THE FAMOUS PEPPER BOOKS

By MARGARET SIDNEY

LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

BOSTON

Ben and Polly held their breath. What if they shouldn’t fit!—Page [43].

FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS
IN THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE

BY
MARGARET SIDNEY
Author of “Five Little Peppers and How they Grew,”
“Five Little Peppers Midway,” “Five Little Peppers
Grown Up,” “Ben Pepper,” “A Little Maid of
Concord Town,” “Two Little Friends in
Norway,” etc.

ILLUSTRATED BY HERMANN HEYER

BOSTON
LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

PEPPER
TRADE MARK
Registered in U. S. Patent Office.

Copyright, 1907, by Harriett M. Lothrop.
Published, August, 1907.
All Rights Reserved.
Five Little Peppers
in the Little Brown House.
Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing Co.—Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

PREFACE

“What ever became of Polly Pepper’s famous Chicken Pie, and also Phronsie’s red-topped shoes?” the friends of the “Five Little Peppers” keep asking. “We have searched through all the Pepper Books, and cannot find them. Please give us those two stories again.”

At last all these requests are granted in this book, containing, first of all, those two stories that make the very beginning of all the records of the Pepper Family. Indeed, there wasn’t any Pepper Family before they were written; nor any Little Brown House, not a sign of one; nor any Badgertown even, till Margaret Sidney one day wrote “Polly Pepper’s Chicken Pie” and sent it to the Wide Awake Magazine.

And no one could be more astonished than was she—for the record was so simple—when the editor wrote for another one just like it. So “Phronsie Pepper’s New Shoes” was written.

And then—well, the editor wrote that the Wide Awake must have enough stories for one year, to be connected. So Margaret Sidney had to go regularly after that to the “Little Brown House” and write down all the records just as Mrs. Pepper and the Five Little Peppers told them to her, and then those insatiable editors wrote that they must have a book—nothing more nor less—because the children’s letters to them from all over the country demanded it. So that was the way it all began. And of course the two separate stories—the motif, as it were, for the book—had to be left out.

So here they are now in the post of honor—leading off in the very front of the volume, as is quite proper; the other stories (which are all just newly written expressly for this book) following humbly after in the wake of Phronsie’s red-topped shoes.

MARGARET SIDNEY.

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

I
POLLY PEPPER’S CHICKEN PIE

TO begin with, it was the most remarkable chicken that was to have made the famous pie for Thanksgiving. But alas! A sad mishap befell the Pepper family.

In the first place none of the family ever knew where it came from. Ebenezer, or Ben, as he was usually called, found it one day in a swamp, down by the meadow as he was digging sweet-flag to sell, in order to get some money to buy a pair of boots for the coming winter. It was not hurt, only it couldn’t get out. The wonder is, how it ever got there. However, Ben didn’t stop to think of that; he must set to work to get Master Chick out. So, forgetting flag-root in his eagerness, he took an old fence rail, and by dint of poking and urging it, and tumbling around in the bog till he was pretty wet himself, he at last had the satisfaction of obtaining his prize.

It proved to be a fine black chicken, a shanghai, and grasping it tightly under one arm, its eyes protruding with fright, Ben flew home, and bursting into the door of the Little Brown House, astonished them all by thrusting the long-legged black fowl before their faces, nearly upsetting Polly as he did so, who was helping her mother pull out the basting-threads of the coat Mrs. Pepper had just finished on the edge of the twilight.

The chicken gave a shrill scream, and this was the first introduction to its future home.

“Goodness me, Ben!” ejaculated Polly, “you scared me ’most to death, and you’ve broken my box.”

“What is it?” exclaimed Mrs. Pepper; “is it a crow?”

“Ho! Ho! Crow, Mother?” replied Ben, holding the chicken firmly by one leg, “It’s the—well, the most beautiful bird you ever saw! Hey, Polly, look!” he flapped the shanghai over Polly’s brown head as she disconsolately groped around on the kitchen floor for her scattered spools, and the cover of her cherished box.

“I don’t care for any old birds, Ben Pepper. See there!” and she brought to light from under her mother’s chair the dilapidated cover.

“Oh, Polly, I’m real sorry. Come, I’ll give you half of the chicken. See, he’s real big, and won’t he grow into a buster! And then, perhaps,—hooray, Polly; why, then we’ll have him for Thanksgiving, and you can make your pie, you know.”

“Will you really, Ben?” relented Polly, as she sat on the floor.

“Yes, certain true, black and blue!” solemnly said Ben.

“Hooray, then!” screamed Polly, “and, Bensie, I’ll make the crust awfully thick, and it’ll be ’most all drumsticks,” and she danced a whirligig in the middle of the old kitchen floor.

“Queer kind of crust, I should think; drumstick crust,” retorted Ben.

“Oh, you Benny goose!” flung back Polly, as she went up to hug her mother’s neck; “Mammy, when is Thanksgiving? Is it more than six weeks, anyway, before it comes?”

“Let me see,” said Mrs. Pepper, laying down her work. “Oh, yes, it’s July now. Yes, you’ll have to wait four months. But perhaps you can’t have it at all, for if the chicken belongs to anybody round here you must give it back. Let me see it, Ben,” and his mother grasped the leg of the bird, which all this time was squawking dismally, and amid the groans from Ben, and the wails from Polly, she repeated: “yes, if you can find out where it belongs, you’ve got to carry it back.”

“What, and have no chicken pie!” exclaimed Polly. “Why, we can’t, Mother, we’ve waited so long for our pie, and I’ve never tasted one. We can’t give it back!”

“For shame, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, sternly, “the chicken doesn’t belong to you, and I should rather you’d never taste a morsel of chicken pie than to get one underhand. But put him away now, children,” she said in a kinder tone, as she saw the sorrowful faces before her; “he can sleep in the box the gray goose had in the shed, for to-night anyway, and then in the morning we’ll send him home if he’s got any to go to.”

“And we won’t have anything left but the old gray goose,” mourned Polly; “I wish the old thing was dead, I do!”

“Why, Polly Pepper! And then we wouldn’t have anything,” said Ben, preparing to take his chicken out to its quarters for the night.

“Well, I don’t care,” said Polly, as she followed; “I’m tired of seeing her round, anyway.”

Now, all this time, the younger Peppers were away by chance from the old kitchen, or there would have been more of an uproar still, over the advent of the chicken. The two small boys were busy on the edge of Farmer Brown’s cow-yard, where in a dirty pool of water they were having the highest glee over the sailing of a boat, composed of one of Polly’s old shoes with a rag for a sail. Well was it for the chicken that they were missing at the reception, else it would have been almost torn to death with delight. And Sophronia, or Phronsie, had been put to bed early this afternoon, so she was tucked away fast asleep under the gay, patched bedquilt of the old crib.

There was no father in this Pepper household. He died when Phronsie was a baby, and Mrs. Pepper struggled along bravely, making coats to put bread into her own and her children’s mouths. And the children, healthy and rugged, and happy-go-lucky, came up or “scrambled up,” as Mrs. Pepper said, and fairly made the little old brown house ring with their cheery life.

Polly was ten, and Ben one year older, and it was the one great ambition of their lives “to help Mother.” The only thing in which Ben could really boast superiority over Polly, aside from his being a boy while she was only a girl, was the fact that once on a great and memorable visit with his father to a neighboring farm, he had eaten a piece of chicken pie; oh, so perfectly splendid! And to Polly, who had never tasted or even seen one, he dilated upon it, till she was nearly wild with curiosity and longing at the delightful vision he brought up.

“Oh, Ben, was it good?” she would say the five-hundredth time, as in some interval when work “slacked up,” perhaps when they crouched at dusk on the kitchen floor, the wink of fire from the old stove lighting up their absorbed little faces, they imagined or played they had all their fancied dreams or wildest wishes realized.

“Yes, you better believe!” Ben smacked his lips; “seem’s if I taste it now!”

“Well, how did it taste?” questioned Polly, still for the five-hundredth time.

“Oh, like,—well, like everything nice; there was fat, and wing, and oh, the wishbone, Polly, and a thick crust, oh, thicker’n my hand, and the juice was prime, and, well, it was all the nice tastes together you ever had in your life, Polly Pepper!”

“O dear!” Polly would sigh, “don’t you s’pose we’ll ever have one, Ben? I could make one, I know; I can ’most see one now, you’ve told me about it so many times.”

And Polly would shut her eyes, and give herself up to the delicious thought till she had to hop up to put the children to bed, or to help Mother in the many ways in which she knew so well how to save her steps. And now here was a fine chicken come right to their very door!

The Pepper family had no cow, nor pig, nor even a chick. The only thing of life in the animal kingdom belonging to the household was an old gray goose; too old and tough to benefit any one by her death. She was just as cross as she could be, or at least she might have amused the children and been of some comfort. She had grown for ever so long in her present quarters, wandering around the poor Little Brown House and shed, picking up a scanty living and taking thanklessly all the bits that the children still conscientiously fed her.

Polly and Ben had glorious visions of the day when they would “buy Mammy a cow,” and many were the talks and plans as to exactly what kind it should be. But nothing ever came their way, until this black chicken appeared right in the old kitchen, and all for Thanksgiving, too! That is, if they could keep him; for Polly and Ben, albeit the conflict within, conscientiously obeyed the commands of their mother and made inquiries far and near as to the ownership of Master Shanghai. Nobody knew anything of him, and he seemed indeed to have dropped down from the clouds. Clearly he was to remain at the Peppers’, and, as day after day passed by and they were not forced to give him up, their spirits rose, until the gayety over the future festival assumed the jolliest aspect. They already saw in imagination the glorious pie completed, and decking the festival board which Polly declared “must be trimmed with flowers.”

“Whew! Where are you going to get flowers?” demanded practical Ben.

“I don’t care; we must!” persisted Polly. “Folks always have them at a party, and we’ll get them someway; you’ll see.”

But although Ben always stanchly pinned his faith to whatever Polly said, on this occasion he only gave a little sniff. It was too good to be true.

So time passed on. The chick was fed, often by the scrimping of Polly’s, or Ben’s, or Joel’s, or David’s, or little Phronsie’s plate, or, as it frequently happened, by all of them, each stealing out secretly to do it. Consequently he grew and throve famously, his thin frame filling out, until he enjoyed his new quarters so well that he confided in a burst of delight one day to the old gray goose his pleasure and delight at the attention he was receiving.

“Humph!” said the old goose, with a knowing look, “you don’t know as much as you will in a short time, say in November.”

Now what these mysterious words of the cross old goose meant, or even what November was, the chicken was unable to tell, having never in his short life seen a November; so he went to work, digging and scratching over the old stony ground, and soon forgot all about it.

But as time passed on, the hints of the goose grew broader and deeper, till at last the shanghai, politely but plainly one day, asked her to explain and tell him exactly what she did mean. This was the week before Thanksgiving, a cold, dreary afternoon, and the two inhabitants of the old worn shed were perched on a rail shivering with the cold, and engaged in a conversation that caused Shanghai to shiver even more with fright. Inside the house, the fun had commenced.

The plans were all made, it is true, weeks before; but there remained that mysterious consulting and “talking over” which is half the pleasure, and at last it was decided that Ben could actually go up to the store to-night when he carried home Mr. Atkins’s coat, and buy half a pound of raisins for the pudding. For Mrs. Pepper, seeing the joy and excitement of the children, scrimped and twisted her scanty earnings till she could contribute to the feast, and “you shall have the pudding, children,” an announcement which was received with a perfect babel of delight. And Joel stood on his head in the corner, and waved his feet in the air, unable to express his joy in any other appropriate way.

Now, nothing remained but to kill the black chicken, which Ben was to do on the morrow morning, for Polly declared, as that would be Saturday, it must be done that day, “and then we shan’t have to think it’s got to be done, over Sunday, you know, Bensie, dear.”

The feathers, David said, must be for a pillow to put at the mother’s back when she sewed; a proposition that made Mrs. Pepper beam an appreciative smile, for Davie was “Mother’s boy.”

“And, oh, Ben, you can’t think how perfectly elegant the crust is going to be! Mamsie, now, don’t I know?” and Polly began a rapid jargon of the directions her mother had given her of the way they made chicken pies when she was a girl.

Poor woman! Very few had come in her way during her married life. Thankful enough was she when bread and milk were plentiful; and of late years mush and brown bread took the place of more elaborate fare.

“Oh, and I say,” broke in Joel, “I’m going to have the wishbone—so there!”

“No, you mustn’t, Joel; Davie’s younger,” said Polly, decisively.

“Well, Phronsie’s youngest,” retorted Joel.

“Yes, you’re right there,” declared Ben. “Phronsie, you’re the girl for the wishbone. Do you hear, Puss, and you must wish with me,” tossing her up in the air.

“No, no, I spoke for you, Phronsie,” screamed Joel. “Say you’ll wish with me.”

“What is it, Ben?” said little Phronsie; “what is a wissbone?”

“Oh, you little goose,” began Joel, but Polly gave him a pinch to make him stop.

“Let her alone, Joel,” said she. “Phronsie, you’ll see when Thanksgiving comes, and that’s next week. Come and see, now, if the flour is all right.”

And Polly spun along to the little old cupboard in the corner, the whole troop at her heels, to inspect the precious materials. The flour had been measured out certainly a week or more, and there it stood in the bag in the old yellow pudding-dish. Everything was in readiness. There was the lard near by in a cracked bowl, and to the five pairs of happy, expectant eyes directed to these festive preparations, no sight could have been more delightful.

“Well, children,” said Polly, as she shut the cupboard door fast with an important air, “we must get up early in the morning, there’ll be so much to do. Now, Phronsie, it’s time for you to go to bed.”

“Oh, no, I’m not one bit tired,” protested Phronsie, in an injured tone. But while Polly went to bring the little flannel nightgown to undress her by the kitchen fire, Phronsie’s little yellow head bobbed ominously, and she nearly fell off her stool, so that Ben had to carry her in his arms into the bedroom, after all.

All this while, in the thick dreary November twilight, the old gray goose and the black chicken were talking busily. The old goose was so jealous and determined to make the last hours of the chicken very miserable, that she dilated at length and with great exactness on the dreadful fate that awaited him on the morrow; and painted in fearful words the awful ending of being baked in pieces in a pie!

“I’ve seen ’em!” she declared, with the air of one who knew what she was talking about. “Year after year, hens and chickens, yes, and geese, too, stepping around in the morning, oh, so happy and smart, and then at evening they would go past here to market all stiff and stark, with their heads off, and Mr. Brown’s boy holding ’em by their legs! All for pies, and so that people may eat themselves sick. And they call that a Thanksgiving!”

How the chicken shook! It almost fell from its perch; but it was very dark, so the old goose couldn’t see very well. Shanghai wouldn’t, for all the world, have had her jealousy rewarded by a sight of the terror she had inspired, so he controlled himself like a brave little fellow, and although his heart was beating dreadfully, he commanded his voice enough to ask, “Well, why weren’t you, then, baked in a pie along with the others?”

“What,—why—well,” stammered the goose, “they were going to kill me time and again, but, well, the fact is, they thought so much of me they couldn’t bear to.”

In spite of its fright, the black chicken couldn’t help laughing softly to himself as he sat there on the rail.

“Well, come, you’d better go to bed,” snapped the old goose; “they’ll come for you bright and early in the morning. I heard ’em saying so.”

“In that case,” declared the black chicken, drawing himself up on his long legs, “they won’t find me here; that’s all I’ve got to say.”

“Why, where will you go?” demanded the old goose, sticking out her long neck in amazement.

“Oh, I’m going to set out for my fortune,” gayly replied the chicken. “At any rate, I can’t fare worse than to be baked in a pie. Baked in a pie, forsooth! I think I see myself staying here for that! No, good night, Mrs. Goose. Thank you, for all your kindness; I’m off!”

“Yes, and be stuck again in a bog for your pains,” scornfully hissed the old goose, seeing it was useless to remonstrate further. The black chicken had hopped off from the rail, and, its long legs going at a pretty smart pace down the hill, it was soon out of sight.

Brightly rose the sun next morning, clear and cold. The air smelt of everything spicy and suggestive of the approaching holiday. Ben sharpened the old hatchet, the other children running away, for at the last minute they declared they didn’t want the chicken killed. They’d rather go without the pie. But Mrs. Pepper and Ben talked until they made them see it was no worse than if they had bought the chicken. Fowls had to be killed and eaten, and they couldn’t afford to keep the black chicken any longer. And the mother stopped Phronsie’s screams as she ran to hide her head in her lap, and wiped away the tears that ran down the little cheeks. Joel and David relented at last, and joined Ben as he hurried out of doors. And Polly, as she began to wash the breakfast dishes to be ready to help pick the chicken, tried to be gay, and to hum a scrap of a song to reassure Phronsie, when Joel burst into the old kitchen and after him, little Davie.

“’Tisn’t there!” shouted Joel. “No, ’tisn’t either!” gasped little David.

Polly whirled around with the dish-cloth in her hand, and stared. “What?” she exclaimed.

“No, ’tisn’t, I say,” screamed Joel, and then he began to cry as hard as he could.

“Oh, Joe, what is the matter?” implored Polly, and then Mrs. Pepper, thinking that Joel was hurt, dropped her work to hurry over. And Ben came running in, his ruddy face quite white, and his blue eyes big with distress.

“Come, boys, quick, and help me look for him,” and he seized Joel’s arm. “The chicken’s gone,” he explained to the distressed group.

Joel gave a louder scream at that.

“Stop, Joel,” said Polly. “Oh, isn’t it under the shed, Ben?” and she rushed out, dish-cloth in hand, followed by Mrs. Pepper and all the others.

“I don’t believe he’s there,” said Ben, gloomily, and so it proved. Neither there, nor in any other hiding-place, no matter how long and thoroughly they searched, could they see the black chicken. There was the old gray goose as usual, stalking around and stretching her long neck to see everything, while the children flew hither and thither calling the chicken. They searched adjoining meadows, and little David ran down to the brook to see if he had fallen in there.

At last, toward noon, tired and hot, they were obliged to give up all hope. And a most distressed little bunch of children went slowly into the Little Brown House; and oh, dismal enough, a pouring rain set in, splashing the small-paned window as if crying with them.

“Don’t you see you’re making Mamsie feel bad?” whispered Polly, hoarsely, to Joel, and she pointed over to the corner where Mrs. Pepper was trying to sew.

Little David, at that, went behind the door and struggled to keep back the tears. “I can’t help it,” sniffled Joel; “now we can’t,—we can’t,—”

“Be still,” said Polly, pulling his sleeve, and turning her back on the old cupboard, where the flour bag stood up so smartly, all ready in the old yellow bowl. “Oh!” Then she gave a jump into the middle of the floor.

“Oh, what is it?” they all screamed. Little Davie ran out from behind the door to hear.

“Why,” and Polly’s brown eyes grew very big, “oh, let’s have the old gray goose!”

“The old gray goose!” they all echoed, dreadfully disappointed, while Joel cried harder than ever, and little Davie slipped off toward the door again.

“I shouldn’t think you’d say so,” said Ben, in disapproval, and wondering at Polly, for she always helped out in any trouble.

“Well, now, I think Polly’s plan is a very good one,” said Mother Pepper, over in her corner. “You can’t get the chicken, and you must have your pie; it’s as good as commenced, and the old goose ought to be killed anyway; she’s getting so cross, it isn’t safe to have her around after she bit Sally Brown the other day. So, as Polly says, why not try it? There’ll be a pie anyway.”

“Oh, Mamsie!” cried Polly, flying over to her with rosy cheeks to throw her arms around her neck. “I’m so glad you think it’s right to try it,” smothering a sigh at thoughts of the pie they might have had.

“Indeed, I do, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, with a little pat on the brown head; “there, child, now run off to your work,” and she picked up her needle to make it fly faster than ever.

“It won’t be chicken pie,” said Joel, disconsolately, who had wiped his black eyes at these first signs of cheer.

“Well,” said Ben, stoutly, and swallowing hard, “if we can’t have chicken pie, why, we must take the next best, and that’s goose,” and he pretended to laugh heartily at his joke.

“And,” said Polly, running back to the little bunch of Peppers in the middle of the kitchen, for Davie wisely concluding since Mamsie thought Polly was right, everything was coming out well somehow, had hurried back to the others, “it’s all we’ve got left; but why didn’t the old goose run away, I wonder!”

The idea of the old gray goose running away, set them all into such a fit of laughter, that when they came out of it, the affair was as good as settled. The chicken pie was to be goose pie, and such a goose! The tables were turned decidedly; the old goose, huddling into the shed from the November rain and chuckling to herself, had called down on her own head a sure retribution.

The old gray goose was killed. Polly went bravely to work as if the pleasure of making the most beautiful chicken pie in all the world was before her. And the “children,” as Polly and Ben always called the three younger ones in the Pepper brood, laughed and sang and danced about, through all the preparations when they couldn’t help them forward, and almost forgot they had ever intended to have a chicken pie.

And they had a pudding on Thanksgiving Day. Oh, yes, and a famous one it was! And at the last minute, old Mrs. Beebe, whose husband kept a little shoe-shop in Badgertown Centre, stopped in their old wagon, with some beautiful asters.

