt clear
to the tips of her toes with a thrill of delight.

About half-past two, long after dinner, Joe came walking in, hungry as a
beaver, but flushed and triumphant.

“Why, where have you been all this time?” asked his mother.

“Oh, Joe, you didn't stop to play?” asked Polly, from her perch where
she sat sewing, giving him a reproachful glance.

“Stop to play!” retorted Joe, indignantly; “no, I guess I didn't! I've
been to Old Peterses.”

“Not all this time!” exclaimed Mrs. Pepper.

“Yes, I have too,” replied Joel, sturdily marching up to her. “And
there's your money, mother;” and he counted out a quarter of a dollar
in silver pieces and pennies, which he took from a dingy wad of paper,
stowed away in the depths of his pocket.

“Oh, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper, sinking back in her chair and looking at
him; “what do you mean?”

Polly put her work in her lap, and waited to hear.

“Where's my dinner, Polly?” asked Joel; “I hope it's a big one.

“Yes, 'tis,” said Polly; “you've got lots to-day, it's in the corner of
the cupboard, covered up with the plate--so tell on, Joe.”

“That's elegant!” said Joel, coming back with the well-filled plate,
Ben's and his own share.

“Do tell us, Joey,” implored Polly; “mother's waiting.”

“Well,” said Joel, his mouth half full, “I waited--and he said the coat
was all right;--and--and--Mrs. Peters said 'twas all right;--and Mirandy
Peters said 'twas all right; but they didn't any of 'em say anythin'
about payin', so I didn't think 'twas all right--and--and--can't I have
some more butter, Polly?”

“No,” said Polly, sorry to refuse him, he'd been so good about the
money; “the butter's got to be saved for Ben and Phronsie.”

“Oh,” said Joe, “I wish Miss Henderson would send us some more, I do! I
think she might!”

“For shame, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper; “she was very good to send this, I
think; now what else did you say?” she asked.

“Well,” said Joel, taking another mouthful of bread, “so I waited; you
told me to, mother, you know--and they all went to work; and they didn't
mind me at all, and--there wasn't anything to look at, so I sat--and
sat--Polly, can't I have some gingerbread?”

“No,” said Polly, “it's all gone; I gave the last piece to Phronsie the
day she was taken sick.”

“Oh, dear,” said Joel, “everything's gone.”

“Well, do go on, Joe, do.”

“And--then they had dinner; and Mr. Peters said, 'Hasn't that boy gone
home yet?' and Mrs. Peters said, 'no'--and he called me in, and asked me
why I didn't run along home; and I said, Phronsie was sick, and Ben had
the squeezles--”

“The what?” said Polly.

“The squeezles,” repeated Joel, irritably; “that's what you said.”

“It's measles, Joey,” corrected Mrs. Pepper; “never mind, I wouldn't
feel bad.”

“Well, they all laughed, and laughed, and then I said you told me to
wait till I did get the money.”

“Oh, Joe,” began Mrs. Pepper, “you shouldn't have told 'em so--what did
he say?”

“Well, he laughed, and said I was a smart boy, and he'd see; and Mirandy
said, 'do pay him, pa, he must be tired to death'--and don't you think,
he went to a big desk in the corner, and took out a box, and 'twas full
most of money--lots! oh! and he gave me mine--and--that's all; and I'm
tired to death.” And Joel flung himself down on the floor, expanded his
legs as only Joel could, and took a comfortable roll.

“So you must be,” said Polly, pityingly, “waiting at those Peterses.”

“Don't ever want to see any more Peterses,” said Joel; never, never,
never!

“Oh, dear,” thought Polly, as she sewed on into the afternoon, “I wonder
what does all my eyes! feels just like sand in 'em;” and she rubbed and
rubbed to thread her needle. But she was afraid her mother would see,
so she kept at her sewing. Once in awhile the bad feeling would go away,
and then she would forget all about it. “There now, who says I can't do
it! that's most done,” she cried, jumping up, and spinning across the
room, to stretch herself a bit, “and to-morrow I'll finish it.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Pepper, “if you can do that, Polly, you'll be the
greatest help I've had yet.”

So Polly tucked herself into the old shake-down with a thankful heart
that night, hoping for morning.

Alas! when morning did come, Polly could hardly move. The measles! what
should she do! A faint hope of driving them off made her tumble out
of bed, and stagger across the room to look in the old cracked
looking-glass. All hope was gone as the red reflection met her gaze.
Polly was on the sick list now!

“I won't be sick,” she said; “at any rate, I'll keep around.” An awful
feeling made her clutch the back of a chair, but she managed somehow to
get into her clothes, and go groping blindly into the kitchen. Somehow,
Polly couldn't see very well. She tried to set the table, but 'twas no
use. “Oh, dear,” she thought, “whatever'll mammy do?”

“Hulloa!” said Joel, coming in, “what's the matter, Polly?” Polly
started at his sudden entrance, and, wavering a minute, fell over in a
heap.

“Oh ma! ma!” screamed Joel, running to the foot of the stairs leading to
the loft, where Mrs. Pepper was with Ben; “something's taken Polly! and
she fell; and I guess she's in the wood-box!”




HARD DAYS FOR POLLY


“Ma,” said David, coming softly into the bedroom, where poor Polly
lay on the bed with Phronsie, her eyes bandaged with a soft old
handkerchief, “I'll set the table.”

“There isn't any table to set,” said Mrs. Pepper, sadly; “there isn't
anybody to eat anything, Davie; you and Joel can get something out of
the cupboard.”

“Can we get whatever we've a mind to, ma?” cried Joel, who followed
Davie, rubbing his face with a towel after his morning ablutions.

“Yes,” replied his mother, absently.

“Come on, Dave!” cried Joel; “we'll have a breakfast!”

“We mustn't,” said little Davie, doubtfully, “eat the whole, Joey.”

But that individual already had his head in the cupboard, which soon
engrossed them both.

Dr. Fisher was called in the middle of the morning to see what was the
matter with Polly's eyes. The little man looked at her keenly over his
spectacles; then he said, “When were you taken?”

“This morning,” answered Polly, her eyes smarting.

“Didn't you feel badly before?” questioned the doctor. Polly thought
back; and then she remembered that she had felt very badly; that when
she was baking over the old stove the day before her back had ached
dreadfully; and that, somehow, when she sat down to sew, it didn't stop;
only her eyes had bothered her so; she didn't mind her back so much.

“I thought so,” said the doctor, when Polly answered. “And those eyes
of yours have been used too much; what has she been doing, ma'am?” He
turned around sharply on Mrs. Pepper as he asked this.

“Sewing,” said Mrs. Pepper, “and everything; Polly does everything,
sir.”

“Humph!” said the doctor; “well, she won't again in one spell; her eyes
are very bad.”

At this a whoop, small but terrible to hear, came from the middle of the
bed; and Phronsie sat bolt upright. Everybody started; while Phronsie
broke out, “Don't make my Polly sick! oh! please don't!”

“Hey!” said the doctor; and he looked kindly at the small object with
a very red face in the middle of the bed. Then he added, gently, “We're
going to make Polly well, little girl; so that she can see splendidly.”

“Will you, really?” asked the child, doubtfully.

“Yes,” said the doctor; “we'll try hard; and you mustn't cry; 'cause
then Polly'll cry, and that will make her eyes very bad; very bad
indeed,” he repeated, impressively.

“I won't cry,” said Phronsie; “no, not one bit.” And she wiped off the
last tear with her fat little hand, and watched to see what next was to
be done.


And Polly was left, very rebellious indeed, in the big bed, with a
cooling lotion on the poor eyes, that somehow didn't cool them one bit.

“If 'twas anythin' but my eyes, mammy, I could stand it,” she bewailed,
flouncing over and over in her impatience; “and who'll do all the work
now?”

“Don't think of the work, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper.

“I can't do anything but think,” said poor Polly.

Just at that moment a queer noise out in the kitchen was heard.

“Do go out, mother, and see what 'tis,” said Polly.

“I've come,” said a cracked voice, close up by the bedroom door,
followed by a big black cap, which could belong to no other than Grandma
Bascom, “to set by you a spell; what's the matter?” she asked, and
stopped, amazed to see Polly in bed.

“Oh, Polly's taken,” screamed Mrs. Pepper in her ear.

“Taken!” repeated the old lady, “what is it--a fit?”

“No,” said Mrs. Pepper; “the same as Ben's got; and Phronsie; the
measles.”

“The measles, has she?” said grandma; “well, that's bad; and Ben's away,
you say.”

“No, he isn't either,” screamed Mrs. Pepper, “he's got them, too!”

“Got two what?” asked grandma.

“Measles! he's got the measles too,” repeated Mrs. Pepper, loud as she
could; so loud that the old lady's cap trembled at the noise.

“Oh! the dreadful!” said grandma; “and this girl too?” laying her hand
on Phronsie's head.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, feeling it a little relief to tell over her
miseries; “all three of them!”

“I haven't,” said Joel, coming in in hopes that grandma had a stray
peppermint or two in her pocket, as she sometimes did; “and I'm not
going to, either.”

“Oh, dear,” groaned his mother; “that's what Polly said; and she's
got 'em bad. It's her eyes,” she screamed to grandma, who looked
inquiringly.

“Her eyes, is it?” asked Mrs. Bascom; “well, I've got a receet that
cousin Samanthy's folks had when John's children had 'em; and I'll run
right along home and get it,” and she started to go.

“No, you needn't,” screamed Mrs. Pepper; “thank you, Mrs. Bascom; but
Dr. Fisher's been here; and he put something on Polly's eyes; and he
said it mustn't be touched.”

“Hey?” said the old lady; so Mrs. Pepper had to go all over it again,
till at last she made her understand that Polly's eyes were taken care
of, and they must wait for time to do the rest.

“You come along of me,” whispered grandma, when at last her call was
done, to Joel who stood by the door. “I've got some peppermints to home;
I forgot to bring 'em.”

“Yes'm,” said Joel, brightening up.

“Where you going, Joe?” asked Mrs. Pepper, seeing him move off with Mrs.
Bascom; “I may want you.”

“Oh, I've got to go over to grandma's,” said Joel briskly; “she wants
me.”

“Well, don't be gone long then,” replied his mother.

“There,” said grandma, going into her “keeping-room” to an old-fashioned
chest of drawers; opening one, she took therefrom a paper, from which
she shook out before Joe's delighted eyes some red and white peppermint
drops. “There now, you take these home; you may have some, but be
sure you give the most to the sick ones; and Polly--let Polly have the
biggest.”

“She won't take 'em,” said Joel, wishing he had the measles. “Well, you
try her,” said grandma; “run along now.” But it was useless to tell Joel
that, for he was half-way home already. He carried out grandma's wishes,
and distributed conscientiously the precious drops. But when he came to
Polly, she didn't answer; and looking at her in surprise he saw two big
tears rolling out under the bandage and wetting the pillow.

“I don't want 'em, Joe,” said Polly, when he made her understand that
“twas peppermints, real peppermints;” “you may have 'em.”

“Try one, Polly; they're real good,” said Joel, who had an undefined
wish to comfort; “there, open your mouth.”

So Polly opened her mouth, and Joel put one in with satisfaction.

“Isn't it good?” he asked, watching her crunch it.

“Yes,” said Polly, “real good; where'd you get 'em?”

“Over to Grandma Bascom's,” said Joel; “she gave me lots for all of us;
have another, Polly?”

“No,” said Polly, “not yet; you put two on my pillow where I can reach
'em; and then you keep the rest, Joel.”

“I'll put three,” said Joel, counting out one red and two white ones,
and laying them on the pillow; “there!”

“And I want another, Joey, I do,” said Phronsie from the other side of
the bed.

“Well, you may have one,” said Joel; “a red one, Phronsie; yes, you may
have two. Now come on, Dave; we'll have the rest out by the wood-pile.”

How they ever got through that day, I don't know. But late in the
afternoon carriage wheels were heard; and then they stopped right at the
Peppers' little brown gate.

“Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, running to the bedroom door, “it's Mrs.
Henderson!”

“Is it?” said Polly, from the darkened room, “oh! I'm so glad! is Miss
Jerushy with her?” she asked, fearfully.

“No,” said Mrs. Pepper, going back to ascertain; “why, it's the parson
himself! Deary! how we look!”

“Never mind, mammy,” called back Polly, longing to spring out of bed and
fix up a bit.

“I'm sorry to hear the children are sick,” said Mrs. Henderson, coming
in, in her sweet, gentle way.

“We didn't know it,” said the minister, “until this morning--can we see
them?”

“Oh yes, sir,” said Mrs. Pepper; “Ben's upstairs; and Polly and Phronsie
are in here.”

“Poor little things!” said Mrs. Henderson, compassionately; “hadn't you
better,” turning to the minister, “go up and see Ben first, while I will
visit the little girls?”

So the minister mounted the crooked stairs; and Mrs. Henderson went
straight up to Polly's side; and the first thing Polly knew, a cool,
gentle hand was laid on her hot head, and a voice said, “I've come to
see my little chicken now!”

“Oh, ma'am,” said Polly, bursting into a sob, “I don't care about my
eyes--only mammy--” and she broke right down.

“I know,” said the minister's wife, soothingly; “but it's for you to
bear patiently, Polly--what do you suppose the chicks were doing when I
came away?” And Mrs. Henderson, while she held Polly's hand, smiled and
nodded encouragingly to Phronsie, who was staring at her from the other
side of the bed.

“I don't know, ma'am,” said Polly; “please tell us.”

“Well, they were all fighting over a grasshopper--yes, ten of them.”

“Which one got it?” asked Polly in intense interest; “oh! I hope the
white one did!”

“Well, he looked as much like winning as any of them,” said the lady,
laughing.

“Bless her!” thought Mrs. Pepper to herself out in the kitchen,
finishing the sack Polly had left; “she's a parson's wife, I say!”

And then the minister came down from Ben's room, and went into the
bedroom; and Mrs. Henderson went up-stairs into the loft.

“So,” he said kindly, as after patting Phronsie's head he came over and
sat down by Polly, “this is the little girl who came to see me when I
was sick.”

“Oh, sir,” said Polly, “I'm so glad you wasn't!”

“Well, when I come again,” said Mr. Henderson, rising after a merry
chat, “I see I shall have to slip a book into my pocket, and read for
those poor eyes.”

“Oh, thank you!” cried Polly; and then she stopped and blushed.

“Well, what is it?” asked the minister, encouragingly.

“Ben loves to hear reading,” said Polly.

“Does he? well, by that time, my little girl, I guess Ben will be
down-stairs; he's all right, Polly; don't you worry about him--and I'll
sit in the kitchen, by the bedroom door, and you can hear nicely.”

So the Hendersons went away. But somehow, before they went, a good many
things found their way out of the old-fashioned chaise into the Peppers'
little kitchen.

But Polly's eyes didn't get any better, with all the care; and the lines
of worry on Mrs. Pepper's face grew deeper and deeper. At last, she just
confronted Dr. Fisher in the kitchen, one day after his visit to Polly,
and boldly asked him if they ever could be cured. “I know she's--and
there isn't any use keeping it from me,” said the poor woman--“she's
going to be stone-blind!”

