overgrown with vines. There were big trees that sent their arms clear
across the top of his house, and the vines ran all over them, so that
it looked for all the world as if it was a great arbor. Well, and just
a little ways off, about as far as from here to Grandma Bascom’s, was a
gre--at big cave. And that was all grown over with vines too, and funny
dangling trees that looked as if they were upside down.”
“Oh!” laughed Joel, “how funny!” And “How funny!” said little David.
“Yes; but it wasn’t half so funny, as it was inside of the house and
the cave,” said Polly, sewing away busily; “because you see the man who
was Adolphus’s father owned all the wild beasts that were in the cave.
And as he had them all brought out of the cave, and up to the big
house sometimes, when he had company, and he wanted to amuse them, why,
you know everything was made so they might show off, and the people
could have a good time.”
“Tell about it,” cried Joel, crowding up to Polly’s work so closely
that she couldn’t see where to set her stitches. “Take care, Joe,” she
warned; “I sewed that crooked. Mr. Atkins won’t give Mamsie any more
sacks to do if they’re done badly. And I want to learn to sew them all
for her.” And Polly’s face was very sad as she picked out the poor work.
Joel huddled out of the way in dismay. “There, that’s all right now,”
announced Polly in a minute; “you didn’t do any mischief, Joe. Let me
see, where was I?”
“You said Adolphus’s father had all the wild beasts brought out of the
cave, and into the house, when he had company,” cried Joel. “Oh, make
him bring ’em all in now, Polly, do!”
“So he shall,” nodded Polly. “You see, boys, Adolphus’s father had lots
and lots of animals in his cave; but he liked the wolves and the bears
and the crocodiles the best.”
“Oh, dear me!” said Davie quite overcome.
“Now, Adolphus liked the best thing in the world,--yes, the very best
thing in all the world, mince-pie. And he had it for breakfast, dinner,
and supper.”
“Whick--oh, dear me!” exploded Joel.
“Yes; all the beasts liked mince-pie too, every single one of all those
sixteen hundred beasts.”
“Were there sixteen hundred of ’em?” cried little David with flaming
cheeks, and pushing up close to her work.
“Yes,” said Polly recklessly. “Adolphus’s father had sixteen hundred
wild beasts in his cave, and”--
“Make it some more,” cried Joel. “Make him have eighteen hundred,
Polly, do.”
“No,” said Polly firmly; “he hadn’t a single one more than sixteen
hundred, not a single one, Joe.”
“Well, go on,” said Joel.
“But the beasts couldn’t get any mince-pie, ever,” said Polly, hurrying
on.
“Why?” broke in both of the boys.
“Because Adolphus’s mother said that she couldn’t spend the time to
bake mince-pies for so many beasts and beastesses, because you see,
all the animals would have to have a pie apiece. And Adolphus used to
go out into the front yard, and eat his pie; and all the creatures
would come out of their cave, and stand in their yard, and lick their
chops, and wish they had some.”
“And so do I wish I had some, Polly,” declared Joel, licking his mouth.
“Did it have plums in, Polly?”
“Gre--at big ones,” declared Polly, “oh, so rich and juicy! My! there
never was such a pie as those that Adolphus got every day,--one for
breakfast, and one for dinner, and one for supper.”
“Oh, dear me!” exclaimed both boys again, unable to find other words.
“Well, one day there was a great stir in the big house under the vines,
and everybody far and near knew that Adolphus’s folks were going to
have company. And that very same night the beasts and beastesses got
together, and held a meeting. And when everybody in the big house was
sound asleep, and nothing was stirring but the mice scampering up and
down in the walls, all the creatures in the cave were wide awake, and
talking all together.
“‘I’ll tell you what,’ said a big white polar bear”--
“What’s a polar bear?” interrupted Joel, with a shout.
[Illustration: The mince-pie boy and the beasts.]
“You mustn’t interrupt,” said Polly; “it’s a bear that lives at the
Poles.”
“What Poles? Are they clothes-poles?” asked Joel persistently. “Say,
Polly; and did the bear help to hang out the clothes to dry?”
