circle. "We girls all just made her stop. My! Miss Anstice, it was just
a mob here when we saw Polly coming."
"Sarah Miller, you have nothing to say until I address you." A little
red spot was coming on either cheek as Miss Anstice turned angrily to
the big girl. "And I shall at once report you to sister, for improper
behavior."
"Oh dear, dear! Well, I wish 'sister' would fire old black silk,"
exclaimed a girl on the edge of the circle under her breath. "Look at
her now. Isn't she a terror!" and then the big bell rang, and they all
filed in.
"Now she won't let us have our picnic; she'll go against it every way
she can," cried a girl who was out of dangerous earshot. And the terror
of this spread as they all scampered down the hall.
"Oh dear, dear! to think this should have happened on her black silk
day!"
"No, we won't get it now, you may depend," cried ever so many. And poor
Polly, with all this added woe, to make her feel responsible for the
horrible beginning of the day, sank into her seat and leaned her head on
her desk.
The picnic, celebrated as an annual holiday, was given by Miss Salisbury
to the girls, if all had gone well in the school, and no transgressions
of rules, or any misdemeanor, marred the term. Miss Anstice never had
looked with favor on the institution, and the girls always felt that she
went out of her way to spy possible insubordination among the scholars.
So they strove not to get out of her good graces, observing special care
when the "black silk days" came around.
On this unlucky day, everything seemed against them; and as Miss Anstice
stalked off to sit upon the platform by "sister" for the opening
exercises, the girls felt it was all up with them, and a general gloom
fell upon the long schoolroom.
Miss Salisbury's gentle face was turned in surprise upon them as she
scanned the faces. And then, the general exercises being over, the
classes were called, and she and "sister" were left on the platform
alone.
"Oh, now she's getting the whole thing!" groaned Leslie, looking back
from the hall, to peer in. "Old black silk is giving it to her. Oh, I
just hate Miss Anstice!"
"Sarah, why couldn't you have kept still?" cried another girl. "If you
hadn't spoken, Miss Anstice would have gotten over it."
"Well, I wasn't going to have Polly Pepper blamed," said Sarah sturdily.
"If you were willing to, I wasn't going to stand still and hear it, when
it was our fault she told us first."
"Oh, no, Sarah," said Polly, "it surely was my own self that was to
blame. I ought to have run in and told Miss Salisbury first. Well, now,
girls, what shall I do? I've lost that picnic for you all, for I don't
believe she will let us have it now."
"No, she won't," cried Leslie tragically; "of that you may be sure,
Polly Pepper."
VIII "WE'RE TO HAVE OUR PICNIC!"
And that afternoon Polly kept back bad recollections of the gloomy
morning at school as well as she could. She didn't let Alexia get the
least bit of a hint about it, although how she ever escaped letting her
find it out, she never could quite tell, but rattled on, all the
messages the girls had sent, and every bit of school news she could
think of.
"Were the other girls who went to Silvia's, at school?" asked Alexia
suddenly, and twitching up her pillow to get higher in bed, for Dr.
Fisher had said she mustn't get up this first day; and a hard piece of
work Mother Fisher had had to keep the aunt out of the room.
"I wouldn't go in," Mamsie would say; "Dr. Fisher doesn't wish her to be
disturbed. To-morrow, Miss Rhys." And it was all done so quietly that
Alexia's aunt would find herself off down in the library again and busy
with a book, very much to her own surprise.
"I'll shake 'em up," Polly cried; and hopping off from the foot of the
bed, she thumped the pillows, if not with a merry, at least with a
vigorous hand. "There now," crowding them in back of Alexia's restless
head, "isn't that fine?"
"I should think it was," exclaimed Alexia with a sigh of satisfaction,
and giving her long figure a contented stretch; "you do know just the
best things to do, Polly Pepper. Well, tell on. I suppose Amy Garrett is
perfectly delighted to cut that old art lecture."
"Oh, Professor Mills didn't come at all," said Polly. That brought it
all back about Miss Anstice, and her head drooped suddenly.
"Didn't come? oh dear!" And Alexia fell to laughing so, that she didn't
notice Polly's face at all. But her aunt popping in, she became sober at
once, and ran her head under the bedclothes.
"Oh, are you worse? is she, Polly?" cried Miss Rhys all in a flutter. "I
heard her cry, I thought."
"No, I was laughing," said Alexia, pulling up her face red and shining.
"Do go right away, aunt. Dr. Fisher said Polly was to tell me things."
"Well, if you are not worse," said her aunt, slowly turning away.
"No," said Alexia. "Polly Pepper, do get up and shut that door," she
cried; "slam it, and lock it."