“My good woman,” Dr. Fisher's voice was very gentle; and he took the
hard, brown hand in his own--“your little girl will not be blind; I
tell you the truth; but it will take some time to make her eyes quite
strong--time, and rest. She has strained them in some way, but she will
come out of it.”

“Praise the Lord!” cried Mrs. Pepper, throwing her apron over her
head; and then she sobbed on, “and thank you, sir--I can't ever thank
you--for--for--if Polly was blind, we might as well give up!”

The next day, Phronsie, who had the doctor's permission to sit up, only
she was to be kept from taking cold, scampered around in stocking-feet
in search of her shoes, which she hadn't seen since she was first taken
sick.

“Oh, I want on my very best shoes,” she cried; “can't I, mammy?”

“Oh, no, Phronsie; you must keep them nice,” remonstrated her mother;
“you can't wear 'em every-day, you know.”

“'Tisn't every-day,” said Phronsie, slowly; “it's only one day.”

“Well, and then you'll want 'em on again tomorrow,” said her mother.

“Oh, no, I won't!” cried Phronsie; “never, no more to-morrow, if I can
have 'em to-day; please, mammy dear!”

Mrs. Pepper went to the lowest drawer in the high bureau, and took
therefrom a small parcel done up in white tissue paper. Slowly unrolling
this before the delighted eyes of the child, who stood patiently
waiting, she disclosed the precious red-topped shoes which Phronsie
immediately clasped to her bosom.

“My own, very own shoes! whole mine!” she cried, and trudged out into
the kitchen to put them on herself.

“Hulloa!” cried Dr. Fisher, coming in about a quarter of an hour later
to find her tugging laboriously at the buttons--“new shoes! I declare!”

“My own!” cried Phronsie, sticking out one foot for inspection, where
every button was in the wrong button-hole, “and they've got red tops,
too!”

“So they have,” said the doctor, getting down on the floor beside her;
“beautiful red tops, aren't they?”

“Be-yew-ti-ful,” sang the child delightedly.

“Does Polly have new shoes every day?” asked the doctor in a low voice,
pretending to examine the other foot.

Phronsie opened her eyes very wide at this.

“Oh, no, she don't have anything, Polly don't.”

“And what does Polly want most of all--do you know? see if you can tell
me.” And the doctor put on the most alluring expression that he could
muster.

“Oh, I know!” cried Phronsie, with a very wise look. “There now,” cried
the doctor, “you're the girl for me! to think you know! so, what is it?”

Phronsie got up very gravely, and with one shoe half on, she leaned over
and whispered in the doctor's ear:

“A stove!”

“A what?” said the doctor, looking at her, and then at the old, black
thing in the corner, that looked as if it were ashamed of itself; “why,
she's got one.”

“Oh,” said the child, “it won't burn; and sometimes Polly cries, she
does, when she's all alone--and I see her.”

“Now,” said the doctor, very sympathetically, “that's too bad; that is!
and then what does she do?”

“Oh, Ben stuffs it up,” said the child, laughing; “and so does Polly
too, with paper; and then it all tumbles out quick; oh! just as quick!”
 And Phronsie shook her yellow head at the dismal remembrance.

“Do you suppose,” said the doctor, getting up, “that you know of any
smart little girl around here, about four years old and that knows how
to button on her own red-topped shoes, that would like to go to ride
to-morrow morning in my carriage with me?

“Oh, I do!” cried Phronsie, hopping on one toe; “it's me!”

“Very well, then,” said Dr. Fisher, going to the bedroom door, “we'll
lookout for to-morrow, then.”

To poor Polly, lying in the darkened room, or sitting up in the big
rocking-chair--for Polly wasn't really very sick in other respects,
the disease having all gone into the merry brown eyes--the time seemed
interminable. Not to do anything! The very idea at any time would have
filled her active, wide-awake little body with horror; and now, here she
was!

“Oh, dear, I can't bear it!” she said, when she knew by the noise in the
kitchen that everybody was out there; so nobody heard, except a fat, old
black spider in the corner, and he didn't tell anyone!

“I know it's a week,” she said, “since dinnertime! If Ben were only
well, to talk to me.”

“Oh, I say, Polly,” screamed Joel at that moment running in, “Ben's
a-comin' down the stairs!”

“Stop, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper; “you shouldn't have told; he wanted to
surprise Polly.”

“Oh, is he!” cried Polly, clasping her hands in rapture; “mammy, can't I
take off this horrid bandage, and see him?”

“Dear me, no!” said Mrs. Pepper, springing forward; “not for the world,
Polly! Dr. Fisher'd have our ears off!”

“Well, I can hear, any way,” said Polly, resigning herself to the
remaining comfort; “here he is! oh, Ben!”

“There,” said Ben, grasping Polly, bandage and all; “now we're all
right; and say, Polly, you're a brick!”

“Mammy told me not to say that the other day,” said Joel, with a very
virtuous air.

“Can't help it,” said Ben, who was a little wild over Polly, and
besides, he had been sick himself, and had borne a good deal too.

“Now,” said Mrs. Pepper, after the first excitement was over, “you're
so comfortable together, and Phronsie don't want me now, I'll go to the
store; I must get some more work if Mr. Atkins'll give it to me.”

“I'll be all right now, mammy, that Ben's here,” cried Polly, settling
back into her chair, with Phronsie on the stool at her feet.

“I'm goin' to tell her stories, ma,” cried Ben, “so you needn't worry
about us.”

“Isn't it funny, Ben,” said Polly, as the gate clicked after the mother,
“to be sitting still, and telling stories in the daytime?”

“Rather funny!” replied Ben.

“Well, do go on,” said Joel, as usual, rolling on the floor, in a
dreadful hurry for the story to begin. Little David looked up quietly,
as he sat on Ben's other side, his hands clasped tight together, just as
eager, though he said nothing.

“Well; once upon a time,” began Ben delightfully, and launched into one
of the stories that the children thought perfectly lovely.

“Oh, Bensie,” cried Polly, entranced, as they listened with bated
breath, “however do you think of such nice things!”

“I've had time enough to think, the last week,” said Ben, laughing, “to
last a life-time!”

“Do go on,” put in Joel, impatient at the delay.

“Don't hurry him so,” said Polly, reprovingly; “he isn't strong.”

“Ben,” said David, drawing a long breath, his eyes very big--, “did he
really see a bear?”

“No,” said Ben; “oh! where was I?”

“Why, you said Tommy heard a noise,” said Polly, “and he thought it was
a bear.”

“Oh, yes,” said Ben; “I remember; 'twasn't a--”

“Oh, make it a bear, Ben!” cried Joel, terribly disappointed; “don't let
it be not a bear.”

“Why, I can't,” said Ben; “twouldn't sound true.”

“Never mind, make it sound true,” insisted Joel; “you can make anything
true.”

“Very well,” said Ben, laughing; “I suppose I must.”

“Make it two bears, Ben,” begged little Phronsie.

“Oh, no, Phronsie, that's too much,” cried Joel; “that'll spoil it; but
make it a big bear, do Ben, and have him bite him somewhere, and most
kill him.”

“Oh, Joel!” cried Polly, while David's eyes got bigger than ever.

So Ben drew upon his powers as story-teller, to suit his exacting
audience, and was making his bear work havoc upon poor Tommy in a way
captivating to all, even Joel, when, “Well, I declare,” sounded Mrs.
Pepper's cheery voice coming in upon them, “if this isn't comfortable!”

“Oh, mammy!” cried Phronsie, jumping out of Polly's arms, whither she
had taken refuge during the thrilling tale, and running to her mother
who gathered her baby up, “we've had a bear! a real, live bear, we have!
Ben made him!”

“Have you!” said Mrs. Pepper, taking off her shawl, and laying her
parcel of work down on the table, “now, that's nice!”

“Oh, mammy!” cried Polly, “it does seem so good to be all together
again!”

“And I thank the Lord!” said Mrs. Pepper, looking down on her happy
little group; and the tears were in her eyes--“and children, we ought to
be very good and please Him, for He's been so good to us.”




THE CLOUD OVER THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE


When Phronsie, with many crows of delight, and much chattering, had
gotten fairly started the following morning on her much-anticipated
drive with the doctor, the whole family excepting Polly drawn up around
the door to see them off, Mrs. Pepper resolved to snatch the time and
run down for an hour or two to one of her customers who had long been
waiting for a little “tailoring” to be done for her boys.

“Now, Joel,” she said, putting on her bonnet before the cracked
looking-glass, “you stay along of Polly; Ben must go up to bed, the
doctor said; and Davie's going to the store for some molasses; so you
and Polly must keep house.”

“Yes'm,” said Joel; “may I have somethin' to eat, ma?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper; “but don't you eat the new bread; you may have
as much as you want of the old.”

“Isn't there any molasses, mammy?” asked Joel, as she bade Polly
good-bye! and gave her numberless charges “to be careful of your eyes,”
 and “not to let a crack of light in through the curtain,” as the old
green paper shade was called.

“No; if you're very hungry, you can eat bread,” said Mrs. Pepper,
sensibly.

“Joel,” said Polly, after the mother had gone, “I do wish you could read
to me.”

“Well, I can't,” said Joel, glad he didn't know how; “I thought the
minister was comin'.”

“Well, he was,” said Polly, “but mammy said he had to go out of town to
a consequence.”

“A what!” asked Joel, very much impressed.

“A con--” repeated Polly. “Well, it began with a con--and I am
sure--yes, very sure it was consequence.”

“That must be splendid,” said Joel, coming up to her chair, and
slowly drawing a string he held in his hand back and forth, “to go to
consequences, and everything! When I'm a man, Polly Pepper, I'm going to
be a minister, and have a nice time, and go--just everywhere!”

“Oh, Joel!” exclaimed Polly, quite shocked; “you couldn't be one; you
aren't good enough.”

“I don't care,” said Joel, not at all dashed by her plainness, “I'll be
good then--when I'm a big man; don't you suppose, Polly,” as a new idea
struck him, “that Mr. Henderson ever is naughty?”

“No,” said Polly, very decidedly; “never, never, never!”

“Then, I don't want to be one,” said Joel, veering round with a sigh of
relief, “and besides I'd rather have a pair of horses like Mr. Slocum's,
and then I could go everywheres, I guess!”

“And sell tin?” asked Polly, “just like Mr. Slocum?”

“Yes,” said Joel; “this is the way I'd go--Gee-whop! gee-whoa!” and Joel
pranced with his imaginary steeds all around the room, making about as
much noise as any other four boys, as he brought up occasionally against
the four-poster or the high old bureau.

“Well!” said a voice close up by Polly's chair, that made her skip with
apprehension, it was so like Miss Jerusha Henderson's--Joel was whooping
away behind the bedstead to his horses that had become seriously
entangled, so he didn't hear anything. But when Polly said, bashfully,
“I can't see anything, ma'am,” he came up red and shining to the
surface, and stared with all his might.

“I came to see you, little girl,” said Miss Jerusha severely, seating
herself stiffly by Polly's side.

“Thank you, ma'am,” said Polly, faintly.

“Who's this boy?” asked the lady, turning around squarely on Joel, and
eying him from head to foot.

“He's my brother Joel,” said Polly.

Joel still stared.

“Which brother?” pursued Miss Jerusha, like a census-taker.

“He is next to me,” said Polly, wishing her mother was home; “he's nine,
Joel is.”

“He's big enough to do something to help his mother,” said Miss
Jerusha, looking him through and through. “Don't you think you might do
something, when the others are sick, and your poor mother is working so
hard?” she continued, in a cold voice.

“I do something,” blurted out Joel, sturdily, “lots and lots!”

“You shouldn't say 'lots,” reproved Miss Jerusha, with a sharp look over
her spectacles, “tisn't proper for boys to talk so; what do you do all
day long?” she asked, turning back to Polly, after a withering glance at
Joel, who still stared.

“I can't do anything, ma'am,” replied Polly, sadly, “I can't see to do
anything.”

“Well, you might knit, I should think,” said her visitor, “it's dreadful
for a girl as big as you are to sit all day idle; I had sore eyes once
when I was a little girl--how old are you?” she asked, abruptly.

“Eleven last month,” said Polly.

“Well, I wasn't only nine when I knit a stocking; and I had sore eyes,
too; you see I was a very little girl, and--”

“Was you ever little?” interrupted Joel, in extreme incredulity, drawing
near, and looking over the big square figure.

“Hey?” said Miss Jerusha; so Joel repeated his question before Polly
could stop him.

“Of course,” answered Miss Jerusha; and then she added, tartly, “little
boys shouldn't speak unless they're spoken to. Now,” and she turned back
to Polly again, “didn't you ever knit a stocking?”

“No, ma'am,” said Polly, “not a whole one.”

“Dear me!” exclaimed Miss Jerusha; “did I ever!” And she raised her
black mitts in intense disdain. “A big girl like you never to knit a
stocking! to think your mother should bring you up so! and--”

“She didn't bring us up,” screamed Joel, in indignation, facing her with
blazing eyes.

“Joel,” said Polly, “be still.”

“And you're very impertinent, too,” said Miss Jerusha; “a good child
never is impertinent.”

Polly sat quite still; and Miss Jerusha continued:

“Now, I hope you will learn to be industrious; and when I come again, I
will see what you have done.”

“You aren't ever coming again,” said Joel, defiantly; “no, never!”

“Joel!” implored Polly, and in her distress she pulled up her bandage
as she looked at him; “you know mammy'll be so sorry at you! Oh, ma'am,
and” she turned to Miss Jerusha, who was now thoroughly aroused to the
duty she saw before her of doing these children good, “I don't know what
is the reason, ma'am; Joel never talks so; he's real good; and--”

“It only shows,” said the lady, seeing her way quite clear for a little
exhortation, “that you've all had your own way from infancy; and that
you don't do what you might to make your mother's life a happy one.”

“Oh, ma'am,” cried Polly, and she burst into a flood of tears, “please,
please don't say that!”

“And I say,” screamed Joel, stamping his small foot, “if you make Polly
cry you'll kill her! Don't Polly, don't!” and the boy put both arms
around her neck, and soothed and comforted her in every way he could
think of. And Miss Jerusha, seeing no way to make herself heard,
disappeared feeling pity for children who would turn away from good
advice.

But still Polly cried on; all the pent-up feelings that had been so long
controlled had free vent now. She really couldn't stop! Joel, frightened
to death, at last said, “I'm going to wake up Ben.”

That brought Polly to; and she sobbed out, “Oh, no, Jo--ey--I'll stop.”

“I will,” said Joel, seeing his advantage; “I'm going, Polly,” and he
started to the foot of the stairs.

“No, I'm done now, Joe,” said Polly, wiping her eyes, and choking back
her thoughts--“oh, Joe! I must scream! my eyes aches so!” and poor Polly
fairly writhed all over the chair.

“What'll I do?” said Joel, at his wits' end, running back, “do you want
some water?”

