Phronsie and the Children.
(See Page [21].)

PHRONSIE PEPPER

THE YOUNGEST OF THE “FIVE
LITTLE PEPPERS”

BY
MARGARET SIDNEY
AUTHOR OF “FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS AND HOW THEY GREW,” “FIVE LITTLE
PEPPERS MIDWAY,” “FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS GROWN-UP”
“OLD CONCORD: HER HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS”
“THE GOLDEN WEST”, ETC., ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY JESSIE McDERMOTT

BOSTON:
LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

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

Copyright, 1897,
BY
Lothrop Publishing Company.
All rights reserved.
Seventy-first Thousand.
TYPOGRAPHY BY C. J. PETERS & SON, BOSTON.
PRESSWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH.

In Memoriam.

TO MY HUSBAND,
WHO INSPIRED WHATEVER IS
OF WORTH IN THIS,
AND IN ALL MY BOOKS.

PREFACE.

As Phronsie Pepper was the only one of the “Five Little Peppers” who had not a chance to become “grown-up” in the three books that form the Pepper Library, it seemed (to judge by the expressions of those persons interested in this family) a little unfair not to give her that opportunity.

The author has had so many letters from the elders, as well as the children, presenting this view of the case, that she has been brought over to that opinion herself. And as Phronsie appeared to have something to say on her own account, that the public, ever kind and attentive to the Peppers, desired to hear, it was thought best to let her speak, to make her appearance as “grown-up,” and then to draw the curtain over the “little brown house” and the “Five Little Peppers,” never more to rise.

Nothing was farther from the mind of the author of the “Five Little Peppers” than a series concerning them; for she did not naturally incline to the extension of a book into other volumes. But the portrayal of the lives of the Peppers seemed to be a necessity. They were living, breathing realities to her; and when pressed by many importunate readers to know “more and more” about “Mamsie and Polly, Ben, Joel, David, and Phronsie,” it was only like telling the stories in the twilight hour, of what was so real and vital to their author, that it was as if she were not speaking, but only the scribe to jot it all down as it fell from the lips and the lives of others.

And here let the author state, in answer to the question so often asked her, “Did the Peppers really live? and was there any little brown house?” that the whole story is imaginative, existing only in her mind; although they always seemed so alive to her, that she let them talk and move and act from beginning to end without let or hindrance; believing that Margaret Sidney’s part was to simply set down what the Peppers did and said, without trying to make them do or say anything in particular.

And now the closing volume, that shuts the door of the little brown house forever, takes the whole scene back to dear old Badgertown; and life begins over again in rollicking, merry, and home-y fashion; and the “Five Little Peppers,” with their troops of friends old and young, control the book, and say and do and live, just as they like, without the meddlesome intervention of

The Author.

CONTENTS.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PHRONSIE PEPPER.

CHAPTER I.
THE LITTLE BROWN HOUSE.

“O CHILDREN!” said Phronsie softly, “what are you doing?”

“They’re pulling all the hair out of my mamsie’s cushion,” shouted King-Fisher, in a tone of anger; and, struggling with the two delinquents on the floor, he bestowed several smart pulls on the chubby shoulders bent over their task.

“Oh, oh!” cried Phronsie, dropping needle and scissors, and the little sheer lawn bit destined to adorn Mamsie’s head, the lace trailing off by itself across the old kitchen floor, as she sprang to her feet. “How can you, King?”

“Stop pulling all the hair out of my Mamsie’s cushion, Barby,” screamed King-Fisher, very red in the face. “Look at that, now! I’ll bite you, if you don’t stop!”

“O King!” Phronsie seized his arm, as he began to set his white teeth on the little fat arm.

Barby sat still in the middle of the floor, both hands grasped tightly around the old calico cushion, which she huddled close to her small bosom. “Go ’way!” she commanded, her blue eyes flashing at him from her tangle of brown hair. “Go right ’way, bad, naughty boy!”

“I’ll take care of him. There, now, see if you come biting round here, Mister King!” The other figure deserted the old hair cushion pulled out of the rocking-chair, and, throwing itself on the unsuspecting King, rolled over and over, pommelling and puffing furiously.

“O children, children!” cried Phronsie in great dismay. Just then the door opened, and in walked old Mr. King, bending his handsome white head to clear the doorway.

“Well—well—well! this is beautiful upon my word!” Then he burst out laughing.

“O Grandpapa!” exclaimed Phronsie, clasping her hands in distress, “this is so very dreadful! Do make them stop!”

“Nonsense! Let them alone,” said the old gentleman, in the midst of his laugh. “I don’t doubt King-Fisher has been putting on airs, and Polly’s boy is aching to take it out of him. That’s right, Elyot, give it to him! I dare say he deserves it all, every bit.”

“Grandpapa,” begged Phronsie, hurrying up to clasp his arm entreatingly, “do please make them stop. They’re in the little brown house, Grandpapa; only just think, the little brown house. Please make them stop!”

“To be sure,” said old Mr. King, pulling himself out of his amusement, and wiping his face, “that is a consideration. Come, now, boys, hold up there; you must finish all this out-of-doors, if you’ve got to.”

“O Grandpapa!” interposed Phronsie, “please tell them not to finish at all. Make them stop always.”

“Well, at any rate, you must stop now, this minute; do you hear?” He stamped his shapely foot, and the combatants ceased instantly, King, in the sudden pause, finding himself at last on top.

“I could have beaten him all to nothing,” he declared, puffing violently; “but he jumped whack on me, and my arm got twisted under, and—and”—

“Never mind the rest of it,” said Grandpapa coolly; “of course you’d have beaten if you could. Well, Elyot, you did pretty good for a boy of five.”