“Here, children, ’s some posies for your table. I’ve got more’n I want; I’m real sorry you had such a time about your pie.” And afterward, in the midst of the festivities at home, she broke out, “I declare, I was ’most beat to see them little dears behave so nice, and flyin’ round pretendin’ they’d rather have a tough old goose than not.”

So Polly had her flowers after all, and she dressed the pie gayly with them.—Page [20].

So Polly had her flowers after all, and she dressed the pie gayly with them, stifling a sigh as she put them over the old goose; and they laughed and ate, to be sure, not so much as if tender chicken had been on their plates. However, it turned out better than they had expected, Polly having persistently boiled it before it was cut up to be baked in the pie. And so they hurried over that part of the repast; they were all in such a hurry to get to that elegant pudding. That was just magnificent, and done to a turn; and to Joel’s great delight, fairly beaded with plums. Wasn’t it splendid, though!

But at last the feast was all over, and they finally pushed back their chairs, leaving the biggest part of the goose pie untouched.

“Now,” said Phronsie, “where’s my wissbone, Polly? I want my wissbone, I do.”

“Oh, darling,” cried Polly, catching her up from the high-chair, “you’ll have to wait for next Thanksgiving for that. ’Tisn’t our fault you can’t have it, Phronsie; the black chicken ran away with it.”

II
PHRONSIE’S NEW SHOES

POLLY was working hard to make the fire burn. Something was the matter with the old stove that morning. There had been a big crack for some time at the back that let in the air alarmingly; but Ben had stuffed this up with putty the week before, and it had done very well; but just as Polly had washed up the breakfast dishes this morning, and was going to put her pans of bread into the oven, out tumbled the putty, the old black stove grew cold, and everything came to a standstill. The truth was, the poor old stove was about worn out.

“O dear!” said Polly, “now what’s going to be done! Why couldn’t it have waited, and Ben’s away, too!”

She flew around for something to stop up the hole with; she couldn’t find any putty, of course, but nothing else appeared. So she got down on the floor before it and rattled the dampers, and put in more wood. She was kneeling in front of it, her face very red with her exertions, and trying to push a refractory smouldering log of wood into a more “burnable” position, when Phronsie emerged from the bedroom with a very injured expression. “Oh, Polly, I’m so hungry!”

“Why, Phronsie,” said Polly, giving the log a push, “you can’t be.”

“Oh, but I am, Polly,” said Phronsie, shaking her head decidedly. “I know I am very hungry.”

“Well, wait just a bit, dear—oh, why won’t you stay where you ought to! (this to the log). You won’t act so when Ben comes, old log! Yes, Phronsie, in a minute!”

“Oh, let me get it, Polly,” said the little girl, eagerly. “Let me, do!”

“Do you think you can?” said Polly, resting a minute, her black hands stuck straight out before her as she sat on the floor.

“Oh, yes! just as nice,” said Phronsie; “it’s only some bread, Polly.”

Phronsie’s delight was to be thought big enough to help, to go to the bread-pail that hung under the little old steps that ran down into a small shed or provision room where the Pepper family always kept their slender stock of eatables. “Provision Room” was a good name for it, Polly had once said, because “there always ’s plenty of room for provisions, even if there are no provisions.” Polly knew there were some good bits from breakfast that Phronsie could easily get, so she said “yes” rather absently, and Phronsie trotted off.

As she passed the cupboard door, she spied the old bread-knife lying on the shelf. “Suppose,” thought Phronsie, “I should have to cut some bread—I know how—I do truly. I better take the knife, I think.” So she reached up, took the knife, and proceeded to go down the rickety steps. Now, why she should have stumbled this particular morning is more than anybody can tell. Yet, she certainly did; and the first thing Polly heard was a knock, then a rolling, then a sharp and loud cry. “Oh, what is the matter, Phronsie dear! I’m coming!”

Springing up, leaving the stove door wide open, she flew over the old steps, finding Phronsie in a little screaming heap at the bottom.

“Oh, darling baby! dear little Phron! don’t cry!” said Polly, gathering her up. “There, there.”

Sitting on the lowest step with her in her arms, she saw the knife off at some little distance, where it fell on the floor. “Oh, Phronsie, you didn’t take the knife! Oh!” she added faintly, as she saw a stream of blood roll over Phronsie’s pink apron, and great dabs on her face. White as a sheet, Polly never knew how she looked Phronsie over; but she soon saw the trouble came only from her little fat thumb, which, after the first fright, Phronsie protested was the only place that “hurt.”

Strange as it may seem, Phronsie had rolled over and over the steps, with the knife in her hand, and sustained no injury beyond a rather deep cut in her thumb, which, however, bled enough to have caused greater fears. Polly sopped up the tears from the child’s bloody little face, and rolled the poor thumb in her handkerchief. Then she set Phronsie down, pulled out her feet, felt of her joints, and made her get up and walk back and forth. She drew a long breath. “Well,” she said in the greatest relief, “there aren’t any bones broken anyway. Oh, Phronsie, do you feel bad anywhere else?”

“No,” said little Phronsie, “only my thumb.” And she stuck up the little dingy wad, and when she saw it, began to cry again.

“There, there, Polly’s darling! now, let’s see what we can do!” Polly cooed away as she waddled up the steps with Phronsie in her arms.

The first thing that met her view, was the old black stove, now utterly hateful, with the fire all out. “Oh, you old ugly thing!” said she, “think what you’ve done this morning!” And then she set herself to work over Phronsie.

In the first place, she knew she must get some court-plaster, for the cut was bleeding pretty fast. “Now, Phronsie, you sit just as still as everything.” Polly had put her in Mammy’s old rocking-chair. “And, childie, you can have this.” A most magnificent thing it seemed to Phronsie, and it stopped her tears at once, for it was a piece of cake, rather hard to be sure, but still beautiful. Polly had saved it up, since it had been given them, as a treat, and the children were going to have it this very night.

There wasn’t any court-plaster in the house, but she knew old “Grandma Bascom” had some. Her cottage was just down at the end of the lane; so leaving Phronsie munching her cake, she sped over, and rushed in without knocking, for the old lady was deaf, and wouldn’t have heard, anyway. “Oh, if you please, Grandma, Phronsie’s got hurt! May I have some court-plaster?”

“Why, for the land’s sake! your ma’s got hurt, did you say?” said the old lady, stopping her sweeping in the middle of the floor, and leaning on the broom.

“No, marm; Phronsie!” screamed Polly in the old lady’s ear. “Mamsie’s away.”

“She is, though?” said Grandma, kindly; “now that’s too bad; ’n what did you say you want?”

“Court-plaster,” said Polly, “and could you hurry?—for her thumb’s bleeding so.”

“Yes, yes, to be sure,” said the old lady, laying down her broom, and waddling to the cupboard. She brought a big cracked sugar-bowl to the table, then adjusted her spectacles, and diving down into the depths brought up paper after paper of herbs, salve, etc., till Polly thought she would go wild.

“Oh, I don’t believe you’ve got any,” she said.

“Yes, yes, I have, child; don’t be so fast; I remember where I put it; ’twan’t in this bowl, after all! I give some to Jane Dusenberry’s folks, when her pa got cut with a scythe. You know Jane?” And Grandma paused, and rested both hands on the bowl to relate the dreadful accident.

“Yes, yes,” said Polly, “but I can’t leave Phronsie. Oh, I can get it for you, if you’ll only tell me where it is.”

“Hadn’t you better run right home, and stay along of Phronsie, dear, and I’ll step over and bring it soon’s I get on my cap, and,” looking around the room, “get fixed up just a mite!” said the old lady.

“If you please, I must have it now,” said Polly, in utter dismay, who knew what Grandma’s “settling her cap,” and fixing up, meant.

So Mrs. Bascom finally produced a roll of ancient court-plaster out of some unseen drawer in the cupboard, the requisite amount was carefully cut off, and Polly bounded over to poor little Phronsie, whose supply of cake had given out, and who, consequently, as she sat curled up on the old chair, was surveying the poor little bandaged thumb ruefully.

The cut was soon nicely stuck together; her dirty little pink apron taken off; herself washed, and the tangled yellow curls all brushed and stroked by Polly’s kind hands. And then Polly began to look around. Her mother, she knew, wouldn’t be back until night. She had a chance to make some jackets for the minister’s boys, so she was at the parsonage for the day. Ben was chopping wood, one of the odd jobs he picked up now and then; he might be in any time, it only depended on the length of the job. Where Joel and David were, Polly, for the life of her, couldn’t have told. Their whereabouts were often shrouded in mystery. In the midst of it, just as Polly was saying, while she gave the last curl a brush, “There, dearie, you’re all right again; now I must get at my old stove, hateful thing!” the door opened and in walked Ben. “Oh, Ben!” she cried, and she almost burst into tears, “I’m so glad you’ve come!”

And Phronsie, with a most important air, began to announce, “I’ve cut my thumb, oh, and it bled; see, Bensie, see!” And the child held up the wounded little hand carefully wrapped up in a clean, old handkerchief.

“Whew!” whistled Ben, as he stood still. “What’s been happening? What is it, Polly?”

“Oh, Ben, such a fall!” answered Polly, kissing Phronsie tenderly; and she then gave him the whole account, interspersed with Phronsie’s corrections, when she considered anything left out.

Ben petted Phronsie to her heart’s content, patted the poor little hand sympathetically, and tried to think of something he could give her to show his sorrow. But he could think of nothing, till Polly leaned over and whispered something in his ear.

“The very thing!” he shouted.

“Sh! sh! but isn’t it?” said Polly, skipping, “if Mammy’ll only say yes!”

“What is it, Ben?” said Phronsie. “I’m big enough now to know secrets, and besides, I’ve cut my thumb.”

“I know, Pet, and you wait a little,” said Ben, “and you’ll know. Halloa, what’s the matter with your stove, Polly?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Polly, despairingly. “It won’t burn! the putty fell out, Ben, and I’ve put in wood, but it won’t do anything; and there’s my bread, see! it’ll be spoilt, and what’ll we do, then, I wonder!”

“Shan’t we have anything to eat then, Polly?” said little Phronsie, with big eyes.

“Yes,” said Ben, quickly, “I’ll go out and bring home lots of chipmunks, Phronsie, a hundred, say, and we’ll hang ’em up all round the kitchen, and they’ll last us a year.”

“I don’t think I should like chipmunks, Ben,” said the child, gravely.

“Oh, Ben, do stop laughing,” said Polly, “for it is really dreadful if we can’t eat the bread.”

Ben was already on his knees before the stove. He fussed and worked over it, and had recourse to his putty again, which Polly remarked might stay as long as he was putting it in; and finally the old stove concluded to make the best of it, and try again. So in a short space of time there was a bright, cheerful fire crackling and snapping, the bread was in the oven, and Polly was flying around making up for lost time.

About dinner-time, Joel and David made their appearance, as hungry as two little beavers. Polly’s bread wasn’t done, so they had to content themselves with the old crusts in addition to their hasty-pudding. What a fuss they made over little Phronsie! Everything had to be gone over again for their benefit, the handkerchief to be taken off, and the thumb exhibited, and Joel felt very bad because Polly wouldn’t allow him to pull up the court-plaster to see exactly what kind of a cut it was. “Just one little end, Polly, I should think you might; it’ll stick down again just as easy.” But Polly was firm.

Phronsie was the pet of the household. Anything harming her hurt them all. Into each heart she crept, though in a different way, making a place not filled by any other. She was the baby; and to see Phronsie hurt, almost took away the boys’ appetites, the most touching way in which they could show their grief. After dinner, Joel rehearsed Phronsie’s adventure, trying to roll down the old steps, just as she said she did. “Phoh! it don’t hurt any,” he said.

“Well, but take the knife, Joe,” said Davie, “take the knife; that’ll hurt, I guess.”

“No,” said Ben, “we’ve had enough cuts to-day; don’t let’s make any more trouble for Mamsie. What’ll she say now, I wonder?”

Nightfall brought Mrs. Pepper, tired with her toil; but oh! so thankful, while she held her baby in her lap, that the kind Father in Heaven had watched over the Little Brown House in her absence.

There was nobody to little Phronsie’s mind like her mother. Cuddled up there to her warm breast, while Polly got the cup of tea that had been kept warm for Mamsie by the stove, she told over in childish way the story that Polly had already rehearsed so fully to the mother’s anxious ears, not forgetting—and here the child hung her head—the recital of taking the bread-knife and the sad consequences ensuing. And then it all came out—Polly’s and Ben’s secret—and after its disclosure Phronsie was decidedly glad that she had been hurt.

For some time, ever since Phronsie could remember, she had been promised a pair of new shoes, very new, for her own; just as soon as the mother could get together money that could be spared for their purchase. She had never had a pair really bought for her. Joel’s and David’s were generally so worn and holey, long before there was a chance of their outgrowing them, that there was no hope from that quarter.

Once, Mrs. Pepper had made a mistake in buying a pair for David. They proved to be much shorter than at first supposed, and put him in so much pain when wearing them that they were put by for Phronsie; the beauty of them was gone, however, before David complained of them. And once a lady in the village gave Mrs. Pepper a half-worn pair of her little daughter’s; so that no “new shoes” had ever come to Phronsie,—that greatest delight in a child’s life.

For a long time then she had had the promise. It seemed to her interminable, but she waited patiently; only sometimes when she got to thinking of them, it seemed as if she couldn’t wait any longer. And Polly caught her one day saying to Seraphina, her doll, when she thought no one was near:—

“Well, do you suppose I’ll ever get my new shoes? Not till I get to be a big woman, I guess!”

Polly couldn’t stand that, and she privately told Ben that they must contrive some way and get them soon. And now Ben’s wood-choppings had helped some, and Mrs. Pepper had been able to get more work than usual, so that Polly, during that dismal morning, had been thinking perhaps now they could do it. And when would they ever want to do more for poor little Phronsie! She wouldn’t be able to play for some time, for the cut would be very painful. Oh, if Mammy would only say yes!

And Mrs. Pepper had said “yes!” and the children had shouted and shown in different ways their delight; only Phronsie, the one most interested, sitting there in her mother’s lap, had just clasped her little hands together as tight as she could for the thumb, and given an ecstatic long sigh.

So it was all settled—“really and truly settled,” as Phronsie said. To-morrow Polly and Ben should take her to the town to be fitted, if Mr. Brown would let them have his wagon.

“Oh, mayn’t we go, too?” cried Joel; “we can sit in behind. Say, now, Mammy, mayn’t we?”

“Do, Mammy!” said David.

“Well, I don’t see why not, I’m sure,” said Mrs. Pepper; “’Twon’t cost anything; the wagon’s going anyway, and the horse is strong—if you’ll be good, Joey.”

“Oh, won’t I, though!” said Joel, giving his mother a hearty kiss, while little David beamed his satisfaction.

Ben ran over to Deacon Brown’s to ask him about the horse and wagon. The answer was all right, for the Deacon wanted him to do an errand in town; so the wildest hilarity reigned in the Pepper household that night.

“Oh, Ben, will they be red-tops, do you think?” whispered little Phronsie, privately.

“Yes, I guess so, Puss,” whispered Ben, back again, inwardly resolving if there was a pair of “red-topped” shoes in the store, that were otherwise just right, Phronsie should have them.

So on the morrow, after they had their early dinner, the old wagon was driven up to the door with a flourish by Ben, who guided the ancient but tough old roadster with a dignity befitting a better horse. Joel and David had already secured reserved seats, having run over ahead to the Deacon’s shed and got in first. And there they sat, dangling their legs over the back of the wagon as they laughed and crowed in utter delight.

Phronsie stood in the doorway holding Polly’s hand. It was a decidedly solemn undertaking to her, this setting out on this great and weighty expedition, and the child’s heart was about as full as it could hold of anticipation and happiness. Oh, the pains that had been taken to get her ready! Ben said that Polly began before they got up in the morning.

At any rate, everything had been brushed, patted and pulled into place on Phronsie a dozen times by each member of the family before they were quite satisfied. But, at last, they had acknowledged that nothing more could be done; and, as Polly tied the waves of yellow hair back with a little blue bow, Mrs. Pepper stepped off, set her head on one side critically, and said:—

“Well, I’m sure, child, if you only behave as well as you look, you’ll do!”

And then Phronsie was told to go and sit in her little chair and not move till it was time to put on her hood and sack. Any other child than Phronsie would have hated all this fuss and trouble, but to her it was only part of the extreme delight; so she stuck out the patched, worn little shoes before her, and thought of the new ones.

“Oh, Ben’s coming, Polly!” called Mrs. Pepper, from the window where she sat sewing. “He’s just driving down the hill! Hurry, child! I’ll put on Phronsie’s things.”

“Yes, Mamsie,” said Polly, from the bedroom, in a great twitter, “I’m coming.”

And now they were all ready, and Mrs. Pepper on the steps gave her last injunction to Polly, who held tightly the old leather purse, with the precious money, in her hand,—“to be sure and take the right change,” and “to get them plenty broad” (not the change, but the shoes), and “not to let anything happen to Phronsie;” “oh! and not to get them ‘rights and lefts,’ you know, but ‘evens,’ Polly,”—all of which directions she had given carefully before. All this made great confusion, of course, but it only added to the general delight, while Joel and David were screaming in chorus for them to “come or they’d be late!”

But at last they were off, and Mrs. Pepper from the doorstep shaded her eyes with her hands—perhaps the sun was too bright for them. Her precious load of little ones; might she only have more sunshine to put into their lives! Well, at least, they should enjoy this, bless them!

Merry was the ride to town. Once Polly was afraid she had dropped the old purse when she leaned over to tie Phronsie’s tippet a little tighter, and they were all aghast for a minute at this tremendous fright; but, on Ben’s pulling up the old horse, she found it in her lap safe and sound. So they were merrier than ever out of contrast, and Deacon Brown’s horse so far overcame his usual melancholy manner as to quite enjoy the jolly crowd behind him, and to gallop and plunge in quite a festive manner along the road.

At last they turned into the village street and came in sight of the shops. Then it was that Phronsie sat straight up and began to look eagerly from one side to the other. They passed the milliner’s, gay with ribbons and spring bonnets, and two or three other stores of various descriptions, until they came to a little unpretending shop, crowded in between two others, over whose green door hung the modest sign of “J. Beebe, Boots and Shoes.”

When Phronsie caught sight of the little window strung with shoes of every size, from the littlest wee ones up, she cried out, “Oh, there ’tis, Ben! there ’tis! Oh, do stop!” long before they reached it.

“Yes, yes, child,” said Polly, “Ben’s going to. Joe, now you mustn’t! You know you told Mamsie you’d be good.” For Polly saw premonitory signs of Joe’s giving one of his awful whoops to announce their arrival.

The whoop died away in Joe’s throat as he reflected he never should get another chance to come “to town” with Polly, who was quite fastidious as to manners, if he indulged too boisterously now.

So they bundled out and up the steps, Joel quite gallantly opening the door for his sisters, to atone; while Ben fastened the horse to the well-worn post.

Old Mr. Beebe, smiling at the thought of customers, came, rubbing his hands, out from his little room at the back that served his old wife and himself as both parlor and kitchen. Oh, how magnificent it all looked to Phronsie! Oh, so many shoes, and such beautiful ones! Where did all the people live who could want so many! Great green things, that she found afterward were boxes, had shoes and slippers hanging and dangling to them; and then, away up by the top of the shelf were boots,—oh, as big as Ben’s!—and all around the little dingy room were rubbers, shoes, and slippers wherever there was a spot big enough to contain them. And, over and above it all, such a lovely smell of leather. Well, it was the most delightful place!

“And now, my little dears, what can I do for you to-day?” said old Mr. Beebe, pleasantly looking from one to another of the happy group, including Ben who had now joined them.

“If you please,” said Polly, with quite a matronly air, “it’s for Phronsie.”

“Is it, though?” said the old man, “then we must get her a nice pair, don’t you think?” And he beamed at her so kindly over his old spectacles that he quite won her heart over again, for the Pepper children were always delighted when an errand took them to his little shop; he was such a kindly, fresh, little old man.

“Now if you’ll sit right down here, my little girl, we’ll see what we can do for you.” And he brought a little wooden chair and placed it in the middle of the room.

Obediently, Phronsie sat down and confidently put her rusty little patched shoe upon Mr. Beebe’s knee.

“So, so!” he said, “and you thought you’d have a new pair of shoes this morning, and you thought you’d see what I’d got for you, didn’t you?” he added to make conversation, the others meanwhile encircling Phronsie and watching her with the most intense interest.

“Oh, I’ve never had a pair for my very own,” said the little girl, simply.

“Haven’t you, now?” said the old man, kindly. “Well, then, I don’t see but we must make this the best pair you’ve ever bought,” and he laughed and shook his sides till his spectacles nearly tumbled off; and all the children laughed with him, he was so jolly.

Then he got up and rummaged among some boxes over in the corner, until he emerged from them with two or three pairs of little shoes hanging over his arm.

“There, now, here’s a pair,” he said, and he proceeded to try on a beautiful shiny shoe over Phronsie’s little red stocking. It just fitted; but Polly saw to her dismay that it was “rights and lefts.”

“Oh, Ben,” she whispered to him aside, “they won’t do, and they’re lovely; for Mamsie said, you know, we must be sure to get ‘evens.’”

“Well, we can try again, then,” said Ben, “he’s got plenty more, I s’pose.” And he told Mr. Beebe the difficulty.

