"Yes, quite likely; but I'll tell you what I will do. I will buy you a
pair, and we will take them home. That will be fine, won't it, dear?"
"Yes," said Phronsie, wriggling in delight. Then she sat quite still.
"Grandpapa," she said, reaching up to whisper again, "I'm afraid it
will make Araminta feel badly to see me with my beautiful wooden shoes
on, when she can't have any. Do you suppose there are little teenty
ones, Grandpapa dear, and I might get her a pair?"
"Yes, indeed," cried Grandpapa, nodding his white head in delight,
"there are shoals of them, Phronsie, of all sizes."
"What are shoals?" queried Phronsie.
"Oh, numbers and numbers--so many we can't count them," answered Mr.
King, recklessly.
Phronsie slid down into her place again, and sat quite still lost in
thought. So many wooden shoes she couldn't count them was quite beyond
her. But Grandpapa's voice roused her. "And I'll buy a bushel of them,
Phronsie, and send them home, so that all your dolls at home can each
have a pair. Would that suit you, Pet?"
Phronsie screamed with delight and clapped her hands. Polly and Jasper
who had changed places, as Dr. Fisher and Mr. Henderson had made them
take theirs by one window, now whirled around. "What is it?" cried
Polly of Phronsie. "What is it?"
"I'm going to have wooden shoes," announced Phronsie, in a burst of
confidence that included everybody in the compartment, "for my very own
self, and Araminta is going to have a pair, and every single one of my
children at home, too. Grandpapa said so."
"Whew!" whistled Jasper. "Oh, what fun," sighed Polly.
"And you shall have a pair, too, if you want them, Polly," Grandpapa
telegraphed over to her in the corner.
"And Jasper can, too, can't he, Grandpapa? And, oh, thank you _so
much,_" cried Polly, all in one breath.
"I guess it's as well I shall be on hand to set the broken bones," said
little Dr. Fisher, "with all you children capering around in those
wooden abominations."
"Oh, Dr. Fisher, we are not going to fall!" exclaimed Jasper, in
disdain, at the very thought. And "No, indeed," came merrily from
Polly. And then they all fell to work admiring the numberless windmills
past which their train was speeding toward Rotterdam.
"To think it is only six o'clock!" exclaimed Polly, looking at her
little travelling watch that Grandpapa had given her. "Now, what a fine
long day we are going to have, Jasper, for sightseeing in Rotterdam."
As the train came to a standstill, the guards threw open compartment
doors, and all the people poured out calling for porters to see to
their luggage, and everything was in confusion at once on the platforms.
"Indeed, you won't, Miss Polly," declared Mr. King, overhearing it, as
they waited till all was ready for them to get into the hotel
coach,--"we are all going to spend this day at the hotel--first, in
getting a good breakfast, and then, dear me, I shall sleep pretty much
all of the morning, and I'd advise the rest of you to jump into your
beds and get good naps after the experience on that atrocious steamboat
last night."
"Oh, Grandpapa, must we really go to bed?" cried Polly, in horror at
the mere thought.
"Well, not exactly into your beds," laughed Mr. King, as Jasper,
announcing that all was ready, piloted them into the coach, "but you've
got to rest like sensible beings. Make up your mind to that. As for
Phronsie," and he gallantly lifted her up to the step, "she's half
asleep already. She's got to have a splendid nap, and no mistake."
"I'm not sleepy," declared Phronsie, stumbling into the high coach to
sit down next to Mother Fisher. "No, Grandpapa dear, not a bit." And
before anybody knew it, and as soon as the coach wheels spun round, she
rolled over into Mamsie's lap. There she was as fast asleep as could be!