“Oh, no,” gasped Polly; “doctor wouldn't let me; oh! I wish mammy'd
come!”

“I'll go and look for her,” suggested Joel, feeling as if he must do
something; and he'd rather be out at the gate, than to see Polly suffer.

“That won't bring her,” said Polly; trying to keep still; “I'll try to
wait.”

“Here she is now!” cried Joel, peeping out of the window; “oh! goody!”




JOEL'S TURN


“Well,” Mrs. Pepper's tone was unusually blithe as she stepped into the
kitchen--“you've had a nice time, I suppose--what in the world!” and she
stopped at the bedroom door.

“Oh, mammy, if you'd been here!” said Joel, while Polly sat still, only
holding on to her eyes as if they were going to fly out; “there's been
a big woman here; she came right in--and she talked awfully! and Polly's
been a-cryin', and her eyes ache dreadfully--and--”

“Been crying!” repeated Mrs. Pepper, coming up to poor Polly. “Polly
been crying!” she still repeated.

“Oh, mammy, I couldn't help it,” said Polly; “she said--” and in spite
of all she could do, the rain of tears began again, which bade fair to
be as uncontrolled as before. But Mrs. Pepper took her up firmly in her
arms, as if she were Phronsie, and sat down in the old rocking-chair and
just patted her back.

“There, there,” she whispered, soothingly, “don't think of it, Polly;
mother's got home.”

“Oh, mammy,” said Polly, crawling up to the comfortable neck for
protection, “I ought not to mind; but 'twas Miss Jerusha Henderson; and
she said--”

“What did she say?” asked Mrs. Pepper, thinking perhaps it to be the
wiser thing to let Polly free her mind.

“Oh, she said that we ought to be doing something; and I ought to knit,
and--”

“Go on,” said her mother.

“And then Joel got naughty; oh, mammy, he never did so before; and I
couldn't stop him,” cried Polly, in great distress; “I really couldn't,
mammy--and he talked to her; and he told her she wasn't ever coming here
again.”

“Joel shouldn't have said that,” said Mrs. Pepper, and under her breath
something was added that Polly even failed to hear--“but no more she
isn't!”

“And, mammy,” cried Polly--and she flung her arms around her mother's
neck and gave her a grasp that nearly choked Mrs. Pepper, “ain't I
helpin' you some, mammy? Oh! I wish I could do something big for you?
Ain't you happy, mammy?”

“For the land's sakes!” cried Mrs. Pepper, straining Polly to her heart,
“whatever has that woman--whatever could she have said to you? Such a
girl as you are, too!” cried Mrs. Pepper, hugging Polly, and covering
her with kisses so tender, that Polly, warmed and cuddled up to her
heart's content, was comforted to the full.

“Well,” said Mrs. Pepper, when at last she thought she had formed
between Polly and Joel about the right idea of the visit, “well, now we
won't think of it, ever any more; 'tisn't worth it, Polly, you know.”

But poor Polly! and poor mother! They both were obliged to think of it.
Nothing could avert the suffering of the next few days, caused by that
long flow of burning tears.

“Nothing feels good on 'em, mammy,” said Polly, at last, twisting her
hands in the vain attempt to keep from rubbing the aching, inflamed eyes
that drove her nearly wild with their itching, “there isn't any use in
trying anything.”

“There will be use,” energetically protested Mrs. Pepper, bringing
another cool bandage, “as long as you've got an eye in your head, Polly
Pepper!”

Dr. Fisher's face, when he first saw the change that the fateful visit
had wrought, and heard the accounts, was very grave indeed. Everything
had been so encouraging on his last visit, that he had come very near
promising Polly speedy freedom from the hateful bandage.

But the little Pepper household soon had something else to think of more
important even than Polly's eyes, for now the heartiest, the jolliest
of all the little group was down--Joel. How he fell sick, they scarcely
knew, it all came so suddenly. The poor, bewildered family had hardly
time to think, before delirium and, perhaps, death stared them in the
face.

When Polly first heard it, by Phronsie's pattering downstairs and
screaming: “Oh, Polly, Joey's dre-ad-ful sick, he is!” she jumped right
up, and tore off the bandage.

“Now, I will help mother! I will, so there!” and in another minute she
would have been up in the sick room. But the first thing she knew, a
gentle but firm hand was laid upon hers; and she found herself back
again in the old rocking-chair, and listening to the Doctor's words
which were quite stern and decisive.

“Now, I tell you,” he said, “you must not take off that bandage again;
do you know the consequences? You will be blind! and then you will be a
care to your mother all your life!”

“I shall be blind, anyway,” said Polly, despairingly; “so 'twon't make
any difference.”

“No; your eyes will come out of it all right, only I did hope,” and the
good doctor's face fell--“that the other two boys would escape; but,”
 and he brightened up at sight of Polly's forlorn visage--“see you do
your part by keeping still.”

But there came a day soon when everything was still around the once
happy little brown house--when only whispers were heard from white lips;
and thoughts were fearfully left unuttered.

On the morning of one of these days, when Mrs. Pepper felt she could not
exist an hour longer without sleep, kind Mrs. Beebe came to stay until
things were either better or worse.

Still the cloud hovered, dark and forbidding. At last, one afternoon,
when Polly was all alone, she could endure it no longer. She flung
herself down by the side of the old bed, and buried her face in the gay
patched bed-quilt.

“Dear God,” she said, “make me willing to have anything,” she
hesitated--“yes, anything happen; to be blind forever, and to have Joey
sick, only make me good.”

How long she staid there she never knew; for she fell asleep--the first
sleep she had had since Joey was taken sick. And little Mrs. Beebe
coming in found her thus.

“Polly,” the good woman said, leaning over her, “you poor, pretty
creeter, you; I'm goin' to tell you somethin'--there, there, just to
think! Joel's goin' to get well!”

“Oh, Mrs. Beebe!” cried Polly, tumbling over in a heap on the floor, her
face, as much as could be seen under the bandage, in a perfect glow, “Is
he, really?”

“Yes, to be sure; the danger's all over now,” said the little old lady,
inwardly thinking--“If I hadn't a-come!”

“Well, then, the Lord wants him to,” cried Polly, in rapture; “don't he,
Mrs. Beebe?”

“To be sure--to be sure,” repeated the kind friend, only half
understanding.

“Well, I don't care about my eyes, then,” cried Polly; and to Mrs.
Beebe's intense astonishment and dismay, she spun round and round in the
middle of the floor.

“Oh, Polly, Polly!” the little old lady cried, running up to her, “do
stop! the doctor wouldn't let you! he wouldn't really, you know! it'll
all go to your eyes.”

“I don't care,” repeated Polly, in the middle of a spin; but she
stopped obediently; “seems as if I just as soon be blind as not; it's so
beautiful Joey's going to get well!”




SUNSHINE AGAIN


But as Joel was smitten down suddenly, so he came up quickly, and his
hearty nature asserted itself by rapid strides toward returning health;
and one morning he astonished them all by turning over suddenly and
exclaiming:

“I want something to eat!”

“Bless the Lord!” cried Mrs. Pepper, “now he's going to live!”

“But he mustn't eat,” protested Mrs. Beebe, in great alarm, trotting for
the cup of gruel. “Here, you pretty creeter you, here's something nice.”
 And she temptingly held the spoon over Joel's mouth; but with a grimace
he turned away.

“Oh, I want something to eat! some gingerbread or some bread and
butter.”

“Dear me!” ejaculated Mrs. Beebe. “Gingerbread!” Poor Mrs. Pepper saw
the hardest part of her trouble now before her, as she realized that the
returning appetite must be fed only on strengthening food; for where it
was to come from she couldn't tell.

“The Lord only knows where we'll get it,” she groaned within herself.

Yes, He knew. A rap at the door, and little David ran down to find the
cause.

“Oh, mammy,” he said, “Mrs. Henderson sent it--see! see!” And in the
greatest excitement he placed in her lap a basket that smelt savory and
nice even before it was opened. When it was opened, there lay a little
bird delicately roasted, and folded in a clean napkin; also a glass of
jelly, crimson and clear.

“Oh, Joey,” cried Mrs. Pepper, almost overwhelmed with joy, “see what
Mrs. Henderson sent you! now you can eat fit for a king!”

That little bird certainly performed its mission in life; for as Mrs.
Beebe said, “It just touched the spot!” and from that very moment Joel
improved so rapidly they could hardly believe their eyes.

“Hoh! I haven't been sick!” he cried on the third day, true to his
nature. “Mammy, I want to get up.”

“Oh, dear, no! you mustn't, Joel,” cried Mrs. Pepper in a fright,
running up to him as he was preparing to give the bedclothes a lusty
kick; “you'll send 'em in.”

“Send what in?” asked Joel, looking up at his mother in terror, as the
dreadful thought made him pause.

“Why, the measles, Joey; they'll all go in if you get out.”

“How they goin' to get in again, I'd like to know?” asked Joel, looking
at the little red spots on his hands in incredulity; say, ma!

“Well, they will,” said his mother, “as you'll find to your sorrow if
you get out of bed.”

“Oh, dear,” said Joel, beginning to whimper, as he drew into bed again,
“when can I get up, mammy!”

“Oh, in a day or two,” responded Mrs. Pepper, cheerfully; “you're
getting on so finely you'll be as smart as a cricket! Shouldn't you
say he might get up in a day or two, Mrs. Beebe?” she appealed to that
individual who was knitting away cheerily in the corner.

“Well, if he keeps on as he's begun, I shouldn't know what to think,”
 replied Mrs. Beebe. “It beats all how quick he's picked up. I never see
anything like it, I'm sure!”

And as Mrs. Beebe was a great authority in sickness, the old, sunny
cheeriness began to creep into the brown house once more, and to bubble
over as of yore.

“Seems as if 'twas just good to live,” said Mrs. Pepper, thankfully
once, when her thoughts were too much for her. “I don't believe I shall
ever care how poor we are,” she continued, “as long as we're together.”

“And that's just what the Lord meant, maybe,” replied good Mrs. Beebe,
who was preparing to go home.

Joel kept the house in a perfect uproar all through his getting well.
Mrs. Pepper observed one day, when he had been more turbulent than
usual, that she was “almost worn to a thread.”

“Twasn't anything to take care of you, Joe,” she added, “when you were
real sick, because then I knew where you were; but--well, you won't ever
have the measles again, I s'pose, and that's some comfort!”

Little David, who had been nearly stunned by the sickness that had laid
aside his almost constant companion, could express his satisfaction and
joy in no other way than by running every third minute and begging to do
something for him. And Joel, who loved dearly to be waited on, improved
every opportunity that offered; which Mrs. Pepper observing, soon put a
stop to.

“You'll run his legs off, Joel,” at last she said, when he sent David
the third time down to the wood-pile for a stick of just the exact
thickness, and which the little messenger declared wasn't to be found.
“Haven't you any mercy? You've kept him going all day, too,” she added,
glancing at David's pale face.

“Oh, mammy,” panted David, “don't; I love to go. Here Joe, is the best I
could find,” handing him a nice smooth stick.

“I know you do,” said his mother; “but Joe's getting better now, and he
must learn to spare you.”

“I don't want to spare folks,” grumbled Joel, whittling away with
energy; “I've been sick--real sick,” he added, lifting his chubby face
to his mother to impress the fact.

“I know you have,” she cried, running to kiss her boy; “but now, Joe,
you're most well. To-morrow I'm going to let you go down-stairs; what do
you think of that!”

“Hooray!” screamed Joel, throwing away the stick and clapping his hands,
forgetting all about his serious illness, “that'll be prime!”

“Aren't you too sick to go, Joey?” asked Mrs. Pepper, mischievously.

“No, I'm not sick,” cried Joel, in the greatest alarm, fearful his
mother meant to take back the promise; “I've never been sick. Oh, mammy!
you know you'll let me go, won't your?”

“I guess so,” laughed his mother.

“Come on, Phron,” cried Joel, giving her a whirl.

David, who was too tired for active sport, sat on the floor and watched
them frolic in great delight.

“Mammy,” said he, edging up to her side as the sport went on, “do you
know, I think it's just good--it's--oh, it's so frisky since Joe got
well, isn't it, mammy?”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mrs. Pepper, giving him a radiant look in return for
his; “and when Polly's around again with her two eyes all right--well, I
don't know what we shall do, I declare!”

“Boo!” cried a voice, next morning, close to Polly's elbow, unmistakably
Joel's.

“Oh, Joel Pepper!” she cried, whirling around, “is that really you!”

“Yes,” cried that individual, confidently, “it's I; oh, I say, Polly,
I've had fun up-stairs, I tell you what!”

“Poor boy!” said Polly, compassionately.

“I wasn't a poor boy,” cried Joel, indignantly; “I had splendid things
to eat; oh, my!” and he closed one eye and smacked his lips in the
delightful memory.

“I know it,” said Polly, “and I'm so glad, Joel.”

“I don't suppose I'll ever get so many again,” observed Joel,
reflectively, after a minute's pause, as one and another of the wondrous
delicacies rose before his mind's eye; “not unless I have the measles
again--say, Polly, can't I have 'em again?”

“Mercy, no!” cried Polly, in intense alarm, “I hope not.”

“Well, I don't,” said Joel, “I wish I could have 'em sixty--no--two
hundred times, so there!”

“Well, mammy couldn't take care of you,” said Ben; “you don't know what
you're sayin', Joe.”

“Well, then, I wish I could have the things without the measles,” said
Joel, willing to accommodate; “only folks won't send 'em,” he added, in
an injured tone.

“Polly's had the hardest time of all,” said her mother, affectionately
patting the bandage.

“I think so too,” put in Ben; “if my eyes were hurt I'd give up.”

“So would I,” said David; and Joel, to be in the fashion, cried also, “I
know I would;” while little Phronsie squeezed up to Polly's side, “And
I, too.”

“Would what, Puss?” asked Ben, tossing her up high. “Have good things,”
 cried the child, in delight at understanding the others, “I would
really, Ben,” she cried, gravely, when they all screamed.

“Well, I hope so,” said Ben, tossing her higher yet. “Don't laugh at
her, boys,” put in Polly; “we're all going to have good times now,
Phronsie, now we've got well.”

“Yes,” laughed the child from her high perch; “we aren't ever goin' to
be sick again, ever--any more,” she added impressively.

The good times were coming for Polly--coming pretty near, and she
didn't know it! All the children were in the secret; for as Mrs. Pepper
declared, “They'd have to know it; and if they were let into the secret
they'd keep it better.”

So they had individually and collectively been intrusted with the
precious secret, and charged with the extreme importance of “never
letting any one know,” and they had been nearly bursting ever since with
the wild desire to impart their knowledge.

“I'm afraid I shall tell,” said David, running to his mother at last;
“oh, mammy, I don't dare stay near Polly, I do want to tell so bad.”

“Oh, no, you won't, David,” said his mother encouragingly, “when you
know mother don't want you to; and besides, think how Polly'll look when
she sees it.”

“I know,” cried David in the greatest rapture, “I wouldn't tell for all
the world! I guess she'll look nice, don't you mother?” and he laughed
in glee at the thought.

