"Just like your father," cried Mrs. Chatterton, settling herself irascibly back in the chair-depths again. "There is no hope that affairs in this house will mend. I wash my hands of you."
"I am so glad that you consider me like my father," said Mrs. Whitney gleefully as a child. "We surely are united on this question."
"May I read some more?" cried Polly, coming in softly, and trying to calm the impetuous rush of delight as her eyes met Mrs. Whitney"s.
"Yes; I am waiting for you," said Mrs. Chatterton. "Begin where you left off."
Mrs. Whitney bit her pretty lips and slipped out of her chair, just pausing a moment to lay her hand on the young shoulder as she pa.s.sed, and a world of comfort fell upon Polly, shut in once more to her dreary task.
"How perfectly splendid that I didn"t go to Silvia Home"s luncheon party now!" cried Polly"s heart over and over between the lines. "If I had, I should have missed dear Auntie"s home-coming, and d.i.c.ky"s." She glanced up with luminous eyes as she whirled the sheet. Mrs.
Chatterton, astonishing as it may seem, was actually smiling.
"It"s some comfort to hear you read," she observed with a sigh of enjoyment, "because you enjoy it yourself. I wouldn"t give a fig for anybody to try to do it."
Polly felt like a guilty little thing to take this quietly, and she eased her conscience by being more glad that she was in that very room doing that very task. And so the moments sped on.
Outside, d.i.c.k was holding high revel as every one revolved around him, the hero of the coasting accident, till the boy ran considerable danger from all the attention he was receiving. But one glance and a smile from Mrs. Whitney brought him back to himself.
"Don"t talk any more about it," he cried a trifle impatiently. "I was a m.u.f.f to stick on, when I knew we were going over. Mamma, won"t you stop them?"
And she did.
"Do you know, d.i.c.ky and I have a secret to tell all of you good people." The color flew into her soft cheek, and her eyes beamed.
"Really, Marian," said her father, whose hand had scarcely ceased patting d.i.c.k"s brown head since the boy"s home-coming, "you"ve grown young in Badgertown. I never saw you look so well as you do to-day."
Mrs. Whitney laughed and tossed him a gay little smile, that carried him back to the days when Marian King stood before him looking just so.
"Now listen, father, and all you good people, to my secret--d.i.c.ky"s and mine; we are allowed to tell it now. Papa Whitney sailed in the Servia, and he ought to be in to-day!"
A shout of joy greeted her announcement. Polly, off in her prison, could hear the merry sounds, and her happy heart echoed them. The misery of the past week, when she had been bearing an unatoned fault, seemed to drop away from her as she listened, and to say, "Life holds sunshine yet."
Then a hush dropped upon the gay uproar. She did not know that d.i.c.ky was proclaiming "Yes, and he is never, never going back again. That is, unless he takes mamma and me, you know."
Mrs. Chatterton turned suddenly upon the young figure.
"Do go!" She tossed an imperative command with her jeweled fingers.
"You have ceased to be amusing since your interest is all in the other room with that boy."
Polly dashed the newspaper to the floor, and rushing impulsively across the room, threw herself, with no thought for the consequences, on her knees at Mrs. Chatterton"s chair.
"Oh--oh!" she cried, the color flying up to the brown waves on her temples, "don"t send me off; then I shall know you never will forgive me."
"Get up, do!" exclaimed Mrs. Chatterton, in disgust; "you are crushing my gown, and besides I hate scenes."
But Polly held resolutely to the chair-arm, and never took her brown eyes from the cold face.
"I must say, Polly Pepper," cried Mrs. Chatterton with rising anger, "you are the most disagreeable girl that I ever had the misfortune to meet. I, for one, will not put up with your constant ebullitions of temper. Go out of this room!"
Polly rose slowly and drew herself up with something so new in face and manner that the old lady instinctively put up her eyegla.s.s and gazed curiously through it, as one would look at a strange animal.
"Humph!" she said slowly at last, "well, what do you want to say? Speak out, and then go."
"Nothing," said Polly in a low voice, but quite distinctly, "only I shall not trouble you again, Mrs. Chatterton." And as the last words were spoken, she was out of the room.
"Pretty doings these!" Mr. King, by a dexterous movement, succeeded in slipping back of the portiere folds into the little writing-room, as Polly rushed out through the other doorway into the hall. "A fortunate thing it was that I left d.i.c.k, to see what had become of Polly. Now, Cousin Eunice, you move from my house!" and descending the stairs, he called determinedly, "Polly, Polly, child!"
Polly, off in her own room now, heard him, and for the first time in her life, wished she need not answer.
"Polly--Polly!" the determined call rang down the pa.s.sage, causing her to run fast with a "Yes, Grandpapa, I"m coming."
"Now, I should just like to inquire," began Mr. King, taking her by her two young shoulders and looking down into the flushed face, "what she has been saying to you." "Oh, Grandpapa!" down went Polly"s brown head, "don"t make me tell. Please don"t, Grandpapa."
"I shall!" declared Mr. King; "every blessed word. Now begin!"
"She--she wanted me to go out of the room," said Polly, in a reluctant gasp.
"Indeed!" snorted Mr. King. "Well, she will soon go out of that room.
Indeed, I might say, out of the house."
"Oh, Grandpapa!" exclaimed Polly, in great distress, and raising the brown eyes--he was dismayed to find them filling with tears--"don"t, don"t send her away! It is all my fault; indeed it is, Grandpapa!"
"Your fault," cried Mr. King irately; "you must not say such things, child; that"s silly; you don"t know the woman."
"Grandpapa," cried Polly, holding back the storm of tears to get the words out, "I never told you--I couldn"t--but I said perfectly dreadful words to her a week ago. Oh, Grandpapa! I did, truly."
"That"s right," said the old gentleman in a pleased tone. "What were they, pray tell? Let us know."
"Oh, Grandpapa, don"t!" begged Polly, with a shiver; "I want to forget them."
"If you would only follow them up with more," said Mr. King meditatively; "when it comes to tears, she must march, you know."
"I won"t cry," said Polly, swallowing the lump in her throat, "if you will only let her stay."
She turned to him such a distressed and white face that Mr. King stood perplexedly looking down at her, having nothing to say.
"I"m tired of her," at last he said; "we are all tired of her; she has about worn us out."
"Grandpapa," cried Polly, seeing her advantage in his hesitation, "if you will only let her stay, I will never beg you for anything again."
"Well, then she goes," cried Mr. King shortly. "Goodness me, Polly, if you are going to stop asking favors, Cousin Eunice marches instanter!"
"Oh! I"ll beg and tease for ever so many things," cried Polly radiantly, her color coming back. "Will you let her stay, Grandpapa--will you?" She clasped his arm tightly and would not let him go.
"Well," said Mr. King slowly, "I"ll think about it, Polly."
"Will you?" cried Polly. "Dear Grandpapa, please say yes."
Mr. King drew a long breath. "Yes," he said at last.