“He was biting my sister,” declared Elyot, squaring up, with flushed cheeks, and clinching his small fists.

“Oh—oh!” cried Barby, who had held her breath in delighted silence while the encounter was in progress; and running up, her brown hair flying away from her face, she presented a fat arm for the old gentleman’s inspection.

“I don’t see any bite,” he said, after a grave scrutiny of it all over.

“Not yet,” said Barby, shaking her brown head wisely; “but it was coming—it truly was, Grandpapa.”

“Don’t worry till your miseries do come, little woman;” he swung her up over his white head, then put her on his shoulder.

“There Phronsie used to perch,” he said, smiling over at the young girl.

“O Grandpapa, she’s too big—why, she’s Aunt Phronsie, and she’s most dreadful old,” said Barby, leaning over to look at him.

“Well, she used to sit just where you are, Miss,” repeated the old gentleman. “Now, you be sure you’re always number two.” He pinched her toes, making her squirm and squeal.

“What’s numtwo?” she asked at length, all out of breath from play.

“Lucky you don’t know,” said the old gentleman, his mouth close to her ear; “well, it’s just always after number one, and never gets in front. There, now, jump down, and help Phronsie patch it up with the boys.” He put her on the floor, and went over to the corner, to sit down and view operations.

Phronsie, meanwhile, had a boy each side of her, both trying to get into her lap at once.

“It would just kill Mamsie,” she said mournfully, “to think of you two boys behaving so, and she’s only gone a week!”

There was an awful pause. The old gentleman over in the corner kept perfectly still; and Barby, finding all obstructions removed, placidly engaged in completing the destruction of Mother Fisher’s cushion.

“And you promised her, King, you’d be a good boy, and be nice to the children.”

“I—forgot,” blurted out King, winking very fast, and not looking at Elyot. “I—I—did. Don’t look so, Phronsie,” he mumbled; and instantly after his head went over in his sister’s lap, and he sobbed in her dress, “Don’t write her, Phronsie—don’t!”

“And to think,” said Phronsie, gravely regarding Elyot, “that you should fly at him, when he only wanted to protect Mamsie’s dear old cushion. O Elyot! I am so surprised at you for pulling it to pieces.”

“I only wanted to see inside it; you said Mamsie and Uncle Ben made a Santa Claus wig of it once; I was going to put it right back,” said Elyot stoutly. Yet he looked at the ceiling diagonally, not trusting himself a glance into Phronsie’s brown eyes. “Say, you don’t suppose Grandmamsie will know?” he asked suddenly.

“I suppose I must tell Mamsie everything,” said Phronsie soberly. “I promised to, you know. And, besides, we always have.”

Elyot shivered all over his small frame, while King howled, and burrowed deeper than ever in Phronsie’s lap.

“But I can tell her how sorry you two boys are,” Phronsie went on, “and that you never, never will do such a naughty thing again; that is, if you never will, boys.”

“There! I got it all out alone by myself,” said Barby.

“Oh, we never will!” they both protested over and over; and King came up out of his shelter, and wiped his eyes, and the two put their arms around each other, and made up splendidly; then turned to hear Barby say, “There, I got it all out alone by myself;” and there was the hair out of Mamsie’s cushion all sprawled over the floor.

While the children were picking this up, and crowding it back into the big calico cover, Phronsie making Elyot do the best part of the work, as he was older, and had helped Barby along, King working vigorously, as penance, old Mr. King called, “Now, Phronsie, I want you, as those youngsters seem to be straightened out;” and she had gone and sat on his knee, her usual place in a conference.

“Well, I’ve just done such a good stroke of work, child,” he said complacently, pulling softly the golden waves of hair that lay over her cheek.

“What, Grandpapa?” she asked, as he seemed to wait her reply.

“Yes, such a good piece of work,” he ran on. Then he chuckled, well pleased. “You must know, Phronsie,” for he was determined to tell it in a way to suit himself, “that I was sitting on the back veranda—Polly’s gone to town to-day, you know.”

“Yes, Grandpapa.”

“Well, and the house was quiet, thanks to you and the little brown house, and I had a chance to read the morning paper in peace.” This he said, unconscious of the fact that every one knew quite well he courted the presence of the children on any and every occasion. “Well, I had considerable to read; the news, strange to say, is very good, really very good to-day, so it took me quite a long time.” He forgot to mention that he had lost himself a half-hour or so in a nap; these occurrences were never to be commented on in the family. “And I was turning the paper—it’s abominable that editors mix things up so; it’s eternally turning and returning the sheet, to find what you want. It’s very hard, Phronsie, when we pay such prices for articles, that we cannot have them to suit us, child.”

“Yes, Grandpapa,” said Phronsie patiently.

“Well, don’t look at those youngsters, Phronsie; they’re all right now. They won’t fight any more to-day.”

“O Grandpapa!”

“I mean it, child. Well, I was turning that contemptible paper for about the fiftieth time,—I wanted to read Brinkerhoff’s editorial,—when I caught sight of a figure making around the lawn to the front veranda. Thinks I, ‘that looks wonderfully like Roslyn May.’”

The pink glow in Phronsie’s round cheek went suddenly out.

“And so it was, as sure as you’re here on my knee.” He had her hand in both of his, and was affectionately pressing it. “Yes, Phronsie, there was that fellow. So I jumped up, and told Johnson to send him around to me; and he came.”

Old Mr. King drew a long breath of pleased reminiscence. Phronsie sat quite still, the afternoon sunlight that streamed through the western window glinting her yellow hair. Her hands lay in Grandpapa’s, and her eyes never wavered from his face. But she said nothing.