"Oh, no," said Polly, in dismay at the very thought, "I couldn't ever do
that, Alexia."
"Well, then I will." Alexia threw back the bedclothes with a desperate
hand, and thrust one foot out.
"If you do," said Polly, not moving from where she sat on the foot of
the bed, "I shall go out of this room, and not come back to-day."
"Shall you really?" cried Alexia, fixing her pale eyes on her.
"Yes, indeed I shall," said Polly firmly.
"Oh, then I'm not going." Alexia drew in her foot, and huddled all the
clothes up over her head. "Polly Pepper," she said in muffled tones,
"you're a perfectly dreadful creature, and if you'd gone and sprained
your arm in a horrible old railway accident and were tied in bed, I'd do
just everything you said, I would."
"Oh, I hope you wouldn't," said Polly.
"Hope I wouldn't!" screamed Alexia, flinging all the clothes away again
to stare at Polly out of very wide eyes. "Whatever do you mean, Polly
Pepper?"
"I hope you wouldn't do as I wanted you to," said Polly distinctly, "if
I wanted something that was bad."
"Well, that's a very different thing," mumbled Alexia. "Oh dear me!" She
gave a grimace at a twinge of pain in her arm. "This isn't bad; I only
wanted that door shut."
"Oh now, Alexia, you've hurt your arm!" cried Polly; "do keep still,
else Papa-Doctor won't let me stay in here."
"Oh dear, dear! I'll keep still," promised Alexia, making up her mind
that horses shouldn't drag any expression of pain from her after that.
"I mean, do sit up straight against your pillows; you've got 'em all
mussed up again," cried Polly. So she hopped off from the bed, and
thumped them into shape once more.
"I wish you'd turn 'em over," said Alexia: "they're so hot on that
side." So Polly whisked over the pillows, and patted them straight, and
Alexia sank back against them again.
"Wouldn't you like me to smooth your hair, Alexia?" asked Polly. "Mamsie
does that to me when I don't feel good."
"Yes, I should," said Alexia, "like it very much indeed, Polly."
So Polly, feeling quite happy, albeit the remembrance of the morning
still lay deep in her mind, ran off for the brush and comb. "And I'm
going to braid it all over," she said with great satisfaction, "after
I've rubbed your head."
"Well, now tell on," said Alexia, as Polly climbed up back of the
pillows, and began to smooth the long light fluffs of hair, trying to do
it just as Mamsie always did for her. "You say Professor Mills didn't
come--oh dear! and think of that black silk gown wasted on the girls.
Well, I suppose she was cross as two sticks because he didn't come,
wasn't she, Polly? Oh dear me! well, I'm glad I wasn't there," she
hurried on, not waiting for a reply; "I'd rather be in with this old
bundle"--she patted her bandages--"Oh Polly!" She started up so suddenly
that the brush flew out of Polly's lap and spun away across the floor.
"Take care," said Polly, "oh, there goes the comb now," and she skipped
down, recovered the articles, and jumped up to her post again. "What is
it, Alexia?"
"Why, I've just thought--you don't suppose Miss Salisbury will appoint
the day for the picnic, do you, while my arm is lame?"
The color in Polly's cheeks went out, and she was glad that she could
get well behind the pillows.
"Oh, no, Alexia," she made herself say, "we wouldn't ever in all this
world have the picnic till you were well. How could you think it,
Alexia?"
"I didn't believe you would," cried Alexia, much gratified, and huddling
down again, without once seeing Polly's face, "but most of the girls
don't care about me, Polly, and they wouldn't mind."
"Oh yes, they do," said Polly reassuringly, "they're very fond of you,
most of them are."
"Well," said Alexia, "I'm not fond of them, so I don't really expect
them to be, Polly. But I shouldn't like 'em to go off and have that
picnic when I couldn't go. Was anything said about it, Polly?" she asked
abruptly.
"Miss Salisbury or Miss Anstice didn't say a word," said Polly,
trembling for the next question. Just then Mother Fisher looked in with
a smile. "Polly, you are wanted," she said. "Grandpapa and Jasper are
ready to go to the railroad station. I'm going to stay with Alexia and
finish her hair just as I do for Polly."
Alexia looked up and smiled. It was next best to having Polly, to have
Mrs. Fisher. So Polly, happy to have a respite from Alexia's questions
about the picnic, and happier still to be going to find out something
about the poor brakeman's family, flew off from the bed, set a kiss on
Alexia's hot cheek, and another on Mamsie's, and raced off.
"I'm coming, Jasper," she called. She could see him below in the wide
hall.