But Ben was wrong. It wasn’t so easy to fit Phronsie’s little fat foot thus nicely again, and Mr. Beebe brought forward shoe after shoe until they were almost in despair.

In the meantime, Ben kept his own counsel. He walked around the shop to see if he could possibly spy out a pair of “red-topped ones.” If he couldn’t, he wasn’t going to take away Phronsie’s pleasure in the plain ones by mentioning it. But no delightful “red-topped ones” appeared, or showed signs of appearing, and he had almost given up the idea, when—

“Stay! wait a bit!” said the old man; “now I remember I made a pair once for the squire’s little daughter down to the Point, but her ma didn’t take ’em, she thought they were too small. Maybe they’ll just fit. I shouldn’t wonder, now.”

And he ambled away to the farther part of the room; there, from underneath a shelf, he produced a pair, saying as he brought them towards the children, “But perhaps you’ll object to them for being red-tops.”

“Object to them!” Phronsie screamed right out. “Oh, Ben, he did have them!” And then she was so ashamed she hid her face in Polly’s cloak, while Ben explained to delighted Mr. Beebe, who began to try them on.

Ben and Polly both held their breath. What if they shouldn’t fit! But on the little shoe went; snugly it buttoned up; and then Mr. Beebe told Phronsie to stand up.

“Stamp in it, child. Why, it looks as if ’twas made for her, don’t it?” he said, pleased almost as the children.

The price, too, was just right. Polly didn’t know, as she counted out the money into the old man’s hand, that at least a quarter of their value was deducted. Phronsie wouldn’t have the shoe taken off; so the old man cut the string, buttoned on its mate, and rolled up the poor little old ones in a bit of newspaper.

“There, now!”—and then he put into her hand a most beautiful button-hook; it had a bright little handle that looked like silver, and it was just as cunning as it could be,—“that’s from me! And you’ll come and see the old man again, won’t you, dear, and tell him how the shoes go?”

And then Mrs. Beebe had to come in to see the “Pepper children” and to ask after their mother; and to hear all about Phronsie’s accident of the day before; and then she must run out and get a doughnut apiece for them all, out of the big stone pot; and for Phronsie, a big piece of cinnamon candy extra.

And then they all said “good-by,” and “Oh, thank you!” added Polly, “ever so much!”

Out again and into the old wagon.

“I say,” said Joel, “that’s prime! Don’t I wish some of us had to get new shoes every day!” And he settled back to a huge bit of his doughnut.

Over, back, and away they went home, only stopping to do Deacon Brown’s errand. Phronsie would keep sticking her feet out from under the old shawl to be sure that her shoes were really there, despite Polly’s fear that she would take cold; for it was getting towards evening and a little chilly.

Such an uproar as they had when they got home. The shoes were admired and admired again, Mrs. Pepper protesting that she couldn’t have done better if she had gone herself; as indeed she couldn’t. And she praised the children heartily for their good behavior. As for Phronsie, she danced around the old kitchen till the “red-tops” seemed only little specks of color.

“I’m going to have ’em to sleep with me anyway, Polly,” she declared, as Polly insisted on taking them off at last.

So to bed Phronsie trudged, grasping the precious shoes tightly to her breast. And when Polly went to get into the big bed with her mother, she peeped the last thing at Phronsie and laughed right out. One small, red-topped shoe was clasped in the little well hand; the other, tucked up on the pillow, had settled right down over her nose.

III
THE LITTLE TIN PLATE

“O DEAR me!” exclaimed Polly, out in the “Provision Room.” “What’s that?”

A loud noise struck her ear, and she dropped the end of the big bag, out of which she was getting some potatoes for dinner and stopped to listen. There it was again.

“Oh, my goodness me!” Polly gave a merry little laugh, “It’s at the door,” and dropping the tin pan she had brought for the potatoes, she skipped nimbly over the big bag. “P’raps it’s somebody come to call;” for Polly dearly loved to be elegant, and nothing could have been so truly magnificent as to have callers in their very best clothes come and rap at the old green door. She had often imagined how they would look. And now, “Perhaps—just perhaps,” she thought, as she skipped along over the rickety steps leading up to the kitchen, “that there is one really and truly come to see us!”

She raced through the kitchen and threw open the old door, the color flying up to her brown hair, and her eyes sparkling. A man was standing on the old flat stone, and pressed up close to the green door.

“Oh, Mr. Beggs!” cried Polly, the color dropping all out of her cheek in her disappointment. He wasn’t a caller, not a bit of it, only the ragman who drove through Badgertown once in a while, and collected the rags and old bottles at the houses. And in return he gave tinware of every description and brooms and wooden pails. There, off by the old gate, was his big red cart, waiting in the road.

“Yes, I’ve come.” Mr. Beggs pushed back his flapping straw hat from his forehead, and pulling out a big red cotton handkerchief from the pocket of his much-worn linen coat that flapped around his legs, he wiped his forehead vigorously. “Call’ated your Ma was ready maybe to trade to-day.”

“We don’t have many rags, Mr. Beggs,” said Polly, stifling her disappointment. “You know Mamsie told you not to trouble to stop often because—”

“I know—I know,” said Mr. Beggs, interrupting. Then he leaned against the door-casing to rest on one foot while he talked. “But then I alwus d’rather stop, for you might get ready to trade. An’ tain’t no trouble to me, cause it rests th’ horse. Is the boys to home?”

“No,” said Polly, “they went off to dig flag-root.”

“Pshaw, now.” The ragman pushed the old straw hat farther off from his head till it began to look like a new background for it. “Why couldn’t they have dug flag-root any other day, pray tell,” he exclaimed in vexation; “I was a-goin’ to take ’em to ride on my cart.”

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, just as much distressed, and clasping her hands, “now, isn’t that too bad, Mr. Beggs!”

“’Tis,” said Mr. Beggs, gloomily. “I got to go all down round about here, an’ over to the Hollow.”

Polly couldn’t say anything. To go “all down round about here and over to the Hollow” on top of the red cart was such an enchanting thing, and now the boys must lose it all!

“An’ I ain’t comin’ this way agin this summer,” said Mr. Beggs, as if the other statement was not as bad as it possibly could be.

“O dear me!” said Polly again.

“I s’pose you an’ th’ little gal wouldn’t go, now.” The ragman pointed a dingy thumb into the kitchen to indicate Phronsie.

For one wild moment Polly thought, “Oh, Mamsie wouldn’t care, and I never get the chance if the boys are home.” And she took one rapturous step to get Phronsie from the bedroom where she was washing “Baby”; then she turned and stood quite still. “No,” she said.

“Well, you come right along,” said Mr. Beggs, well pleased to see her start for Phronsie. “I’ll wait for ye an’ th’ little gal,” and he was already slouching down to the old gate.

“I can’t go,” called Polly after him.

“Yes, come right along,” the ragman kept saying, so of course he couldn’t hear any one else talk.

“I can’t go, and Phronsie can’t either.” Polly panted it out as she went flying down the path after him, and she took hold of the end of his old brown linen coat as he had one foot on the trace preparing to jump up to his seat.

“Pshaw, now!” exclaimed Mr. Beggs, pausing to regard her ruefully. “Ye can’t?”

“No,” said Polly. She couldn’t trust herself to look at the dear, delightful tin things hanging all down the side of the cart. What a lovely music they must make jingling together as the old horse jogged along on his way! And the brooms stuck up at the corners, and smelling so nice and new, and the quantities of other things, they might be the most beautiful in all the world hidden within, that Mr. Beggs would take out when customers were ready to buy. And she must give it all up!

“Pshaw, now—yer Ma won’t care, an’ I ain’t a-comin’ this way agin this summer.” Mr. Beggs didn’t take his foot from the trace while he argued it out. “An’ I’m goin’ all down round about here, an’ home by the Hollow.”

“O dear!” Polly turned off and threw herself down on the grass just beside the road. “I must go,” she cried passionately to herself. “I’ve never been, and I can’t get the chance again.” Then Mamsie’s face seemed to hop right up before her, saying only one word, “Polly.”

“So run along an’ git your bunnit, an’ bring th’ little gal.” Mr. Beggs, seeing everything now fixed to his satisfaction, mounted his cart, and took up the well-worn leather reins.

“No,” said Polly. She was standing by the cart now. “I can’t go, Mr. Beggs. I thank you, sir, very much, but Mamsie wouldn’t like it; that is, I can’t ask her.” The brown eyes seemed to say more than the words, for the ragman, giving a long whistle to vent his regrets, clacked to the old horse, and away the red cart rumbled down the dusty road, leaving Polly standing on the grass by its side.

And the two little boys, hurrying around by the back way, found her so, just as the red cart turned the corner of the road.

“Joel!” cried Polly, turning around. “Oh, I thought you’d gone to dig flag-root.”

“So we did,” grumbled Joel, “but Davie forgot the knife.”

“I did, Polly,” confessed little Davie, hanging his head.

“Never mind, now,” cried Polly, in such a twitter she jumbled up her words, “the ragman—Mr. Beggs—oh, Joe, run after him—”

“Where?” cried Joel, his black eyes roving wildly. To have Mr. Beggs with them was an event not to be missed. “Where, Polly?” twitching her sleeve.

“There,” Polly cried, just as wildly and pointing in the direction in which the ragman had disappeared; “oh, run, Joe,—he’s been here to take you and Davie to ride on his cart.”

It wasn’t necessary to tell Joel to run after that, and even Davie showed a nimble pair of heels, and presently they were lost to view, and Polly was left alone to go in and get the potatoes for dinner.

Joel roared so hard at every step of the road in pursuit of the red cart that when he finally did come up with it, he had little breath left. Mr. Beggs had slackened speed at the beginning of the hill, and was now ruminating sourly over his failure to give pleasure to the Little Brown House people, when he heard a faint piping sound that made him crane his neck to look around the stack of brooms to see where it came from. “We’re going,” gasped Davie, running to the side of Joel, both boys having anxious hands outspread.

“Jerusalem, and th’ natives!” ejaculated the ragman, pulling the old horse up straight. “I thought you was a-diggin’ flag-root.”

“We were,” gasped David. But it wasn’t until they were both fairly on the cart and beside Mr. Beggs on the seat, that breath could be wasted to relate the whole, “Only I forgot the big knife.”

“I’ll drive,” declared Joel, promptly. To talk about digging flag-root was well enough when there was nothing greater as a subject, but now—and he made a dash at the leather reins.

“Not yit,” said the ragman, holding them fast in his horny hand. “Well, I never!” and he slapped his knee with the other fist. “Ain’t this just—well, Jerusalem, an’ th’ natives—’tis!”

“When can I, say?” Joel pounded Mr. Beggs’s knee, and fastened his black eyes pleadingly on the face under the old straw hat. Little Davie had lapsed into a state of silent bliss, and was hanging to the edge of the seat where it turned up on the outside. “Say, Mr. Beggs, when will you let me drive?”

“You be still,” said Mr. Beggs, turning a pair of ruddy cheeks on which a broad smile of satisfaction played; “I’ll let you drive when the time comes.”

“When is it coming?” asked Joel, in impatience.

“’Tain’t never comin’,” said Mr. Beggs, “if you ain’t still, an’ behave yourself.”

Joel, very much alarmed at this, sank back in his seat, and kept still till it seemed to him that the ragman had forgotten his promise, so he slid forward and began to clamor again.

“Can I—you said you would,” he teased, stretching out both brown little hands.

“I said when ’twas time,” replied Mr. Beggs, coolly.

“’Tisn’t ever going to be time,” declared Joel, quite gone in despair.

The ragman burst out laughing, but seeing Joel’s face, and also that little Davie on the other side was leaning forward much disturbed since something that Joel didn’t like was being said, he added kindly, “now, Joel, I’ll let you take th’ reins when we come to that house. See it?” and he pointed off with his whip.

“Where—where?” cried Joel, eagerly, and jumping up to his feet.

“Sit down,” cried Mr. Beggs, pulling him back. “Land o’ Goshen, you’ll be out an’ break your neck; then you never’d go with me agin, an’ what would your Ma say?”

“Well, where is the house?” cried Joel, struggling to get a sight of it. “I can’t see it.”

“You will in a minnit—there, now, look.”

It wasn’t necessary to advise this as Joel’s black eyes were doing their best to acquaint their owner with an idea as to how soon the little brown hands could hold those reins. And at last he squealed right out, “Oh, there ’tis—oh, goody! I’m going to drive, Dave, I am, soon’s we git up to that house,” pointing to a red farm-house set back from the road and in between two tall poplars.

When they arrived, he was in great excitement, not caring in the least for the pleasure of hearing Mr. Beggs calling out, “Ra-ags—Ra-ags,” in a tone that began in a sort of a roar, and ended in a little fine squeal that seemed to vanish into thin air; but it always brought every farmer’s wife and daughter to the window or door, eager to turn the last year’s or half year’s supply of carefully hoarded rags and old bottles to good account. For sometimes, if Mr. Beggs could not dispose of his tinware and brooms and pails which, of course, he much preferred to do, he would count out pennies and five-cent pieces, so that new ribbons or a bit of lace would be possible for such as cared for finery.

But little Davie, if it were possible to add to his bliss as he sat there clinging to the edge of his seat on the top of the red cart, now experienced that increase of delight, and he hung entranced as Mr. Beggs bawled again impressively, “Ra-ags—Ra-ags!” as they came almost up to the poplars.

A woman thrust her head in a sweeping-cap out of the side door. “The ragman’s here, Em’line!” she screamed. Then she ran out to the grass-plot. “Here, stop, Mr. Beggs,” she called frantically, waving both hands.

“All right, marm,” said the ragman, pulling up his old horse. “I’m a-stoppin’; you needn’t screech so.”

“You said I might drive when we got here.” Joel turned on him perfectly furious, his black eyes flashing.

“Well, an’ so you may,” replied Mr. Beggs, composedly, preparing to get down over the wheel. “But we ain’t a-goin’ to run over Mis’ Hinman. When we start from here, Joel, you can have them lines. Now, then, both o’ you boys can git down an’ stretch your legs, while I dicker with th’ women folks.”

Joel, seeing that this was all he could get, suffered himself to be helped down from the cart, and little Davie followed, for both of them hung absorbed over the exciting bargaining and exchange that now took place.

“There’s another bag in the wood-chamber,” said Mrs. Hinman, as Em’line, a tall, thin maiden not over young, with her red hair done up in a hard twist like a door-knob on the back of her head, came hastily dragging after her a swelled-up bag over the grass. “You’ve forgot that.”

“I hain’t forgot it,” said Em’line, tartly, releasing the bag on the ground by the side of the red cart, “but I can’t get ’em both to once. My arm’s ’most broke with this one.”

Mrs. Hinman’s faded eyes took a new light. “You’ll give us good weight, Mr. Beggs,” she said greedily.

“I’ll give you th’ weight that ’tis,” said the ragman, lifting out from under his seat the long iron steelyards.

Em’line ran her eyes, a second edition of her mother’s, over the two little figures crowding up at the ragman’s elbow. “Can’t one o’ them boys git that other bag o’ rags?” she said.

“Oh, you don’t want to let ’em in th’ house,” said Mrs. Hinman, in dismay.

“They won’t do no hurt,” said Em’line, carelessly; “it’s in th’ wood-chamber.”

“But they’ve got to go through th’ kitchen,” protested her mother, “an’ you don’t know who they be.”

“Excuse me,” said the ragman, with great dignity, “but I don’t take folks a-ridin’ with me on this cart unless I do know who they be, Mis’ Hinman.”

“Well, they’re boys,” said Mrs. Hinman, holding to her point, notwithstanding her desire to get to trading.

“Yes, to be sure, they is boys,” said Mr. Beggs; “I ain’t a-denyin’ that,” and running the hook of the steelyards through the tied strings of the bags, “but they’re Mis’ Pepper’s boys, an’ that makes a difference.”

“Not Mis’ Pepper over to Badgertown, who lives in that little brown house!” exclaimed Mrs. Hinman.

“Yes, marm;” with that the ragman lifted the steelyards and gave the bag a swing, endeavoring to slide the hook along the iron bar to adjust the weight, peering at it closely, while he held the whole thing aloft.

“Take care—it’s a-tetchin’ you,” screamed Mrs. Hinman, and trying to push the bag of rags away from the long linen coat.

Mr. Beggs turned on her an angry face. “When I weigh rags, I weigh ’em, Mis’ Hinman,” he said, “or else I never drive a trade with nobody.”

Thus admonished, Mrs. Hinman folded her nervous hands across her apron, and held herself in check.

“Well, are those boys a-goin’ in after that other bag?” said Em’line; “I know I ain’t,—my arm’s broke almost, draggin’ this one down.” But Mr. Beggs, not appearing to hear, and certainly Joel and David, so absorbed over the excitement of seeing the rags weighed that they couldn’t be expected to understand what was wanted of them, it really began to look as if Em’line would have to go after the other bag herself, if she wanted it brought down.

“Twelve—twelve an’ a ha-alf,” said Mr. Beggs, slowly moving the hook along a hair’s breadth.

“It’s more’n that,” broke in Mrs. Hinman, standing on tiptoe to peer over his arm.

“Of course it is,” declared Em’line; “it weighs a lot more. It most broke my arm a-draggin’ it along,” she added, as if bringing out a wholly new statement.

“Th’ bag’s fairly busting, it’s so full,” contributed her mother, indignantly.

“Rags weigh light; it takes a good many to make a pound,” said Mr. Beggs, oracularly, and squinting at the numbers on the iron rod.

“I don’t care if they is, an’ mine are good hefty ones—all them pieces after we got through with Sarah’s jacket, you know, Em’line,” she nodded across Mr. Beggs’s big back.

“Don’t I know, Ma?” said Em’line, thriftily; “of course, there’s lots o’ money in that bag o’ rags.”

“Twelve pounds an’ half an ounce,” declared Mr. Beggs, dumping the bag on the grass, and slipping out the iron hook from the strings. “There’s every bit as much as ’tis, an’ if you want to sell ’em to some other ragman, why, I don’t care,” he added squarely.

“Oh, we ain’t a-goin’ to sell ’em to no one else, Mr. Beggs,” Mrs. Hinman made haste to say in alarm; “only we did think there was a little more weight to ’em,—jest a leetle more.”

“That’s every scrap there is,” declared Mr. Beggs, pushing back his straw hat from his forehead, and beginning to put up his steelyards under his seat.

“An’ there’s another bag, you know,” cried Em’line. “Say, ain’t one o’ them boys goin’ to bring it down for me?”

“I d’no, I’m sure,” replied Mr. Beggs; “that’s as they say. I don’t invite folks to go a-ridin’ with me on my cart an’ then work ’em while they’re a-visitin’.”

“Well, don’t they want to?” said Em’line; “say, don’t you?” and she turned to Joel.

“Want to what?” demanded Joel, turning his black eyes on her, since the delights of weighing the rags was over.

“Go into th’ house an’ get another bag o’ rags,” said Em’line, wheedlingly.

“May I bring ’em out,” cried Joel, his black eyes sparkling; “may I?”

“Yes, if you’re a good boy,” said Em’line.

“Oh, whickets!” screamed Joel, springing off; “come on, Dave.”

“At th’ head o’ th’ stairs from th’ kitchen,” screamed Em’line after him, in a jubilant little shriek.

“An’ don’t tetch nothin’ in th’ kitchen,” Mrs. Hinman called shrilly. “You better go with ’em, Em’line,” she advised anxiously.

“There ain’t no need,” said Em’line, yet she went lazily over the grass and disappeared in the kitchen doorway. And presently down came Joel and David carrying between them a bag as much bigger as possible than the first one.

“There, now, I guess you’ll see rags, Mr. Beggs,” said Em’line, triumphantly following them; “them’s mine,” as the boys deposited the bag on the grass, and then stood up to draw a long breath.

“Whew!” whistled the ragman, and then to fill up conversation, he added, “I guess you’re goin’ to git married, Miss Em’line—”

Em’line simpered, and hung her head with the little hard knob of red hair at the back. “How’d you guess, Mr. Beggs?”

“The Land o’ Goshen, ye be!” exclaimed the ragman, in great surprise; “well, who’s th’ man, pray tell?”

“It’s Isr’el Sawyer,” said Mrs. Hinman, quickly. “An’ we better be a settlin’ up this rag business, for I’ve got all my work a-waitin’ for me in th’ house.”

The ragman smothered something in his straggly beard that, if heard, would not be very complimentary to Isr’el Sawyer’s good judgment. “That’s so, Mis’ Hinman,” he declared briskly; “well, now, we must see what this ’ere bag weighs. ’Tis heftier, ain’t it?”

“I sh’d think ’twas,” cried Em’line, with greedy eyes, and an expansive smile.

“Well, now, bein’s you’re goin’ to git married, I s’pose we must make these rags come to as much as possible. Goin’ to take ’em out in tin?” All the while he was adjusting the iron hook in place on the steelyards and getting ready for the final swing of the bag.

“I guess not,” snapped Em’line; “I’m goin’ to have money an’ nothin’ else.”

“I’d just as lieves,” assented Mr. Beggs; “there she goes!” Then, when the bag ceased to tremble as it hung from the hook, and the final notch on the long bar had been decided on, “Fif—teen pounds an’ a quarter—”

“There’s twice as much,” cried Em’line, with an angry twitch at the steelyards; “let me weigh ’em myself.”