“You don’t ask me anything, Phronsie,” said the old gentleman at last. “Hey, child?” pinching her ear.

“No, Grandpapa, because you will tell me yourself.”

“And so I will; you are a good girl not to badger me with questions. Well, he came about the same thing, Phronsie,—wanted to see you, and all that. But I couldn’t allow it, of course; for, if I did, the next thing, you would be worried to death by his teasing. And that’s all out of the question. Besides being decidedly unpleasant for you, it would kill me.”

“Would it, Grandpapa?” Phronsie leaned forward suddenly, and held him with her brown eyes.

“Not a shadow of doubt,” he answered promptly; “I shouldn’t live a month if you went off and got married, Phronsie.”

“I wouldn’t go off and get married, Grandpapa!” exclaimed Phronsie. “I could stay with you then; didn’t Roslyn say we could, and you would always go with us if we went away? O Grandpapa, you didn’t think I would ever leave you!” She threw her arms around his neck, and clung to him convulsively.

“Yes, yes, that’s right,” said the old gentleman, immensely pleased, and patting her on the back as if she were a child of three; “but you see this is nothing to the point, Phronsie, nothing at all.” Then he went on testily, “You’d belong to somebody else besides me, and that would be the same as being a thousand miles away. And as long as I’m sure you don’t love him, Phronsie,”—which he had found out by taking care not to ask her,—“why, I’ve done just the very best thing for you, to send him away about his business.”

“Did he ask to see me?” Phronsie sat up quite straight now, and waited quietly for the answer.

“Why, of course he did; but I knew it would only trouble you to see him.”

“O Grandpapa—just one little minute—I wouldn’t have let him stay long. Couldn’t you have sent him over here just for one minute?”

“Nonsense! You’re so tender of his feelings, it would only have been hard for you. No, I thank my stars, Phronsie, I saved you from all this trouble. What you would do, child, if it were not for your old Granddaddy, I’m sure I don’t know. Well, he’s gone, and I told him never to come back again with that errand in view; and I only hope to goodness it’s the last time I shall be so worried by him.”

“There, we’ve got the hair all in,” announced King triumphantly, rushing up, followed by the other two, Barby wiping her grimy little hands in great satisfaction over her white apron. “Now please say we’ve been good boys, and”—

“And a good girl,” chimed in Barby, flying after with red cheeks.

“And sew up the old cushion,” begged Elyot. This would be almost as good fun as the pulling it open had been, to see Phronsie sewing it tight, and she could tell them stories meanwhile.

“Let the cushion wait,” began Mr. King.

“But, Grandpapa, the hair may get spilled out again,” said Phronsie gently, and getting off from his knee. “I really think I ought to do it now, Grandpapa dear.”

“Yes—yes,” cried all the children, hopping up and down; “do it now—do it now, Phronsie.”

So Phronsie found her thimble and scissors once more, and got out the coarse brown thread from her little sewing-bag, and sewed the big seam in the old calico cushion fast again, the children taking turns in poking the wisps of hair in the crevice.

“Now tell all what you used to do when you lived here—just here,” demanded Elyot, patting the old floor with his hand, “every single thing, Phronsie;” for the children, except on rare occasions, never called her “Aunt.” “Don’t leave out anything you did in the little brown house. Now begin.”

“O Elyot,” said Phronsie, “I couldn’t tell it all if I tried ever so hard.”

“Polly tells the best stories,” said King, pushing and picking the hair into place in the last corner.

“So she does,” said Phronsie; “there now, King-Fisher, that’s all you can do. Look out; my needle is coming up there,” as King with a final pull settled the last little wisp into place.

“Let me—let me,” begged Barby, thrusting her little hand in. “I want to do it last. Let me, King.”

“No,” said King stoutly, hanging to the corner. “I shall; it’s my mother’s cushion.”

“O King,” began Phronsie gently, “Mamsie would like it better if you let Barby do it. She’s so little.”

“She’s always pushing, just the same,” said King stoutly, “as if she was big folks.”

“Well, if you want to please Mamsie, you’ll let her do it,” went on Phronsie, pausing with needle in mid-air. “Hurry, now, children; I can’t wait any longer.”

“You may, Barby,” declared King, relinquishing with a mighty effort the pinched-up corner. “There, go ahead,” and he winked fast at her great satisfaction while she pushed and poked the wisps in with her fat little finger, humming contentedly meanwhile.

Phronsie flashed a smile over at King. “Now, children,” she said, “you must know we were very poor in those days, and”—

“What is poor?” asked Barby, stopping singing.

“I know,” said Elyot; “it’s wearing rags like the ashman. Oh, I wish I could!”

“Oh, no!” cried Phronsie in horror; “that isn’t poor; that’s shiftless, Mamsie always used to say. Oh, we were just as nice! Well, you can’t think, children, how spick and span everything was!”

“What’s spick ’n’ span?” demanded Barby.

“Make her stop,” cried Elyot crossly; “we shall never hear all about it if she keeps asking questions every minute. Now go on, Phronsie.”

“Well,” said Phronsie, “now that corner’s all done beautifully, Barby; take care, or I shall prick your finger. Why, Polly would scrub and scrub the floor and the table, till I used to try to see my face in them, they were so bright.”

“They’re bright now,” declared both the boys, jumping off to investigate. Barby pushed her hair back from her round cheeks, and leaned over. “I don’t see my face, Phronsie,” she exclaimed.

“No, and I couldn’t see mine; but I always tried to, for Polly kept them so bright, and one day I remember I was scrubbing Seraphina, and”—

“Who’s Seraphina?” burst in Barby, coming back to crouch at Phronsie’s feet.