“No, no--don’t ask so many questions, Joe; I never shall get through
if you do. This bear came from the North Pole, where it is dreadfully
cold. And he loved mince-pie, oh, terribly! And he began, ‘Now, fellow
bears and bearesses, and wolves, and--and--wolveresses.’”
“And crocodiles,” said Joel; “don’t forget them.”
“No, I won’t. ‘And crocodiles and croco--crocodilesses and all the rest
of you,’ because, you see, he couldn’t mention them all by name, for he
wouldn’t have had time for his speech if he had; ‘we must get some of
that boy’s mince-pie. It isn’t fair for him to have so much, and we to
have none. Now, I have a plan; and if you will all do just as I say,
I will get you some mince-pie.’ So they all--the different beasts and
beastesses--crowded around the white polar bear, and he spoke out his
plan.
“‘You know the company is coming to the big man’s house’--the beasts
always called Adolphus’s house by that name--‘and we shall be sent for
as usual. Now, when we get there, let us march into the hall as if we
were going to perform. But instead of that I shall go right straight
up in front of the big man and that dreadful mince-pie boy, and shall
roar at them: ‘I will eat off your head and scrunch your bones, unless
you give me some mince-pie this minute!’”
Polly roared it out so loud, and looked so very dreadful, that Phronsie
came running in from the bedroom where she had been putting on her
red-topped shoes which Mamsie let her do sometimes, but not step
in them for fear of hurting them. One shoe was half off, and every
button of the other was in the wrong button-hole. “O Polly!” she cried
scuttling over to her; “what was that dreadful noise?”
[Illustration: “O Polly!” she cried scuttling over to her.]
“Now you see, Joel,” cried Polly, throwing down her work, and gathering
up Phronsie into her lap, “I’ve scared her most to death. ’Tisn’t
anything, Phronsie pet, but some bears and things Joel wanted me to
tell of”--as Phronsie hid her yellow head on Polly’s arm.
“Polly made that noise with her own mouth,” said Joel; “and ’twas
splendid, Phron. Make it again, Polly, do.”
“No, I sha’n’t,” said Polly. “There, there, Phronsie, don’t be scared;
it was I made it, and not a truly bear.”
“If it was you, Polly,” said Phronsie, lifting her head, “and not a
truly bear, I don’t mind. But please don’t make it again, Polly.”
“I won’t, Pet,” promised Polly. “Dear me! just look at your red-topped
shoes. Take ’em off, or you’ll spoil them; Mamsie doesn’t like you to
walk in them, you know.”
“I want to go back to the bedroom,” wailed Phronsie, “and show ’em to
Seraphina. Oh, dear! can’t I, Polly? I’ll go on the tips of my toes.”
“No, I’ll carry you,” said Polly, preparing to spring up; but Joel
jumped to his feet,--
“Let me, Polly; I’ll carry her. Come on, Phron.” He seized her and
staggered off, depositing her on the bedroom floor, close to Seraphina
lying face downward where she had been dropped in fright.
“Now go on,” he cried, springing back to huddle at Polly’s feet.
“‘I’ll scrunch your head off,’” said Polly in a stage whisper. “I can’t
say it loud as I did before, boys, or Phronsie’ll hear. ‘Give me the
pantry keys!’
“At hearing these dreadful words, the crocodile began to cry. ‘I’m
afraid, I’m afraid,’ he said. But one of the wolves ran up and boxed
his ears. ‘Nobody dares to say he is afraid here,’ he cried. ‘Yes, we
are going to have _those pantry keys_.’”
It was impossible to describe the excitement that now seized the two
boys as they huddled closer and closer to Polly, as she hurried on,--
“And when all the beasts and beastesses had promised to do just as the
white polar bear should tell them, he roared at them in a perfectly
dreadful voice: ‘You must all say with me, “I’ll scrunch your heads off
if you don’t give me those pantry keys.”’ So they all said it after
him, the crocodile weeping great tears that ran over his cheeks as he
repeated the words. And then every animal went to bed; and the next
night the company came to the big house under the vines, and Adolphus’s
father sent for all the beasts and beastesses.”