“No, sir—ee!” declared Mr. Beggs, quite insulted; “no one does th’ weighin’ on them steelyards but myself. You can see all you want to, an’ there ’tis, an’ you can’t make no more, not a mite, but fifteen pounds an’ a quarter. But I ain’t anxious to trade with you to-day, Miss Em’line,” and he slid out the hook from the strings of the bag; “so after you’ve picked out your tinware, Mis’ Hinman, or do you want a broom to-day, or do you want money, I ain’t partic’lar which, why, I’ll say good day to ye both.”

“There, now, you see, Em’line,” cried her mother, “how you bite your nose off to spite your face! Now you won’t sell them old rags at all, for another man won’t come along, like enough, who’ll buy ’em, in a dog’s age.”

Em’line stood biting her lips and tapping the ground with an irritable foot. “You can have ’em,” at last she said to Mr. Beggs.

“I ain’t a-goin’ to take ’em unless you’re satisfied,” said the ragman; “land, I can’t make ’em weigh more’n they do. You goin’ to take tin, or a broom, or money, Mis’ Hinman?” he turned around to her.

“I’ll take a broom,” said Mrs. Hinman; “I got to; mine’s all worn down to th’ handle. What you got new in tin, Mr. Beggs?”

“A full assortment.” He threw open the side of the red cart, and she stuck in her head, still in its sweeping-cap, to gloat over its shining contents. “My! I guess you have been stockin’ up!”

“’Tis a pretty good lot,” said Mr. Beggs, affecting indifference. “You said a broom, didn’t ye, Mis’ Hinman?” He stepped up on the hub of the nearest wheel and handed down one. “That’s prime,” he declared.

“I d’no’s I will take a broom,” said Mrs. Hinman, discontentedly, and not looking at it, but with her eyes glued to the shining interior of the cart, “but then I’ve got to, for by’m by I’ll have to sweep with the handle. How much is that skimmer?” with an abrupt finger pointing to the article.

“Twenty cents,” said Mr. Beggs.

“That’s dretful dear,” said Mrs. Hinman; “well, let’s see your broom,” so she pulled away her head from its close proximity to the fascinating door and put out her hand. “Hain’t you got one that ain’t so thin along th’ edge?” running her fingers over it. “’Tain’t near as good a one as th’ one I bought last of you, Mr. Beggs.”

“I thought this was pretty fair for a broom,” said the ragman, who had stepped down from the hub of the wheel. He now hopped up again, and after careful examination of his stock in trade, so far as brooms were concerned, got back to the ground again, with one in his hand. “There, if you like that any better you’re free to choose,” he said obligingly.

“This one’s all uneven—seems so there ain’t no two wisps alike,” said Mrs. Hinman, turning the broom over and over and pinching it here and there; “when I buy a broom, I want one, Mr. Beggs.”

“All right,” said the ragman, so he mounted the hub of the wheel again. “There,” he said, coming down with a great clatter, “now, take your pick an’ go over th’ hull lot,” and he deposited the entire bunch on the grass.

When the trading was done, so far as Mrs. Hinman was concerned, who went carefully over and over the collection of brooms laid out for her inspection on the grass, she finally decided that she wouldn’t take a broom at all, but some article of tin. And it took so long to pick these over and select from the lot, that Em’line finally broke in—“Well, I know I ain’t goin’ to stand here all day. Are you goin’ to pay me my money or not, Mr. Beggs?”

“If you’re satisfied,” said the ragman.

“I’ll sell ’em to you anyway,” said Em’line, “an’ that’s enough.” So Mr. Beggs took out an old leather bag from his trousers’ pocket and counted out the money, which she seized and stalked into the house, grumbling all the way over the grass.

“And now,” said Mr. Beggs, stowing away the two bags of rags on his cart, “if you’ve got through turnin’ over that tin, marm, I’ll just start on my way.”

“Can’t you throw in that?” asked Mrs. Hinman, diving into the cart to hold up a little tin plate with big letters all around its edge; “I sh’d admire to have it to give John’s little boy.”

“No, I can’t,” Mr. Beggs shook his head, decidedly; “an’ John Hinman jest a-rollin’ in money!” he declared wrathfully to himself.

“I’ll take the skimmer,” decided Mrs. Hinman, tossing back the little tin plate scornfully into the cart; “tain’t wuth twenty cents, but if you won’t take no less—”

“I won’t take no less,” said Mr. Beggs, picking up his brooms from the grass, and piling them up on the cart, “as I’m a-givin’ it to you now ’most a cent an’ a half off; your rags don’t come to more’n a leetle over eighteen cents. I don’t give skimmers entirely away, Mis’ Hinman.” Then he slammed to the door of the red cart. “Now, then, boys,” to Joel and David, who had been standing quite still hanging on every word, “hop up lively.”

“Are you going?” screamed Joel, all awake to the fact that now was the time when those leather reins were to be put into his hands, and beginning a wild scramble for the top of the cart, little Davie pitching after.

“I s’pose we’d better be,” said Mr. Beggs, grimly, “unless we spend th’ mornin’ here. Well, good day, Mis’ Hinman.”

But she neither saw nor heard him, busy as she was picking her way across the grass, her new skimmer grasped in her hard old hand.

“She beats th’ Dutch an’ Tom Walker!” exclaimed Mr. Beggs. It was all that escaped him, but as he repeated it over and over, perhaps no more was needed. And as the old horse had been somewhat revived by his long rest, he now concluded to show off his best speed. Joel sat up as straight as he could, his brown little hands thrust stiffly out, grasping the old leather reins in a great state of excitement, and crying out, “G’lang, there—g’lang!” while little Davie plunged into terror, clung with one hand to the edge of his seat, and the other to Joel’s jacket to keep him from falling out.

“Ye’re enjoyin’ it, ain’t ye?” Mr. Beggs leaned over to peer at Joel’s red cheeks.

“It’s prime!” cried Joel. “G’lang there—see him go, Dave, I’m driving,” he announced.

“Isn’t he going very fast?” asked little Dave, timidly, not being able to look around, having all he could do to hold on with both hands.

“Gee—whiz!” sang Joel, wishing Polly was there to see him, and how he was exactly as big as Ben.

“Oh, don’t, Joel,” begged Davie, “make him go any faster.”

“Phoo! that’s nothin’,” said Joel, magnificently; “I’m going to take the whip,” and he broke away from David’s clutch to lean forward.

“Oh, don’t!” screamed little Davie. “Oh, Mr. Beggs, don’t let him,” he implored.

“You needn’t worry,” said Mr. Beggs, settling Joel back with a big hand; “nobody takes that whip on this cart but Peter Beggs.”

“I don’t want the whip,” said Joel, grasping the reins tighter than ever; “g’lang there—see me drive, Dave!”

“An’ you’re goin’ to drive on th’ way home,” said Mr. Beggs, leaning over to fling the words to little Davie.

“You’re going to drive on the way home—oh, goody!” screamed Joel, as away the old horse jogged, so surprised at such unwonted jollity back of him that he forgot to slow down to his accustomed gait.

It was well along toward noon when Phronsie, who had been watching for a long time in the front yard, scrambled over the flat door-stone. “They’re coming, Polly,” she screamed.

“Oh, no, I guess not, Pet,” said Polly, who had been summoned several times to hurry and welcome the boys—“we shall hear them fast enough. Run out and play, child.”

“But they are, Polly, coming, really and truly,” declared Phronsie, in an injured voice, and her lip trembled. So Polly flung down the broom where she was sweeping and taking Phronsie’s hand, ran out to see. And sure enough, there they were, the old horse coming up in front of the gate in grand style, and Joel waving both hands and hooraying with all his might from the high seat of the red cart, little Davie between him and Mr. Beggs, and—oh, most wonderful sight—holding the reins and driving! Polly and Phronsie ran as fast as they could to the road.

“I drove ’most all the way over there,” screamed Joel, before he clambered over the wheel.

“Did you, Joey?” cried Polly, in a transport, while Mr. Beggs, now out on the ground, helped little David down. “And to think, that Davie drove home!” as he ran up to her, his blue eyes shining with excitement and his cheeks as pink as could be.

“I didn’t drive all the way,” said little Davie, rubbing his hands together and trying not to think that they smarted.

“Well, you drove some,” said Polly, happily; “just think of that, Davie.”

And just then, whether it was that the old horse felt the excitement of the morning too much for his nerves, no one knew, but he started suddenly, and before Mr. Beggs could even shout out “whoa!” or clutch the leather reins dangling over the harness, away he went with a few clumsy jerks, and off flew Em’line’s bag of rags, the strings untying and a good part of the ravellings and snippings of her wedding clothes scattered in the dusty road.

And away clattered Mr. Beggs after his horse, Joel whooping and hallooing at his heels, and little Davie following as fast as he could.

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, clasping her hands. She longed to run, too, and help to catch good Mr. Beggs’s horse, but there was Phronsie—no, she must stay and take care of her.

“Won’t he ever come back?” asked Phronsie, and the tears began to come.

“Oh, yes, Pet,” said Polly, cheerfully. “There, I’ll lift you up to the gate, so you can see better—”

So Phronsie put up her little arms, and Polly lifted her and set her in a good place on the old post. “Now then, says I, look sharp, Phronsie, and pretty soon you’ll see Mr. Beggs and the boys coming back, and—”

“And will they bring the horsie with them?” asked Phronsie, folding her hands in her lap.

“Yes, of course, child,” said Polly, promptly, and keeping a tight hold of Phronsie’s little gown; “now watch, Phronsie,—here they come!”

“Here they come!” piped Phronsie, clapping her hands. Then she threw her arms around Polly’s neck. “Oh, they are coming back,” she cried; “they truly are, Polly.”

“Yes, and they’re here,” said Polly, quickly setting Phronsie down on the ground, “and now we’ve all got to help pick up those rags and put them in the bags, just as soon as Mr. Beggs gets back and ties up his horse, so he can’t run away some more.”

“I’m going to pick ’em up now,” declared Phronsie, running into the middle of the road and sitting down in the dirt among the pieces of Em’line’s wedding gowns.

“Oh, Phronsie!” exclaimed Polly, hurrying after. And just then up came Mr. Beggs holding the bridle, with Joel on the other side of the horse trying to be big enough to do the same thing, and little Davie following the red cart.

“Oh, we’ll help, Dave and me,” cried Joel, when the old horse tied to the gate post couldn’t run any more, and seeing Phronsie and Polly busy over the rags scattered in the road, the two boys scampered off to the scene of action. And presently when Mr. Beggs got there, every one of the four pairs of hands was gathering up the pieces, oh, so fast—that there really didn’t seem as if there would be anything for him to do.

“We’ll pick ’em all up,” screamed Joel at him, as he stood in the road, and flying up to cram both fists full into the bag as it flopped half empty where it had tumbled.

“Take care, Joe,” warned Polly, “don’t let any dirt get in—”

“I guess a little dirt ain’t a-goin’ to hurt ’em,” said the ragman and very much pleased to think he didn’t have to get his fat body down to pick up the snips.

Phronsie, who was busy as a bee, picking up the smallest pieces and carrying them one at a time to tuck in the bag, was suddenly interrupted by Joel calling out, “Look at Phron!” Then he burst out into a laugh.

“Hush!” said Polly, warningly; “oh, Joey, how could you?” for Phronsie suddenly deserted her snip of cloth and ran to hide herself in Polly’s arms,—“there, Pet—”

“I didn’t mean to,” cried Joel, with a very red face. Then he threw down his bits of cloth, and raced off to where Polly now sat on the grass with Phronsie on her lap. “Oh, Polly, I didn’t mean to—” and he burst into a loud sob.

When Phronsie found that any one else could feel badly, she lifted her yellow head, and two tears that had made up their minds they were coming out, concluded after all they wouldn’t. “Are you sick, Joey?” she asked, patting his old jacket.

“Now I tell you what, Joel,” said Polly, briskly, “you take hold of Phron’s hand. No—no, Phronsie, Joel isn’t sick. He’s going to take you over to the bag, so you can help him pick them up. And that will be helping good Mr. Beggs, too. You must, Joey,” she whispered in his ear.

Every one of the four pairs of hands was gathering up the pieces, oh, so fast!—Page [73].

So Joel lifted his stubby black head, and when he saw Phronsie with a happy smile and heard her exclaim joyfully, “I’m going to help you, Joey, and good Mr. Beggs, too,” he smiled too, and seized her hand and raced her over to the big bag. And before long with all those brisk little hands, why, how could those snips and bits of Em’line’s wedding gowns do anything but hop back into their bag again. And it was tied tightly together with the old strings, each of the children having a turn at pulling the knot fast, and then Mr. Beggs tossed it up to the top of his red cart. “There, I guess ye won’t come down agin, till I take ye down,” he said.

“Now you’re all safe,” exclaimed Polly, happily, looking up at it, and bobbing her head at the big bump where it had settled, “and you can’t come down again.”

“You can’t come down again,” shouted Joel, dancing a jig around the red cart.

“You can’t come down again,” sang little Davie, flying away after him, and then Phronsie had to pipe it out, as she picked up her red gown to make a cheese in the road.

“And I’m sure I’m obleeged to all ye children,” said Mr. Beggs.

“You took them to ride—” said Polly; “oh, Mr. Beggs, you are so very good!”

“You took us to ride,” said Joel and Davie together. “And can I go again?” begged Joel, racing up to clutch his arm.

“Oh, Joel, for shame!” cried Polly, her cheeks very rosy.

But Mr. Beggs only laughed—“Yes, sir—ee—I ain’t comin’ this way this summer agin, but sometime ye may. Well, thank ye all for pickin’ up them pieces.”

“I picked up, too,” announced Phronsie, who, seeing all the others around Mr. Beggs, concluded not to make any more cheeses. So she got up, and spatted her hands together to get off the dirt, and made her way over to the group. “I picked up, too—I did—”

“That’s a fact,” Mr. Beggs bowed his old straw hat solemnly. Then he said, “I wonder, now, if there ain’t somethin’ in my cart that’s just waitin’ to hop out an’ stay with you.” And he threw open the door of the cart to that beautiful shining array.

“Oh—oh!” they all crowded around, Joel getting dreadfully in the way, until Mr. Beggs lifted Phronsie up and set her on his knee. “Now, then, I wonder what you’d like, little gal?”

“Are you going to give it to her to keep?” screamed Joel, looking up into the ragman’s face.

Mr. Beggs bowed again solemnly.

“To keep always?” cried Joel, not believing his ears.

“Yes, forever an’ ever. Amen,” said Mr. Beggs.

“Oh, hooray!” screamed Joel. Polly, scarcely less excited, held her breath, unable to speak, while little David panted out, “Oh!” Phronsie was the only one able to gaze unmoved at the beautiful shining things.

“I guess this is about th’ best thing for a little gal about your size,” said Mr. Beggs at last, and reaching with his long arm over Phronsie’s head into the interior of the cart, he brought out the little tin plate with big letters all around its edge, from the corner just where Mrs. Hinman had thrown it, and put it into her hand. “There, that’s for you,” he said.

But it took some time to make Phronsie believe that the little tin plate was really and truly hers. When she did, she sat down on the grass by the side of the road, holding it tightly with both hands, and Mr. Beggs looked back from the top of his red cart, the last thing before he turned the corner of the road, to see her sitting there.

IV
IN DEACON BLODGETT’S BARN

“YES, you must come, Joe; so hurry up.”

Ben slipped the last spoonful of mush and molasses into his mouth and pushed back his chair.

“Oh, I don’t want to,” whined Joel, scraping his saucer, violently. “Polly, I’m awful hungry.”

“Oh, you can’t be, Joe,” said Polly, hurrying off with her hands full of dishes to be washed; “you’ve had two big saucers full.”

“They weren’t full,” said Joel, with an injured air, “only up to there,” rapping his spoon against the side of the saucer. “See, Polly, only just that much.”

“Well, that’s full,” said Polly, peering back over her armful. “If you put any more in, you’d splash over the molasses.”

“I wouldn’t splash molasses,” declared Joel, on a high key, “and I’m awful hungry.”

“Do say ‘awfully,’ Joe,” corrected Polly, with a little wrinkle in her brow.

“And you’ve just got to come along,” said Ben, with a pat on his shoulder that meant it. “See Davie! Aren’t you ashamed, Joe!”

Little David had laid down his spoon on hearing Ben, and, slipping off from his chair, was now over by the door, waiting.

“Oh, Davie,” cried Polly, with a glance at his saucer of mush, as she set down her load by the waiting dish-pan, “you haven’t finished your breakfast. Wait a minute for him, Ben.” And she ran over to the door. “Come, Davie.”

“I don’t want it,” said little Davie; “truly, I don’t, Polly.”

“Oh, yes, you do,” contradicted Polly, taking hold of his jacket. “Come back and finish your mush.”

“I wish I could have some more,” said Joel, enviously, as David, with one eye on Ben, who stood cap in hand, sat down again and made his spoon fly briskly.

“Don’t eat so fast,” said Polly; “misery me! You’ll choke yourself. No, no, Davie,” as David pushed his saucer over toward Joel. “Joey’s had enough.”

“I haven’t had near enough,” declared Joel, stoutly.

“Well, you aren’t going to have any more,” declared Polly, decidedly. “Davie must eat all that up, else he can’t go and help Ben.”

So Joel, seeing he was not to get any more breakfast, flung himself on the old kitchen floor and waved his legs in the air, shouting to Davie to hurry up at every spoonful. Until at last, his face quite red, and swallowing the last morsel, Davie hopped off from his chair and ran over to Ben. “I’m through,” he announced happily.

“That’s a good boy,” said Ben, approvingly. “Now, then, we’re off.”

Seeing this, Joel took down his legs from the air, and hopped up, racing after them, and banging the door as he went.

“O dear me!” cried Polly, in vexation, “now Joel’s forgotten to take the molasses can.” Then she rushed over to a corner of the kitchen where Joel had thrown it. It was his turn to-day to take it to the store, to be filled, on the way to Deacon Blodgett’s, where the boys were to work. Then on the way home it was to be called for, all ready with a fresh supply for breakfasts in the Little Brown House.

“Where are you going, Polly?” It was Mother Pepper’s voice from the bedroom, where she was getting off Phronsie’s soiled little pinafore, down which trailed a sticky stream of molasses.

“Oh, Joe’s forgotten the molasses can, Mamsie,” called back Polly, and starting on a run after the boys; “Jo-el!” she called, racing down the path. But Ben, who hated above all things to be late to his work, was hauling them along at a pretty pace. And the wind carried away her voice, so they didn’t hear.

“O dear me!—well, I don’t care,” gasped Polly, feeling every nerve tingle with delight in her healthy little body as she sped on, “if I don’t catch up with them at all. If I only could work at Deacon Blodgett’s,” she mourned, at the thought of the old dish-pan and the hateful tasks indoors that awaited her at home, where she would be cooped up all day. But she couldn’t even reach Deacon Blodgett’s, for just then Ben turned.

“My goodness me!” as he spied her.

“It’s the molasses can,” panted Polly, her brown hair flying, and swinging it at them as she raced up. “Joel forgot it—”

“Oh, Joe, how could you?” began Ben, reproachfully, as the two little boys whirled about on the road.

“I didn’t mean to,” said Joel, digging his rusty little shoe into the dirt, while his fingers worked nervously together, and his face got very red.

“Oh, I don’t mind,” said Polly, wiping her hot face. “It was good to run;” while Ben took the molasses can with a “Here, Joe.”

“I didn’t mean to,” said Joel, over again, and taking the can; “I didn’t, Polly, truly.”

“Oh, I know it,” said Polly, smiling at him.

“Well, come along now,” said Ben, beginning to stride off faster than ever to make up for lost time. So little David, divided between sorrow for Polly having such a long hot walk, and fear that Joel was going to cry, ran by the big brother’s side, doing his best to keep up with him.

Joel, on the other side of Ben, hurried on, clutching the molasses can, to the turn in the road; then he suddenly spun around, and dashed back after Polly’s fleeting footsteps.

“Wait!” he wailed. But Polly, all her thoughts intent on getting back to those waiting dishes,—for Mamsie might stop and do them, oh, dreadful thought!—was going at her best pace. And presently Polly dashed up through the old gateway, up the path and over the flat door-stone, and after her Joel as hard as he could run.

“Oh, my goodness me, Joe!” she cried, and then she sat right down on the big old stone. “What have you come back home for?”

“I’m sor-ry, Polly,” panted Joel, stumbling up to fling himself, molasses can and all, in her lap. “O dear me!—Boo—hoo—hoo! I didn’t—didn’t—” He couldn’t get any further, for the tears rained all down his round, hot cheeks.

“Oh, hush—Mamsie will hear you,” warned Polly, in great distress and lifting his stubby black head. “Oh, misery me, Joe, how you look!” For Joe’s face was streaked from top to bottom where his grimy little hands had frantically tried to wipe away the tears, a few drops from the molasses can oozing out as he had bumped it up and down in his mad run, adding themselves to the general effect. “Now you must come right around to the ‘Provision-Room’ door, and I’ll bring out a wet towel and wash you up; for it will worry Mamsie dreadfully to think you didn’t stay with Ben.”