“Ow! Be still!” cried Elyot, with a small pinch.

“Seraphina was my very first doll, the only child I ever had until Grandpapa gave me all the rest,” Phronsie sent a smile over to the old gentleman in the corner, “and she’s in Mamsie’s big bureau in the bedroom now.”

“I’m going to see,” declared all three children at once, hopping up.

“Oh, no! you mustn’t,” said Phronsie; “not till this cushion is done. Then, if you’re very good, I’ll show her to you.”

“We’ll be just as good,” they all cried, “as we can be,” and running back to sit down on the floor again at her feet. “Do go on,” said Elyot.

“You see, I wanted Seraphina to be just as nice as Polly kept things; and so I was scrubbing her with soap and water one day, when Polly called out, ‘O Phronsie! the big dog’s out here that scared the naughty organ-man; and the boy;’ and before she could wipe my hands and my face, for you see I’d got the soap all over me too, I ran to see them, and Jasper kissed me, and got the soft soap all in his mouth.”

“Ugh!” cried King, with a grimace.

“Yes, that’s just the way Japser looked, and that’s what he said too!” said Phronsie, going on with the recital.

“Who was Japser?” demanded Barby.

“Why, he was our Popsie,” said Elyot, who had heard the story many times. “Now do stop talking, Barby. Well, go on,” he begged, turning back to Phronsie.

“And I couldn’t say Jasper,” said Phronsie, “and then sometimes we called him Jappy.”

“Oh, goody! here comes Mr. Tisbett,” howled King.

“How funny!” laughed all three. “Oh, goody! here comes Mr. Tisbett,” howled King in a sudden rapture, lifting his head to see the top of the old stage through the window. “Why, he’s stopping here! He’s stopping here!” and, tumbling over the other two, King found his feet, and pranced off over the big flat doorstone, and down the path, Elyot and Barby flying after, to see Mr. Tisbett open the stage-door with a, “Here you be, ma’am, and the boy too.”

“Grandpapa,” cried Phronsie, taking one look out of the window, “it’s Mrs. Fargo and Johnny!”

“The mercy it is!” exclaimed the old gentleman ruefully. “Well, good-by, Phronsie, to any sort of peace, now that boy’s come!”

CHAPTER II.
A BADGERTOWN EVENING.

“BOOKS! I’ve a fine packet for you to-night, Polly.” Jasper’s eyes glowed. Polly ran up to meet him.

“O Mamsie! let me take the books—let me!” Elyot thrust in his small figure between them, and tugged at the parcel.

“You take yourself off, young man,” said his father. “Now, Polly, hold out your arms.”

“Oh, what richness!” sighed Polly ecstatically, “as Alexia would say;” and, clasping her parcel closely, she sank into a big chair, and examined her treasure. “O Jasper!” she cried, “isn’t it just magnificent to be a publisher’s wife!”

Jasper laughed, and swung his boy up to his broad shoulder.

“I thought you’d like them, Polly,” he said with great satisfaction, looking at her.

“Like them!” repeated Polly in a glow. Then she sprang to her feet, tossed the whole pile into the easy-chair, and ran up to her husband, putting her hand within his arm. “But where is the bag, Jasper?” she asked suddenly.

“Oh, what richness!” sighed Polly.

“Well, the fact of it is, Polly,” said Jasper slowly, “I left the bag at the office. Just for this night,” he added, as he saw her face.

“Why, Jasper?” asked Polly quickly, the color dropping out of her cheek.

“Well, the truth is, I was afraid,” began Jasper.

“Oh! go on, and dance me up and down, Daddy,” screamed Elyot, beating his heels with all his might.

Polly laid her hand on the small feet. “No, no, dear; Mamsie’s going to talk now. Why, Jasper?” she asked again. This time she stood quite still, and looked at him.

Jasper swung his boy lightly to the ground. “Off with you!” he cried with a laugh, and Elyot scuttled away. “Now, Polly,” as he put his arm around her, and drew her to a seat, “the fact is, I thought you wouldn’t sit down and go over those books to-night if I brought out the bag.”

“And so I wouldn’t,” declared Polly. “Of course not, with the dear old bag waiting. How could I?”

“That’s just it,” said Jasper; “and it’s not fair for me to bring the bag, with those waiting, either;” he nodded over at the untied packet and the new books scattered about. “You ought to have at least one go at them before being tied down to business matters.”

Polly broke loose from him, and ran over to the easy-chair. “And did you think I would so much as look at these once?” she cried, her face flushing up to the brown waves. “Oh! oh! I just detest them now.” She looked down at the pile with the same face that she carried in the little brown house when the old stove burned Mamsie’s birthday cake.

“But, Polly,” said Jasper, hurrying over to comfort her, “you see it’s just this way. I’m tying you down too much to business detail, and you ought to be enjoying yourself more, dear.”

“And don’t you suppose, Jasper,” cried Polly, turning on his troubled face a radiant one, “that lovely old bag is just the dearest dear in all the world next to you and the children? Oh, say you will never leave it again! Do say so, Jasper;” she clung to him.

“I am so afraid I’m making your life too full of care, Polly,” said Jasper gravely, “to bring the bag out every night. And this evening we might go over the new books, and have a break in the routine for once.”

“And let you work over all your papers alone, Jasper,” cried Polly, aghast. “O Jasper!”

“Dance me up and down, daddy!” screamed Elyot.

“I can find time to do them, dear; don’t worry. And it would be better for you.”

“And indeed it would be the worst thing in all this world, dear,” protested Polly, shaking her brown head. “I should be so dismal, Jasper, you can’t think, without our lovely time working together after dinner. When the bag is done, then we’ll play and read, and do all sorts of things. But that first hour is the best of the whole evening, Jasper; it truly is.”