“Poor child! I guess she will!” and then Mrs. Pepper laughed too, till
the little old kitchen rang with delight at the accustomed sound.

The children all had to play “clap in and clap out” in the bedroom while
it came; and “stage coach,” too--“anything to make a noise,” Ben said.
And then after they got nicely started in the game, he would be missing
to help about the mysterious thing in the kitchen, which was safe since
Polly couldn't see him go on account of her bandage. So she didn't
suspect in the least. And although the rest were almost dying to be
out in the kitchen, they conscientiously stuck to their bargain to keep
Polly occupied. Only Joel would open the door and peep once; and then
Phronsie behind him began. “Oh, I see the sto----” but David swooped
down on her in a twinkling, and smothered the rest by tickling her.

Once they came very near having the whole thing pop out. “Whatever is
that noise in the kitchen?” asked Polly, as they all stopped to
take breath after the scuffle of “stage coach.” “It sounds just like
grating.”

“I'll go and see,” cried Joel, promptly; and then he flew out where his
mother and Ben and two men were at work on a big, black thing in the
corner. The old stove, strange to say, was nowhere to be seen! Something
else stood in its place, a shiny, black affair, with a generous supply
of oven doors, and altogether such a comfortable, home-like look about
it, as if it would say--“I'm going to make sunshine in this house!”

“Oh, Joel,” cried his mother, turning around on him with very black
hands, “you haven't told!”

“No,” said Joel, “but she's hearin' the noise, Polly is.”

“Hush!” said Ben, to one of the men.

“We can't put it up without some noise,” the man replied, “but we'll be
as still as we can.”

“Isn't it a big one, ma?” asked Joel, in the loudest of stage whispers,
that Polly on the other side of the door couldn't have failed to hear if
Phronsie hadn't laughed just then.

“Go back, Joe, do,” said Ben, “play tag--anything,” he implored, “we'll
be through in a few minutes.”

“It takes forever!” said Joel, disappearing within the bedroom door.
Luckily for the secret, Phronsie just then ran a pin sticking up on the
arm of the old chair, into her finger; and Polly, while comforting her,
forgot to question Joel. And then the mother came in, and though she had
ill-concealed hilarity in her voice, she kept chattering and bustling
around with Polly's supper to such an extent that there was no chance
for a word to be got in.

Next morning it seemed as if the “little brown house,” would turn inside
out with joy.

“Oh, mammy!” cried Polly, jumping into her arms the first thing, as Dr.
Fisher untied the bandage, “my eyes are new! just the same as if I'd
just got 'em! Don't they look different?” she asked, earnestly, running
to the cracked glass to see for herself.

“No,” said Ben, “I hope not; the same brown ones, Polly.”

“Well,” said Polly, hugging first one and then another, “everybody looks
different through them, anyway.”

“Oh,” cried Joel, “come out into the kitchen, Polly; it's a great deal
better out there.”

“May I?” asked Polly, who was in such a twitter looking at everything
that she didn't know which way to turn.

“Yes,” said the doctor, smiling at her.

“Well, then,” sang Polly, “come mammy, we'll go first; isn't it just
lovely--oh, MAMMY!” and Polly turned so very pale, and looked as if she
were going to tumble right over, that Mrs. Pepper grasped her arm in
dismay.

“What is it?” she asked, pointing to the corner, while all the children
stood round in the greatest excitement.

“Why,” cried Phronsie, “it's a stove--don't you know, Polly?” But Polly
gave one plunge across the room, and before anybody could think, she was
down on her knees with her arms flung right around the big, black thing,
and laughing and crying over it, all in the same breath!

And then they all took hold of hands and danced around it like wild
little things; while Dr. Fisher stole out silently--and Mrs. Pepper
laughed till she wiped her eyes to see them go.

“We aren't ever goin' to have any more burnt bread,” sang Polly, all out
of breath.

“Nor your back isn't goin' to break any more,” panted Ben, with a very
red face.

“Hooray!” screamed Joel and David, to fill any pause that might occur,
while Phronsie gurgled and laughed at everything just as it came along.
And then they all danced and capered again; all but Polly, who was
down before the precious stove examining and exploring into ovens and
everything that belonged to it.

“Oh, ma,” she announced, coming up to Mrs. Pepper, who had been obliged
to fly to her sewing again, and exhibiting a very crocky face and a
pair of extremely smutty hands, “it's most all ovens, and it's just
splendid!”

“I know it,” answered her mother, delighted in the joy of her child.
“My! how black you are, Polly!”

“Oh, I wish,” cried Polly, as the thought struck her, “that Dr. Fisher
could see it! Where did he go to, ma?”

“I guess Dr. Fisher has seen it before,” said Mrs. Pepper, and then
she began to laugh. “You haven't ever asked where the stove came from,
Polly.”

And to be sure, Polly had been so overwhelmed that if the stove had
really dropped from the clouds it would have been small matter of
astonishment to her, as long as it had come; that was the main thing!

“Mammy,” said Polly, turning around slowly, with the stove-lifter in her
hand, “did Dr. Fisher bring that stove?”

“He didn't exactly bring it,” answered her mother, “but I guess he knew
something about it.”

“Oh, he's the splendidest, goodest man!” cried Polly, “that ever
breathed! Did he really get us that stove?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, “he would; I couldn't stop him. I don't know
how he found out you wanted one so bad; but he said it must be kept as a
surprise when your eyes got well.”

“And he saved my eyes!” cried Polly, full of gratitude. “I've got a
stove and two new eyes, mammy, just to think!”

“We ought to be good after all our mercies,” said Mrs. Pepper
thankfully, looking around on her little group. Joel was engaged in the
pleasing occupation of seeing how far he could run his head into the
biggest oven, and then pulling it out to exhibit its blackness, thus
engrossing the others in a perfect hubbub.

“I'm going to bake my doctor some little cakes,” declared Polly, when
there was comparative quiet.

“Do, Polly,” cried Joel, “and then leave one or two over.”

“No,” said Polly; “we can't have any, because these must be very nice.
Mammy, can't I have some white on top, just once?” she pleaded.

“I don't know,” dubiously replied Mrs. Pepper; “eggs are dreadful dear,
and--”

“I don't care,” said Polly, recklessly; “I must just once for Dr.
Fisher.”

“I tell you, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, “what you might do; you might
make him some little apple tarts--most every one likes them, you know.”

“Well,” said Polly, with a sigh, “I s'pose they'll have to do; but some
time, mammy, I'm going to bake him a big cake, so there!”




A THREATENED BLOW


One day, a few weeks after, Mrs. Pepper and Polly were busy in
the kitchen. Phronsie was out in the “orchard,” as the one scraggy
apple-tree was called by courtesy, singing her rag doll to sleep under
its sheltering branches. But “Baby” was cross and wouldn't go to sleep,
and Phronsie was on the point of giving up, and returning to the house,
when a strain of music made her pause with dolly in her apron. There
she stood with her finger in her mouth, in utter astonishment, wondering
where the sweet sounds came from.

“Oh, Phronsie!” screamed Polly, from the back door, “where are--oh,
here, come quick! it's the beau-ti-fullest!”

“What is it?” eagerly asked the little one, hopping over the stubby
grass, leaving poor, discarded “Baby” on its snubby nose where it
dropped in her hurry.

“Oh, a monkey!” cried Polly; “do hurry! the sweetest little monkey you
ever saw!”

“What is a monkey?” asked Phronsie, skurrying after Polly to the gate
where her mother was waiting for them.

“Why, a monkey's--a--monkey,” explained Polly, “I don't know any
better'n that. Here he is! Isn't he splendid!” and she lifted Phronsie
up to the big post where she could see finely.

“O-oh! ow!” screamed little Phronsie, “see him, Polly! just see him!”

A man with an organ was standing in the middle of the road playing away
with all his might, and at the end of a long rope was a lively little
monkey in a bright red coat and a smart cocked hat. The little creature
pulled off his hat, and with one long jump coming on the fence, he made
Phronsie a most magnificent bow. Strange to say, the child wasn't in the
least frightened, but put out her little fat hand, speaking in gentle
tones, “Poor little monkey! come here, poor little monkey!”

Turning up his little wrinkled face, and glancing fearfully at his
master, Jocko began to grimace and beg for something to eat. The man
pulled the string and struck up a merry tune, and in a minute the monkey
spun around and around at such a lively pace, and put in so many queer
antics that the little audience were fairly convulsed with laughter.

“I can't pay you,” said Mrs. Pepper, wiping her eyes, when at last the
man pulled up the strap whistling to Jocko to jump up, “but I'll give
you something to eat; and the monkey, too, he shall have something for
his pains in amusing my children.”

The man looked very cross when she brought him out only brown bread and
two cold potatoes.

“Haven't you got nothin' better'n that?”

“It's as good as we have,” answered Mrs. Pepper.

The man threw down the bread in the road. But Jocko thankfully ate his
share, Polly and Phronsie busily feeding him; and then he turned and
snapped up the portion his master had left in the dusty road.

Then they moved on, Mrs. Pepper and Polly going back to their work in
the kitchen. A little down the road the man struck up another tune.
Phronsie who had started merrily to tell “Baby” all about it, stopped a
minute to hear, and--she didn't go back to the orchard!

About two hours after, Polly said merrily:

“I'm going to call Phronsie in, mammy; she must be awfully tired and
hungry by this time.”

She sang gayly on the way, “I'm coming, Phronsie, coming--why, where!--”
 peeping under the tree.

“Baby” lay on its face disconsolately on the ground--and the orchard was
empty! Phronsie was gone!

“It's no use,” said Ben, to the distracted household and such of the
neighbors as the news had brought hurriedly to the scene, “to look any
more around here--but somebody must go toward Hingham; he'd be likely to
go that way.”

“No one could tell where he would go,” cried Polly, wringing her hands.

“But he'd change, Ben, if he thought folks would think he'd gone there,”
 said Mrs. Pepper.

“We must go all roads,” said Ben, firmly; “one must take the stage to
Boxville, and I'll take Deacon Brown's wagon on the Hingham road, and
somebody else must go to Toad Hollow.”

“I'll go in the stage,” screamed Joel, who could scarcely see out of his
eyes, he had cried so; “I'll find--find her--I know.

“Be spry, then, Joe, and catch it at the corner!”

Everybody soon knew that little Phronsie Pepper had gone off with “a
cross organ man and an awful monkey!” and in the course of an hour
dozens of people were out on the hot, dusty roads in search.

“What's the matter?” asked a testy old gentleman in the stage, of Joel
who, in his anxiety to see both sides of the road at once, bobbed the
old gentleman in the face so often as the stage lurched, that at last he
knocked his hat over his eyes.

“My sister's gone off with a monkey,” explained Joel, bobbing over to
the other side, as he thought he caught sight of something pink that
he felt sure must be Phronsie's apron. “Stop! stop! there she is!”
 he roared, and the driver, who had his instructions and was fully in
sympathy, pulled up so suddenly that the old gentleman flew over into
the opposite seat.

“Where?”

But when they got up to it Joel saw that it was only a bit of pink
calico flapping on a clothes-line; so he climbed back and away they
rumbled again.

The others were having the same luck. No trace could be found of the
child. To Ben, who took the Hingham road, the minutes seemed like hours.

“I won't go back,” he muttered, “until I take her. I can't see mother's
face!”

But the ten miles were nearly traversed; almost the last hope was gone.
Into every thicket and lurking place by the road-side had he peered--but
no Phronsie! Deacon Brown's horse began to lag.

“Go on!” said Ben hoarsely; “oh, dear Lord, make me find her!”

The hot sun poured down on the boy's face, and he had no cap. What cared
he for that? On and on he went. Suddenly the horse stopped. Ben doubled
up the reins to give him a cut, when “WHOA!” he roared so loud that the
horse in very astonishment gave a lurch that nearly flung him headlong.
But he was over the wheel in a twinkling, and up with a bound to a small
thicket of scrubby bushes on a high hill by the road-side. Here lay a
little bundle on the ground, and close by it a big, black dog; and over
the whole, standing guard, was a boy a little bigger than Ben, with
honest gray eyes. And the bundle was Phronsie!

“Don't wake her up,” said the boy, warningly, as Ben, with a hungry look
in his eyes, leaped up the hill, “she's tired to death!”

“She's my sister!” cried Ben, “our Phronsie!”

“I know it,” said the boy kindly; “but I wouldn't wake her up yet if I
were you. I'll tell you all about it,” and he took Ben's hand which was
as cold as ice.




SAFE


“It's all right, Prince,” the boy added, encouragingly to the big dog
who, lifting his noble head, had turned two big eyes steadily on Ben.
“He's all right! lie down again!”

Then, flinging himself down on the grass, he told Ben how he came to
rescue Phronsie.

“Prince and I were out for a stroll,” said he. “I live over in Hingham,”
 pointing to the pretty little town just a short distance before them in
the hollow; “that is,” laughing, “I do this summer. Well, we were out
strolling along about a mile below here on the cross-road; and all of a
sudden, just as if they sprung right up out of the ground, I saw a man
with an organ, and a monkey, and a little girl, coming along the road.
She was crying, and as soon as Prince saw that, he gave a growl, and
then the man saw us, and he looked so mean and cringing I knew there
must be something wrong, and I inquired of him what he was doing with
that little girl, and then she looked up and begged so with her eyes,
and all of a sudden broke away from him and ran towards me screaming--'I
want Polly!' Well, the man sprang after her; then I tell you--” here the
boy forgot his caution about waking Phronsie--“we went for him, Prince
and I! Prince is a noble fellow,” (here the dog's ears twitched very
perceptibly) “and he kept at that man; oh! how he bit him! till he had
to run for fear the monkey would get killed.”

“Was Phronsie frightened?” asked Ben; “she's never seen strangers.”

“Not a bit,” said the boy, cheerily; “she just clung to me like
everything--I only wish she was my sister,” he added impulsively.

“What were you going to do with her if I hadn't come along?” asked Ben.

“Well, I got out on the main road,” said the boy, “because I thought
anybody who had lost her, would probably come through this way; but if
somebody hadn't come, I was going to carry her in to Hingham; and the
father and I'd had to contrive some way to do.”

“Well,” said Ben, as the boy finished and fastened his bright eyes on
him, “somebody did come along; and now I must get her home about as fast
as I can for poor mammy--and Polly!”

“Yes,” said the boy, “I'll help you lift her; perhaps she won't wake
up.”

The big dog moved away a step or two, but still kept his eye on
Phronsie.

“There,” said the boy, brightly, as they laid the child on the wagon
seat; “now when you get in you can hold her head; that's it,” he added,
seeing them both fixed to his satisfaction. But still Ben lingered.

“Thank you,” he tried to say.

“I know,” laughed the boy; “only it's Prince instead of me,” and he
pulled forward the big black creature, who had followed faithfully down
the hill to see the last of it. “To the front, sir, there! We're coming
to see you,” he continued, “if you will let us--where do you live?”