“I don’t want to be washed up,” began Joel, perfectly overcome with all this dreadful accumulation of woe, most of which was now the fear of Mamsie’s being worried.

“Well, you are going to be,” declared Polly, getting off from the door-stone; “the very idea, Joel Pepper; such a sight as you are! Just think of going down to Deacon Blodgett’s in that way.” So Polly hurried into the house, and Joel crept miserably around its corner, and presently out through the “Provision-Room” door, there she was, towel in hand, and in less time than it takes to tell it, there he was, too, his round face all red and shining and spick-span clean.

“Now, Joe,” said Polly, setting a kiss on each red cheek, “you run right straight down to Deacon Blodgett’s like a good boy, and don’t forget to leave the molasses can at Mr. Atkins’s,—and don’t bump it.”

“I’m sorry,” began Joel, beginning again on what he had come back to say.

“Well, you’ve said that ever so many times,” said Polly, “so don’t say it again; only run along, because just think now you’ve been naughty to run away from Ben and Davie.”

So Joel, feeling as if things that he’d got to be sorry for were piling up too fast for his taste, gulped down his sobs, and started off, this time holding the old molasses can up high with both hands.

“O dear me!” cried Polly to herself, “now he’ll tumble on his nose, I know. Joe—don’t do so,” she screamed after him.

But as well try to stop the wind. And at last, Joel had put the molasses can on the counter of Mr. Atkins’s shop, and sped out again, wild to get to the work at Deacon Blodgett’s that now seemed the loveliest thing in the world for a boy to do.

Ben turned a disapproving glance on him as he panted into the barn.

“Davie is up in the loft,” he said. “He’s picking over the nails. You go up and help him, Joe.”

“I’m sorry,” gasped Joel, flinging himself up against Ben sawing away for dear life on some hickory sticks.

“Take care—well, I sh’d think you would be, Joe, running off like that,” said Ben, not stopping his work an instant.

“O dear—dear!” Joel twisted his small fists into his eyes, whirling around so that Ben might not see him. And catching sight of this, Ben threw down the saw, thinking, “I’ll tell Deacon Blodgett I stopped a bit”—and the next thing Joel knew he had two strong hands on his shoulders and he was spun about again.

“Now, says I,” exclaimed Ben, “what’s it all about, Joel?”

So the whole story came out, and at the end Joel scampered up over the crooked stairs to the loft where little Davie, trembling first because Joel had run away and then much worse because he had come back, and something dreadful seemed to be the matter, was suddenly pounced upon where he sat sorting out a big box of nails.

“I’ve come back!” announced Joel, in the most cheerful of tones, and dropping to the floor by Davie’s side.

David gave a little scream of delight, and throwing his arms around Joel, upset the big box and away flew half of the nails, crooked and straight in the greatest confusion.

“There—now you see,” cried Joel, springing after them, and succeeding in overturning the box again, thereby spilling out the most of the remainder.

“Oh, I’ll pick ’em up,” exclaimed Davie, in a transport, his little hands trembling in his efforts to recover them. Since Joel had come back, the whole world might be upset and it wouldn’t be any matter.

“So will I,” cried Joel, pawing wildly about in the straw scattered on the floor. So the two boys worked like everything, and presently were obliged to say that they had found all that they possibly could. And then setting the big box carefully between them, they set to work sorting out the good nails from the crooked ones.

“They’re ’most all crooked,” observed Joel, shifting a handful in one grimy little palm, and peering into the big box.

“There’s some good ones,” said little Davie, carefully picking out one as he spoke.

“I wish we could have the crooked ones,” said Joel. “P’r’aps Deacon Blodgett’ll give ’em to us. I mean to ask him.”

“Oh, no, you mustn’t, Joe,” cried little David, in alarm; “you know Mamsie told us never to ask for things.”

“Well, I’ll tell him we want ’em,” said Joel, patting a long crooked nail fondly before he laid it aside, “to build our rabbit-house with.” The Pepper boys had never had a rabbit, nor was there any expectation that they ever would possess one, but since Joel had said they ought to get a house ready, and perhaps then a rabbit would come, little Davie had worked as hard as he could to achieve it. Every bit of board was saved, and there were not many, because Polly had to have all that would burn nicely in the stove, of course. But, O joy!—Mr. Atkins, the storekeeper, finding all this out one day, presented the boys with some old boxes. Nails were the hardest things to get, and every stray one that came in their way was hoarded as a great treasure. But they came in very slowly. And now here was the Blodgett big box, and Joel was not to ask for a single crooked one!

“No, no, no!” Little Davie dropped his work to bring his hot face over towards Joel’s. “You mustn’t tell him, Joel; Mamsie wouldn’t like it.”

“That isn’t asking,” said Joel, bobbing his black head obstinately, and picking away furiously at the assortment of nails in his hand.

“Yes, it is,” said little Davie. “Oh, you mustn’t do it, Joe.”

“No, it isn’t either,” contradicted Joel, “and I shall tell him all about our rabbit-house, Dave. So there, now.”

“Then I don’t want any rabbit,” declared Davie, slipping back to his place on the floor, and wringing his hands.

“Not want any rabbit!” reiterated Joel, in amazement, and letting the nails stream through his fingers.

“No, I don’t,” said Davie, quite pale and sitting very still, “want any rabbit at all, Joel.”

“Then I don’t want any nails,” roared Joel,—“not a single smitch of a one.”

“Oh, I am so glad,” said little Davie, his pale face breaking into a smile, “’cause then, Mamsie won’t be sorry, Joel. She won’t, really.”

“And you’ll want a rabbit?” cried Joel, hanging on Davie’s lips.

“Yes, I will,” nodded David, “very much, if you won’t want the nails, Joel.”

“I won’t want one of the old nails,” said Joel, diving vigorously into the box-depths for a fresh handful.

“Boys!” called Ben, from below, “are you working up there?”

“Yes,” screamed Joel, quickly, and picking at the nails with all his might.

But little David’s fingers got in each other’s way so much, over this new panic, started by Ben’s voice, that he made very little headway, and mixed up the pile of nails dreadfully.

“You’re putting in crooked ones,” said Joel, twitching out one from the straight specimens. “Hah,—Hoh, just see that, Dave Pepper!”

“O dear me!” exclaimed poor little David, quite overcome with mortification.

“I’ll pick ’em out,” said Joel, generously. “There,—there ain’t a single bad one in, now.”

So David, after assuring himself that this was really so, began to breathe easily once more, and the two pairs of small fingers kept busily on at their task, till the first thing they knew, heavy steps were heard ascending the crooked stairs and a long face appeared, its keen gray eyes spying them at once.

“Well, boys!” said Mrs. Blodgett, walking along the floor of the loft, “now you must come in to dinner.”

“Dinner!” screamed Joel, hopping up to his feet, and making nails fly in every direction. Little Davie sat quite still, clasping his hands silently, “Oh, are we to stay to dinner, Mrs. Blodgett?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Blodgett, her long face, with its high cheek bones, taking on a smile. “I’m going to keep you to dinner. Come, Betsey is peeling the potatoes, so you must hurry.”

“Did Mamsie say we’re to stay?” asked David, trembling with delight, so that he could hardly get to his feet.

“No,” said Mrs. Blodgett, “but I expected you to stay, only the Deacon forgot to say so, when he told Ben to bring you along to look over those nails.”

“If Mamsie didn’t say we were to stay, we can’t,” said little David, feeling the expected bliss dropping away from him at each step. Joel, cantering over the crooked stairs, hadn’t heard, and he was singing at the top of his joy, and telling everybody within hearing that they were going to stay to dinner at Mrs. Blodgett’s, as he raced into the house.

Deacon Blodgett, wiping his face on the crash towel that hung by the sink-room door, heard him as he came rushing in.

“So you be, Joel, so you be,” he cried, almost as much pleased. “Well, now, Joe, come and wash up.” He set the tin basin he had hung up on its nail, down again in the sink and pumped up some fresh water into it, as Mrs. Blodgett, with little Davie, came in.

“Where’s Ben, Pa?” asked Mrs. Blodgett. “He wasn’t in the barn.”

“I sent him up to the wood-lot,” said the Deacon; “he’ll be along at the right time. Dinner ready, Ma?”

“Yes.” Mrs. Blodgett hurried into the kitchen, where Betsey was making a terrible clatter dishing up the hot things. At the good smells, Joel plunged his face down to the tin basin, and splashed the water all over his hot cheeks and into his eyes, then put out a hand blindly for the crash towel on its nail. “Hurry up, Dave!” he cried.

“We ought not to stay,” said little Davie, huddling up to his side, the Deacon having followed Mrs. Blodgett into the kitchen.

“Mrs. Blodgett said we must,” said Joel, mopping away like everything. “Oh, what do you s’pose they’re going to have for dinner?” wrinkling up his short nose in an effort to distinguish between the delightful smells.

Little Davie tried not to smell at all, even burying his nose in one hand, while he held to Joel’s jacket with the other. “Mamsie won’t like it,” he said, when the door opened, and there was Ben, his ruddy face now quite red. “Oh, boys! I ought to have told you to go home before,” he cried, catching his breath, for he had run from the wood-lot every step of the way.

“We are going to stay to dinner,” announced Joel, boldly; “Mrs. Blodgett said so.”

“Well, you can’t,” said Ben, shortly “for Mamsie expects you home.”

Joel didn’t stop to think, but dashed wildly into the kitchen and up against Mrs. Blodgett’s big blue-checked apron. “He’s going to send us home, Ben is,” he gasped.

“What’s that?” Deacon Blodgett, catching the words, broke in. “Hey, Ben?”

“Yes, sir,” said Ben, in the doorway, with little Davie hanging to his hand, “the boys ought to go home, for Mamsie expects them.”

“Oh, let ’em sit down and eat,” said the deacon, sociably, “There, Joel, stop feeling bad, you h’ain’t got to go home. Come, Ben, set down, and here’s your chair, Davie.” He was dropping into his own, while he talked.

“No, sir,” said Ben, firmly.

It seemed as if he could never get the words out, when he saw the Deacon’s face. Maybe he wouldn’t give him any more work if he didn’t mind him; for there was a little black cloud coming on the high forehead. And Ben shivered from head to foot as he stood there.

“Set down, set down,” Deacon Blodgett, pointing with his fork, kept repeating.

But Ben shook his head, while Joel sobbed in the depths of Mrs. Blodgett’s big apron, and Davie hung helplessly to Ben’s hand.

“There, Pa, I guess I wouldn’t urge no more,” said Mrs. Blodgett, at last. “Yes, you must go,” to Joel, loosening his hold on her apron, “and some other time, maybe, I’ll ask your Ma beforehand to let you stay.”

The Deacon jabbed a potato with his fork from the big dish of smoking hot ones, and carried it to his plate without another word.

“And you can stay and eat dinner, Ben,” said Mrs. Blodgett.

“No,” said Ben, “thank you, Mrs. Blodgett, I’ve got my dinner same’s ever; Polly put it up for me. It’s in the barn.” He kept talking, hoping the Deacon would say something, but he didn’t even look up, and Ben stifled a sigh, and went out after the two boys.

And after they had started for the “Little Brown House,” Mother Pepper, not wishing them to work but half a day at a time helping Ben, he sat down on a log of wood and ate his dinner. But he didn’t enjoy it very much, for thinking of them with every mouthful.

“Well, dear me, what did make you so late?” cried Polly, as the two boys walked into the kitchen. Then she hopped out of her chair, where she sat over in the west window, pulling out basting-threads from one of the coats Mrs. Pepper had finished that morning before she went down to the parsonage to help the minister’s wife, and hurried to take out the potatoes she was keeping hot in the oven. In that way she didn’t see the two dismal little faces.

“Now, then, says I, haven’t they got hot little jackets, though!” sang Polly, running over with the two baked potatoes wrapped in an old towel; “hurry, and get into your chairs, boys, and I’ll cut you some bread.”

And she flew into the pantry. “That’s fine,” she sang, rushing out with it, when, catching sight of Joel’s face, “What is the matter?” And she set the plate of bread down hard on the table, and stared at them.

“We couldn’t stay to dinner,” said Davie, as Joel, contrary to his usual custom, didn’t answer.

“Couldn’t stay to dinner!” echoed Polly.

“Oh, Polly!” Little Davie, finding it hard to keep up this one-sided conversation any longer, and not willing to show Joel’s part in the matter, now rushed to her, wailing, “Mamsie wouldn’t have wanted us to,” and throwing his arms about her, he burst out crying as hard as he could.

Now, all this time, Phronsie, who had come in tired from play, had eaten her dinner very early, and Polly had tucked her into the trundle bed for a long nap. So all was quite free in the old kitchen for the good talk that Polly now set up with the two boys. And she soon had one each side of her, and leaning over her lap, when, the whole story once out, she comforted and coddled them quite as much as Mother Pepper herself could have done, which is really saying a good deal. And so, although the baked potatoes, waiting on the table got very cold, the three little Peppers were bubbling over with happiness, and Joel really forgot he was hungry, until Polly sprang up, nearly upsetting the two small figures.

“Oh, my goodness me!” running over to the table and beginning to pinch the brown jackets of the potatoes, “they’re as cold as two stones.”

“I like ’em cold,” declared Joel, rushing after her, and seizing one of the potatoes. “Oh, ain’t they good!” tearing off the skin to scoop out a mouthful.

“Put in some salt, Joe, do,” said Polly. But Joel couldn’t wait for such small matters as salt, and he dug his spoon violently back and forth in the potato jacket. “I’m going to eat it, every scrap,” suiting the action to the word.

“No, no, Joe, you mustn’t,” commanded Polly, just in time, as the whole of the potato skin showed signs of rapidly disappearing.

“I’m so hungry,” cried Joel.

“Well, if you are very hungry, you can eat some bread,” said Polly, wisely, and wishing she had something nice for them after their terrible disappointment about the beautiful dinner Mrs. Blodgett had wanted to give them. But what was there? O dear me! Polly knew quite well, without looking into the cupboard, just exactly how bare she should find it.

“Now, I tell you, Joel and Davie, what I’ll do. There isn’t anything else to eat, you know, but bread. You may have as much as you want of that. I’ll tell you a story, if you’ll be good boys and eat it.—Mamsie would let me, I know,” said Polly to herself, thinking of the basting-threads not yet pulled out.

“Why, it’s the middle of the day, Polly,” said little Davie, in astonishment, for Polly never was able to leave the work that always seemed clamoring to be done, to tell stories to the children. That enjoyment had to be put off till the twilight hour, when it was too dark to see to do anything else.

“Yes, I know,” said Polly, recklessly, “but I’ll tell you one now, Mamsie would say I could, if she were here.”

“Then I want it,” said little David, happily, and reaching out his hand for a big piece of bread. And Joel began to cram down his slice as quickly as possible to get the sooner to the story which he felt quite sure would not be forthcoming until Polly saw the bread disappear, when the door opened so suddenly that they all three jumped.

Deacon Blodgett’s round face appeared. “How d’ye do, Polly?” and without further ado, he marched in, and laid a bundle on the table wrapped in old newspaper, in between the potato skins and the plate of bread. “Somethin’ Mrs. Blodgett sent, and I’ve got to go down to John Hines’s, and if you’ll let Joel and David go with me, I’ll take ’em along. They can tend to what’s in that bundle on th’ way.”

Joel had already torn off the old newspaper, little Davie quite willing to sit still and watch the proceeding.

There was disclosed a much-worn clean napkin with a red border all around it, and Joel’s frantic hands soon got this open, and there were some of the slices of beef he had smelt just before dinner in the Blodgett kitchen, and thick pieces of bread with,—really and truly there was, and plenty of it,—butter spread all over them! And at last—and didn’t Joel’s eyes stick out then, and even Davie held his breath!—two little apple turnovers tucked in at the bottom!

“They can eat those in th’ wagon,” said Deacon Blodgett, when he could be heard for the shouts sent out by Joel, and Davie’s crows of delight, “if you’ll say, ‘Yes, they can go,’ Polly.”

“Oh, yes, yes, yes!” cried Polly, saying it so fast, over and over, it seemed as if she were never going to stop. “Dear Mr. Blodgett, they can go, and oh, you are so good to ask them!” and it didn’t seem a minute before they were all off and she was picking up the potato skins and clearing the table neatly, as the rattle of Deacon Blodgett’s wagon wheels died away in the road.

V
BAKING DAY

“DEAR me!” said Jasper, standing on tiptoe and running his head well within the old cupboard, “how perfectly fine! I wish we had one just like this at our house,” he added enviously.

“Isn’t it!” cried Polly, with sparkling eyes, quite delighted that he should so approve. “And we keep our very best dishes here.” She pointed up to a blue willow plate, and one or two cracked cups and saucers on the upper shelf.

“Good?” exclaimed Jasper, heartily; “I should say it was! I just love it all, Polly.”

“Phoo!” cried Joel, crowding in between, “that’s nothing. We’re going to have ever so many more; the shelves’ll be all rammed, crammed full.”

Little Davie who couldn’t possibly get nearer than the outside edge of the group, stared with all his might.

“What do you mean, Joel?” gasped Polly, hanging to the door of the old cupboard.

“We are,” declared Joel, delighted to see the impression he had made, and pushing his way out to the middle of the kitchen to thrust his hands in his little trousers’ pockets and strut up and down the old floor, “and they won’t be such old things neither. They’ll be spick-span new, every single one of ’em; plates and plates and plates—yes, sir!”

“Joel Pepper!” exclaimed Polly, deserting Jasper and the old cupboard to rush over and seize his jacket sleeve, “what are you talking about? We aren’t ever going to have anything new.”

“We are, too,” declared Joel, and facing her.

“O dear me!” cried Polly, “what do you mean?”

“We’re going to have everything new,” declared Joel, confidently.

Then he took his little brown hands out of his trousers’ pockets and waved them triumphantly around the old kitchen. “We’re going to have a sofa like the minister’s for Mamsie, and Dave and me’s going to have a table and a gimlet and some jack-knives, and—and a piano. Oh, Polly, you’re going to have a piano,” and Joel pranced about joyfully, “and our ship’s going to bring ’em!”

“Our ship!” echoed Polly, faintly, while Jasper ran over to this exciting centre of things, joined by little Davie. Phronsie alone remained gazing up into the old cupboard.

“Um!” nodded Joel, “and they’re coming here, and going to bring ’em. And Mirandy Peters is going to have some ships coming, too; I heard her mother tell her to wait for ’em. I did, truly, Polly, just the other day, when I went to work there, and they gave me some dinner, ’cause the dog eat mine up. And then Mrs. Peters told me to wait for it. So there, now!”

“O dear me!” cried Polly. Then she sat right down on the old floor and little Davie sank by her side. “Oh, Jappy, do tell him that folks don’t really have ships.”

“See here, Joel,” called Jasper.

But Joel, delighted that now he had explained everything to the complete satisfaction of Polly and the others, had dashed off and was now spinning around the old kitchen, whooping and shouting as if driving a pair of the most unmanageable steeds. “And I’m going to have a horse just like Mr. Beggs’s. No, it’s going to be like Mr. Tisbett’s, and,—”

“Oh, Joey,” cried little Davie, getting up from the floor to run after him, “do have it like dear Mr. Beebe’s horse; do, Joey,” he begged.

“Phoo! Mr. Beebe’s horse can’t go any,” said Joel, scornfully, slackening his speed a bit.

“But he’s so nice,” pleaded David, with tears in his eyes; “please, Joel, I’d rather have one like dear Mr. Beebe’s.”

“Well, then, I’ll give you one,” said Joel, magnificently, “but I’m going to have mine like,—no, I’ll have two,—like Mr. Tisbett’s, and I’ll have a stage and go, flapperty jickerty, down the hill, just like this,—g’lang, there, git up!”—brandishing an imaginary whip. And away Joel pranced, raising a dreadful make-believe dust, and making so much noise there was no chance for any one else to be heard. And Davie, well pleased since he was to have a horse exactly like dear Mr. Beebe’s, raced and pranced after him.

“You can’t hear yourself think,” said Jasper, laughing to see them go; “there’s no use, Polly, in trying to talk to him.”

“But just as soon as they stop a bit, oh, please, Jasper, tell him that we aren’t going to have any ships coming in,” begged Polly, clasping her hands; “it’s so very dreadful for him to be expecting them.”

“I’ll try,” nodded Jasper at her. “Don’t you be afraid, Polly, and perhaps you will sometime have new things,” and he sat down on the floor by her side.

“No,” said Polly, shaking her brown head, “we’re ever and always going to live in this Little Brown House, Jasper King, and we don’t want new things, only—” and her face fell.

“Well, you’ve got a new stove,” nodding over at it, said Jasper, cheerfully; “that’s good, Polly.”

“Isn’t it?” cried Polly, radiantly, and her cheeks grew rosy again; “dear Doctor Fisher gave us that, you know, Jasper.”

“Yes, I know,” said Jasper, who had heard the story many times, the Pepper children never tiring of telling it over. “Well, and perhaps some more things will come, Polly.”

“Oh, no,” said Polly, heaving a sigh, “they won’t, Jasper, and we don’t want them, only—” she paused again.

“Only what, Polly?” begged Jasper, quickly; “tell me, Polly, do.”

He looked so very unhappy that she hurried to say, “Mamsie ought to have a new chair to sew in.”