“I’m sure I love it,” cried Jasper, with kindling eyes; “I never could do it so well without you, nor in half the time, Polly.”

“Well, then you must just promise you’ll never leave the bag back in the office,” said Polly, laughing. “Promise now, Jasper.”

“I suppose I must,” said Jasper, laughing too. “Here come Alexia and Pickering,” looking down the carriage-drive.

“We’ve come out to dinner, Polly, if you want us,” said Alexia, hurrying in, Pickering’s tall figure following. “Goodness me! how you can live so far out of town, I don’t see!”

“So you say every time I chance to meet you, Alexia” said Jasper.

“Yes, and that’s the reason she’s decided to try it herself,” said Pickering with a drawl.

“O Alexia!” Polly gave her a small hug, as she helped her off with her things, “are you really coming to Badgertown? Oh, how nice!”

“Pickering is always springing things on me, and telling everything I say,” said Alexia, trying to send a cross grimace over at her husband, but ending with a short laugh instead, “and just because I said I wanted to have a house near you, Polly, he’s got it into his head I’m coming out here to live.”

Pickering indulged in a long laugh.

“And I think it’s a shame,” declared Alexia, with a very injured face, “to have one’s husband go about, and spoil all one’s surprise parties—so there!”

“Then you really do mean to come to Badgertown to live, Alexia?” cried Polly with sparkling eyes. “Oh, you dear! how perfectly delightful!”

“I suppose I’ll have to, Polly,” said Alexia, “as I must be just as near you as I can get. But I do think Badgertown is utterly horrid, and you ought to be ashamed to live out here so far. I’m dying to have that cunning little yellow house on the hill, Polly,” she broke off suddenly, “with the barberry-bushes in front, and we’ve come out here to see it after dinner. Now you know it all; only I was going to ask you to go out and take a walk, and then bring you up there with a flourish, and give you a grand surprise. And now it’s as tame as tame can be.” She shook her linger at Pickering, who bore it like a veteran.

“How’s baby?” asked Polly, when the wraps were off, and they were all seated on the long veranda for a talk.

“He’s the dearest little rat you ever saw,” said Alexia, who couldn’t forgive her boy for not being a girl, whom she could call Polly. “He’s two teeth, and four more coming.”

“Alexia always counts those teeth that are coming with so much gusto,” said Pickering.

“And why shouldn’t I?” cried Alexia. “It would be perfectly horrid if he stopped with two teeth; you know it would yourself, Pickering. And to-day, Polly Pepper, you can’t think”—

“I decidedly object to having my wife called Polly Pepper,” said Jasper, trying to get on a grave look. “Polly Pepper King is all right. But be sure to put on the King.”

“Oh! we girls shall never call her anything else but Polly Pepper—never in all this world, Jasper,” said Alexia carelessly. “Well, you tell what baby did to-day, Pickering. I’m quite tired out with all my trial of getting here, and the disappointment of my surprise spoiled.” She leaned back in the rattan chair, and played with her rings.

“Our child,” said Pickering solemnly, “developed a most astonishing mental power this morning, and actually uttered two consecutive syllables like this, ‘Ar-goo!’”

“So did Elyot at the same tender age,” observed Jasper, “and Barby too, I believe.”

“Now, you just be quiet, Pickering!” Alexia cried, starting forward; “and aren’t you ashamed, Jasper, to help him on? Baby actually said the most beautiful words; he really and truly did. And that’s what I wanted to come out for to-night, Polly, as much as to look at the house, to tell you that baby’s talking; and he’s only eight months old! Think of that, now!”

“I met Roslyn May down town to-day,” said Pickering when the laugh had subsided.

“Did you!” exclaimed Jasper.

Polly stopped laughing at one of Alexia’s sallies, and met her husband’s eyes. His look said, “Strange he did not come out here.”

“Yes; he just got in day before yesterday, he told me, from England. I couldn’t understand what he came over for.”

“He is going to stay some time, I suppose,” said Jasper, “now he’s here.”

“No, he was on the way to the steamer, when we ran across each other on Broadway,—sailed to-day on the Cunarder; that is, he said he was going to.”

“He was going right back!” exclaimed Polly; and going over to Jasper’s side, she lay her hand on his. “What do you mean, Pickering?”

“It’s just so, Polly,” said Pickering, feeling awfully that he must make the sad droop in her eyes, and the color go out of her face.

“He probably is coming back soon—he may have been cabled back—a dozen things may have happened,” said Jasper. “Don’t feel so badly, dear.”

“Well, Phronsie must never know he has been over,” said Polly. “Promise, Alexia, you never’ll tell her! You won’t, dear, will you?” She ran over and put her arms around Alexia.

“Horses won’t drag it out of me,” declared Alexia. “I won’t ever mention Roslyn May to”—

“Hush!—hush! here she comes,” warned Polly frantically, pinching Alexia’s arm to make her stop.

“Oh, mercy! Well, I didn’t say anything,” said Alexia.

Phronsie came around the veranda corner in her soft white gown. “We’re going to have a candy party to-night,” she said.

“And a peanut party,” cried the children at her heels, as they scurried over the veranda steps. “Tell it all, Phronsie; tell it all.”

“And you’re just in time, Alexia and Pickering,” said Phronsie, with a smile, “to come over to the little brown house after dinner, to the party.”

“And you’ve got to pull candy with me, Mrs. Dodge,” declared Elyot, who just adored her, racing up to possess himself of her long white fingers, glittering with rings.

“Oh, mercy me! I can’t. Why, I’ve on my best dress,” she said, to tease him.