“Do come,” said Ben, lighting up, for he was just feeling he couldn't
bear to look his last on the merry, honest face; “anybody'll tell you
where Mrs. Pepper lives.”

“Is she a Pepper?” asked the boy, laughing, and pointing to the
unconscious little heap in the wagon; “and are you a Pepper?”

“Yes,” said Ben, laughing too. “There are five of us besides mother.

“Jolly! that's something like! Good-bye! Come on, Prince!” Then away
home to mother! Phronsie never woke up or turned over once till she was
put, a little pink sleepy heap, into her mother's arms. Joel was there,
crying bitterly at his forlorn search. The testy old gentleman in the
seat opposite had relented and ordered the coach about and brought
him home in an outburst of grief when all hope was gone. And one after
another they all had come back, disheartened, to the distracted mother.
Polly alone, clung to hope!

“Ben will bring her, mammy; I know God will let him,” she whispered.

But when Ben did bring her, Polly, for the second time in her life,
tumbled over with a gasp, into old Mrs. Bascom's lap.

Home and mother! Little Phronsie slept all that night straight through.
The neighbors came in softly, and with awestruck visages stole into the
bedroom to look at the child; and as they crept out again, thoughts
of their own little ones tugging at their hearts, the tears would drop
unheeded.




NEW FRIENDS


Up the stairs of the hotel, two steps at a time, ran a boy with a big,
black dog at his heels. “Come on, Prince; soft, now,” as they neared a
door at the end of the corridors.

It opened into a corner room overlooking “the Park,” as the small
open space in front of the hotel was called. Within the room there was
sunshine and comfort, it being the most luxurious one in the house,
which the proprietor had placed at the disposal of this most exacting
guest. He didn't look very happy, however--the gentleman who sat in an
easy chair by the window; a large, handsome old gentleman, whose whole
bearing showed plainly that personal comfort had always been his, and
was, therefore, neither a matter of surprise nor thankfulness.

“Where have you been?” he asked, turning around to greet the boy who
came in, followed by Prince.

“Oh, such a long story, father!” he cried, flushed; his eyes sparkling
as he flung back the dark hair from his forehead. “You can't even
guess!”

“Never mind now,” said the old gentleman, testily; “your stories are
always long; the paper hasn't come--strange, indeed, that one must needs
be so annoyed! do ring that bell again.”

So the bell was pulled; and a porter popped in his head.

“What is it, sir?”

“The paper,” said the old gentleman, irritably; “hasn't it come yet?”

“No, sir,” said the man; and then he repeated, “taint in yet, please,
sir.”

“Very well--you said so once; that's all,” waving his hand; then as the
door closed, he said to his son, “That pays one for coming to such an
out-of-the-way country place as this, away from papers--I never will do
it again.”

As the old gentleman, against the advice of many friends who knew his
dependence on externals, had determined to come to this very place, the
boy was not much startled at the decisive words. He stood very quietly,
however, until his father finished. Then he said:

“It's too bad, father! supposing I tell you my story? Perhaps you'll
enjoy hearing it while you wait--it's really quite newspaperish.”

“Well, you might as well tell it now, I suppose,” said the old
gentleman; “but it is a great shame about that paper! to advertise that
morning papers are to be obtained--it's a swindle, Jasper! a complete
swindle!” and the old gentleman looked so very irate that the boy
exerted himself to soothe him.

“I know,” he said; “but they can't help the trains being late.”

“They shouldn't have the trains late,” said his father, unreasonably.
“There's no necessity for all this prating about 'trains late.' I'm
convinced it's because they forgot to send down for the papers till they
were all sold.”

“I don't believe that's it, father,” said the boy, trying to change the
subject; “but you don't know how splendid Prince has been, nor--” “And
then such a breakfast!” continued the old gentleman.

“My liver certainly will be in a dreadful state if these things
continue!” And he got up, and going to the corner of the room, opened
his medicine chest, and taking a box of pills therefrom, he swallowed
two, which done, he came back with a somewhat easier expression to his
favorite chair.

“He was just splendid, father,” began the boy; “he went for him, I tell
you!”

“I hope, Jasper, your dog has not been doing anything violent,” said the
old gentleman. “I must caution you; he'll get you into trouble some day;
and then there'll be a heavy bill to pay; he grows more irritable every
day.”

“Irritable!” cried the boy, flinging his arms around the dog's neck, who
was looking up at the old gentleman in high disdain. “He's done the most
splendid thing you ever saw! Why, he saved a little girl, father, from
a cross old organ-man, and he drove that man--oh! you ought to have seen
him run!”

And now that it was over, Jasper put back his head and laughed long and
loud as he remembered the rapid transit of the musical pair.

“Well, how do you know she wasn't the man's daughter?” asked his father,
determined to find fault someway. “You haven't any business to go around
the country setting your dog on people. I shall have an awful bill
to pay some day, Jasper--an awful bill!” he continued, getting up and
commencing to pace up and down the floor in extreme irritation.

“Father,” cried the boy, half laughing, half vexed, springing to his
side, and keeping step with him, “we found her brother; he came along
when we were by the side of the road. We couldn't go any further, for
the poor little thing was all tired out. And don't you think they live
over in Badgertown, and--”

“Well,” said the old gentleman, pausing in his walk, and taking out
his watch to wonder if that paper would ever come, “she had probably
followed the organ-man; so it served her right after all.”

“Well, but father,” and the boy's dark eyes glowed, “she was such a
cunning little thing! she wasn't more than four years old; and she had
such a pretty little yellow head; and she said so funny--'I want Polly.”

“Did she?” said the old gentleman, getting interested in spite of
himself; “what then?”

“Why, then, sir,” said Jasper, delighted at his success in diverting
his thoughts, “Prince and I waited--and waited; and I was just going to
bring her here to ask you what we should do, when--” “Dear me!” said
the old gentleman, instinctively starting back as if he actually saw the
forlorn little damsel, “you needn't ever bring such people here, Jasper!
I don't know what to do with them, I'm sure!”

“Well,” said the boy, laughing, “we didn't have to, did we, Prince?”
 stroking the big head of the dog who was slowly following the two as
they paced up and down, but keeping carefully on the side of his master;
“for just as we really didn't know what to do, don't you think there was
a big wagon came along, drawn by the ricketiest old horse, and a boy in
the wagon looking both sides of the road, and into every bush, just as
wild as he could be, and before I could think, hardly, he spied us, and
if he didn't jump! I thought he'd broken his leg--”

“And I suppose he just abused you for what you had done,” observed the
old gentleman, petulantly; “that's about all the gratitude there is in
this world.”

“He didn't seem to see me at all,” said the boy. “I thought he'd eat the
little girl up.”

“Ought to have looked out for her better then,” grumbled the old
gentleman, determined to find fault with somebody.

“And he's a splendid fellow, I just know,” cried Jasper, waxing
enthusiastic; “and his name is Pepper.”

“Pepper!” repeated his father; “no nice family ever had the name of
Pepper!”

“Well, I don't care,” and Jasper's laugh was loud and merry; “he's
nice anyway,--I know; and the little thing's nice; and I'm going to see
them--can't I, father?”

“Dear me!” said his father; “how can you, Jasper? You do have the
strangest tastes I ever saw!”

“It's dreadful dull here,” pleaded the boy, touching the right string;
“you know that yourself, father, and I don't know any boys around here;
and Prince and I are so lonely on our walks--do permit me, father!”

The old gentleman, who really cared very little about it, turned away,
muttering, “Well, I'm sure I don't care; go where you like,” when a
knock was heard at the door, and the paper was handed in, which broke up
the conversation, and restored good humor.

The next day but one, Ben was out by the wood-pile, trying to break up
some kindlings for Polly who was washing up the dishes, and otherwise
preparing for the delights of baking day.

“Hulloa!” said a voice bethought he knew.

He turned around to see the merry-faced boy, and the big, black dog who
immediately began to wag his tail as if willing to recognize him.

“You see I thought you'd never look round,” said the boy with a laugh.
“How's the little girl?”

“Oh! you have come, really,” cried Ben, springing over the wood-pile
with a beaming face. “Polly!”

But Polly was already by the door, with dish-cloth in hand. “This is my
sister, Polly,” began Ben--and then stopped, not knowing the boy's name.

“I'm Jasper King,” said the boy, stepping upon the flat stone by Polly's
side; and taking off his cap, he put out his hand. “And this is Prince,”
 he added.

Polly put her hand in his, and received a hearty shake; and then she
sprang over the big stove, dish-cloth and all, and just flung her arms
around the dog's neck.

“Oh, you splendid fellow, you!” said she. “Don't you know we all think
you're as good as gold?”

The dog submitted to the astonishing proceeding as if he liked it, while
Jasper, delighted with Polly's appreciation, beamed down on them, and
struck up friendship with her on the instant.

“Now, I must call Phronsie,” said Polly, getting up, her face as red as
a rose.

“Is her name Phronsie?” asked the boy with interest.

“No, it's Sophronia,” said Polly, “but we call her Phronsie.”

“What a very funny name,” said Jasper, “Sophronia is, for such a little
thing--and yours is Polly, is it not?” he asked, turning around suddenly
on her.

“Yes,” said Polly; “no, not truly Polly; it's Mary, my real name is--but
I've always been Polly.”

“I like Polly best, too,” declared Jasper, “it sounds so nice.”

“And his name is Ben,” said Polly.

“Ebenezer, you mean,” said Ben, correcting her.

“Well, we call him Ben,” said Polly; “it don't ever seem as if there was
any Ebenezer about it.”

“I should think not,” laughed Jasper.

“Well, I must get Phronsie,” again said Polly, running back into the
bedroom, where that small damsel was busily engaged in washing “Baby”
 in the basin of water that she had with extreme difficulty succeeded in
getting down on the floor. She had then, by means of a handful of soft
soap, taken from Polly's soap-bowl during the dish-washing, and a bit of
old cotton, plastered both herself and “Baby” to a comfortable degree of
stickiness.

“Phronsie,” said Polly--“dear me! what you doing? the big dog's out
there, you know, that scared the naughty organ-man; and the boy--” but
before the words were half out, Phronsie had slipped from under her
hands, and to Polly's extreme dismay, clattered out into the kitchen.

“Here she is!” cried Jasper, meeting her at the door. The little soapy
hands were grasped, and kissing her--“Ugh!” he said, as the soft soap
plentifully spread on her face met his mouth.

“Oh, Phronsie! you shouldn't,” cried Polly, and then they all burst out
into a peal of laughter at Jasper's funny grimaces.

“She's been washing 'Baby,” explained Polly, wiping her eyes, and
looking at Phronsie who was hanging over Prince in extreme affection.
Evidently Prince still regarded her as his especial property.

“Have you got a baby?” asked Jasper. “I thought she was the baby,”
 pointing to Phronsie.

“Oh, I mean her littlest dolly; she always calls her 'Baby,” said Polly.
“Come, Phronsie, and have your face washed, and a clean apron on.”

When Phronsie could be fairly persuaded that Prince would not run
away during her absence, she allowed herself to be taken off; and soon
re-appeared, her own, dainty little self. Ben, in the meantime, had
been initiating Jasper into the mysteries of cutting the wood, the
tool-house, and all the surroundings of the “little brown house.” They
had received a re-inforcement in the advent of Joel and David, who
stared delightedly at Phronsie's protector, made friends with the dog,
and altogether had had such a thoroughly good time, that Phronsie,
coming back, clapped her hands in glee to hear them.

“I wish mammy was home,” said Polly, polishing up the last cup
carefully.

“Let me put it up,” said Jasper, taking it from her, “it goes up here,
don't it, with the rest?” reaching up to the upper-shelf of the old
cupboard.

“Yes,” said Polly.

“Oh, I should think you'd have real good times!” said the boy,
enviously. “I haven't a single sister or brother.”

“Haven't you?” said Polly, looking at him in extreme pity. “Yes, we do
have real fun,” she added, answering his questioning look; “the house is
just brimful sometimes, even if we are poor.”

“We aren't poor,” said Joel, who never could bear to be pitied. Then,
with a very proud air, he said in a grand way, “At any rate, we aren't
going to be, long, for something's coming!”

“What do you mean, Joey?” asked Ben, while the rest looked equally
amazed.

“Our ships,” said Joel confidently, as if they were right before their
eyes; at which they all screamed!

“See Polly's stove!” cried Phronsie, wishing to entertain in her turn.
“Here 'tis,” running up to it, and pointing with her fat little finger.

“Yes, I see,” cried Jasper, pretending to be greatly surprised; “it's
new, isn't it?”

“Yes,” said the child; “it's very all new; four yesterdays ago!”

And then Polly stopped in sweeping up and related, with many additions
and explanations from the others, the history of the stove, and good Dr.
Fisher (upon whom they all dilated at great length), and the dreadful
measles, and everything. And Jasper sympathized, and rejoiced with them
to their hearts content, and altogether got so very home-like, that they
all felt as if they had known him for a year. Ben neglected his work a
little, but then visitors didn't come every day to the Peppers; so
while Polly worked away at her bread, which she was “going to make like
biscuits,” she said, the audience gathered in the little old kitchen was
in the merriest mood, and enjoyed everything to the fullest extent.

“Do put in another stick, Bensie dear,” said Polly; “this bread won't be
fit for anything!”

“Isn't this fun, though!” cried Jasper, running up to try the oven; “I
wish I could ever bake,” and he looked longingly at the little brown
biscuits waiting their turn out on the table.

“You come out some day,” said Polly, sociably, “and we'll all try
baking--mammy'd like to have you, I know,” feeling sure that nothing
would be too much for Mrs. Pepper to do for the protector of little
Phronsie.

“I will!” cried Jasper, perfectly delighted. “You can't think how
awfully dull it is out in Hingham!”

“Don't you live there?” asked Polly, with a gasp, almost dropping a tin
full of little brown lumps of dough she was carrying to the oven.

“Live there!” cried Jasper; and then he burst out into a merry laugh.
“No, indeed! I hope not! Why, we're only spending the summer there,
father and I, in the hotel.”

“Where's your mother?” asked Joel, squeezing in between Jasper and
his audience. And then they all felt instinctively that a very wrong
question had been asked.

“I haven't any mother,” said the boy, in a low voice.

They all stood quite still for a moment; then Polly said, “I wish you'd
come out sometime; and you may bake--or anything else,” she added; and
there was a kinder ring to her voice than ever.

No mother! Polly for her life, couldn't imagine how anybody could feel
without a mother, but the very words alone smote her heart; and there
was nothing she wouldn't have done to give pleasure to one who had done
so much for them.

“I wish you could see our mother,” she said, gently. “Why, here she
comes now! oh, mamsie, dear,” she cried. “Do, Joe, run and take her
bundle.”

Mrs. Pepper stopped a minute to kiss Phronsie--her baby was dearer than
ever to her now. Then her eye fell on Jasper, who stood respectfully
waiting and watching her with great interest.

“Is this,” she asked, taking it all in at the first glance--the boy with
the honest eyes as Ben had described him--and the big, black dog--“is
this the boy who saved my little girl?”

