"Mamsie, have we been here a whole week in Amsterdam," cried Polly,
leaning out of the window to look up and down the canal where the
many-coloured boats lay, "beside all those days at Scheveningen? I
can't believe it!"
"It doesn't seem possible," Mother Fisher answered musingly, and her
hands dropped to her lap, where they lay quietly folded.
"Mamsie,"--Polly suddenly drew in her gaze from the charming old canal
and its boats, and sprang to Mrs. Fisher's side,--"do you know, I think
it was just the loveliest thing in all the world for Grandpapa to bring
dear Mr. and Mrs. Henderson abroad with us? I do, Mamsie."
"Mr. King is always doing good, kind things," said Mrs. Fisher, coming
out of her revery, as Polly threw herself down on the floor and laid
her head in her mother's lap, just as she used to do at home. "I
haven't done this for so long," she said, "and it is so good!"
"That is the only drawback about travel," observed Mother Fisher, her
hand passing soothingly over Polly's head, "that there never seems to
be time for the little home ways that are so good. Now we must make the
time and keep it, Polly."
"Indeed we will," cried Polly, seizing Mamsie's other hand to cuddle it
under her chin, "and I'm going to begin right now. It makes me think of
the little brown house, Mamsie, whenever you smooth my hair. What good
times we used to have there!"
Mrs. Fisher's hand trembled a bit, but the black eyes were as serene as
ever. "You used to work pretty hard, Polly," she said.
"Oh, but it was fun!" said Polly, merrily, "only I didn't like the old
stove when it acted badly. But then came my new stove. Mamsie, wasn't
Papa Fisher splendid? And then he saved my eyes. Just think, Mamsie, I
never can love him half enough. I wish I could do something for him,"
she mourned, just as she did in the old days.
"You do, Polly; you are doing something every day of your life," said
her mother, reassuringly. "Never think that you don't do anything. Why,
it was only this very morning that your father told me that you were
his little helper, and that he depended on you to cheer him up."
"Did he say that?" asked Polly, much gratified, poking up her head to
look at her mother. "Oh, I want to be, but I don't know how to help
him. Papa Fisher always seems to be doing something for other people,
and not to need anybody to do things for him."
"Ah, Polly, when you have lived longer," said Mrs. Fisher, "you will
know that those who are doing things always for other people, are the
very ones who need cheering up, for they never complain. Your father,
in going about as he does, day after day, to the hospitals and
everywhere, where he can learn anything that will make him a better
doctor, is working very hard indeed, and yet think how cheerful he is
when he comes home! And he says you help to keep him so, Polly." She
bent over and set a kiss on Polly's red cheek.
"Mamsie," cried Polly, with a glow where the kiss had dropped, "I'm
going to try harder than ever to see wherever I can find a time to help
Papa-Doctor. And I hope that one will come soon."
"And you'll find just such a time will come; it never fails to when you
watch for it," said Mother Fisher, wisely. Just then the door opened,
and Phronsie, fresh from the hands of Matilda, who had been changing
her gown, came in with Araminta in her arms. When she saw Polly on the
floor with her head in Mamsie's lap, she got down by her side and
curled up there, too.
"Smooth my hair, do, Mamsie," she begged.
"Mamsie's got her two bothers," said Polly, with a little laugh.
"Mamsie doesn't mind her bothers," said Mrs. Fisher, her other hand
going softly over Phronsie's yellow hair, at which Phronsie gave a
small sigh of content, and wriggled her toes as they were stretched out
straight before her on the carpet, "if only they grow up a little
better every day than they were the day before."
"We'll try to, Mamsie," said Polly, "won't we, Pet?" leaning over and
kissing her.
"I'll try to," promised Phronsie, with another wriggle of her small
toes.
"That's right," said Mother Fisher, smiling approval.
"Mrs. Fisher!" called Grandpapa's voice at the door. Thereupon Polly
and Phronsie sprang to their feet, and a lively race ensued to see
which should be there the first to open it. The consequence was that
both faces met him at once.
"Bless me!" cried old Mr. King, laughing gaily, as the door flew open,
and they both rushed into his arms; "so you did like to have your old
Grandfather come to see you," he exclaimed, mightily pleased.
"I should think we did!" cried Polly, as they escorted him in, and led
him to the seat of honour, a big carved arm-chair, with a faded
tapestry covering.
"I should very much like to get into your lap, Grandpapa dear," said
Phronsie, surveying him gravely as he sat down and leaned his head
against the chair back.
"So you shall," cried Mr. King, lifting her up to his knee, Araminta
and all. She perched there in quiet content, while he set forth his
business which he had come to talk over with Mother Fisher.
"Now, you know those three boys of yours are the most splendid boys
that ever were in all this world, and they are working away at home,
studying and all that, Joel and David are, and Ben is pegging away at
business." Old Mr. King thought best to go to the heart of the matter
at once without any dallying.
Mrs. Fisher's cheek grew a shade paler, but she said not a word as she
fastened her black eyes on his face.
"Hem--well, we don't talk much about those boys," observed the old
gentleman, "because it makes us all homesick after them, and it's best
that they should be there, and that we should be here, so that was
settled once for all by our coming."
Still Mrs. Fisher said not a word.
"Well, now, the fact of it is," continued old Mr. King, still keeping
to the main point with wonderful directness, "I think the time has come
for us to act, which is much better than talking, in my opinion; and I
want to do something for those boys."
A pin could have been heard to drop. Polly leaned over his chair and
hung on his words, while Mrs. Fisher never took her eyes from his face.