“And did they scrunch their heads off?” screamed Joel.
“Hush--you’ll scare Phronsie again,” cried Polly.
“Did they, did they?” cried Joel, lowering his voice--“oh, make them,
Polly, do, scrunch all their heads, every single one!”
“You must wait and see,” said Polly; “and don’t interrupt, or I never
will get a chance to tell the story. Well, all the animals went up to
Adolphus’s house, two by two; and there, in the long hall, sat all the
company in tall chairs, and Adolphus in the middle. And the first thing
that anybody knew, before one of them was asked to perform a single
thing, the white cat that lived up at the big house, and always slept
on a white satin cushion, and drank from a silver bowl, sprang into
the centre of the hall, and made a bow and a curtsey. She had a green
ribbon embroidered in silver tied under her chin, and she looked too
perfectly splendid for anything.
“‘My master wishes me to say,’ she announced, with another low bow down
to the ground, ‘that you are asked over to-night, not to show off,
but to eat mince-pies.--Behold!’ And there right at her elbow were
twenty-five boys dressed in green and scarlet, and all with big trays
full of mince-pies, with plums sticking out all over them, and”--
“Ugh!” grunted Joel, and kicking his heels in great disgust. “Now the
white polar bear can’t scrunch those people’s heads off. Hoh! that’s no
story, Polly Pepper!”
VIII.
THE CUNNING LITTLE DUCK.
“The little duck ran away,” announced Polly, “to begin with,” to the
group around her chair.
“Then he was a very naughty duck,” said Phronsie, shaking her yellow
head.
“Tell about him!” cried Joel with a gusto.
“Yes, I’m going to,” said Polly, setting her stitches with a firm hand.
“But, children, you interrupt so much that it makes me forget all what
I’m going to say, when I’m telling stories.”
“Oh, we won’t; we won’t!” they all promised. “Do begin, Polly, do.”
“Well, once upon a time,” said Polly, with true story-book flourish,
“no, when I was a little girl, years ago, that’s the way Grandma Bascom
begins her stories”--
“But ’twasn’t years ago when you were a little girl, Polly,” said
little David thoughtfully.
“Well, ’tis in a play-story,” said Polly. “And all my stories are
make-believe, you know. Now, I’m an old lady, children; and I’m going
to tell you about my little duck I had, oh, ever so many years ago!”
The little bunch of Peppers shouted at the idea of Polly’s being an old
lady; and Joel got up and whirled around, clapping his fists together
till the old kitchen rang with the noise. “Put on a big cap, Polly,” he
screamed, “just like Grandma’s!”
So Polly, who dearly loved to dress up and play things, dropped her
sewing, and ran off into the bedroom. “There isn’t anything I can tie
on that’s like a cap,” she said, coming back, “but this; wasn’t it nice
Mamsie had it?” It was a big piece of light brown paper that had done
up the last batch of sacks brought home from the store for Mrs. Pepper
to sew up.
“Hoh, that isn’t _white_!” cried Joel in disdain, while the faces of
the others fell.
“Well, we must play it’s white,” said Polly. “I’m going to; and all
frilled with deep lace, too.”
So the children began to smile with satisfaction once more. If Polly
could play it was white and all trimmed with beautiful lace, it was
all right.
“Run to the string-bag, one of you children,” said Polly, crinkling up
the paper on her head to make it look as much like an old lady’s cap as
possible, and nearly putting out one eye with the corner of the paper,
“and tie it fast while I hold it on.”
“I will--I will!” cried little Davie, springing off.
“No, I will; I can get it twice as quick!” cried Joe, tumbling after
him, and seizing his jacket. Thereupon ensued a scuffle as to which
should first reach the string-bag in the Provision Room. Joel did, and
soon came racing back with a very red face, and bearing it triumphantly
aloft. “Here ’tis!--I got it, Polly; now I’ll tie you up.”
[Illustration: Joel came racing back.]
Polly looked out from under her big paper--“Go and hang that string-bag
right up again, Joey,” she said slowly.
“I got it,” said Joel stoutly.