“Mamsie will let you have one of her aprons,” he cried, “or my nice Mrs. Higby will. I’ll go and ask her.”

“No, I’m going to; Mrs. Higby will let me have the aprons,” shouted Barby, turning her back on her father, in whose lap she had thrown herself, and rushing after him.

“We’re all in for it, I see,” said Pickering. “Well, King, you’re my boy, seeing the others have got champions. What do you want? I’ll see you through this candy scrape.”

“I’d rather have my brother Jasper,” said King, not over politely, “but I’ll take you.”

“O King!” remonstrated Phronsie gently.

“Let him alone, Phronsie,” said Pickering. “King is delicious when unadulterated. Well, my boy, so I’ll consider myself engaged to you for this evening at the party.”

“All right,” said King coolly.

“And Mrs. Higby says we can have all the aprons we want,” announced Elyot, rushing back.

“And she’ll boil the candy while we’re at dinner,” piped Barby, tumbling after.

“This knocks your pretty plan of gazing at the yellow house, sky-high, Alexia,” whispered Pickering, under cover of the noise.

“No, it doesn’t,” she retorted. “We’ll go afterward, when the children are abed. It’s moonlight, and we can see it just as well.”

“Think of choosing a house by moonlight!” laughed Pickering.

“Just as well as to choose it by sunlight, as long as we can see,” said Alexia, jingling the house-key they had secured from the agent on the way up. “Yes; we’ll have quite time before we take the train home.”

“Oh, you can’t go home to-night!” cried Polly and Jasper together. “The idea! with a party and house-hunting on your hands. Stay over, Alexia.”

“I must be in town at eight in the morning,” said Pickering, getting out of his chair to stretch his long legs and look at the hills. “Alexia can stay if she wants to.”

“As if I could or would, when my husband can’t,” she cried. “And there’s that blessed child left all alone!”

“But since he’s learned to converse,” said Pickering, “he can ask for his rations. So he’s not to be considered.”

“Well, I’m perfectly shocked!” declared Alexia. “And I shall go home with you in the late train.”

Oh, the candy frolic of that night! Everybody had such a glorious time that the little old kitchen rang with the jollity that flowed over, taking in all Primrose Lane, and down as far as “Grandma Bascom’s” little cottage. “Grandma” now had to lie abed with her rheumatism; but Polly and Jasper found time to slip away a bit in the midst of the festivities and carry her a little dish of the candy before the nuts were put in, for “Grandma” didn’t like nuts, and she did like molasses candy. And Polly carried a few other things in a small basket on her arm.

“For I never shall forget, Jasper,” she said as they hurried along, “how good Grandma was the day Phronsie hurt her toe. Oh, that horrible old ‘receet’ of Mirandy’s wedding-cake! I thought it would kill me to wait for it. Dear, dear,” laughed Polly, “how we do remember, don’t we, Jasper, things we used to do when we were children?”

“I’m sure I never want to forget what we did in the little brown house,” said Jasper. “Well, Grandma was always good, I remember, bringing raisins and all that. Now, Polly, we must tell her every single bit of Joel’s last letter; for she’ll question us up just as closely, you may be sure.”

“We’ve come out to dinner, Polly,” said Alexia.

“I know it,” said Polly, hanging to his arm; “and Joel thinks as much of Grandma as she does of him. It’s so nice of him, Jappy, isn’t it?”

“Oh, yes, indeed!” said Jasper, nodding briskly; “for no matter how tired Joe is,—and he must get awfully used up sometimes, Polly, with that big parish of his,—he’s always doing something for her. It was fine for him to buy her that big easy-chair with the first money he had saved up after he paid father back for his education.”

“Dear, beautiful old Joel!” cried Polly, with shining eyes.

“How upset father was,” exclaimed Jasper, in a reminiscent mood, “when Joe made him take that money back. I declare, Polly, I never saw him so upset in all my life!”

“It was right for Joel to make him,” said Polly stoutly.

“Yes, I know it. But Father had so set his mind on doing it for Joe.”

“But Joey couldn’t take it to keep,” declared Polly. “You know he really couldn’t, Jasper.”

“Of course not,” said Jasper quickly. “But what we should have done without Phronsie to make the peace between them, I don’t know. Well, here we are.”

“See here,” cried Alexia, Mrs. Higby’s red plaid apron working all up her long figure, as she had tied it by the strings around her neck, “if somebody doesn’t go over and call Polly Pepper home, why I’ll just go myself.” She brandished the big wooden spoon, a few drops of molasses trailing off over the floor.

“I suppose that is meant for me,” said Pickering, placidly eating the big piece he ought to have been pulling, “as I’m the only one she orders round.”

“Horrors!” cried Alexia, glancing along the tip of the spoon, “just see the mischief I’ve done! Now the Peppers won’t ever let me in this kitchen again.”

“I’ll wipe it up,” said Elyot, running over to her, with sticky hands, and face streaked with molasses.

“Oh!” exclaimed Alexia with a grimace, and edging away. “Oh, my goodness, me! and see my husband eating candy like a little pig, and me in this dreadful scrape.”

“I wish I was your husband,” said little Elyot, getting down on his knees; and, seizing the first thing he could find, which proved to be a fine damask napkin, he began to vigorously mop the floor.

“Mercy me! what have you got?” cried Alexia, her sharp eyes peering at him. “Oh! give it to me.” She seized it from his hand, and threw down the spoon. “Come along, do,” and she hauled him out into the entry. “It’s one of Polly Pepper’s bestest napkins; we brought it over on the cake-plate. Now we must just douse it into a pail of water; but goodness knows where that is.”

“Hoh!” said Elyot, “I know where there’s one, just as easy as not. Come on.”

