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.106
“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.107
“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?”108
“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.”109
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 she110 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 next111 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 all112 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 high113 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,”114 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.115
“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 bow116 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,117 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.”118
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 quite119 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,120 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.