“Oh, ma'am,” cried Jasper, “I didn't do much; 'twas Prince.”

“I guess you never'll know how much you did do,” said Mrs. Pepper. Then
looking with a long, keen gaze into the boy's eyes that met her own so
frankly and kindly: “I'll trust him,” she said to herself; “a boy with
those eyes can't help but be good.”

“Her eyes are just the same as Polly's,” thought Jasper, “just such
laughing ones, only Polly's are brown,” and he liked her on the spot.

And then, somehow, the hubbub ceased. Polly went on with her work, and
the others separated, and Mrs. Pepper and Jasper had a long talk. When
the mother's eyes fell on Phronsie playing around on the floor, she gave
the boy a grateful smile that he thought was beautiful.

“Well, I declare,” said Jasper, at last, looking up at the old clock in
the corner by the side of the cupboard, “I'm afraid I'll miss the stage,
and then father never'll let me come again. Come, Prince.”

“Oh, don't go,” cried Phronsie, wailing. “Let doggie stay! Oh, make him
stay, mammy!”

“I can't, Phronsie,” said Mrs. Pepper, smiling, “if he thinks he ought
to go.”

“I'll come again,” said Jasper, eagerly, “if I may, ma'am.”

He looked up at Mrs. Pepper as he stood cap in hand, waiting for the
answer.

“I'm sure we should be glad if your father'll be willing,” she added;
thinking, proudly, “My children are an honor to anybody, I'm sure,” as
she glanced around on the bright little group she could call her own.
“But be sure, Jasper,” and she laid her hand on his arm as she looked
down into his eyes, “that you father is willing, that's all.”

“Oh, yes, ma'am,” said the boy; “but he will be, I guess, if he feels
well.”

“Then come on Thursday,” said Polly; “and can't we bake something then,
mammy?”

“I'm sure I don't care,” laughed Mrs. Pepper; “but you won't find much
but brown flour and meal to bake with.”

“Well, we can pretend,” said Polly; “and we can cut the cakes with the
heart-shape, and they'll do for anything.

“Oh, I'll come,” laughed Jasper, ready for such lovely fun in the old
kitchen; “look out for me on Thursday, Ben!”

So Jasper and Prince took their leave, all the children accompanying
them to the gate; and then after seeing him fairly started on a smart
run to catch the stage, Prince scampering at his heels, they all began
to sing his praises and to wish for Thursday to come.

But Jasper didn't come! Thursday came and went; a beautiful, bright,
sunny day, but with no signs of the merry boy whom all had begun to
love, nor of the big black dog. The children had made all the needful
preparations with much ostentation and bustle, and were in a state of
excited happiness, ready for any gale. But the last hope had to be given
up, as the old clock ticked away hour after hour. And at last Polly
had to put Phronsie to bed, who wouldn't stop crying enough to eat her
supper at the dreadful disappointment.

“He couldn't come, I know,” said both Ben and Polly, standing staunchly
up for their new friend; but Joel and David felt that he had broken his
word.

“He promised,” said Joel, vindictively.

“I don't believe his father'd let him,” said Polly, wiping away a sly
tear; “I know Jasper'd come, if he could.”

Mrs. Pepper wisely kept her own counsel, simply giving them a kindly
caution:

“Don't you go to judging him, children, till you know.”

“Well, he promised,” said Joel, as a settler.

“Aren't you ashamed, Joel,” said his mother, “to talk about any one
whose back is turned? Wait till he tells you the reason himself.”

Joel hung his head, and then began to tease David in the corner, to make
up for his disappointment.

The next morning Ben had to go to the store after some more meal. As he
was going out rather dismally, the storekeeper, who was also postmaster,
called out, “Oh, halloa, there!”

“What is it?” asked Ben, turning back, thinking perhaps Mr. Atkins
hadn't given him the right change.

“Here,” said Mr. Atkins, stepping up to the Post-office department,
quite smart with its array of boxes and official notices, where Ben had
always lingered, wishing there might be sometime a letter for him--or
some of them. “You've got a sister Polly, haven't you?”

“Yes,” said Ben, wondering what was coming next.

“Well, she's got a letter,” said the postmaster, holding up a nice big
envelope, looking just like those that Ben had so many times wished
for. That magic piece of white paper danced before the boy's eyes for a
minute; then he said, “It can't be for her, Mr. Atkins; why, she's never
had one.”

“Well, she's got one now, sure enough,” said Mr. Atkins; “here 'tis,
plain enough,” and he read what he had no need to study much as it had
already passed examination by his own and his wife's faithful eyes:
“Miss Polly Pepper, near the Turnpike, Badgertown'--that's her, isn't
it?” he added, laying it down before Ben's eyes. “Must be a first time
for everything, you know, my boy!” and he laughed long over his own
joke; “so take it and run along home.” For Ben still stood looking at
it, and not offering to stir.

“If you say so,” said the boy, as if Mr. Atkins had given him something
out of his own pocket; “but I'm afraid 'tisn't for Polly.” Then
buttoning up the precious letter in his jacket, he spun along home as
never before.

“Polly! Polly!” he screamed. “Where is she, mother?”

“I don't know,” said Mrs. Pepper, coming out of the bedroom. “Dear me!
is anybody hurt, Ben?”

“I don't know,” said Ben, in a state to believe anything, “but Polly's
got a letter.”

“Polly got a letter!” cried Mrs. Pepper; “what do you mean, Ben?”

“I don't know,” repeated the boy, still holding out the precious letter;
“but Mr. Atkins gave it to me; where is Polly?”

“I know where she is,” said Joel; “she's up-stairs.” And he flew out in
a twinkling, and just as soon reappeared with Polly scampering after him
in the wildest excitement.

And then the kitchen was in an uproar as the precious missive was put
into Polly's hand; and they all gathered around her, wondering and
examining, till Ben thought he would go wild with the delay.

“I wonder where it did come from,” said Polly, in the greatest anxiety,
examining again the address.

“Where does the postmark say?” asked Mrs. Pepper, looking over her
shoulder.

“It's all rubbed out,” said Polly, peering at it “you can't see
anything.”

“Do open it,” said Ben, “and then you'll find out.”

“But p'raps 'tisn't for me,” said Polly, timidly.

“Well, Mr. Atkins says 'tis,” said Ben, impatiently; “here, I'll open it
for you, Polly.”

“No, let her open it for herself, Ben,” protested his mother.

“But she won't,” said Ben; “do tear it open, Polly.”

“No, I'm goin' to get a knife,” she said.

“I'll get one,” cried Joel, running up to the table drawer; “here's one,
Polly.”

“Oh, dear,” groaned Ben; “you never'll get it open at this rate!”

But at last it was cut; and they all holding their breath, gazed
awe-struck, while Polly drew out the mysterious missive.

“What does it say?” gasped Mrs. Pepper.

“Dear Miss Polly,” began both Ben and Polly in a breath. “Let Polly
read,” said Joel, who couldn't hear in the confusion.

“Well, go on Polly,” said Ben; “hurry!”

“Dear Miss Polly, I was so sorry I couldn't come on Thursday--”

“Oh, it's Jasper! it's Jasper!” cried all the children in a breath.

“I told you so!” cried Ben and Polly, perfectly delighted to find their
friend vindicated fully--“there! Joey Pepper!”

“Well, I don't care,” cried Joe, nothing daunted, “he didn't come,
anyway--do go on, Polly.”

“I was so sorry I couldn't come--” began Polly.

“You read that,” said Joel.

“I know it,” said Polly, “but it's just lovely; 'on Thursday; but my
father was sick, and I couldn't leave him. If you don't mind I'll come
again--I mean I'll come some other day, if it's just as convenient for
you, for I do so want the baking, and the nice time. I forgot to say
that I had a cold, to,' (here Jasper had evidently had a struggle in his
mind whether there should be two o's or one, and he had at last decided
it, by crossing out one) but my father is willing I should come when I
get well. Give my love to all, and especially remember me respectfully
to your mother. Your friend,

“JASPER ELYOT KING.”

“Oh, lovely! lovely!” cried Polly, flying around with the letter in her
hand; “so he is coming!”

Ben was just as wild as she was, for no one knew but Polly just how the
new friend had stepped into his heart. Phronsie went to sleep happy,
hugging “Baby.”

“And don't you think, Baby, dear,” she whispered sleepily, and Polly
heard her say as she was tucking her in, “that Jasper is really comin';
really--and the big, be-you-ti-ful doggie, too!”




PHRONSIE PAYS A DEBT OF GRATITUDE


“And now I tell you,” said Polly, the next day, “let's make Jasper
something; can't we, ma?”

“Oh, do! do!” cried all the other children, “let's; but what'll it be,
Polly?”

“I don't know about this,” interrupted Mrs. Pepper; “I don't see how you
could get anything to him if you could make it.”

“Oh, we could, mamsie,” said Polly, eagerly, running up to her; “for Ben
knows; and he says we can do it.”

“Oh, well, if Ben and you have had your heads together, I suppose it's
all right,” laughed Mrs. Pepper, “but I don't see how you can do it.”

“Well, we can, mother, truly,” put in Ben. “I'll tell you how, and
you'll say it'll be splendid. You see Deacon Blodgett's goin' over to
Hingham, to-morrow; I heard him tell Miss Blodgett so; and he goes right
past the hotel; and we can do it up real nice--and it'll please Jasper
so--do, mammy!”

“And it's real dull there, Jasper says,” put in Polly, persuasively;
“and just think, mammy, no brothers and sisters!” And Polly looked
around on the others.

After that there was no need to say anything more; her mother would have
consented to almost any plan then.

“Well, go on, children,” she said; “you may do it; I don't see but what
you can get 'em there well enough; but I'm sure I don't know what you
can make.”

“Can't we,” said Polly--and she knelt down by her mother's side and put
her face in between the sewing in Mrs. Pepper's lap, and the eyes bent
kindly down on her--“make some little cakes, real cakes I mean? now
don't say no, mammy!” she said, alarmed, for she saw a “no” slowly
coming in the eyes above her, as Mrs. Pepper began to shake her head.

“But we haven't any white flour, Polly,” began her mother. “I know,”
 said Polly; “but we'll make 'em of brown, it'll do, if you'll give us
some raisins--you know there's some in the bowl, mammy.”

“I was saving them for a nest egg,” said Mrs. Pepper; meaning at some
future time to indulge in another plum-pudding that the children so
loved.

“Well, do give 'em to us,” cried Polly; “do, ma!”

“I want 'em for a plum-pudding sometime,” said Mrs. Pepper.

“Ow!--” and Joel with a howl sprung up from the floor where he had been
trying to make a cart for “Baby” out of an old box, and joined Mrs.
Pepper and Polly. “No, don't give 'em away, ma!” he screamed; “let's
have our plum-pudding--now, Polly Pepper, you're a-goin' to bake up all
our raisins in nasty little cakes--and--”

“Joey!” commanded Mrs. Pepper, “hush! what word did you say!”

“Well,” blubbered Joel, wiping his tears away with his grimy little
hand, “Polly's--a-goin'--to give--”

“I should rather you'd never have a plum-pudding than to say such
words,” said Mrs. Pepper, sternly, taking up her work again. “And
besides, do you think what Jasper has done for you?” and her face grew
very white around the lips.

“Well, he can have plum-puddings,” said Joel, whimpering, “forever an'
ever, if he wants them--and--and--”

“Well, Joey,” said Polly, “there, don't feel bad,” and she put her arms
around him, and tried to wipe away the tears that still rolled down his
cheeks. “We won't give 'em if you don't want us to; but Jasper's sick,
and there isn't anything for him to do, and--” here she whispered slyly
up into his ear, “don't you remember how you liked folks to send you
things when you had the measles?”

“Yes, I know,” said Joel, beginning to smile through his tears; “wasn't
it fun, Polly?”

“I guess 'twas,” laughed Polly back again, pleased at the return of
sunshine. “Well, Jasper'll be just as pleased as you were, 'cause we
love him and want to do somethin' for him, he was so good to Phronsie.”

“I will, Polly, I will,” cried Joel, completely won over; “do let's make
'em for him; and put 'em in thick; oh! thick as you can;” and determined
to do nothing by halves, Joel ran generously for the precious howl of
raisins, and after setting it on the table, began to help Polly in all
needful preparations.

Mrs. Pepper smiled away to herself to see happiness restored to the
little group. And soon a pleasant hum and bustle went on around the
baking table, the centre of attraction.

“Now,” said Phronsie, coming up to the table and standing on tip-toe to
see Polly measure out the flour, “I'm a-goin' to bake something for my
sick man, I am.”

“Oh, no, Phronsie, you can't,” began Polly.

“Hey?” asked Joel, with a daub of flour on the tip of his chubby nose,
gained by too much peering into Polly's flour-bag. “What did she say,
Polly?” watching her shake the clouds of flour in the sieve.

“She said she was goin' to bake something for Jasper,” said Polly.
“There,” as she whisked in the flour, “now that's done.”

“No, I didn't say Jasper,” said Phronsie; “I didn't say Jasper,” she
repeated, emphatically.

“Why, what did you say, Pet?” asked Polly, astonished, while little
Davie repeated, “What did you say, Phronsie?”

“I said my sick man,” said Phronsie, shaking her yellow head; “poor sick
man.”

“Who does she mean?” said Polly in despair, stopping a moment her
violent stirring that threatened to overturn the whole cake-bowl.

“I guess she means Prince,” said Joel. “Can't I stir, Polly?”

“Oh, no,” said Polly; “only one person must stir cake.”

“Why?” asked Joel; “why, Polly?”

“Oh, I don't know,” said Polly, “cause 'tis so; never mind now, Joel. Do
you mean Prince, Phronsie?”

“No, I don't mean Princey,” said the child decisively; “I mean my sick
man.”

“It's Jasper's father, I guess she means,” said Mrs. Pepper over in the
corner; “but what in the world!”

“Yes, yes,” cried Phronsie, perfectly delighted at being at last
understood, and hopping on one toe; “my sick man.”

“I shall give up!” said Polly, tumbling over in a chair, with the cake
spoon in her hand, from which a small sticky lump fell on her apron,
which Joel immediately pounced upon and devoured. “What do you want to
bake, Phronsie?” she gasped, holding the spoon sticking up straight, and
staring at the child.

“A gingerbread boy,” said the child, promptly; “he'd like that best;
poor, sick man!” and she commenced to climb up to active preparations.




A LETTER TO JASPER


“Mamsie, what shall we do?” implored Polly of her mother.

“I don't know,” said her mother; “however did that get into her head, do
you suppose?”

“I am sure I can't tell,” said Polly, jumping up and beginning to stir
briskly to make up for lost time. “P'r'aps she heard us talking about
Jasper's having to take care of his sick father, and how hard it must be
to be sick away from home.”

“Yes,” said Phronsie, “but he'll be glad to see my gingerbread boy, I
guess; poor, sick man.”

“Oh, Phronsie,” cried Polly, in great distress, “you aren't ever going
to make a 'gingerbread boy' to-day! see, we'll put in a cunning little
cake for Mr. King--full of raisins, Phronsie; won't that be lovely!”
 and Polly began to fill a little scalloped tin with some of the cake
mixture.