It was now his turn to haul Alexia, and he did it so successfully that she was soon over the little steps, and in the “Provision Room.”

“If ever I’m thankful,” she sighed gratefully, “it is to see that sticky mess come out,” when Elyot had delightedly plunged the napkin into a pail of water standing in the corner. “Oh, my goodness me! if it had spoiled that; and it’s one of her great big embroidered K’s, too! Well, come on; we must run back, or the whole troop of them will be after us. Wring it out and hang it up, do! Now come on.”

She picked up her skirts, and skipped over the steps, Elyot scuttling after, in time to hear Pickering say, “Evidently my wife doesn’t intend to take the train with me, for she’s disappeared.”

“Somebody take off this!”

“I haven’t disappeared at all; I’m here,” cried Alexia at his elbow. “The idea! Why, I’m going to look at the house on the hill; but ’tisn’t time yet,” drawing a long breath.

“Going to look at the house on the hill! Well, I guess you won’t to-night,” said Pickering, taking out his watch; “it’s just a quarter of ten, and the train leaves at ten. So, good-by, Alexia; you’ve got to stay all night.”

“Oh, I can’t—I won’t!” cried Alexia. “Oh, dear! somebody take off this horrible old apron,” wildly twisting this way and that.

“I will—I will,” cried little Elyot, fumbling at the strings.

“Oh, dear—dear!” wailed Alexia, “my face is all stuck up; somebody—where’s Mrs. Higby? Oh, somebody wash it, please!” She was rushing around after her bonnet now, Elyot hanging to the apron-strings valiantly, this process tying them tighter than ever at each step.

“Here, hold on, can’t you!” roared Pickering. “You’ll never get her undone at that rate.”

“Yes, I will, too,” cried Elyot, tugging away, and tumbling against Mrs. Higby with a towel, wet at one end, in her hand.

“Oh, dear, dear! and that blessed child at home alone,” cried Alexia. “Mercy! here’s my best bonnet down by the coal-scoop. Well, as long as I’ve got anything to put on my head I suppose I should be thankful. Oh, dear! where’s that wet towel? Do cut the strings of this horrible old apron—Oh, dear! what shall I do!” She whirled around on them all, as the door opened, and in ran Polly and Jasper, with glowing cheeks.

“For goodness sake, Alexia!” began Polly.

“Whew! Is it a menagerie?” cried Jasper.

“Well, it’s bad enough to go visiting, and have your friends run off to see horrible old women,” said Alexia, whirling more than ever, “without coming back to laugh at one’s misery. Oh, that’s a dear, Mrs. Higby!” as that good lady’s scissors clicked, and set her free. “I’ll bring you out a new pair of strings next time I come. Come on, Pickering—good-by, everybody;” and she was out and running down the path by the time he found his hat.

“Oh dear!” and back she came again, “I forgot my face; it’s all stuck up. Do, somebody, wash this molasses off.” And Polly gave her a dab with the wet towel, and a little kiss at the same time.

“You didn’t wash it in the right place,” grumbled Alexia, running off again; “it was the other cheek. Oh dear, dear! Come on, Pickering; we shall lose the train.”

CHAPTER III.
JOHNNY.

“WHAT a pity that Johnny couldn’t come to the candy party,” sighed Phronsie the next day, looking over at the little brown house across the lane, which presented the same serene appearance, as if such jovial affairs had not been; “but I suppose Mrs. Fargo knew best, and he really was too tired, as they’d just come.”

“Mrs. Fargo surely does know best,” said Polly, stopping long enough in her trial of a very difficult passage in the sonata to fling this over her shoulder to Phronsie; “for you know, Phronsie, Johnny is just awful when he’s tired out.”

“Yes; I know,” said Phronsie, with another sigh, “but then he’s Johnny, you know, Polly.”

“And the dearest dear of a Johnny too!” cried Polly warmly, going on with her practising. “O Phronsie, supposing I shouldn’t play this—good!” She stopped suddenly, and leaned both hands on the music-rest at the dreadful thought.

Phronsie stopped looking over the children’s books on the table, and, setting them straight, came over to her side.

“You can’t make a mistake,” she breathed confidently. “Why, Polly, you play it beautifully!”

“But I may,” broke in Polly recklessly. “Oh, I may, Phronsie! And then, oh, dear! I could never hold my head up in all this world. It would be so very dreadful for Jasper and the children, for me not to play it as it ought to be.”

Phronsie leaned over Polly’s shoulder, and put two soft arms around her neck. “You will play it good, Polly,” she declared; “and Mamsie would say,—I know she would,—that you’re not to think of what you’ll do at the time, till the time comes.”

“You blessed child!” cried Polly, whirling around on the music-stool. “O Phronsie! you’re just such a comfort as you were that day when Grandpapa brought you and put you in my arms, when I broke down practising, and I’d almost made up my mind to go home. Now, then, I’ll just stop worrying, and play ahead.”

And she sat up straight, and flashed all the brilliant passages over again, Phronsie standing quite still to watch Polly’s fingers flying up and down.

But, notwithstanding all Phronsie’s comfort, Polly knew that she would have to give hard and constant work to make this, the supreme effort of her life thus far in a musical way, a success. It was the first time that anybody outside of the highest professional lines had been asked to play with the Symphony Orchestra; and when this urgent request had been laid before Polly, she had said, “Oh, no! I cannot play well enough.”

But Mrs. Jasper King’s reputation as a pianist had gone farther than Polly knew. A request came, signed by a long list of people whose names were high in an artistic sense, fortified by the best citizens of the good old town of Berton,—itself a guaranty of anything in that line, for was it not the home of the Symphony? When this came, and Polly saw Jasper’s eyes, she gave a little gasp. “I will, dear, if you think best,” she said, looking at no one but him.