"All right, don't hurry so, father isn't ready yet. Dear me! Polly, you
can get ready so quickly for things!" he said admiringly. And, in the
glow of starting, he couldn't see that Polly's spirits seemed at a low
ebb, and he drew a long breath as he tried to make himself believe that
what he had noticed at luncheon wasn't really so at all.
And Polly, between Grandpapa and Jasper, tried to make them have such a
good time that really it seemed no walk at all, and they were all quite
surprised when they found themselves there.
"We must go up into the superintendent's room," said Mr. King. So up the
long stairs they went, the old gentleman grumbling at every step because
there was no elevator, and at all other matters and things that were,
as he declared, "at loose ends in the whole system." At last they stood
before the desk.
"Have the goodness," began old Mr. King to the official, a short,
pompous person who came up in the absence of the superintendent and now
turned a cold face up to them, "to give me some information regarding a
brakeman who was killed last night in the accident to the train due here
at 7.45."
"Don't know anything about him," said the official in the crispest
accents. He looked as if he cared less, and was about to slam down the
window, when Mr. King asked, "Does anybody in this office know?"
"Can't say." The official pulled out his watch, compared it with the big
clock on the wall, then turned away.
"Do any of you know who the man was who was killed last night?" asked
the old gentleman, putting his face quite close to the window, and
speaking in such clear, distinct tones that every clerk looked up.
Each man searched all the other faces. No, they didn't know; except one,
a little, thin, weazen-faced person over in the corner, at a high desk,
copying. "I only know that his name was Jim," he said in a voice to
match his figure.
"Have the goodness to step this way, sir, and tell me what you do know,"
said Mr. King in such a way that the little man, but with many glances
for the pompous individual, slipped off from his high stool, to advance
to the window rubbing his hands together deprecatingly. The other clerks
all laid down their pens to see the interview.
"What was his name--this brakeman's?" demanded Mr. King.
"I don't know, sir," said the little, thin clerk. "Jim--that was all I
knew him by. I used to see him of a morning when I was coming to the
office, and he was waiting to take his train. He was a steady fellow,
Jim was," he added, anxiously scanning the handsome face beneath the
white hair.
"I don't doubt that," said old Mr. King hastily. "I don't in the least
doubt it."
"And he wasn't given to drink, sir," the little, thin clerk cried
abruptly, "although some did say it who shouldn't; for there were many
after Jim's place. He had an easy run. And----"
"Yes, yes; well, now what I want to know," said Mr. King interrupting
the stream, Polly and Jasper on either side having a hard time to
control their impatience, "is where this 'Jim,' as you call him, lived,
and what was his last name."
"That I don't know, sir," said the little, thin clerk. "I only know he
had a family, for once in a while when I had a minute to spare he'd get
to talking about 'em, when we met. Jim was awful fond of 'em; that any
one could see."
"Yes, well, now what would he say?" asked the old gentleman, trying to
hurry matters along. The pompous official had his eye on the clock. It
might go hard for the little, thin clerk in his seedy coat, if he took
too much time from office hours.
"Why, he had one girl who was crazy about music," said the little clerk,
"and--"
"Oh dear me!" exclaimed Polly. Old Mr. King heard her sigh at his side,
and he cried, "Well, what else?"
"Why, I've heard Jim say more'n once he'd live on bread and water if he
could only give his daughter a chance. And there were his three boys."
"Three boys," echoed Mr. King sharply.
"Yes, sir. I saw 'em round the train once or twice; they were likely
chaps, it seemed to me." The little, thin clerk, a bachelor with several
unmarried sisters on his hands for support, sighed deeply.
"Well, now," cried Mr. King, thinking it quite time to bring the
interview to a close, "I'd take it quite kindly if you'd find out for me
all you can about this Jim. A member of my family was on the train last
night, who but for this noble brakeman might--might--bless me! There is
my card." The old gentleman pulled out one from his cardcase, then fell
to wiping his face violently.
"What is your name?" asked Jasper, seeing that his father couldn't
speak.
"Hiram Potter," said the little clerk. The pompous official drew near,
and looked over his shoulder at the card. "Oh! why--Mr. King!" he cried,
all the pomposity suddenly gone. "I beg your pardon; what can I do for
you, sir?"
"Nothing whatever, sir." Mr. King waved him away. "Well, now, Mr.
Potter, if you'll be so very good as to get this information for me as
soon as possible and bring it up to my house, I'll be very much indebted
to you." With a bow to him, in which the official was nowise included,
the old gentleman and Polly and Jasper went off down the stairs again.