“I thought you were going to say, a piano,” said Jasper, abruptly.

“A piano!” cried Polly, springing to her feet. “Why, Jasper Elyot King, I’m never going to have a piano in all this world!” and her brown eyes opened their widest.

It was just at this moment that Joel paused to take breath and to let his pair of horses exactly like Mr. Tisbett’s, go up hill comfortably, and the words, “a piano” striking his ear, he threw down his reins, and plunged over to Polly.

“Oh, play for us now,” he begged, for nothing beside Polly’s stories ever gave so much joy as to hear Polly drum on the old kitchen table, running her fingers swiftly up and down along its entire length, while she hummed and sang the tune. “Play, Polly, do!” he teased.

“Oh, I can’t,” said Polly, with flushed cheeks.

“Please, Polly.” Little Davie, tired by driving a horse even exactly like dear Mr. Beebe’s, jumped off from his wagon, and added his entreaties, so Polly allowed herself to be pulled and pushed over to the old table. “Well, what shall I play?” she said. “Oh, wait, I must put the dishes away first.”

“Yes, clear off the piano,” said Joel, sticking out two ready little arms to help; “that’s Polly’s piano,” he announced, just as if stating an entirely new fact.

“No, no, Joe,” cried Polly, warningly, “I’ll do it,” and “I’ll help; oh, let me,” begged Jasper.

So the two older ones put away the pile of clean breakfast dishes left standing until the cupboard shelf—which Polly had just washed down, should be dry,—was ready for them, which now being the case, they were all neatly set in place.

“There, now, that’s all done,” said Jasper, rubbing his hands in great satisfaction. “Come, Phronsie,” and Polly started to shut the cupboard door.

“But I want to look at them,” said Phronsie, in gentle remonstrance and putting up her hand to stop Polly.

“Oh, no, Pet,” said Polly, “you’ve seen them enough; come away, child.”

“But, I haven’t seen them enough, Polly,” contradicted Phronsie, “my dear Mamsie’s dishes, and I want to look at them some more, I do.”

“Don’t you want to hear Polly play on the piano?” asked Jasper. “Come, Phronsie, she’s going to.”

“Is Polly going to play on the piano?” asked Phronsie, her hand dropping down and taking off her gaze from the old cupboard shelves.

“Yes, she is, Phronsie,” said Jasper.

“Then, I want to hear her play very much indeed,” said Phronsie, turning away from the old cupboard, “and I can look at my Mamsie’s dishes to-morrow.”

Joel, who had been clamoring for Polly to hurry and come, now set up a dreadful racket on the old table as he drummed his impatience, “I’m a soldier!” he cried. “Come on, Dave, I’m captain!”

“Oh, hurry, Polly,” cried Jasper, bursting into a laugh, “he won’t stop until you play. Hold up, there, Joe,” he shouted, “Polly’s coming.”

“So I must,” laughed Polly, “or the house will come down.”

“Will the house come down, Polly?” asked little Phronsie, anxiously, as she hurried over clinging to Jasper’s hand.

“Oh, no, Phronsie,” said Polly, quickly. “I shouldn’t have said so,” she added reproachfully.

“Dear me, it couldn’t ever come down,” declared Jasper. “Why, it’s as strong as anything. It’s going to last just forever.”

“And I’m going to live here, I am, just forever, too,” declared Phronsie, hopping over the uneven floor.

“Well, now, what shall I play?” asked Polly, with quite an air, and pushing the sleeves of her brown calico gown up further over her wrists.

“Oh, play that jiggy, wiggly piece,” said Joel, who never could remember the names of Polly’s wonderful flights of melody.

“Oh, Joel, I don’t want that to-day,” said Polly, wrinkling up her cheeks in disdain.

“That was splendid,” retorted Joel, “and I liked it when the organ man played it.”

“Did another organ man come by here?” asked Jasper, in a whisper to Polly.

“No,” said Polly, in a low voice, and her cheek turned pale at the remembrance of the dreadful time when Phronsie followed one to see the monkey.

Jasper drew a long breath of relief.

“He stopped at Mr. Beebe’s, one day when we were there, and dear Mrs. Beebe gave him five cents to play for us,” finished Polly.

“Oh!” said Jasper, quite relieved.

“And I like that best of all,” Joel was saying in a loud injured voice, “and Polly won’t play it.”

“Oh, I will, I will,” cried Polly, quite overcome with remorse, and then Jasper ran over to bring a chair and place it in front of the old table, and Polly sat down, and began with quite a flourish. And before she got through, she forgot all about how she hadn’t wanted to play that piece, and there she was singing away for dear life, and presently she ended by gay little trills and a “bang,—bang!”

“Hooray!” cried Joel, capering about. “Now play another one, and we’re going to dance. Come on, Phron!” trying to seize her hand.

“Hold on,” cried Jasper; “you’ve had your choice, now let Davie say what he’d like, Joe.”

“Yes, that’s the way to do,” said Polly, approvingly, and trying to whirl around on her piano stool, which she couldn’t do very well as it was a stiff wooden chair. “Each one just take turns and choose. But then, O dear me, we ought to have let you choose first, Jasper, ’cause you’ve come over from Hingham to spend the day with us; O dear me!” Poor Polly, who dearly loved to be hospitable, was now so mortified not to do Mamsie credit by having good manners, that the color went clear up to her brown hair, and she sat quite still in distress.

“See here,” said Jasper, quickly, “I didn’t want to choose first, for I’m not company, Polly; I’m just living in the Little Brown House to-day, and I’m your big brother.”

“Oh, oh!” screamed Joel, forgetting all about his desire to dance, and deserting Phronsie to rush over to Jasper, “are you our big brother, Jappy? are you really?”

“Yes,” said Jasper, eagerly, “I am; that is, if you’ll all have me,” and his gray eyes shone.

“Oh, we will, we will,” screamed Joel. “Oh, Dave, Jappy’s our big brother. Now we’ve got two.”

And presently, the three younger little Peppers were clinging to him, for Phronsie was soon acquainted with the blissful news by Davie screaming it rapturously into her ear. And Polly hopped off from her piano stool to seize Jasper’s hand, declaring, “Oh, how fine! Jappy’s really to be our big brother. Ben’ll be so glad,” and so the compact was signed at once.

“Well, now, we must begin and choose what Polly is to play,” said Jasper at last, when this was all settled, and feeling very fine and big to be considered one of the Little-Brown-House family; “who’s next,—Davie?”

“Yes,” said David, “I am,” and he came over to the old table, where Polly was seating herself again before her piano. “Please play that little brook piece, Polly,” he said softly.

“Oh, how nice,” said Jasper, approvingly; “what’s the name, Polly?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, with rosy cheeks, and beginning to play.

“She just makes it,” said little Davie, and coming around back of Polly, to gaze up into Jasper’s face, “and then she plays it, and the water runs all over the stones; you’ll see,” and having communicated this piece of information, he hurried back to slip up close to Polly on her other side again.

“Did you make it up in your head, Polly?” cried Jasper, admiringly. “O dear me, I wish I could ever do that. All I can do is to play stupid old pieces that I learn.”

“Oh, this isn’t much, Jasper, only Davie likes it,” said Polly, all in a tremor at having Jasper find out that she made it up.

“Well, I don’t like it,” said Joel, hanging back discontentedly from the group; “it’s dreadful soft and squashing; I’d rather have something nice.”

“Look here, sir,” Jasper turned on him, “you’ve had your piece, Joe. Now I just know that I shall like this best.”

To have Jasper like the new choice best invested it at once in Joel’s mind with new interest, and he drew nearer, not taking his black eyes off once from the new big brother’s face.

And Polly, since she must play her own piece, made up in her head, remembered what Mother Pepper always said, “Do everything just the best you know how, Polly.” And so she sat quite straight, and sang away, and made her fingers run up here and there, all along the old table front, and she even put in a great many more tumbles of the water over the stones, than little Davie had ever dreamed of. And then she sat back in the old wooden chair and drew a long breath.

“O dear me!” exclaimed Jasper, excitedly, “I’d give anything, Polly Pepper, to play like that; and to think you made it up out of your own head. It’s too splendid for anything!” and his eyes shone.

“Isn’t it?” Little David ran out of his place by Polly’s side over again to Jasper. “Isn’t it, Jappy?” he cried, his blue eyes very big, and hopping up and down in front of him.

“I should say it was!” cried Jasper, taking Davie’s hands for a good spin in the middle of the floor; “it’s just too splendid for anything, Davie Pepper,” he repeated, enthusiastically.

“I like it,” said Joel, veering around. Then he ran over to the two whirling about. “He’s my big brother’s much as yours, Dave Pepper,” and he crowded in to get hold of Jasper’s hand, and spin too.

“So you shall,” declared Jasper, well pleased to be adopted into all the comradeship of the Little Brown House. “Now, then, Joe; I’ll give you a spin that is one!”

And Polly flew off from her piano stool and ran over with Phronsie for the fun, and there they all were, capering about, until, flushed and out of breath, the whole bunch of children stopped short.

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, pushing back the little rings of brown hair from her forehead, “that was just splendid, only I’m afraid we’ve tired Phronsie to death,” throwing her arms about her.

“I’m not tired, Polly,” panted Phronsie, her cheeks very pink; “please do so some more.”

“Come, now!” cried Polly, “you mustn’t dance any more. You’re all tired out. Mamsie wouldn’t want you to.”

That Mamsie wouldn’t want her to was sufficient reason why Phronsie shouldn’t dance any more at present, so she dropped her little pink calico skirt that she had gathered up, and stood still obediently.

“I’ll tell you,” said Jasper, seeing her face, “what you might do, when you’re rested; when it’s my turn to choose a piece for Polly to play, then you can dance to it.”

Everybody shouted at that, they were so pleased to find that Phronsie was not really to be disappointed, and Phronsie, dreadfully excited, began to hop up and down, “Polly’s going to play, and I’m going to dance, I am.”

And then she chose her piece, for of course it was her turn next. And it was just what Polly and the two boys knew it would be, the goodnight song Mrs. Pepper used to croon to her baby, “Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber.”

“Oh, yes, Phronsie, I’ll play, ‘Hush, my dear,’” said Polly, who saw the words coming long before Phronsie opened her red lips. And Phronsie very gravely stood close to her side, while Polly sang it through and through; each time that she tried to stop, Phronsie would say “again” and pull Polly’s brown calico gown.

At last, Joel was worn out waiting for Polly to get through, and Davie was in a condition that was not much better, so Jasper broke in, “Now it’s my turn to choose” and the one he begged for was “Old Kentucky Home.”

“I think that’s beautiful,” said Polly, pushing back her sleeves, to begin afresh, while Phronsie, seeing that she was not to get any more “Hush, my dear,” went off to sit down on her little stool and think it all over. She was only roused by Jasper singing out, “Now, then, for your dance, Phronsie!” and there he was holding out his hand.

So Phronsie hurried off to her dance, and Polly began on the liveliest of jigs, every now and then looking over her shoulder, to be sure to keep good time; for Phronsie, who always wanted to make cheeses when very happy, would puff out, without a bit of warning, the skirt of her little pink calico gown in the very midst of the measure, and down she would sink to the old floor, to bob up and dance again.

“It’s perfectly awful to keep time to her,” said Polly, who dearly loved to be exact about things, especially with a tune.

“I know it,” said Jasper, sympathetically, “but oh, she’s so sweet!”

“Isn’t she?” cried Polly, with shining eyes, and beginning to play away with new vigor.

But at last Phronsie must be stopped, for Mamsie would surely say so if she were home. And then Polly had to hold her, as with flushed cheeks she begged to be taken up into her lap, and then the music-stool was taken away and the grand piano became an old kitchen table once more.

“And now,” said Polly, “if Ben would only come, we could have our baking, Jasper. O dear, I wish he would!”

“I’m going to watch outside,” said Joel, prancing off to the door.

“That won’t make him come any quicker,” said Jasper. “Can’t we help about something, Polly?” He wrinkled his brows and gazed around the old kitchen.

“No,” said Polly, following his gaze, “there isn’t anything to do, but—” then she stopped.

“Oh, what?” cried Jasper, eagerly, and hanging over her chair where she sat with Phronsie.

“Oh, you can’t do it,” said Polly, wishing she had bitten the end of her tongue before she had spoken.

“But we can, Polly,” insisted Jasper, “I know we can. Do tell what it is,” he begged.

“Why, Mamsie is going to ask Ben to fill the tub in the ‘Provision Room’ with water to wash to-morrow, and I’m going to help her.”

“Oh, Polly, do you wash things?” asked Jasper, looking admiringly at her fingers, now smoothing Phronsie’s yellow hair.

“Yes, indeed!” answered Polly, proudly. “I can do them real nicely, Mamsie says.” Then she blushed at her own praise and hung her head.

“Oh!” exclaimed Jasper, “how I wish I could help! Does Ben wash things, too?”

“Oh, yes, indeed!” said Polly. “You ought to see him. He ties on one of Mamsie’s aprons. Ben washes all the sheets; they’re the biggest things, you know. And he wrings them out, and then we all go outdoors and have great fun pinning them to the line. And Phronsie has a little string; haven’t you seen the hook out on the side of the woodshed? And we fasten it up for her, and she washes all her doll’s clothes. Oh, it’s such fun!” Polly clasped her hands around her knees and drew a long breath.

“You do have such good times,” said Jasper, enviously. “O dear me, and I’ve never had a sister or brother.”

Down dropped Polly’s hands, “Oh, I forgot,” she said.

“I mean a little sister, or near my own age,” corrected Jasper. “Sister Marion is just as nice as she can be,” and his gray eyes glowed. “You ought to see her, Polly; you’d love her dearly, but she’s ever so much older than I am.”

Polly regarded him sorrowfully. Then she brightened up. “Well, Mamsie will let you come here all the time you can,” she cried, meaning from this minute on to do everything she could to make a boy happy who hadn’t any sisters near his own age, nor any brothers at all. To do this nothing was so good as to let him join them in a baking frolic. “Oh, I do wish Ben would come,” she said again, for about the fifth time, just as Joel, out on the path, screamed out, “Oh, here he is!” and dashed off, Davie, as usual, at his heels to meet Ben.

Jasper was just springing over the rickety steps leading down into the “Provision Room.” “Polly,” he called, “where’s the pail to fill the tub with?” And Polly, racing after to get it for him, where it hung behind the door, of course, they didn’t either of them hear Joel’s cry nor see him run down the road with Davie. So the first thing the two knew, Ben’s face appeared. “Halloa!” he cried. “Oh, are you filling that old tub?”

“Yes,” said Polly, “we are; and now you won’t have to break your arms over it, Bensie.”

“Well, I guess I’m not going to let you fill that tub, Jasper,” said Ben, decidedly. “No, sir—ee!” and he made a lunge at the pail now in Jasper’s hand.

“And I guess I’m not going to let you have this pail,” cried Jasper, merrily, and squaring off, “No, sir—ee!”

And there they were going round and round in the middle of the “Provision Room,” the pail swinging wildly out from Jasper’s arm. At last, in one unlucky moment, down he tripped, and Ben rolled over him, and the pail flew off and ran away by itself.

“Hooray!” Joel and David, who had both run after Ben, now seized it together. “Let me have it,” screamed Joel. “I’m going to fill Mamsie’s tub.”

“We didn’t either of us get it, you see,” said Jasper, bursting into a laugh, and sitting still on the earthen floor. “Oh, Ben, to see your face,” and he laughed harder than ever.

“’Tisn’t worse than yours,” said Ben; “it can’t be, Jasper. Yours is dirty from top to bottom.”

“Well, that’s because you rolled me in the dirt,” said Jasper, coolly, and rubbing his face. “Well, I think we’ll need to get into the tub, instead of the clothes,” he added.

“Oh, I’ll get you a towel and the basin,” said Polly; “then you can wash your faces. Misery me! how you both look!” she exclaimed, as she ran out to get it all ready for them.

“Joe,” called Ben, as Joel and David hurried off dragging the big pail, which banged over the rickety steps, “don’t you get that water; Jasper and I are coming out for it.”

And in a minute or two, there the two boys were, all washed up, fresh and clean, out by the big barrel into which a rain-spout ran to collect the water so that Mrs. Pepper could wash the clothes, with Polly and Ben helping her.

And between them they made very quick work over filling the big tub. And then—after the hands were all washed up spick and span,—“Oh, now for the baking!” exclaimed Ben, with great satisfaction, and hanging up the towel by the sink.

“Yes, now for the baking!” they all exclaimed. And soon the old kitchen was the scene of a great excitement, till it thrilled with life in every corner. And the fire burned with clear little winks of light that seemed to say, “Go right ahead, and be as jolly as you want to, I’m with you in everything!”

And the flour bag was brought out from the old cupboard. It took two of the boys to get it, although it wasn’t a big bag by any means, nor was it anywhere near being full. It was brown flour, to be sure, but Jasper declared that was ever so much nicer than if it were white. And the little tins—they were just as clean and shining as they could be, for Polly always kept them so. Besides, she had given them an extra rubbing over that very morning to have them ready. But now, of course, they must have the dish-towel whisked over them again, to be actually sure that they were all right. Oh, the old kitchen was a very busy place, any one could see, with something for all the fingers to do. Even Phronsie was provided for in that respect, for she was polishing up the little tin biscuit cutter most carefully.

“But, dear me!” Polly stopped in the midst of all this merry bustle. “Oh, how could I forget!” Then she dashed into the bedroom and threw open the middle drawer of the old bureau, just above the one where Phronsie’s red-topped shoes were always kept. And she pulled out one of Mrs. Pepper’s clean blue-checked aprons. “Here,” as she ran back to Jasper, “I must tie it around your neck—Mamsie said so—before you began to bake.”

“That’s fine,” exclaimed Jasper, as the big apron fell down in folds almost to his feet, and Polly tied the strings around his neck. “Now, says I, you’ll see what biscuits I’m going to make!” and he brandished the rolling pin.

And then Phronsie must sit up to the table and have a small piece of dough to make little biscuits all alone by herself. And she patted the lump into shape, turning it over and over to push it here and there before she cut one out with the top of the small tin salt-shaker that Polly took off for her, and singing softly to herself all the while. This she did so many times that at last Joel looked up from his end of the table. “Look at Phron,” he cried, “she hasn’t cut one single one out yet!”

“Hush, Joe.” Polly, with a tin plate covered with small lumps of dough that were going to be the most beautiful biscuits in good time, in her hand, turned quickly as she was just going to slip them into the hot oven, and ran up against Ben. “O dear me!” as he put up his hand, but away went the tin plate, falling bottom upward, and all the little lumps hitting the floor.

“O dear, that’s my fault!” cried Ben, in great distress.—Page [124].

“O dear, that’s my fault,” cried Ben, in great distress. “Polly, I’m dreadfully sorry—” and getting down to pick them up.

“Oh, no, it isn’t,” cried Polly; “never mind, Ben,” as she saw his face. Jasper and the others immediately left the baking table to hurry to the scene.

“We can scrape them off,” said Ben, ruefully, and getting a knife to begin operations.

“But they’ve been on the floor,” said Polly, “and they’ll never be so nice,” and she sighed.

“Well, let’s make some more,” said Jasper, “and throw these away, Polly. That’s easy enough.”

“But we can’t throw them away,” said Polly, in horror, “and we haven’t very much flour in the bag,” and she leaned over to look into it. “Mamsie said that was all we could take.”

“Then we must cut off the tops of the biscuits, Polly,” said Ben; “there’s no other way.”

“And Dave and I’ll eat ’em,” said Joel, briskly.

“Well, you must have a sharp knife then, Ben,” said Polly. “Wait, I’ll get it.” So she ran and got Mamsie’s special one in the little drawer under the sink that Mrs. Pepper always used when there was any meat (which wasn’t often) to cut up, and all the bunch of children watching, the tops of the little biscuits were slowly cut off by Ben.

“They’re dreadfully small,” grumbled Joel, who thought it a great waste. “You might have given them to Dave and me.”

“For shame, Joel!” said Polly; “you couldn’t ever have eaten them unless Ben had pared them. O dear me, they are small,” her face falling, “but I guess they’ll be good.”

“I’m sure they will,” said Jasper, “and, Polly, they’ll be so cunning on the plate. Do put them on the blue one that is up in the cupboard there.” He nodded his head over to the corner where the few best dishes were kept.

“Oh, we couldn’t take that down, Jasper,” said Polly, quickly, “not unless Mamsie says we may.”

“And if you don’t hurry and get those biscuits in the oven, you can’t put them on any plate,” broke in Ben, wisely.

“That’s so,” laughed Jasper. So Polly started again with her tin plate of little lumps of dough. And the oven door was flung wide, and in they slipped, and then the door banged, good and hard, and all they had to do was to bake as nicely as possible till they were a lovely brown.

“Oh, I hope they’ll be good,” said Polly, anxiously coming back to the table to oversee operations.

“Oh, I guess they will,” said Ben, comfortingly.

“I can’t do anything with mine, Polly,” said Jasper, patting and punching the lumps of dough in his hand at a great rate. “It sticks dreadfully,—see there! It’s in no end of a mess.”

“That’s because you want some more flour on your fingers,” said Polly, holding out the little bowl in which was a sprinkling of flour for just that very purpose; “there, Jasper, stick them in.”