“N-no,” said the child, eying it suspiciously; “that isn't like a
'gingerbread boy,' Polly; he'll like that best.”

“Mamsie,” said Polly, “we can't let her make a dreadful, horrid
'gingerbread boy' to send Mr. King! he never'll let Jasper come here
again.”

“Oh, let her,” cried Joel; “she can bake it, and Dave an' I'll eat it,”
 and he picked up a raisin that had fallen under the table and began
crunching it with great gusto.

“That wouldn't be fair,” said Polly, gloomily. “Do get her off from it,
mammy.”

“Phronsie,” said Mrs. Pepper, going up back of the child, who sat
patiently in her high chair waiting for Polly to let her begin, “hadn't
you rather wait and give your 'gingerbread boy' to Jasper for his
father, when he comes?”

“Oh, no, no,” cried Phronsie, twisting in her chair in great
apprehension, “I want to send it now, I do.”

“Well, Polly,” said her mother, laughing, “after all it's best, I think,
to let her; it can't do any harm anyway--and instead of Mr. King's
not letting Jasper come, if he's a sensible man that won't make any
difference; and if he isn't, why, then there'd be sure to something come
up sometime to make trouble.”

“Well,” said Polly, “I suppose she's got to; and perhaps,” as a
consoling idea struck her, “perhaps she'll want to eat it up herself
when it's done. Here, Phronsie,” giving her a handful of the cake
mixture, which she stiffened with flour to the right thickness, “there,
you can call that a 'gingerbread boy;' see, won't it make a beautiful
one!”

“You needn't think,” said Mrs. Pepper, seeing Phronsie's delighted face,
and laughing as she went back to her work, “but what that gingerbread
boy'll go?”

When the little cakes were done, eight of them, and set upon the table
for exhibition, they one and all protested that they never saw so fine a
lot. Polly was delighted with the praise they received, and her mother's
commendation that she was “growing a better cook every day.” “How glad
Jasper'll be, won't he, mamsie?” said she.

The children walked around and around the table, admiring and pointing
out the chief points of attraction, as they appeared before their
discriminating eyes.

“I should choose that one,” said Joel, pointing at one which was
particularly plummy, with a raisin standing up on one end with a festive
air, as if to say, “there's lots of us inside, you better believe!”

“I wouldn't,” said Davie, “I'd have that--that's cracked so pretty.”

“So 'tis,” said Mrs. Pepper; “they're all as light as a feather, Polly.”

“But my 'gingerbread boy,” cried Phronsie, running eagerly along with a
particularly ugly looking specimen of a cake figure in her hand, “is the
be-yew-tifullest, isn't it, Polly?”

“Oh, dear,” groaned Polly, “it looks just awfully, don't it, Ben!”

“Hoh, hoh!” laughed Joel in derision; “his leg is crooked, see
Phronsie--you better let Davie an' me have it.”

“No, no,” screamed the child in terror; “that's my sick man's
'gingerbread boy,' it is!”

“Joe, put it down,” said Ben. “Yes, Phronsie, you shall have it; there,
it's all safe;” and he put it carefully into Phronsie's apron, when she
breathed easier.

“And he hasn't but one eye,” still laughed Joel, while little Davie
giggled too.

“He did have two,” said Polly, “but she punched the other in with her
thumb; don't, boys,” she said, aside, “you'll make her feel bad; do stop
laughing. Now, how'll we send the things?”

“Put 'em in a basket,” said Ben; “that's nicest.”

“But we haven't got any basket,” said Polly, “except the potato basket,
and they'd be lost in that.”

“Can't we take your work-basket, mamsie?” asked Ben; “they'd look so
nice in that.”

“Oh,” said Mrs. Pepper, “that wouldn't do; I couldn't spare it, and
besides, it's all broken at the side, Ben; that don't look nice.”

“Oh, dear,” said Polly, sitting down on one of the hard wooden chairs
to think, “I do wish we had things nice to send to sick people.” And her
forehead puckered up in a little hard knot.

“We'll have to do 'em up in a paper, Polly,” said Ben; “there isn't
any other way; they'll look nice in anything, 'cause they are nice,” he
added, comfortingly.

“If we only had some flowers,” said Polly, “that would set 'em off.”

“You're always a-thinkin' of flowers, Polly,” said Ben. “I guess the
cakes'll have to go without 'em.”

“I suppose they will,” said Polly, stifling a little sigh. “Where's the
paper?”

“I've got a nice piece up-stairs,” said Ben, “just right; I'll get it.”

“Put my 'gingerbread boy' on top,” cried Phronsie, handing him up.

So Polly packed the little cakes neatly in two rows, and laid the
'gingerbread boy' in a fascinating attitude across the top.

“He looks as if he'd been struck by lightning!” said Ben, viewing him
critically as he came in the door with the paper.

“Be still,” said Polly, trying not to laugh; “that's because he baked so
funny; it made his feet stick out.”

“Children,” said Mrs. Pepper, “how'll Jasper know where the cakes come
from?”

“Why, he'll know it's us,” said Polly, “of course; 'cause it'll make him
think of the baking we're going to have when he gets well.”

“Well, but you don't say so,” said Mrs. Pepper, smiling; “tisn't polite
to send it this way.”

“Whatever'll we do, mammy!” said all four children in dismay, while
Phronsie simply stared. “Can't we send 'em at all?”

“Why yes,” said their mother; “I hope so, I'm sure, after you've got 'em
baked; but you might answer Jasper's letter I should think, and tell him
about 'em, and the 'gingerbread boy'.”

“Oh dear,” said Polly, ready to fly, “I couldn't mamsie; I never wrote a
letter.”

“Well, you never had one before, did you?” said her mother, composedly
biting her thread. “Never say you can't, Polly, 'cause you don't know
what you can do till you've tried.”

“You write, Ben,” said Polly, imploringly.

“No,” said Ben, “I think the nicest way is for all to say somethin',
then 'twon't be hard for any of us.”

“Where's the paper,” queried Polly, “coming from, I wonder!”

“Joel,” said Mrs. Pepper, “run to the bureau in the bedroom, and open
the top drawer, and get a green box there.”

So Joel, quite important at the errand, departed, and presently put the
designated box into his mother's hand.

“There, now I'm going to give you this,” and she took out a small sheet
of paper slightly yellowed by age; but being gilt-edged, it looked very
magnificent to the five pairs of eyes directed to it.

“Now Ben, you get the ink bottle and the pen, and then go to work.”

So Ben reached down from the upper shelf in the cupboard the ink bottle,
and a pen in a black wooden penholder.

“Oh, mamsie,” cried Polly, “that's where Phronsie bit it off when she
was a baby, isn't it?” holding up the stubby end where the little ball
had disappeared.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, “and now you're going to write about her
'gingerbread boy' with it--well, time goes, to be sure.” And she bent
over her work again, harder than ever. Poor woman! if she could only
scrape together enough money to get her children into school--that was
the earnest wish of her heart. She must do it soon, for Ben was twelve
years old; but with all her strivings and scrimpings she could only
manage to put bread into their mouths, and live from day to day. “I know
I ought to be thankful for that,” she said to herself, not taking time
even to cry over her troubles. “But oh, the learning! they must have
that!”

“Now,” said Polly, “how'll we do it Ben?” as they ranged themselves
around the table, on which reposed the cakes; “you begin.”

“How do folks begin a letter?” asked Ben in despair, of his mother.

“How did Jasper begin his?” asked Mrs. Pepper back again. “Oh,” cried
Polly, running into the bedroom to get the precious missive. “Dear Miss
Polly'--that's what it says.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Pepper, “then you'd better say, 'Dear Mister
Jasper'--or you might say, 'Dear Mr. King.'”

“Oh, dear!” cried Polly, “that would be the father then--s'pose he
should think we wrote to him!” and Polly looked horror-stricken to the
last degree.

“There, there 'tis,” said Ben: “'Dear Mister Jasper'--now what'll we
say?”

“Why, say about the cakes,” replied Polly.

“And the 'gingerbread boy,” cried Phronsie. “Oh, tell about him, Polly,
do.”

“Yes, yes, Phronsie,” said Polly, “we will--why, tell him how we wish
he could have come, and that we baked him some cakes, and that we do so
want him to come just as soon as he can.”

“All right!” said Ben; so he went to work laboriously; only his
hard breathing showing what a hard task it was, as the stiff old pen
scratched up and down the paper.

“There, that's done,” he cried at length in great satisfaction, holding
it up for inspection.

“Oh, I do wish,” cried Polly in intense admiration, “I could write so
nice and so fast as you can, Ben.”

“Read it, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, in pride.

So Polly began: “Dear Mister Jasper we were all dreadfully sorry
that you didn't come and so we baked you some cakes.'--You didn't say
anything about his being sick, Ben.”

“I forgot it,” said Ben, “but I put it in farther down--you'll see if
you read on.”

“Baked you some cakes--that is, Polly did, for this is Ben that's
writing.”

“You needn't said that, Ben,” said Polly, dissatisfied; “we all baked
'em, I'm sure. 'And just as soon as you get well we do want you to come
over and have the baking. We're real sorry you're sick--boneset's good
for colds.”

“Oh, Ben!” said Mrs. Pepper, “I guess his father knows what to give
him.”

“And oh! the bitter stuff!” cried Polly, with a wry face. “Well, it's
hard work to write,” said Ben, yawning. “I'd rather chop wood.”

“I wish! knew how,” exclaimed Joel, longingly.

“Just you try every day; Ben'll teach you, Joe,” said his mother,
eagerly, “and then I'll let you write.”

“I will!” cried Joe; “then, Dave, you'll see how I'll write--I tell
you!”

“And I'm goin' to--ma, can't I?” said Davie, unwilling to be outdone.

“Yes, you may, be sure,” said Mrs. Pepper, delighted; “that'll make a
man of you fast.”

“Oh, boys,” said Polly, lifting a very red face, “you joggle the table
so I can't do anything.”

“I wasn't jogglin',” said Joel; “the old thing tipped. Look!” he
whispered to Davie, “see Polly, she's writing crooked.”

So while the others hung around her and looked over her shoulder while
they made their various comments, Polly finished her part, and also held
it up for inspection.

“Let us see,” said Ben, taking it up.

“It's after, 'boneset's good for colds,'” said Polly, puckering up her
face again at the thought.

“We most of us knew you were sick--I'm Polly now--because you didn't
come; and we liked your letter telling us so. Oh, Polly! we weren't glad
to hear he was sick!” cried Ben, in horror.

“I didn't say so!” cried Polly, starting up. “Why, Ben Pepper, I never
said so!” and she looked ready to cry.

“It sounds something like it, don't it, mammy?” said Ben, unwilling to
give her pain, but appealing to Mrs. Pepper.

“Polly didn't mean it,” said her mother consolingly; “but if I were you,
I'd say something to explain it.”

“I can't put anything in now,” said poor Polly; “there isn't any room
nor any more paper either--what shall I do! I told you, Ben, I couldn't
write.” And Polly looked helplessly from one to the other for comfort.

“Yes, you can,” said Ben; “there, now I'll show you: write it fine,
Polly--you write so big--little bits of letters, like these.”

So Polly took the pen again with a sigh. “Now he won't think so, I
guess,” she said, much relieved, as Ben began to read again.

“I'll begin yours again,” Ben said: “We most of us knew you were sick
because you didn't come, and we liked your letter telling us so because
we'd all felt so badly, and Phronsie cried herself to sleep--” (that's
good, I'm sure.) “The 'gingerbread boy' is for your father--please
excuse it, but Phronsie would make it for him because he is sick. There
isn't any more to write, and besides I can't write good, and Ben's
tired. From all of us.”

“Why, how's he to know?” cried Ben. “That won't do to sign it.”

“Well, let's say from Ben and Polly then,” said Polly; “only all the
others want to be in the letter.”

“Well, they can't write,” said Ben.

“We might sign their names for 'em,” suggested Polly.

“Here's mine,” said Ben, putting under the “From all of us” a big, bold
“Ben.”

“And here's mine,” echoed Polly, setting a slightly crooked “Polly” by
its side.

“Now Joe, you better let Ben hold your hand,” said Polly, warningly. But
Joel declaring he could write had already begun, so there was no hope
for it; and a big drop of ink falling from the pen, he spattered the “J”
 so that no one could tell what it was. The children looked at each other
in despair.

“Can we ever get it out, mammy?” said Polly, running to Mrs. Pepper with
it.

“I don't know,” said her mother. “How could you try it, Joe?”

“I didn't mean to,” said Joel, looking very downcast and ashamed. “The
ugly old pen did it!”

“Well,” said Polly, “it's got to go; we can't help it.” But she looked
so sorrowful over it that half the pleasure was gone for Ben; for Polly
wanted everything just right, and was very particular about things.

“Now, Dave.” Ben held his hand, and “David” went down next to Joel.

But when it was Phronsie's turn, she protested that Polly, and no one
else, must hold her hand.

“It's a dreadful hard name to write--Phronsie is,” said Polly, as she
guided Phronsie's fat little hand that clung faithfully to the stubby
old pen. “There, it's over now,” she cried; “and I'm thankful! I
wouldn't write another for anything!”

“Read it all over now, Ben,” cried Mrs. Pepper, “and don't speak,
children, till he gets through.”

“Don't it sound elegant!” said Polly, clasping her hands, when he had
finished. “I didn't think we ever could do it so nice, did you, Ben?”

“No, indeed, I didn't,” replied Ben, in a highly ecstatic frame of mind.
“Now--oh! what'll we do for an envelope?” he asked in dismay.

“You'll have to do without that,” said Mrs. Pepper, “for there isn't any
in the house--but see here, children,” she added, as she saw the sorry
faces before her--“you just fold up the letter, and put it inside the
parcel; that'll be just as good.”

“Oh dear,” said Polly; “but it would have been splendid the other way,
mammy--just like other folks!”

“You must make believe this is like other folks,” said Mrs. Pepper,
cheerily, “when you can't do any other way.”

“Yes,” said Ben, “that's so, Polly; tie 'em up quick's you can, and I'll
take 'em over to Deacon Blodgett's, for he's goin' to start early in the
morning.”

So after another last look all around, Polly put the cakes in the paper,
and tied it with four or five strong knots, to avoid all danger of its
undoing.

“He never'll untie it, Polly,” said Ben; “that's just like a girl's
knots!”

“Why didn't you tie it then?” said Polly; “I'm sure it's as good as
a boy's knots, and they always muss up a parcel so.” And she gave a
loving, approving little pat to the top of the package, which, despite
its multitude of knots, was certainly very neat indeed.

Ben, grasping the pen again, “here goes for the direction.

“Deary, yes!” said Polly. “I forgot all about that; I thought 'twas
done.”

“How'd you s'pose he'd get it?” asked Ben, coolly beginning the “M.”

“I don't know,” replied Polly, looking over his shoulder; “s'pose
anybody else had eaten 'em up, Ben!” And she turned pale at the very
thought.