“Go and hang it up,” said Polly.
“I--I--got--it,” said Joel faintly--“I sh’d think I might keep it,
Polly,” he said in an injured tone.
“Go and hang it up this minute,” said Polly, coming entirely out from
under her big paper cap and fixing her eyes on him. When Polly looked
like that, it always made them think of Mamsie; so Joel turned at once,
and went slowly down the steps to the Provision Room, dragging the
string-bag after him. He soon came back, twisting his small hands, and
trying not to cry. “Now, Davie,” said Polly pleasantly, “will you go
and get me the string-bag?”
David started to run on joyful feet; but seeing Joel moping in the
corner, he stopped suddenly, “I’d rather Joe went,” he said.
“No, I want you to go,” said Polly firmly; “and if you don’t hurry,
I shall have to go and get it myself, and you wouldn’t want me to do
that, I’m sure.”
Thus adjured, David ran as fast as his feet could carry him, and soon
brought the string-bag to Polly.
“Now says I,” she cried, “somebody must tie my old cap on, and I’m
going to ask Joel to do that.” And she pulled out a long string. “Come
on, Joey.”
“I--didn’t--mean--to,” sobbed Joel, over in his corner. “Polly, I
didn’t.”
“Well, see that you don’t run and scramble and take away Davie’s things
again when he starts first,” said Polly. “Come on, Joe, I’m waiting.”
So Joel tumbled out of his corner, wiping away the tears on the back
of his little red hand; and soon Polly’s cap was tied on in the most
approved style, amid the shouts of the children, who all escorted
her to the cracked looking-glass over the bedroom bureau, when she
pronounced it “just too perfect for anything.”
“Well, now,” said Polly, drawing a long breath, and racing back to sit
down and pick up her sewing, “I must hurry and tell about my cunning
little duck, or I don’t know what I shall do. Now, children, you know
I’m an old, old lady, and”--
“How old?” demanded Joel, who dearly loved facts and figures.
“Oh! I don’t know--most a hundred I guess,” said Polly; “well”--
“Ho--Ho! Polly’s most a hundred,” laughed Joel, and Davie burst out
laughing too. “Polly’s most a hundred,” echoed Phronsie with a gurgle.
“Now, see here, children, I shall never tell this story if you keep
interrupting me like that,” said Polly, pushing back her paper cap that
settled over one eye. “Dear me, I didn’t s’pose it was such trouble to
pretend to be old--this slides all over my head, and I can’t see to
sew. Well, I once had a cunning little duck, when I was a little girl
years and years ago.”
[Illustration: The cunning little duck.]
“Was he as big as that?” asked Phronsie, bringing her two fat little
hands almost together in intense excitement.
“Yes,” said Polly, “and a little bigger. Well, he was all my own, you
know; my grandmother gave him to me.”
“Did you have a grandmother?” asked David. “I thought you were the
grandmother,” looking at the big cap with its nodding border.
“Well, so I am, but I had a grandmother too when I was a little girl.
Everybody has a grandmother when they’re little.”
“Oh!” said Davie.
“Well, my grandmother gave me this little duck. Now, don’t interrupt
again,” said Polly. “You see, he was so little when he was born, that I
s’pose he got lost in the grass, and no one saw him; and then the cat
must have stepped on him, for his leg was bent, and”--
“What’s bent?” demanded Phronsie, pushing an absorbed little face
forward.
“Oh! doubled up like this,” said Joel, suiting the action to the word,
and twisting his leg into as much of a knot as was possible.
“Oh, Polly!” said Phronsie gravely, “please don’t let the little duck’s
leg be like Joel’s.”
“Well, you’ll see, Phronsie,” said Polly reassuringly. “I’ll fix the
little duck’s leg all right. My grandma gave him to me, you know. Well,
he was yellow and white, a cunning little ball, oh, so soft and puffy!”
Phronsie trembled with excitement, and she put out her little hands as
if she had the duck between them. “But please fix his leg, Polly,” she
breathed.
“Yes, yes, child,” said Polly quickly. “Oh, dear me! I’ve sewed that
seam wrong; now that has all to come out.”