“Is that so?” cried Jasper, freeing one set of fingers to get the others in a worse plight. “Ow; it’s all sticking to my other hand. I’ve just spoiled it, Polly.” He held out the little wad hanging to his thumb and finger and gazed at Polly in dismay.

“Oh, no, it isn’t,” said Polly, picking it off to set it on the bread-board; “it’ll come as good as can be after you get some more flour on your fingers, and—”

“Your biscuits’s burning!” screamed Joel, sniffing. “They are—burning—Polly!”

But she didn’t need this second shout to make her run and fling the oven door open, Jasper hurrying after, his fingers all over dough, and all the others following.

“O dear, dear!” he mourned. “Now I made you stop. Oh, Polly, I am so sorry!” kneeling down beside her. “Here, let me pull them out.”

“Oh, Jasper, you’ll burn your hands,” she cried. But he already had the tin plate out; “whew!” dropping it just in time on the old table.

“Oh, did you burn you?” cried Polly. “Oh, what would Mamsie say to have such a thing happen to any one spending the day at the Little Brown House! O dear me!” She was quite gone in distress.

“Only just the veriest bit,” said Jasper, blowing on his thumb. “There; that’s all right now. Don’t worry, Polly.”

And Ben was as much distressed to have anything happen to Jasper. “Come over and stick it under the pump,” he said, leading the way.

“Don’t want to,” said Jasper; “it’s all right now, I tell you, Ben.”

Meantime, Joel had been hanging over the tin plate with the little lumps of dough and loudly protesting that they were all burned up, and that now nobody could eat them. Finally, Polly and Ben satisfying themselves that Jasper’s thumb was really as he said, “all right,” turned off to investigate for themselves the state of the biscuits.

“Indeed, they’re not burned at all,” declared Jasper. “They’re just a lovely brown, and they’ll taste awfully good, I know they will.”

“So do I,” said Ben.

“Give me one,—just one,” begged Joel.

“Get away,” said Ben, as Joel lunged at the tin plate. “You just said they were all burned, Joe.”

“Well, they aren’t,” said Joel. “Do give me just one, Ben,” he whined.

“No,” said Ben, firmly, “you can’t have one till we all have some; and we aren’t near through our baking. Why, just look at Phronsie! She hasn’t finished hers yet.”

“Phronsie never’ll get hers done,” grumbled Joel. “She turns it over and over all the time.”

“Well, you’ve got to wait,” said Ben, and that ended the matter. And then they all set to work busier than ever, around the table, and the little brown biscuits that were baked, were slipped off from the tin plate, and another batch slipped on it; Jasper’s being given the place of honor in the middle. And Ben brought out a pan that Mamsie and Polly always baked their bread in. “There, Polly, let’s put some in there,” as he set it on the table.

“That’s good!” exclaimed Jasper, beaming in approval. “Oh, Polly, my apron’s coming off—”

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, “I’ll tie it up again, Jasper,” and she dropped the dough she was patting deftly, on to the bread-board.

“You keep still, Polly,” said Ben; “I’ll tie him up,” suiting the action to the word. “There, I guess you won’t get that out in a hurry, Jasper.”

“You’ll have to untie me, old chap,” said Jasper, “when the baking’s over. Oh, Polly, this plate is all full now. Let me put it in the oven.”

“And I’ll open the door,” said Ben, hurrying over. “That’s just fine,” he said, regarding the biscuits admiringly.

“Let me see—let me see before you put them in!” cried Joel, getting from his chair to run over to the stove. “I want to see them, Ben.”

“Come on, then,” said Ben, as Jasper paused, resting the tin plate on the sill of the oven.

“Oh, aren’t they splendid!” exclaimed Joel, his fingers itching to get hold of one of them, “and those others are little bits of squinchy ones—”

“You be still, and not abuse those other biscuits,” said Jasper, slipping the tin plate carefully into the centre of the oven; “they’re just splendid, too—” and Ben shut the oven door with a clang.

“They’re dreadfully little,” said Joel, clambering up into his chair.

“Well, now they’re all done but Phronsie’s,” said Polly, as the tin bread-pan was ready to slip into the oven on its last journey. “I’ve saved a place for hers, right here in the middle.”

“Come, Pet, aren’t you ready?” said Ben, going over to her high-chair.

“I will be, Bensie,” said Phronsie, “in a minute,” and turning over her pat of dough again.

“That’s just the way she’s been doing all the while,” said Joel.

“Never mind,” said Ben. “Well, now, Pet, I guess that’s done.”

“In just a minute—please wait, Bensie,” she begged, pushing up the little lump of dough softly; “see, it isn’t nice like Polly’s,” and she turned it again.

“O dear!” groaned Joel, impatiently.

“Phronsie,” said Jasper, running around to the other side of the high-chair, “see what a cunning little place Polly has saved for you, in the pan—to put your biscuits in.”

“Has Polly saved a place for me?” asked Phronsie, in gentle surprise, and pausing as she was turning her little dough-pat again.

“Yes, indeed,” cried Polly, running over to show her the bread-pan, “right there, Phronsie,—see, in the very middle; and your biscuits will be next to Jasper’s and Ben’s.”

“And mine’ll be there, too!” screamed Joel, interrupting; “tell her, Polly; mine’ll be there, too.”

“Yes,” said Polly, “Joel’s will be there, too, and Davie’s. I declare, almost every single one of us are in that pan; our biscuits, I mean. So put yours in, Phronsie.”

“Are yours there, Polly?” asked Phronsie, stopping with her hand holding the small pat of dough almost over the pan.

“Er—no,” said Polly; “I didn’t have any in this pan, Phronsie.”

“Then I don’t want to put my biscuits in,” said Phronsie, pulling back her hand. “I want them to go in next to yours, Polly, I do.”

“O dear me!” said Polly, “now whatever shall we do, Ben?” over Phronsie’s yellow head.

“I don’t know,” said Ben, at his wit’s end. Still, something must be done, for Polly was dreadfully worried, and to have Polly troubled was about the worst thing that could possibly happen, in Ben’s estimation.

“Now, Phronsie,” he said, “if you don’t put your biscuits in the pan, there, just where Polly has said, you’ll make her feel very bad.”

“Will it make her sick?” asked Phronsie, slowly, a worried look coming over her face.

“I don’t know,” said Ben, honestly, “but she’ll feel very bad, I do know that, unless you put your biscuits just in that very spot.” He pointed to the little place in the centre of the pan left for them.

Phronsie gave a long sigh. She wanted dreadfully to put her little biscuit in next to Polly’s and have it bake alongside of hers. Still, it never would do to have Polly feel very bad, as Ben said she would, so she reached out her hand and laid the little dough-pat just where she was told to.

“Now that’s a good child,” said Ben, with an approving pat on her pink apron.

“And when they are done,” said Polly, waving the bread-pan on her way to the oven, “we’ll—”

“Take care, Polly,” warned Ben, “or you’ll spill them—”

“Why, we’ll spread them all out and have our party, and eat them all up,” sang Polly, gayly; “but first we must clean all our baking things away.”

VI
THE LITTLE WHITE CAT

PHRONSIE was crying bitterly. Everything had gone wrong in the Little Brown House that morning. In the first place, it was snowing,—not a cheery, white fluffy shower, but a sour, comfortless downpour just on the edge of becoming a drizzling rain, that sent the chill in between the clapboards and under the old door-sill, and made Polly run every few minutes to put more wood in the stove. And as luck would have it, this was the very morning when the stock in the wood-box ran low. Ben, just before he hurried off to work, told Joel to be sure and fill it up, but Joel, frantic with delight at the approach of what he persisted in calling a snow-storm, had rushed off with little Davie, dragging their home-made sled of rough boards merrily after them, and forgot all about it.

“Dear me!” exclaimed Polly, in vexation, as she poked the fire up and put on a fresh stick; “there are only two more left,” with an anxious glance into the big box back of the stove.

“I’m so cold,” said Phronsie, laying Seraphina down on the floor and coming up to Polly, and she held up her fat little hands.

“Goodness me, so you are, Pet,” said Polly, feeling of them in great concern; “well, you must have on Mamsie’s shawl.”

So Polly ran into the bedroom, Phronsie following quickly, and humming: “I must have on Mamsie’s shawl. Yes, I am, Polly, so cold”—in great glee at the mere mention of Mamsie’s shawl.

“Now pin it,” she said, standing on tiptoe as Polly got it out of the bureau drawer. It was a little brown and black plaid woollen one that the parson’s wife had given Mrs. Pepper to lay over her shoulders when she sat by the west window to sew on cold winter days. So Polly took one of the biggest pins sticking up in the red-flannel cushion on the top of the bureau and drew the little shawl together, making it fast around Phronsie’s neck.

“There, now, Pet,” she said, giving her a kiss, “Mr. Jack Frost will have to go away, for you’ve got on Mamsie’s shawl.”

“Mr. Jack Frost will have to go away, for I’ve got on Mamsie’s shawl,” echoed Phronsie, and folding her arms closely together so she could hug the little shawl the tighter, she ran out into the kitchen after Polly, who was now busy over the stove again.

“Misery me—now there’s only one stick left.” Polly was cramming in some wood, and she set the cover back in a great hurry. “Now I’ve got to go out to the woodpile and get some more. You keep away from the door, Phronsie; I’ll be back in a minute.” And she threw on her sack and hood and dashed out of doors.

But she didn’t come back, and it seemed to Phronsie it was too long to expect any one to wait. She couldn’t see the woodpile from the window, although she plastered her little face against it and tried as hard as she could to find out what Polly was doing.

“I must get Polly,” at last she decided, so she went over to the door and opened it, huddling up into Mamsie’s little shawl as the wet, clinging snow struck against her.

But Polly was nowhere to be seen, and Phronsie, stumbling over to the woodpile and peeping behind it, couldn’t find her anywhere.

“Polly—Polly,” she called in a grieved little voice, but there wasn’t a sound except the soft dropping of the wet snow that was almost like rain. And presently Phronsie’s tears were falling fast and she could hardly see because of them.

“Well—well!” It was Doctor Fisher coming around the side of the Little Brown House because he had been to the big green door and there was nobody to say “come in.” He had a bag in his hand that he was carrying carefully. “Child, what are you doing out here?” he cried, in astonishment.

“Polly isn’t anywhere,” wailed Phronsie, running over to him with the tears streaming down her face.

“Polly isn’t anywhere!” repeated the little doctor in astonishment. “Take care, child,” holding the bag at arm’s length in one hand, while he gathered Phronsie within his other arm. “Oh, yes, she is. We’ll find her just in one minute. Now, then, I must get you into the house.”

“Will you find Polly?” cried Phronsie, looking up through her tears, as the little doctor, the bag in one hand, hurried her along with the other.

“Yes, sir—ee!” declared Doctor Fisher, nodding so violently that his big spectacles tumbled down to the end of his nose; “wait a minute.” He released Phronsie and set them straight. “Now, then, Polly!” he called in a loud voice.

But of course there wasn’t any Polly to answer, and Phronsie was just going to burst into another wail, when a funny little noise struck her ear and she paused in astonishment.

“I don’t suppose you know what I’ve got in this bag,” said Doctor Fisher, artfully, as he set it on the floor, then got down on his knees beside it.

But Phronsie couldn’t get her mind off from Polly, so she turned a sorrowful little face to the window.

“Please get Polly,” she begged.

“Yes, yes, all in good time,” responded the little doctor in a cheery fashion, as if it were the easiest thing in all the world to get Polly; “but you must see what is in my bag first, because, you see, I don’t know what will happen if I don’t let her out soon. She may die,” said the little doctor in an awful whisper, as he untied the bag, put in his long fingers and drew carefully out a fluffy white kitten, who blinked on being drawn out to the light, and then said very indignantly, “Fuff—siss!”

“There—there!” exclaimed the little doctor, holding the fluffy little ball very gingerly, with a great regard for possible claws, while Phronsie squealed with delight. “Oh, give her to me—I want her!” holding out both hands from beneath Mamsie’s little plaid shawl.

“Well, you shall have her, for I brought her to you,” said Doctor Fisher, depositing the fluffy little ball in Phronsie’s arms. “Take care, now, or she may scratch you. Such a piece of work as I had to get her here.”

“Fuff—siss!” said the little white kitten again, just as there was a rattle at the door, and Polly came in quite slowly, because her arms were full of wood, and she couldn’t walk fast.

“Oh, Polly!” screamed Phronsie, “you’ve come back!” And she hurried over to her, kitten and all, the little doctor following quickly.

“See—see!” said Phronsie, dreadfully excited, and holding up the fluffy white ball that was spitting dreadfully, while little Doctor Fisher precipitately seized every bit of the wood out of Polly’s arms and dumped it in the big wood-box back of the stove.

“Now, says I,” he exclaimed, with a quick eye at the stove, “I guess some of those sticks want to go in here.” And in a minute he had the cover off, and before long the wood was crackling merrily away, and Polly was rubbing her cold hands together, thinking how good it was to be in such a nice warm place.

“And so you’ve been out working at the woodpile,” said the little doctor, with a keen glance at her red cheeks.

“Oh, I didn’t get it at the woodpile,” said Polly, flinging off her hood. “Isn’t that the dearest little kitten in all this world!” she cried, rapturously.

“You didn’t get it at the woodpile!” said Doctor Fisher, straightening up to look at her in astonishment. “Where in the world, Polly—” he began.

“Oh, Grandma Bascom gave it to me,” said Polly, with a little laugh. “You see Ben split her wood all up—a whole lot of it—for her, and ours is too big, and I couldn’t find the hatchet, and—”

“No, no, I should think not,” assented the little Doctor Fisher, hastily. “Well, now, you are all right, Polly,” with a glance at the stove.

“We’re all right,” said Polly, with a merry little laugh and skipping around the kitchen, Phronsie huddling up the white fluffy kitten tightly, and flying after her.

“And if you are a good girl,” said the little doctor, opening the door and looking back at Phronsie, “why, then the little white cat shall stay with you always.”

“The little white cat shall stay with me always,—he said so,” declared Phronsie, trying to keep up with Polly’s flying steps.

“Yes; isn’t he good to bring you that dear sweet kitty!” exclaimed Polly, seizing it to give it a good hug, whereat the small fluffy ball said “Fuff—siss!” again very loudly.

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, drawing back; “I didn’t hurt you, you funny little thing, you; you needn’t scream at me so.”

“She’s only talking, Polly,” said Phronsie, anxiously watching Polly’s face.

“Talking?” said Polly, with a little laugh; “well, never mind, I guess she won’t hurt me, Pet.”

“She won’t hurt you, Polly,” said Phronsie, shaking her yellow hair positively; “I won’t let her.”

“And did you ever see such a nice place as this!” said Polly, glancing approvingly around the old kitchen and over to the stove where little winks of the bright fire could be seen, and the wood was crackling away as hard as it could. “Phronsie, I don’t believe ever anybody had such a dear Little Brown House as this is—ever in all this world!”

“It’s my Little Brown House,” said Phronsie, coming to a sudden stop and looking all about her very intently, “and I shall live here forever.”

“Well, come on,” said Polly, every nerve tingling for another spin, she was just beginning to feel so nice and warm and cosey, and holding out her hands. So Phronsie, although she would have preferred to sit quietly and play with her new treasure, hugged it up tighter to her little bosom and let Polly dance her about to her heart’s desire, the little white cat spitting and mewing her discontent, until the two children, tired out, sat down, flushed and panting, to rest.

And just at that moment the door opened and in plunged little Doctor Fisher, his spectacles gleaming behind a big armful of wood.

“Oh—oh!” cried Polly and Phronsie together, as they rushed across the kitchen to him.

“It was such good fun!” declared the little doctor, depositing the big armful with a rattle and a clatter in the wood-box. His eyes sparkled, and a smile of great satisfaction spread all over his face. “You can’t think!”

“You’ve split up all that wood!” exclaimed Polly, in dismay, going back of the stove to peer into the big box; “and where did you find the hatchet?” rushing back to him.

“Oh, that’s telling,” laughed Doctor Fisher.

“And Ben won’t like it, to have you do this, because you have to work so hard to cure sick folks,” said Polly, with a very flushed face.

“Ben isn’t to know anything about it,” retorted Doctor Fisher.

“He would have filled it,” began Polly, and the rosy color flew all over her face deeper yet, “only—” And then she stopped suddenly at the thought that she would have to tell about Joel.

“Ben’s all right,” declared the little doctor, with emphasis. “Now, Polly, don’t think anything more about it.”

“You see, Joel—” And Polly clasped her hands. She had almost let it out, for Ben mustn’t be blamed unjustly—O dear, what could she do!

“And because Joel ran off and forgot to fill the box,” said little Doctor Fisher, gayly, “is that any reason, I should like to know, why I can’t have the fun of splitting up a few sticks? Well, Phronsie—” and he whirled around to her; “don’t you want to know where I got that little white cat for you, before I go, hey?”

“She’s my little white cat,” declared Phronsie, too excited to think of anything except that the kitten was really hers.

“Yes, I know,” Doctor Fisher nodded at her; “well, now, I’m going to tell you how I got her. Polly, you come over and hear it, too.”

So Polly obediently went over. “Oh, you’ve been so good, dear Doctor Fisher; you’ve saved my eyes, and given me my stove, and now you’ve brought Phronsie a little white cat.” Polly clasped her hands tightly together. Oh, if she could only do something for him!

“Well, now, let’s hear how I got that little white cat,” said Doctor Fisher, briskly. He never could bear to be thanked, but he was very much gratified, all the same, at Polly’s words. “You couldn’t guess, children,” he cried, with great animation.

“Phronsie,” said Polly, “he’s going to tell how he got your little white cat.”

At that Phronsie was greatly excited, and she piped out, “Oh, tell me!”

“Why, I didn’t get her at all,” said Doctor Fisher.

“You didn’t get her at all—” repeated Polly, in amazement.

“No,” the little doctor burst into a laugh at her face; “that is, I didn’t go after her. She came to me.”

“She came to you!” echoed Polly. “Oh, do tell us, Doctor Fisher,” hanging on every word breathlessly.

“Why, you see I had been around considerably on my calls yesterday,” said Doctor Fisher; “never had so many it seemed to me; so I got home late and I had bundles in the top of the gig—had it pushed back, you know. And after I had Dobbin out of the shafts, and in his stall, I just reached in to get the parcels, and the first thing I knew—see there!” The little doctor held up one hand, and there was a long, red scratch running halfway across it.

“O dear me!” cried Polly in great distress.

“That’s the first thing I knew about that little white cat,” said Doctor Fisher, ruefully; “although I’d been on the lookout for a kitty for Phronsie, and a white one, I never expected she’d come to me. But there she was, as fine as a fiddle, and she sprang up on top of those bundles. I’d waked her up, you see,—and she puffed up twice her size and hissed and spit and scratched at me like all possessed!” He threw his head back, and laughed long and loud at the remembrance.

“And didn’t you find out where she came from?” cried Polly, with big eyes. Phronsie, divided between her joy at the story and her sorrow at the long scratch on Doctor Fisher’s hand, only hugged the little white cat tighter without a word.

“No, not a bit of it. You see I’d been in so many places yesterday, how could I?” said Doctor Fisher, wrinkling his brows. “I suppose Miss Puss thought my gig-top was about as nice a place to sleep in as she ever saw—so in she went without asking anybody’s leave—”

“Phronsie, just think—your little white cat walked right into Doctor Fisher’s gig-top,” laughed Polly, her worry over the wood dropping off for a moment. “Oh, how funny!”

“How funny!” laughed Phronsie, and the little doctor laughed. And the door swung open suddenly, and in burst Joel, staggering under a load of wood very much too big for him, and after him panted little Davie, and he had an armful, too.

“Oh, Joel,” exclaimed Polly, dashing over to him.

Joel’s face was very red, but it wasn’t from carrying the load of wood, and he couldn’t drop it into the wood-box, because that was full, so down it went with a clang on the kitchen floor.

“I didn’t mean—oh, I—O dear me! Polly, I didn’t mean,” he blubbered. Then he broke down and ran into Polly’s arms to hide his tears.

“Oh, I know—I know,” said Polly, soothingly, and rubbing his stubby head. “Oh, Davie, put down your wood, do,” for little Davie seemed to be paralyzed, and stood quite still in his tracks.

“And I forgot,” sniffled Joel, perfectly oblivious of Doctor Fisher and everything else. “O dear me, and Ben told me.” Here he gave a fresh sob.

“Well, Ben thought there was some wood split,” said Polly, with another pat on his black hair. Still, in her own mind, she was very much perplexed. When did Ben ever forget anything like that? “Never mind; we’ve ever so much now,” she added, brightly.

“But there was lots,” declared Joel, lifting his head to look at her, “lots and lots all ready, and Ben told me—” Here he burst out crying again, and down went his head.

“Joel, stop crying,” said Polly, getting her hand under his chin. But he burrowed deeper yet into her gown, mumbling, “I forgot—”

“Where was the wood?” demanded Polly. “Joel, you must tell me this minute.”

“In the ‘Provision Room,’” wailed Joel. “O dear me!”

“In the ‘Provision Room,’” repeated Polly, faintly.

“Yes, Ben put it in there to have it dr—dry,” whimpered Joel; “in the Cubby Hole—O dear me!”