“There,” said Ben, at last, after a good many flourishes, “now 'tis
done! you can't think of another thing to do to it, Polly!”

“Mamsie, see!” cried Polly, running with it to Mrs. Pepper, “isn't that
fine! 'Mr. Jasper E. King, at the Hotel Hingham.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, admiringly, to the content of all the children,
“I should think it was!”

“Let me take it in my hand,” screamed Joel, reaching eagerly up for the
tempting brown parcel.

“Be careful then, Joe,” said Polly, with an important air. So Joel took
a comfortable feel, and then Davie must have the same privilege. At
last it was off, and with intense satisfaction the children watched Ben
disappear with it down the long hill to Deacon Blodgett's.

The next day Ben came running in from his work at the deacon's.

“Oh, Polly, you had 'em!” he screamed, all out of breath. “You had 'em!”

“Had what?” asked Polly in astonishment. “Oh, Bensie, what do you mean?”

“Your flowers,” he panted. “You sent some flowers to Jasper.”

“Flowers to Jasper!” repeated Polly, afraid Ben had gone out of his
wits.

“Yes,” said Ben; “I'll begin at the beginning. You see, Polly, when I
went down this morning, Betsey was to set me to work. Deacon Blodgett
and Mrs. Blodgett had started early, you know; and while I was
a-cleanin' up the woodshed, as she told me, all of a sudden she said,
as she stood in the door looking on, 'Oh, Ben, Mis' Blodgett took some
posies along with your parcel.' 'What?' said I; I didn't know as I'd
heard straight. 'Posies, I said,' says Betsey; 'beautiful ones they
were, too, the best in the garding. I heard her tell Mr. Blodgett it
would be a pity if that sick boy couldn't have some flowers, and she
knew the Pepper children were crazy about 'em, so she twisted 'em in
the string around the parcel, and there they stood up and looked fine, I
tell you, as they drove away.' So, Polly!”

“Bensie Pepper!” cried Polly, taking hold of his jacket, and spinning
him round, “I told you so! I told you so!”

“I know you did,” said Ben, as she gave him a parting whirl, “an' I wish
you'd say so about other things, Polly, if you can get 'em so easy.”




JOLLY DAYS


“Oh Ben,” cried Jasper, overtaking him by a smart run as he was turning
in at the little brown gate one morning three days after, “do wait.”

“Halloa!” cried Ben, turning around, and setting down his load--a bag of
salt and a basket of potatoes--and viewing Jasper and Prince with great
satisfaction.

“Yes, here I am,” said Jasper. “And how I've run; that fellow on the
stage was awful slow in getting here--oh, you're so good,” he said
and his eyes, brimful of gladness, beamed on Ben. “The cakes were just
prime, and 'twas great fun to get your letter.”

“Did you like it?” asked Ben, the color up all over his brown
face--“Like it!” cried Jasper. “Why 'twas just splendid; and the cakes
were royal! Isn't Polly smart though, to bake like that!” he added
admiringly.

“I guess she is,” said Ben, drawing himself up to his very tallest
dimensions. “She knows how to do everything, Jasper King!”

“I should think she did,” responded the boy quickly. “I wish she was my
sister,” he finished longingly.

“Well, I don't,” quickly replied Ben, “for then she wouldn't be mine;
and I couldn't think of being without Polly! Was your father angry
about--about--'the gingerbread boy'?” he asked timidly, trembling for an
answer.

“Oh dear,” cried Jasper, tumbling over on the grass, “don't, don't! I
shan't be good for anything if you make me laugh! oh! wasn't it funny;”
 and he rolled over and over, shaking with glee.

“Yes,” said Ben, immensely relieved to find that no offence had been
taken. “But she would send it; Polly tried not to have her, and she
most cried when Phronsie was so determined, cause she said your father
never'd let you come again--”

“Twas just lovely in Phronsie,” said the boy, sitting up and wiping his
eyes, “but oh it was so funny! you ought to have seen my father, Ben
Pepper.”

“Oh, then he was angry,” cried Ben.

“No indeed he wasn't!” said Jasper; “don't you think it! do you know it
did him lots of good, for he'd been feeling real badly that morning, he
hadn't eaten any breakfast, and when he saw that gingerbread boy--”
 here Jasper rolled over again with a peal of laughter--“and heard the
message, he just put back his head, and he laughed--why, I never heard
him laugh as he did then! the room shook all over; and he ate a big
dinner, and all that afternoon he felt as good as could be. But he says
he's coming to see the little girl that baked it for him before we go
home.”

Ben nearly tumbled over by the side of Jasper at these words--“Coming to
see us!” he gasped.

“Yes,” said Jasper, who had scarcely got over his own astonishment about
it, for if the roof had suddenly whisked off on to the church steeple,
he couldn't have been more amazed than when he heard his father say
cheerily: “Well, Jasper my boy, I guess I shall have to drive over and
see your little girl, since she's been polite enough to bake me this,”
 pointing to the wild-looking “gingerbread boy.”

“Come in and tell 'em about it,” cried Ben, radiantly, picking up his
potatoes and salt. “It's all right, Polly!” he said in a jubilant voice,
“for here's Jasper, and he'll tell you so himself.”

“Hush!” said Jasper warningly, “don't let Phronsie hear; well, here's
my pet now,” and after bobbing lovingly to the others, with eyes beaming
over with fun, he caught up the little girl who was screaming--“Oh,
here's Jasper! and my beyew-ti-ful doggie!”

“Now Phronsie,” he cried, “give me a kiss; you haven't any soft soap
to-day, have you? no; that's a good, nice one, now; your 'gingerbread
boy' was just splendid!”

“Did he eat it?” asked the child in grave delight.

“Well--no--he hasn't eaten it yet,” said Jasper, smiling on the others;
“he's keeping it to look at, Phronsie.”

“I should think so!” groaned Polly.

“Never mind, Polly,” Ben whispered; “Jasper's been a-tellin' me about
it; his father liked it--he did truly.”

“Oh!” said Polly, “I'm so glad!”

“He had eyes,” said Phronsie, going back to the charms of the
“gingerbread boy.”

“I know it,” said Jasper admiringly; “so he did.”

“Rather deep sunk, one of 'em was,” muttered Ben.

“And I'll bake you one, Jasper,” said the child as he put her down; “I
will very truly--some day.”

“Will you,” smiled Jasper; “well then,” and there was a whispered
conference with Phronsie that somehow sent that damsel into a blissful
state of delight. And then while Phronsie monopolized Prince, Jasper
told them all about the reception of the parcel--how very dull and
forlorn he was feeling that morning, Prince and he shut up in-doors--and
how his father had had a miserable night, and had eaten scarcely no
breakfast, and just at this juncture there came a knock at the door,
“and” said Jasper, “your parcel walked in, all dressed up in flowers!”

“They weren't our flowers,” said Polly, honestly. “Mrs. Blodgett put 'em
on.”

“Well she couldn't have, if you hadn't sent the parcel,” said Jasper in
a tone of conviction.

Then he launched out into a description of how they opened the
package--Prince looking on, and begging for one of the cakes.

“Oh, didn't you give him one?” cried Polly at this. “Good old Prince!”

“Yes I did,” said Jasper, “the biggest one of all.”

“The one I guess,” interrupted Joel, “with the big raisin on top.”

Polly spoke up quickly to save any more remarks on Joel's part. “Now
tell us about your father--and the 'gingerbread boy.'”

So Jasper broke out with a merry laugh, into this part of the story,
and soon had them all in such a gale of merriment, that Phronsie stopped
playing out on the door-step with Prince, and came in to see what the
matter was.

“Never mind,” said Polly, trying to get her breath, just as Jasper was
relating how Mr. King set up the “gingerbread boy” on his writing table
before him, while he leaned back in his chair for a hearty laugh.

“And to make it funnier still,” said Jasper “don't you think, a little
pen-wiper he has, made like a cap, hanging on the pen-rack above him,
tumbled off just at this very identical minute right on the head of the
'gingerbread boy,' and there it stuck!”

“Oh!” they all screamed, “if we could only have seen it.”

“What was it?” asked Phronsie, pulling Polly's sleeve to make her hear.

So Jasper took her in his lap, and told how funny the “gingerbread boy”
 looked with a cap on, and Phronsie clapped her hands, and laughed with
the rest, till the little old kitchen rang and rang again.

And then they had the baking! and Polly tied one of her mother's ample
aprons on Jasper, as Mrs. Pepper had left directions if he should come
while she was away; and he developed such a taste for cookery, and had
so many splendid improvements on the Peppers' simple ideas, that the
children thought it the most fortunate thing in the world that he came;
and one and all voted him a most charming companion.

“You could cook a Thanksgiving dinner in this stove, just as easy as
not,” said Jasper, putting into the oven something on a little cracked
plate that would have been a pie if there were any centre; but lacking
that necessary accompaniment, probably was a short-cake. “Just as easy
as not,” he repeated with emphasis, slamming the door, to give point to
his remarks.

“No, you couldn't either,” said Ben at the table with equal decision;
“not a bit of it, Jasper King!”

“Why, Ben Pepper?” asked Jasper, “that oven's big enough! I should like
to know why not?”

“'Cause there isn't anything to cook,” said Ben coolly, cutting out a
piece of dough for a jumble; “we don't keep Thanksgiving.”

“Not keep Thanksgiving!” said Jasper, standing quite still; “never had a
Thanksgiving! well, I declare,” and then he stopped again.

“Yes,” answered Ben; “we had one once; 'twas last year--but that wasn't
much.”

“Well then,” said Jasper, leaning over the table, “I'll tell you what I
should think you'd do--try Christmas.”

“Oh, that's always worse,” said Polly, setting down her rolling-pin to
think--which immediately rolled away by itself off from the table.

“We never had a Christmas,” said little Davie reflectively; “what are
they like, Jasper?”

Jasper sat quite still, and didn't reply to this question for a moment
or two.

To be among children who didn't like Thanksgiving, and who “never
had seen a Christmas,” and “didn't know what it was like,” was a new
revelation to him.

“They hang up stockings,” said Polly softly.

How many, many times she had begged her mother to try it for the younger
ones; but there was never anything to put in them, and the winters were
cold and hard, and the strictest economy only carried them through.

“Oh!” said little Phronsie in horror, “are their feet in 'em, Polly?”

“No dear,” said Polly; while Jasper instead of laughing, only stared.
Something requiring a deal of thought was passing through the boy's mind
just then. “They shall have a Christmas!” he muttered, “I know father'll
let me.” But he kept his thoughts to himself; and becoming his own gay,
kindly self, he explained and told to Phronsie and the others, so many
stories of past Christmases he had enjoyed, that the interest over the
baking soon dwindled away, until a horrible smell of something burning
brought them all to their senses.

“Oh! the house is burning!” cried Polly. “Oh get a pail of water!”

“Tisn't either,” said Jasper, snuffing wisely; “oh! I know--I forgot all
about it--I do beg your pardon.” And running to the stove, he knelt
down and drew out of the oven, a black, odorous mass, which with a
crest-fallen air he brought to Polly.

“I'm no end sorry I made such a mess of it,” he said, “I meant it for
you.”

“Tisn't any matter,” said Polly kindly.

“And now do you go on,” cried Joel and David both in the same breath,
“all about the Tree, you know.”

“Yes, yes,” said the others; “if you're not tired, Jasper.”

“Oh, no,” cried their accommodating friend, “I love to tell about it;
only wait--let's help Polly clear up first.”

So after all traces of the frolic had been tidied up, and made nice for
the mother's return, they took seats in a circle and Jasper regaled
them with story and reminiscence, till they felt as if fairy land were
nothing to it!

“How did you ever live through it, Jasper King,” said Polly, drawing the
first long breath she had dared to indulge in. “Such an elegant time!”

Jasper laughed. “I hope I'll live through plenty more of them,” he said
merrily. “We're going to sister Marian's again, father and I; we always
spend our Christmas there, you know, and she's to have all the cousins,
and I don't know how many more; and a tree--but the best of all, there's
going to be a German carol sung by choir boys--I shall like that best of
all.”

“What are choir boys?” asked Polly who was intensely fond of music.

“In some of the churches,” explained Jasper, “the choir is all boys; and
they do chant, and sing anthems perfectly beautifully, Polly!”

“Do you play on the piano, and sing?” asked Polly, looking at him in
awe.

“Yes,” said the boy simply; “I've played ever since I was a little
fellow, no bigger'n Phronsie.”

“Oh, Jasper!” cried Polly, clasping her hands, her cheeks all
aflame--“do you mean to say you do really and truly play on the piano?”

“Why yes,” said the boy, looking into her flashing eyes. “Polly's
always crazy about music,” explained Ben; “she'll drum on the table, and
anywhere, to make believe it's a piano.”

“There's Dr. Fisher going by,” said Joel, who, now that they had gotten
on the subject of music, began to find prickles running up and down his
legs from sitting so still. “I wish he'd stop.”

“Is he the one that cured your measles--and Polly's eyes?” asked Jasper
running to the window. “I want to see him.”

“Well there he is,” cried Ben, as the doctor put his head out of the gig
and bowed and smiled to the little group in the window.

“He's just lovely,” cried Polly, “oh! I wish you knew him.”

“If father's sick again,” said Jasper, “we'll have him--he looks nice,
anyway--for father don't like the doctor over in Hingham--do you know
perhaps we'll come again next summer; wouldn't that be nice!”

“Oh!” cried the children rapturously; “do come, Jasper, do!”

“Well, maybe,” said Jasper, “if father likes it and sister Marian and
her family will come with us; they do some summers. You'd like little
Dick, I know,” turning to Phronsie. “And I guess all of you'd like all
of them,” he added, looking at the group of interested listeners. “They
wanted to come this year awfully; they said--'Oh grandpapa, do let us go
with you and Jappy, and--”

“What!” said the children.

“Oh,” said Jasper with a laugh, “they call me Jappy--its easier to say
than Jasper; ever so many people do for short. You may if you want to,”
 he said looking around on them all.

“How funny!” laughed Polly, “But I don't know as it is any worse than
Polly or Ben.”

“Or Phronsie,” said Jappy. “Don't you like Jappy?” he said, bringing
his head down to her level, as she sat on the little stool at his feet,
content in listening to the merry chat.

“Is that the same as Jasper?” she asked gravely.

“Yes, the very same,” he said.

When they parted--Jappy and the little Peppers were sworn friends; and
the boy, happy in his good times in the cheery little home, felt the
hours long between the visits that his father, when he saw the change
that they wrought in his son, willingly allowed him to make.

“Oh dear!” said Mrs. Pepper one day in the last of September--as a
carriage drawn by a pair of very handsome horses, stopped at their
door, “here comes Mr. King I do believe; we never looked worse'n we do
to-day!”

“I don't care,” said Polly, flying out of the bedroom. “Jappy's with
him, mamma, and it'll be nice I guess. At any rate, Phronsie's clean as
a pink,” she thought to herself looking at the little maiden, busy with
“baby” to whom she was teaching deportment in the corner. But there was
no time 

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