“But please fix that little duck’s leg first, Polly,” begged Phronsie,
her lip quivering, “before you pick out those wrong stitches.”
“Oh, dear me, was there ever such a peck of trouble!” cried poor Polly,
picking frantically at the bad stitches. Then her old paper cap, with
its deep border, slid down over her eyes, and her scissors tumbled on
the floor.
“Look at Polly’s cap! Look at Polly’s cap!” screamed Joel.
“It’s grandma,” said little Davie, who dearly loved to carry out all
Polly’s make-believes, while Phronsie still insisted that the little
duck’s leg should be fixed before anything else was done.
In the midst of all this confusion the door opened suddenly, and there
was dear old Mrs. Beebe, her round face smiling over a big basket.
“Well, well, my pretty dears!” she exclaimed. “Why, what’s the matter?
Polly got hurt? Oh, you poor creeters!” seeing the big paper flapping
over Polly’s brown head, and all the children crowded around her chair.
“No’m,” said Polly, twitching off her big cap. And “She’s playing
grandma,” said Joel and David.
“But her cunning little duck has hurt his leg,” cried Phronsie, with
clasped hands flying over to Mrs. Beebe, “and Polly is going to fix it
right away.”
“Yes,” said Polly at sight of her face. “I must. Boys, go and tell dear
Mrs. Beebe all about it, while I take her in my lap and fix that duck’s
leg.” So Joel and David, very important at the piece of work set them,
ran over and poured the whole recital into good Mrs. Beebe’s ear, how
Polly was playing grandmother, and they hadn’t anything to make a cap
of but an old piece of brown paper that came around the sacks from the
store that Mrs. Pepper brought home to sew, and how the old thing kept
tumbling over Polly’s nose, so that she sewed up the seam wrong; and
she was trying to pick it out, because, you see, she had to get it done
before Mamsie got home, who had gone to the minister’s to help Mrs.
Henderson make her soft soap; and how Phronsie almost cried because
Polly said the little duck’s leg was bent in the grass, because maybe
the cat stepped on it; and how that was the reason Polly was talking
to her now, and fixing the leg up. And, oh, dear me! all this and much
more; good Mrs. Beebe oh--ing and ah--ing at just the right times. “And
that’s all,” announced little David at last, flushed and important.
Joel hung his head, “No, it isn’t,” he blurted out; “I was bad.”
“You were bad?” echoed Mrs. Beebe. “Oh, no! I guess not,” she said
soothingly.
“Yes, I was,” said Joel stoutly. “I scuffled Davie, and got the
string-bag first.”
David shifted uneasily from one foot to the other. “He put it back,” he
said.
“Polly made me,” said Joel, twisting his mouth not to cry, and with an
eye to the big basket, which was not for naughty boys. “Oh, dear me!”
Old Mrs. Beebe cast a puzzled glance at him, but was saved the
necessity of replying; for old Mr. Beebe came in just then, rubbing his
hands. “Well, how are you all, my pretty dears? I can’t stay a minute,
for my shop’s all alone, an’ folks’ll be knocking on the door an’ can’t
get in. Come, Ma, give ’em the things in the basket, and then come out
an’ get in the wagon.”
Mrs. Beebe gave a sigh. “Dear me,” she said, “I wish I could set
awhile; but then, there’s the shop.” So she got out of her chair, and
began to undo the basket. And Polly, with Phronsie radiant, and hanging
to her hand, came running up, and they all crowded around the good
woman. And old Mr. Beebe laughed, and shook his fat sides, and rubbed
his hands together worse than ever. And at last all the things were out
and on the table ready to surprise Mamsie with when she came home.
“And I guess if one of you will feel in my pockets,” he said at last,
when his wife clapped to the cover of the empty basket, “p’raps maybe,
now, you’d find something you’d like.”
“Let David,” said Joel, swallowing hard.
“No, let Phronsie,” said little David.