"In short," continued old Mr. King, well pleased with the attention of
his audience, "I propose that we send a box of good things of various
descriptions to Ben and Joel and David."
A small howl of delight from Polly broke the silence. When she heard
that, Phronsie gave a little crow. "Oh, Grandpapa!" exclaimed Polly,
"do you really mean it?" and she threw her arms around his neck.
Phronsie immediately clambered up and did the same thing.
"That's just as your mother shall decide," said Mr. King, immensely
pleased with the way his news was received. "She hasn't said a word yet
whether she likes the idea or not."
"It's just because I couldn't speak at first," said Mrs. Fisher, wiping
her eyes; and her voice trembled. "But it's the very thing; and oh!
thank you, sir, for thinking of it. The boys won't be so homesick for
us when they get the box. And it will be the best thing in the world
for us to keep busy, so we can't worry about them."
"Mamsie _has_ said 'yes'!" exclaimed Polly, flying off to dance around
and around in the middle of the room. "Oh, I wish Jasper was here!" she
cried regretfully, breaking short off.
"Go and call him, then,--he's down in the reading room, writing to the
boys,--and bring him up here," said old Mr. King. "No, no, Phronsie,
you want to stay and take care of me," as Phronsie showed signs of
slipping down from his lap to go too.
"I'll stay and take care of you," said Phronsie, obediently; "just let
me lay Araminta down, Grandpapa, on the sofa, and then I'll come back
and rub your head."
So she got down and set Araminta up straight against the sofa back, and
then came and clambered up again into his lap. By this time Polly and
Jasper, racing along the hall, had reached Mother Fisher's room.
"That's regularly splendid, father." Jasper tossed his dark hair back
from his forehead, and his eyes sparkled. "Oh, can't we go out right
away and begin to buy the presents?"
"I shouldn't think that idea was a half-bad one," said old Mr. King.
"What do you say, Mrs. Fisher? If we are going to send the box, why
isn't it best to begin the work at once? There's never so good a time
as now, in my opinion. I'm sure you agree with me."
On Mother Fisher saying "yes," all three of the young people took hold
of hands, and danced around the room in glee. For old Mr. King set
Phronsie down, with, "There, go, child, and spin with the others; then
all hurry and get your hats on, and we'll be off."
And in less time than it takes to write it, old Mr. King and Mother
Fisher and Jasper and Polly and Phronsie all hurried out of the hotel,
and began a round of the shops to get the things together for the
wonderful box to go home to the boys. And though Polly didn't know it,
several other things, that boys wouldn't be supposed to care for in the
least, were slyly added to the purchases, when she wasn't looking, to
be sent home to the hotel in separate parcels to Mr. King. For Polly
was going to have a birthday before very long; though she had quite
forgotten it in the excitement over this box for Ben and Joel and David.
"It's just like buying things for Christmas, isn't it, Jasper?" said
Polly, as they hung over the show-cases and peered into windows; "only
everything is so funny here. Oh, no, Phronsie, that won't do; it's too
big," as Phronsie protested that nothing was so nice as a huge Delft
plate hanging on the wall. There was a big windmill and several little
windmills in the distance along a Dutch canal, and two or three cows in
the foreground, and a peasant girl with a basket in her hand. Phronsie
stood and gazed at it all the time they were in this particular shop.
"I like that little girl," she said, "and those cows; and they are like
Deacon Blodgett's cows at home in Badgertown. And Ben would like it,
and Joel, and David." And all Polly could do, she would still say, "I
like it, Polly, and I want Grandpapa to send it."
At last Polly turned in despair to Jasper. "Oh, what can we do?" she
cried; "she is just as determined as she was when she would send the
gingerbread boy to Grandpapa."
"Well, I think we would better not try to get her away from the idea,"
said Jasper, with a look at the rapt little face. Phronsie was now
kneeling on a Flemish oak chair, and studying the Delft plate with
absorbed attention.
"No," said Polly, with a sigh, "I suppose it isn't any use to try when
she looks like that." Just then old Mr. King, who had been busy in a
farther corner with the proprietor of the shop, picking out some small
articles that struck his fancy, turned and called Phronsie. She didn't
hear him, being too absorbed. And so he laid down the little silver
paper-cutter he was looking at, and came over to see what was the
matter.
"Well, child," he said, looking over her shoulder. "And so you like
that, hey?"
Phronsie drew a long breath. "I do, Grandpapa, like it very much
indeed," she said.
"Well, then, I don't see but what you must have it. And it shall hang
in your own little room at home, Phronsie."
"But I don't want it for my very own, Grandpapa," said Phronsie; "it
must go in the box for Ben and Joel and David."
"Dear me! You think they would like it, Phronsie?" he asked doubtfully,
and just on the point of saying, like Polly, "it's too big, child,"
when he stopped himself and finished up--"and so it pleases you,
Phronsie?"
"Yes, it does," said Phronsie, with an emphatic little nod; "I love
that nice cow, and that little girl. Grandpapa, I think I should like
to live in a windmill."
"Bless me! I think you wouldn't want to live there very long, child.
Well, the plate shall go to the boys, and I only hope they will like
it," he said to himself, dubiously.
"He is going to send it," Jasper and Polly said to each other, peering
round an angle in the shop at the two. "Well, it's a mercy it's got a
cow on it instead of a cat," said Jasper. "How Joel would howl if
Phronsie sent him the picture of a cat!"
"She would if there were a cat to be found," said Polly; "don't you
believe, Jasper, but what she would?"
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