“It’s just as you say, Polly,” Jasper had answered. But his eyes shone, and he instinctively straightened up with pride. And when she had said, “O Jasper! if you think I can, I’ll do it,”—“I know you can, Polly,” Jasper had declared, and Polly had said “Yes,” and great delight reigned everywhere; and Grandpapa had patted her head, and said, “Well done, Polly! To think of all those hard hours of practice in the old days turning out like this;” and Mamsie had smiled at her in a way that only Mamsie could smile. And Polly and Jasper had hurried off to Berton the next morning, Jasper swinging the little publishing bag, on the way to the train, with a jubilant hand; and in the lapse of the hard working hours, when things eased up a bit, he had said to Mr. Marlowe (for it was Marlowe & King now, in bright gilt letters over the big door), “I am going with my wife to select the music,” for Polly was a prime favorite with Mr. Marlowe, and everything was told to him.

And Jasper and Polly went to the music-store, and ransacked the shelves, and tried various selections, for Polly was to play what she liked; and after the piece was picked out, then the two went to luncheon at the cunning little restaurant on a side street, nice and quiet, where they could talk it all over.

But sometimes, when Polly was all alone in the big music-room opening on the side veranda, she trembled all over at the terrible responsibility she had taken upon herself. It seemed so very much worse to fail now that she bore Jasper’s honored name, than if she were only unknown and simple “Polly Pepper.” And to-day she could not help showing this dismay to Phronsie.

“But Mamsie would say so,” repeated Polly over and over to herself bravely, “just what Phronsie did.” And then at it she would fly harder than ever. And every evening after the “publishing bag” had been looked over in Jasper’s and Polly’s little den, and its contents sorted and attended to for the morrow, Jasper would always say, “Now, Polly, for the music;” and Polly would fly to the piano, while he drew up a big easy-chair to her side, to settle into it restfully; and the others would hurry in at the first note, and then Polly’s concert would begin. And every night she knew she played it a little bit better, and her cheeks glowed, and her heart took comfort.

Tying on her big garden hat, Phronsie went across the road.

Phronsie put away the little sewing-bag as soon as Polly finished practising this morning, and hung it on its hook over Grandpapa’s newspaper rack,—for she always sat and sewed in the music-room mornings when Polly practised, generally making sails for the boys, just as Polly had done years ago, or clothes for Barby’s dolls,—and tying on her big garden hat, she went over across the road, and down around the corner, to the big house where Mrs. Fargo and Johnny had come to board for the summer, arriving a week earlier than they intended, as it was warm at home, and Mrs. Fargo watched jealously over Johnny’s health.

“It does seem so very nice to have you here, dear Mrs. Fargo,” she said, coming upon that lady in one of her big square rooms. For Mrs. Fargo had taken the whole upper floor of the house, and was in the depths of the misery of unpacking the huge trunks with which the rooms and hall seemed to be full, the maid busy as a bee in the process, while Johnny was under foot every other minute in a way terrible to behold. “And now I’m going to help.” She laid aside her big hat on the bed.

“O Phronsie!” cried Mrs. Fargo, turning a pink, distressed face to her, “it’s perfectly lovely to see you; but you’re not going to work, dear. It’s bad enough for me. Joanna, the nails aren’t out of that box of books. You’ll have to go down, and tell Mr. Brown to come and draw them.”

“I’ll draw them,” cried Johnny, springing out from behind a trunk he was trying with all his might to move. “I’ve got my own hammer; yes, sir-ee! Now get out of the way; I’m coming.”

“O Johnny! you can’t,” remonstrated Mrs. Fargo quickly. “You’re not big enough; it needs a strong man.”

“I’m ’most a man,” said Johnny, twitching away from her. “I’m going to do it.”

“But your hammer is in the box of your playthings,” said Mrs. Fargo, glad to remember this.

“I don’t care; I’ll get Mr. Brown’s, then,” declared Johnny, prancing off.

“Oh, dear me! Phronsie, do stop that boy,” begged Mrs. Fargo, tired and distressed.

“Johnny,” called Phronsie softly. She did not offer to go after him. “Come here, dear.”

“Am going for Mr. Brown’s hammer,” said Johnny, edging off.

“I want you, dear.”

“Am going for Mr. Brown’s hammer.” Yet he came back. “What you want?”

“I’m going to take you over with me, if your mamma says so, to our house; and if you’re very good, Johnny, you shall ride on the donkey. May I take him, Mrs. Fargo?”

“Oh, if you only will!” breathed Mrs. Fargo thankfully.

“I don’t want any old hammer!” screamed Johnny in a transport; “the donkey’s a good deal gooder,” scrambling down the stairs.

“And I’ll send Mr. Brown up to open the box,” said Phronsie, tying on her hat, and going after him.

But she didn’t get Johnny over to the donkey, after all; for, just as she had seen Mr. Brown on his way up-stairs to open the box, some one ran up the steps, two at a time, with, “O Phronsie, I’ve a day off!” most joyfully.

“Why, I don’t see how, Dick,” said Phronsie, looking at him from under her big hat.

“Never mind. I have it, anyhow; tell you later. Now for some fun! That chap here?” looking suddenly at Johnny, who now began at the bottom of the steps to howl to Phronsie to hurry for the donkey.

“Yes; they came a week sooner than they expected,” said Phronsie. “They got here yesterday.”

“Botheration! Well, now, Phronsie, let the boy alone. I’m only here for a day, you know. He’s all right if turned out in the dirt to play. I want you to go to drive.”