So Phronsie went up to old Mr. Beebe, who lifted her into a chair, to
be on a level with the pockets in his great-coat, and oh, oh! first
she drew out slowly a pink stick, and then a great thick white one
of peppermint candy! And then, midst a babel of thanks from the Five
Little Peppers, and one or two kisses from old Mr. and Mrs. Beebe, away
the big empty basket and the two good people went to their wagon.
“I’m sure,” said Polly to herself, long after they had danced and
danced around the table with its good things, “none of them care for
the little duck now; so I can fly to my sewing, and have a good time to
pick it out, and do it right.” So she settled herself in the old chair
in the corner, the children in great excitement still circling around
the gifts which they were not to touch till Mamsie got home.
“I choose that,” said Joel, smacking his lips; “that big fat doughnut,
all crisp and brown. O whickets!”
“Joel,” said Polly over in her corner, “what did you say?”
Joel hung his head. “And I choose that,” said Davie, pointing to some
gingerbread, dark and moist, while he carefully licked the remnant of
pink stick in his hand, for Phronsie had insisted on sharing her candy
with them all, the minute the Beebes had gotten into their green wagon,
“what do you choose, Phronsie?”
“I like this,” said Phronsie, holding up a sticky wad of pink stick in
her fat little hand, and smiling with a very much smeared face.
“Oh, deary me!” cried Polly at sight of her. “Well, I s’pose it’s no
use to wash her up till it’s all gone. Well, I am thankful I didn’t
have to tell all the rest about that dreadful little duck.”
IX.
THE OLD TEA-KETTLE.
The rain dripped most dismally on the roof of the Little Brown House.
It had rained just so, without any appearance of stopping, for three
days, and Phronsie held a sad little face against the window-pane.
“Won’t it ever stop, Polly?” she asked.
“Yes, I s’pose so,” said Polly dismally; “though I don’t know when.
Mamsie, did you ever see it rain so long?”
“Dear me, yes,” said Mrs. Pepper, looking up from her stocking-mending
over in the corner, “plenty of times, Polly. If folks don’t worry over
the weather and talk about it, it’s all right. Fly at your baking,
child, and let the rain take care of itself.”
[Illustration: “Dear me, yes,” said Mrs. Pepper.]
“It’s so dark,” said Polly discontentedly, “we can’t see anything,” as
she went into the buttery for the flour.
“It’s so dark,” grumbled Joel, trying to make a box over in the corner,
and catching her tone, “can’t see anything.”
Davie sighed, and went over to his mother’s corner, and stood there
with a very long face.
“There, now you see, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper, as Polly came back with
the flour-sieve and the bread-bowl, and set them on the kitchen table.
Polly looked around the kitchen with a startled air. “Oh, I’m awfully
sorry!” she cried, a wave of color flying up to her brown hair,
“Mamsie, I truly am.” Then she rushed over to Joel, who was banging
petulantly at a refractory nail, “Look out, you’ll pound your thumb,”
and she kneeled down beside him.
“Don’t care,” said Joel crossly; “can’t see anything. Mean old rain
spoils everything.”
“Joel!”--it was Mother Pepper who spoke, and her black eyes flashed
sternly,--“that’s wicked. Don’t you let me hear you say such things
again.”
“O Mamsie!” began Polly.
“And a boy who talks about the rain in such a way, is not only wicked
but foolish. I think he had better go into the Provision Room, and
shut the door, and sit down and think by himself for a while.”
“O _Mamsie_!” exclaimed Polly imploringly.
“Go straight along, Joey,” said Mrs. Pepper; “and when you feel right
about it, you may come back.”
Joel laid down his clumsy hammer, and his round face working
dreadfully, he stumbled off, and down the rickety steps, and presently
they could hear him shut the old door fast.
“O Mamsie--Mamsie!” Polly sprang to her feet, and rushed tumultuously
across the room, and threw herself at Mrs. Pepper’s feet. “It’s all my
fault,” she sobbed, burying her face in the blue-checked apron--“and I
am the one who ought to be sent into the Provision Room.”
“You’re too big to send there, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper sadly; “why,
you’re ten years old.” She laid down her mending, and her toil-worn
hands smoothed the brown hair gently.