"Finkle, you're caught this time; you're in a hole," the brother
officials sang out when the card had been displayed around the office.
"I wouldn't want to be in your shoes," said more than one.
Finkle tried to brave out the dismay he felt at having offended the
powerful millionaire railroad director, but he made but a poor show of
it. Meanwhile the little, thin clerk, slipping the precious card into
his seedy coat pocket, clambered up to his high stool, his mind busy
with plans to unearth all possible information concerning Jim, the
brakeman, as soon as the big clock up on the wall should let them out of
the office.
"Polly, my dear," old Mr. King kept saying, as they went down the
stairs, and he held her hand very closely, "I think this Potter--a very
good sort of a man he seems to be, too--will find out all we want to
know about Jim. I really do, Polly; so we won't worry about it, child."
Nevertheless, on top of all the rest that was worrying her, Polly had a
sorry enough time, to keep her troubles from showing on her face. And
after dinner, when the bell pealed violently, she gave a great start and
turned quite pale.
Jasper saw it. "I don't believe it's any bad news, Polly," he hastened
to say reassuringly, and longing to comfort, though he couldn't imagine
the reason.
"Oh, where's Polly?" She heard the girls' voices out in the hall, and
ran out to meet them. "Oh dear me!" she cried at sight of their faces
that confirmed her worst fears.
"Yes, oh Polly, it's just as I said," cried Leslie Fyle, precipitating
herself against Polly. "Now, girls, keep back; I'm going to tell her
first."
"Well, we are all going to tell too, Les; that's what we've come for,"
cried the others, crowding up.
"Oh, what is it?" cried Polly, standing quite still, and feeling as if
she never could hold up her head again now that the picnic was lost
through her.
"I shall tell, myself," declared Sarah bluntly. "I'm the one, it seems,
that made all the trouble, so it really belongs to me, I should think,
to be the first speaker."
Polly folded her hands tightly together, while the babel went on,
feeling that if she didn't hear the dreaded news soon, she should fly
off to Mamsie.
"Miss Salisbury said--" She could hear little scraps of chatter.
"I know--oh, do hurry and tell Polly."
"Oh, and just think, Miss Salisbury----"
"And Miss Anstice--" Then some of them looked around and into Polly's
face. "Oh my goodness, girls, see Polly Pepper!"
With that they all rushed at her, and nobody told first, for they all
shouted it out together: "Polly, Miss Salisbury has given us our
picnic!" and "Polly, isn't it too splendid!" and "Polly Pepper, just
think how perfectly elegant! Our picnic, Polly--only think!" till the
circle in the library popped out their heads into the hall.
"Jasper," cried Polly, deserting the bunch of "Salisbury girls," to
plunge up to him with shining eyes, "we're to have our picnic; we truly
are, Jasper, and I thought I'd lost it to all the girls."
And just then Johnson advanced down the length of the hall. "It's a
person to see you, sir," he said to old Mr. King,--"says it's quite
important, sir, and that you told him to come. He's sitting by the door,
sir."
"Oh, it's Mr. Potter, I think," said the old gentleman; "show him into
the library, Johnson. Polly, my child. Bless me! I don't see how you
stand it with these girls chattering around you every minute. Now be off
with you," he cried gaily to the group. He was much pleased at the
success of his plan to find out about the brakeman, of which he felt
quite sure from the appearance so promptly of the little clerk. "I have
something quite important for Polly to attend to now; and I really want
her to myself once in a while."
"Yes, I must go, girls," said Polly, turning a blooming countenance on
them; "so good night. We won't have the picnic, you know, till Alexia is
well," she added decidedly.
"Oh, that's what Miss Salisbury said," cried Leslie, turning back. "You
see, I saw her after school--went back for my history--and I was to tell
you that, Polly; only Sarah spoilt it all."
"Never mind," said Polly brightly, "it's all right now, since we are
really to have our picnic." And then she put her hand in old Mr.
King's, quite bubbling over with happiness,--Jasper, just as jubilant,
since Polly was herself again, on the other side,--to go in and meet the
little, thin clerk, scared at his surroundings, and perched on the
extreme edge of a library chair.
IX ALL ABOUT THE POOR BRAKEMAN
Mr. Potter was very miserable indeed on the edge of his chair, and
twirling his hat dreadfully; and for the first moment after the handsome
old gentleman spoke to him, he had nothing to say.
Old Mr. King was asking him for the third time, "You found out all about
poor Jim's family, eh?"
At last he emerged from his fit of embarrassment enough to reply, "Yes,
sir."
"Now that is very good," the old gentleman cried approvingly, and wiped
his face vigorously after his effort, "very good indeed, Mr. Potter."