There was a broken place on the outside of the “Provision Room,” called by the children the “Cubby Hole,” and Ben had tucked the split wood in there, telling Joel to fill the box behind the stove; then he had hurried off to work for Deacon Blodgett.

“Well, never mind,” said Polly again; “don’t cry, Joel, you didn’t mean to forget.”

“No, he didn’t,” said little Davie, who had set down his wood on the floor by the side of Joel’s armful, to come anxiously up to Polly’s side. “He didn’t mean to, Polly.”

“I know,” said Polly, nodding over to him, “and we have plenty of wood. See there, boys,” she pointed over to the big box.

“Where’d you get it?” Joel raised his head to sniff out the words between his tears.

“Oh, Doctor Fisher brought in the most of it,” said Polly.

“No, I didn’t,” said the little doctor, who had heard every word, and whirling around toward them. “Polly brought in the first lot.”

“O dear me!” exclaimed Joel at that, ready to burst into fresh sobs, for the boys never allowed Polly to bring in any wood, each one vying with the others to be the first one to fill the big box.

“Oh, no,” said Polly, so anxious to keep Joel from feeling badly, she forgot she was contradicting. “I only brought in a little, Joey; Doctor Fisher brought in all the top part.”

“Well, now,” said the little doctor, cheerily, “the wood’s here, and, although it was very bad of you, Joel, to go off and forget what Ben told you,—I’m not denying that,—it didn’t hurt Polly half as much to bring it in, as to see you cry. Come, wipe up; you’re ’most a man, Joel.” And that long speech over, Doctor Fisher whipped out his big bandanna and mopped Joel’s red face from top to bottom.

“Fuff—siss—meow!”

“What’s that?” cried Joel, emerging from the big handkerchief with dry and shining cheeks, and pricking up his ears. Little Davie whirled around to listen, too.

“Oh, that?” said the little doctor, bursting into a laugh; “well—run over and ask Phronsie. Good-by, children,” and he skipped to the door and hurried out to climb into his gig and rattle off.

Joel plunged over to Phronsie, little David racing after. “Give her to me, Phron,” screamed Joel, catching sight of the little white ball.

The kitten, quite accustomed now to Phronsie’s fat little arms, had snuggled down, thinking it wasn’t such a very bad place, after all, that she had come to, but at Joel’s loud cry she sprang upright and glared at the two boys,—the very things, if the truth must be told, that she had fled from when she jumped in that old gig standing in the front of her home down in the Hollow.

“Oh, Joel, don’t—you’re scaring her to death,” said Polly, while Phronsie screamed in dismay, and struggled, her face very pink, to hold the little cat.

“Phoh! I ain’t scaring her,” said Joel, poking his stubby black head up closer.

“Don’t, Joey,” begged David, trying to pull him back, but the little white cat, considering it wiser all around to look out for herself, struggled out of Phronsie’s arms and leaped across the kitchen floor, and in a minute there she was, perched up on top of the old corner cupboard and glaring down at them out of two big, angry eyes.

“Now see what you’ve done, Joel,” exclaimed Polly, in vexation. “There, Phronsie, don’t cry; your kitty can’t get away.”

Phronsie, since Polly said so, stopped her screams, and running over to the cupboard,—“Come back, my little white kitty,” she begged, holding up her arms.

But the little white cat looked down at her, as much as to say, “No, indeed, you don’t catch me as long as those dreadful boys are there.”

“I’ll get her,” shouted Joel, running across the kitchen to the old table and preparing to drag it over.

“Stop, Joel!” commanded Polly, running after him.

“I’m going to put a chair on it; then I can reach her,” screamed Joel, with a very red face, tugging away at the table.

“No, no, you mustn’t, Joe,” commanded Polly.

“O dear,—dear!” Little Davie was wringing his hands helplessly and turning first to Phronsie and then to Joel in distress.

“We must just let her alone; she’ll come down herself by and by.” Polly ran over to say this to Phronsie.

“But I want my little white kitty now, Polly, I do,” said Phronsie, in a sorrowful little voice.

“I know, Pet, it’s too bad she’s up there—but she’ll come down by and by,” said Polly, reassuringly, and craning her neck at the little white cat, who sat serenely on her perch. “Let’s go off and play something,” she proposed suddenly.

“Oh, I couldn’t play, Polly,” said Phronsie, reproachfully. “I want my little white cat.”

“Well, I could get her,” declared Joel, in a loud, wrathful tone, “if Polly’d let me; just as easy as pie—”

“Well, I’m not going to have you tumbling off from that chair on top of the table,” declared Polly, firmly. “Besides, Joe, the kitty wouldn’t be there when you’d climbed up.”

“Then I’d jump down and catch her here—gee—whiz!” said Joel, slapping his little brown hands smartly together and stalking up and down in front of the old cupboard.

“Well, you mustn’t try,” said Polly. “Now, Davie, you and I will play with Phronsie, if Joel doesn’t want to. Come on, Pet. Oh, wait a minute; you must take off Mamsie’s shawl.”

“Oh, I don’t want to take it off, Polly,” cried Phronsie, edging off and clutching the little plaid shawl with both hands.

“Yes, you must,” said Polly; “you’ll get so hot.” So the little shawl was unpinned and laid carefully on the table. “Now, then, come on,” said Polly.

“I don’t want to play, Polly,” said Phronsie again, and surveying her with very disapproving eyes.

“Oh, yes, come on, Pet,” said Polly, cheerily, holding out her hands, “and you too, Davie.”

So Phronsie, who never really thought of disobeying Polly, went slowly over to Polly; and having Davie on her other side with a very solemn face, as he much preferred to see how things were coming out with Joel, Polly spun out with the two children into the middle of the kitchen floor.

“Now let’s play ‘Ring—around a rosy,’” she said, gayly; “come on.”

“I want to play ‘Ring around—a—rosy,’” cried Joel, in a loud voice.

“Ring a—round—a rosy,” sang Polly, skipping off bravely. “Take care, Phronsie;” for Phronsie’s gaze was fastened on the little white cat, who sat up stiffly on the top of the old cupboard, with her tail lashed around her legs, and staring down at them. “You almost tumbled on your nose, then, child.”

“I want to play ‘Ring a—round—a—rosy,’ I say,” screamed Joel, as the little circle swept by in the middle of the floor as fast as they could go, and singing at the top of their voices.

“Joel wants to come—Polly, stop,” begged little Davie, breathlessly, as they whirled around.

“O dear me!” panted Polly, and stopping suddenly—“do you really want to play, Joel?” she asked, “really and truly?”

“Yes, I do,” said Joel. “Oh, Polly, let me,” and he rushed up to crowd into the ring.

“Then you may, if you really and truly want to, Joel,” said Polly; “there, now, says I, take hold of Davie’s hand.”

Little Davie, only too glad to have Joel in the ring, joyfully tried to seize his brown little hand.

“I want to take hold of Phronsie’s,” said Joel, pulling away, “and yours, Polly,” running over to get into that part of the little ring.

“No, no,” protested Phronsie, hanging to Polly’s hand for dear life.

“No, you can’t, Joel,” said Polly, decidedly; “that is Phronsie’s place. Come the other side.”

“I’ll let him take my place,” said little Davie, swallowing very hard, for he very much wanted to hold Phronsie’s hand, but he dropped it at once, to let Joel slip into the ring.

“Oh, Davie, that is so good of you!” exclaimed Polly, beaming at him, but she didn’t look at Joel, as he seized Phronsie’s hand. “Well, now, come on,” sang Polly. “Ring—a—round—a rosy.” And off they skipped.

“I don’t like it—stop!” roared Joel. “Polly, I don’t—I say—”

But Polly, not heeding, pulled them around and around till everything in the old kitchen spun before their eyes, and Phronsie couldn’t even see the little white cat sitting stiffly up on top of the old cupboard.

“Stop!” roared Joel, and “Oh, do stop, Polly,” implored little David, tugging at her hand.

“Why, what’s the matter?” Polly brought the little circle up suddenly with a laugh. “O dear me, wasn’t that a fine spin!” And she brushed her brown hair off from her hot face.

“I’m not going to take hold of Phronsie’s hand,” said Joel, dropping her fat little fingers, and running over to squeeze in between Polly and David. “Dave can have the place.”

“Oh, I’d rather you’d have it,” said little Davie, but his heart gave a happy little throb.

“Now, that’s so nice of you, Joey,” said Polly, approvingly, and she dropped a kiss on his stubby black hair. “Well, if you don’t want to play ‘Ring a—round—a—rosy’ any more, why, we won’t.”

“Oh, I do—I do,” said Joel, whose feet actually twitched to be spinning again, and he pulled at Polly’s hand.

“I’d rather play the Muffin Man,” said Phronsie, beginning to feel a bit easier about her little white cat, since she sat up there on top of the cupboard so quietly.

“Oh, no!” roared Joel, horribly disappointed. Then he looked at Polly’s face. “Yes, let’s play the Muffin Man,” he said.

“So we will, Joey,” cried Polly, smiling at him.

So Joel, feeling as if the Muffin Man was just the very nicest play in all the world, since Polly looked at him like that, scrambled into his place in the line, quite contented to let Davie be the Muffin Man and fill the post of honor.

“Phronsie ought to be that first,” said Polly, “and then Davie can be next—”

“All right,” said little David, tumbling out of the post of honor. So Phronsie was set there, but she didn’t like it, because then she had her back to the old cupboard, so of course she couldn’t see her little white cat. When Polly heard that, she gave the order for all the line to whirl over to the other side of the kitchen, with a “Hurry up, children,” to the two boys. “Now, then, Mr. Muffin Man, we’re going to see you; you must scamper and be ready for us—” which Phronsie did as fast as she could, but she didn’t pay much attention to her approaching guests, all her thoughts being on her little white cat. At last she could bear it no longer, and as the line was advancing, “We all know the Muffin Man—the Muffin—Man—the Muffin Man,” Joel shouting it out above the others with great gusto, she broke out—“Isn’t she ever coming down, Polly?”

“O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, who had almost forgotten the little white cat in the general glee. “Oh, yes, sometime. Now, let’s begin again. We all know the—”

But the Muffin Man suddenly deserted the post of honor and ran wailing over to the middle of the line coming to visit him. “Oh, I want her, Polly, I do!” in such a tone that Polly knew that something must be done to try to get the little white cat down from the top of that cupboard.

“Well, now, says I, I must get that kitty,” said Polly, gathering Phronsie up in her arms, and at her wit’s end to know how to do it. “Yes; there, don’t cry, Phronsie; I’ll try to get her down for you.”

“Let’s take the broom,” cried Joel, running over to get it where it hung on its nail behind the door; “that’ll shoo her good.”

“No, no, Joel,” said Polly, shaking her head in disapproval, while Phronsie screamed at the mere thought of the broom touching her little white cat, “that would be the worst thing in the world. It would make her cross and hateful, and then Mamsie would have to send her away and Phronsie couldn’t keep her at all.”

“Well, then, how are you going to get her down?” asked Joel, standing still to regard her impatiently.

“You must let me think,” said Polly, wrinkling up her brows. “Now, Phronsie, if you cry so, I can’t ever get your kitty down. Oh, you bad, naughty little thing, you!” this to the small white cat sitting stiffly up on the cupboard.

“She isn’t a bad, naughty little thing, Polly,” sobbed Phronsie. “She’s my little white cat, and I love her.”

“Well, I don’t mean really she’s bad and naughty,” said Polly, with a sigh, “but I do wish she’d come down, Phronsie.”

And then the very strangest thing in all the world happened. “Mee—ow!” said the small white cat, but it was in a soft little voice, and she unlashed her tail from her legs and there she actually was digging her sharp claws into the side of the old cupboard to assist her descent to the floor!

“Hush—sh!” whispered Polly, her brown eyes very wide, and seizing Joel’s blue cotton blouse; “keep still, all of you. Oh, Phronsie, don’t stir—she’s coming—she’s coming!”

“Mee—ow!” said the little white cat, stepping gingerly along into the middle of the floor, and beginning to believe that the children hadn’t wanted her before so very much after all, and she came up to rub herself against Polly’s brown calico gown.

“Oh, keep still—don’t touch her!” warned Polly, holding her breath. Joel twisted his brown fingers together tightly, and little Davie and Phronsie, not thinking of disobeying Polly, didn’t stir.

“Mee—ow!” said the little white cat, this time in displeasure and beginning to walk all around the small bunch of Peppers. “Mee—ow!”

“Now you all keep still,” said Polly. “I’ll catch her.” And sure enough, in a flash, Polly had the little white cat in her arms. “Oh, you’re hungry, I do believe, you poor little thing, you!” stroking her fur gently. “Joel, keep your hands off. Yes, Phronsie, you shall take her in a minute. There—there!” And Polly cuddled her up, and that little white ball of fur began to purr and try to lick Polly’s face and snuggle up to her like everything!

“Now, boys,” said Polly, after a few minutes of this delightful proceeding when the old kitchen was fairly alive with happiness, “I do believe you must go and ask Grandma Bascom to give us just a very little milk in a cup:” for the little white cat, although apparently much pleased to be the centre of attraction, did not cease to bring out every now and then the most dismal “Mee—ows!”

“Oh, I don’t want to go,” whined Joel, at the mere thought of missing any of this pleasing entertainment.

“For shame, Joe!” exclaimed Polly; “the poor little thing is almost starved.”

“Mee—ow!” said the little white cat.

“And there isn’t a bit of milk in the house and she’s only just come,” finished Polly, feeling it a very poor way to entertain a newly arrived guest, while Phronsie hung over the new treasure, telling her she was going to have some really and truly milk. Joel hung his head. “I’ll go,” he said; “what’ll I get it in, Polly?”

“Take one of the cups,” said Polly, pointing to the dresser, “and Davie, you run too with Joel, that’s a good boy.”

“I’ll run, too,” said little David, with alacrity. So Joel took down one of the cups and then two boys hurrying with all their might, raced off, Polly calling after them—“Don’t spill it—”

And before long back they came. “O dear me!” exclaimed Polly in dismay; “Grandma needn’t have given us all that. Didn’t you tell her just a very little, Joel?” as Joel, gripping the cup with both hands, not daring to take his eyes off from it, walked up carefully to Polly’s side.

“I did,” said Joel. “Oh, yes, he did,” declared little Davie, loudly, while Phronsie gave a little shout of delight. Then she laid her yellow head close to the little white cat, still snuggled up in Polly’s arms. “You are going to have some really and truly milk, you are, kitty,” she whispered.

“Now you may hold her, Phronsie, a minute,” said Polly. “I must pour the milk into a saucer.” For the little white cat’s nose was poked up toward the cup, and trembling violently in her eagerness to get some. “Oh, she’ll upset it all,” cried Polly; “hold her tightly, Phronsie.”

“Mee—ow!” cried the little white cat, in disappointment, as Polly hurried off, two or three drops of milk trailing down the side of the cup.

“Yes, yes—you shall have it,” promised Polly, over her shoulder. “Poor little thing, you—do keep still; I’ll be right back.”

And in a minute there the little white cat was before a saucer, both eyes closing blissfully, and her small pink tongue, darting in and out, was busy enough carrying the milk to her mouth, all four of the little Peppers in a ring around her on the kitchen floor.

VII
SPENDING THE DAY AT THE BEEBES’

“ALL day,” whispered little David, in a rapture. “Just think, Joey, all day!”

“I know it,” sang Joel. “Whoopity la! Ow—you pulled my hair, Polly.”

“Well, I can’t help it,” said Polly, “you jumped so, Joel. Do stand still.”

“I can’t,” said Joel, giving a long stretch. “Ow! Mamsie, Polly is hurting me dreadfully,” he whined to Mother Pepper, out in the kitchen.

“That’s because you don’t stand still and let her brush your hair as it should be done, I suppose,” said Mrs. Pepper, coolly. So Joel, getting no comfort there, wisely determined to make the best of things, and he wrung his hands together, trying his best to keep still, only interrupting the proceedings by teasing to know when Polly was to get through.

At last it was over. “O dear me!” exclaimed Polly, sinking into the first chair quite exhausted. “I’m so glad I’m through, Joey.”

“So am I,” echoed Joel, jubilantly and beginning to prance about; “now I’m going to do Dave’s hair,” and he made a lunge at the old hair-brush in Polly’s hand.

“No, you’re not,” declared Polly, clinging tightly to it. “You go right away, Joel Pepper; the very idea! Davie’s hair would look just like everything if you brushed it.”

“Oh, I don’t want Joel to do it,” cried David, in terror, and running over to Polly’s side—“don’t let him, Polly.”

“Indeed I shan’t,” said Polly, with vigor, and waving the old hair-brush defiantly. “Now come, Davie, and I’ll fix yours, and then you can all start for dear Mrs. Beebe’s. Phronsie is so good; just look at her!”

There she was in her little chair, as still as a mouse, her eyes fastened on the red-topped shoes stuck out straight before her, and her hands folded in her lap. She had been patted and pulled into shape by Polly, and then told to sit down and wait till the boys were ready. The getting-ready process, when the Pepper children were going out visiting, was always full of delight to Phronsie, who wouldn’t have had one of the many details left out that Polly considered were so important.

“Umph, I can fix it as good as pie,” grunted Joel. Then he capered out into the old kitchen, snapping his fingers. “I don’t care—I don’t want to. Whoopity la, we’re going to spend the day at Mr. Beebe’s shop!”

“Misery me!” exclaimed Polly, in dismay; “do stop, Joe. You’ll muss up your hair dreadfully. Oh, Mamsie, he won’t be fit to be seen,” she wailed.

“Joel,” said Mrs. Pepper, “stop this minute,” as Joel capered by, “and go and sit down in that chair;” she pointed to the other side of the kitchen.

“O dear me!” grunted Joel. “I don’t want to sit down, Mamsie.”

“Go and sit down at once, Joe,” said Mrs. Pepper, firmly.

“Can’t I take the chair into the bedroom and sit next to Phronsie?” asked Joel, who always tried for some alleviation of his punishments, and he began to drag it into the bedroom.

“Yes, you may do that,” said Mrs. Pepper, “but you must sit down on it and keep still.” Then she went back to her work.

“And just think how you’ve spoilt your hair,” said Polly, in exasperation, “and it did look so nice.” She heaved a great sigh. Little David ducked under the brush swiftly going over his own head, to peer into her face. “Never mind, Davie,” she said, smiling at him. “Dear Mrs. Beebe will think you look good anyway.”

“Won’t she think Joel looks good, too?” asked Davie, anxiously.

“Oh, yes, maybe,” said Polly, stifling the sigh. “Well, hold still, dear. I’ll brush him again before he puts on his cap.”

Joel, who luckily hadn’t heard this, now crowded up as closely as possible to Phronsie, and sat up on his chair as stiff as a ramrod. And at last everything was pronounced by Polly all ready for the children to set forth on the visit; “Except this,” said Polly, flying over to Joel and giving his stubby black hair the final attention amid his violent protests. And then they were hurried out to Mother Pepper in the kitchen to see how nice they all looked, as they stood in a row, and for her to give them their final charge before setting forth.

“You know, children,” she said, running her black eyes over the line in satisfaction; “that you are to be very good, for Polly and Ben can’t go to Mrs. Beebe’s till afternoon. Just think, this is the first time you have ever been out in company alone!” She surveyed them proudly,—“But Mother trusts you, and I know you will be good.”

“I’ll be good,” said Joel, promptly. “I’m always good.”

“I’ll try, Mamsie; I will,” said little Davie; “I will, truly, Mamsie.”

“I know you will,” said Mother Pepper, beaming at her boys, “and Phronsie, too,—I know she’ll be good.”

“I’ll be good,” piped Phronsie, putting up her little red lips to be kissed.

So Mrs. Pepper took her baby in her arms, and gave her a good hug and a good-by kiss all at once, and then Joel crowded in between them insisting on the same attention, and of course little Davie couldn’t be forgotten. But at last the three were out on the flat door-stone, and Mother Pepper and Polly in the doorway to see them start.

“Now take hold of hands; let Phronsie go in the middle,” said Mrs. Pepper, “and walk along nicely. Be careful, Joel, don’t run—remember—” as the children went down the path to the old gate.

“Doesn’t it seem funny, Mamsie,” said Polly, cuddling up close to Mrs. Pepper’s side, “to have them go alone out visiting?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, “but they’re old enough now. And you’re going, and Ben, too, in the afternoon, so it’s all right,” yet she cast an anxious glance after the three little figures now going solemnly down the road.

“Yes, I’m going in the afternoon and so is Ben, down to our dear, sweet Mrs. Beebe’s,” sang Polly, with a hop, skip, and a jump, getting back into the middle of the old kitchen floor. “Mamsie,” as Mrs. Pepper came in and shut the door, “isn’t it just lovely that we’re really going to supper there?”

“I wish you could have gone for all day,” said Mrs. Pepper, with a sigh, and pausing a minute before taking up her work, “just like the other children—you and Ben.”

“Well, I can’t,” said Polly, flinging back her brown hair where it tumbled over her forehead, “I’m going to help you, Mamsie—O misery me!” catching sight of herself in the cracked looking-glass. Then she burst out laughing and raced into the bedroom. When she came back, every hair was in place, and two braids hanging neatly down her back. Mrs. Pepper looked up and smiled approval, that seemed to hop right down into Polly’s heart, making it glow with comfort.