Hiram Potter now followed up his first attempt to find his voice; and
trying to forget the handsome surroundings that had so abashed him, he
went on now quite glibly.
"You see, sir, there's six of 'em--Jim's children."
"Dear me!" ejaculated old Mr. King.
"Yes, sir, there are." Mr. Potter's hat began to twirl uneasily again.
"And the wife--she ain't strong, just got up from rheumatic fever."
"That's bad--very bad," said Mr. King.
"Those three boys of his are good," said Mr. Potter, brightening up a
bit in the general gloom; "and the biggest one says he's going to be a
brakeman just like his father. But the mother wants 'em all to go to
school. You see, that's what Jim was working for."
"And the girl who wanted to play on the piano?" broke in Polly eagerly.
Then she blushed rosy red. "Oh, forgive me, Grandpapa, for
interrupting," and she hid her face on old Mr. King's arm.
"I was just going to ask about that girl, myself," said Grandpapa
promptly. "Tell us about her, Mr. Potter, if you please."
Hiram Potter set his hat carefully on the floor beside his chair. It was
his Sunday hat, and evidently that, with his best clothes which he had
donned in honor of the occasion, were objects of great care. He
scratched his head and thought deeply. "Well, now, you see, sir," he
said slowly, "that's almost a hopeless case, and I wish, as sure as I
sit here, that girl hadn't never thought of piano music. But it's born
in her, the mother said; the girl's grandfather was a musician in the
old home in Germany, and so she can't help it. Why, she's just so crazy
about it, she'll drum all up and down the kitchen table to make believe
that----"
"Oh Grandpapa!" cried Polly in the greatest excitement, and hopping up
and down by his side, "that's just as I used to do in the little brown
house,--the very same way, Grandpapa, you know."
"Yes, she did, father," cried Jasper, bobbing his head scarcely less
excited, just as if old Mr. King hadn't heard the story many times.
Mr. Potter, for want of something to do to express his amazement, picked
up his hat, stroked it, and set it down again, staring with all his
might.
"So you did, Polly; so you did, my child," cried Grandpapa, taking her
hands in both of his, and looking down into her shining eyes; "well,
well, to be sure. Now, Jasper, get the tablet, and write down the
address of Jim's family as quickly as you can, my boy."
So Jasper ran over to the library table, and brought back the tablet and
pencil hanging to it; and pretty soon Jim's home was all described
thus: "Mrs. James Corcoran, 5 Willow Court--third house from Haven
Street."
"It's kinder hard to find," observed Mr. Potter slowly, "because Willow
Court runs into Haven Street criss-cross, and this number isn't on the
house; it's got rubbed off; but if you follow up No. 3, and come up
carefully, why, there you'll be where No. 5 was."
"Oh dear me!" said Mr. King. "Well, you may describe the house, for I am
going down there to-morrow, and I certainly do not wish to waste my time
walking about."
Polly and Jasper looked so very decidedly "Oh, may we go too?" that the
old gentleman added quickly, "And my young people will accompany me,"
which really left nothing more to be desired at present.
"Well, it's a yellow house," said Mr. Potter, thinking very hard, "that
is, it is in spots, where the paint is on; and it's low, and runs down
to the back, and sets sideways. But I tell you how you'll know it. She's
got--Mrs. Jim Corcoran has--the greatest lot of flowers in her window.
They're chock full, sir."
"I shall know it, then," cried Polly in great satisfaction.
"I think there's no danger, sir, but what we will find the place all
right." Old Mr. King was fumbling in his pocket in great perplexity. "It
never would do," he decided, pulling his hand out. "No, I must contrive
to send him something. Well, now--hem--Mr. Potter," he said aloud, "and
where do you live? Quite near, I presume?"
"Oh, just the other end of the town, sir," said Mr. Potter. "I live on
Acorn Street."
"Acorn Street?" repeated Mr. King, wrinkling his brows, "and where may
that be, pray tell?"
"It's over at the South End, sir; it runs off from Baker Street and
Highland Square."
"Oh yes, yes," said the old gentleman, without much more idea than
before.
"I know where it is, father," said Jasper. "Dear me! You've had to take
a good bit of time to get all this information, Mr. Potter."
Mr. Potter looked down busily on the carpet, trying not to think how
tired his feet were, saving some car-fare for their owner.
"Well, now what number?" The old gentleman seeming to desire his whole
address, that was soon given too,--"23 Acorn Street, South End."
"And I suppose you have a family?" went on the old gentleman, determined
to find out all there was to it, now he had commenced.