Five Little Peppers Grown Up

M >> Margaret Sidney >> Five Little Peppers Grown Up

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"To be sure, to be sure," said Mr. King. "Well now, Phronsie child, come
here and tell me all about it," and he held out his hand.

Phronsie cast an anxious glance at the bundle. "Can I leave him,
Grandpapa?" she asked.

"Leave him? Mercy, yes; it does babies good to be left alone. He'll suck
his thumbs or his toes."

"I'll stay with him," said Polly, running out of her corner to get on
her knees before the baby. "There now, sir, do you know what a blessed
old care you are?" smothering him with kisses.

"Yes, I really think we ought to have a Christmas Tree," Phronsie was
saying, "Grandpapa dear," huddling up against his waistcoat as usual.

"Then we surely will have one," declared old Mr. King, "so that is
settled. Do you hear, young people," raising his voice, "or does that
little scamp of a baby take all your ears?"

"We hear, Grandpapa," said Polly from the floor, "and I'm very glad. It
will be good fun to get up a Christmas Tree."

"Seeing you never have had that pleasing employment," said Jasper
_sotto voce_, on the rug before the fire.

"Never mind; it'll be just as good fun again," said Polly.

"And not a bit of work--oh, no!"

"Don't throw cold water on it," begged Polly under her breath, while the
baby scrambled all over her, "don't, Jasper; Phronsie has set her heart
on it."

"All right; but I thought you wanted every bit of time to get ready for
your Recital, and the other things; and then, besides, there's
Phronsie's performance down at Dunraven."

"Well, so I did," confessed Polly, with a sigh, "but I can get the time
some way."

"Out of 'the other things,'" said Jasper grimly. "Polly, you'll have no
fun from the holidays. It isn't too late to stop this now." He darted
over toward his father.

"Jasper!" cried Polly imploringly.

"What is it, my boy?" asked Mr. King, quite deep in the plans for the
Tree, Joel having added himself to their company.

"Oh, nothing; Polly wants it, and we must make it a good one," said
Jasper, rather incoherently, and beginning to retreat.

"Of course it will be a good one," said his father, a trifle testily,
"if we have it at all. When did we ever get up a poor Tree, pray tell?"

Polly drew a relieved breath, and gathering the baby up in her arms, she
hurried over to the old gentleman's chair with a "Now when do you want
to have the Tree, Phronsie?"

"Must we have it Christmas Day?" asked Phronsie, looking at her
anxiously.

"Christmas Day? Dear me, no! Why, what would the Dunraven children do,
Phronsie, if you took that day away from them?" cried old Mr. King in
astonishment.

Phronsie turned slowly back to him. "I thought perhaps we ought to let
Baby have the Tree Christmas Day," she said.

"No, indeed," again said Mr. King. "Come here, you little scamp,"
catching the baby out of Polly's hand, to set him on his other knee;
"there now, speak up like a man, and tell your sister that you are not
particular about the time you have your Tree."

"Ar--goo!" said the Fisher baby.

"That's it," said the old gentleman with approval, while the others
shouted. "So now, as long as your brother says so, Phronsie, why, I
should have your Tree the day before Christmas."

"Oh, Polly wants to go"--began Jasper.

"Ugh!" cried Polly warningly to him. "Yes, Phronsie; you much better
have it the day before, as Grandpapa says."

"And you don't suppose Baby will feel badly afterwards when he gets
bigger, and cry because we didn't give him Christmas Day," said
Phronsie, "do you, Grandpapa?"

"Indeed, I don't," declared the old gentleman, pinching the set of pink
toes nearest to his hand; "if he does, why, we'll all let him know what
we think of such conduct."

"Then," said Phronsie, clasping her hands, "I should very much rather
not take Christmas Day from the Dunraven children, because you know,
Grandpapa, they expect it."

"Of course they do," said old Mr. King. "Bless me! why, we shouldn't
know it was Christmas at all, if we didn't go down to Bedford and carry
it; and as for those children"--

The picture that this brought up, of Dunraven without a Christmas, threw
such a shadow over Phronsie's face, that Polly hastened to say
reassuringly:

"Oh, Grandpapa! we wouldn't ever think of not carrying a Christmas to
Dunraven, would we, Pet?" and she threw her arms around Phronsie.

"Of course not," chimed in Jasper and Joel, in a way to bring back the
smiles to the little downcast face.

And the baby crowed, and seized Phronsie's floating yellow hair with
both hands, and they all got in one another's way to rescue it; and Mrs.
Pepper hurried in again, this time for Baby; and he was kissed all
around, Phronsie giving him two for fear he might think she was hurt;
and one of the maids popped in with "There is a gentleman in the
reception room to see Miss Mary."

Jasper turned off with an impatient gesture.

"I do suppose it is Mr. Loughead," said Polly, "for he wanted to come
some time and talk about Amy. O, dear! I hope I shall say the right
thing."

"Doesn't the fellow know better than to come when we are home for the
Christmas holidays?" grumbled Joel. Jasper looked as if he could say as
much, but instead, walked to the window, and looked out silently.

"He's very anxious about Amy," said Polly, running off to the door,
where she paused and looked back for sympathy toward her little
protege.

"I should think he would be," grunted Joel; "she's a goose, and beside
that, she doesn't know anything."

"O, Joe! she hasn't any father nor mother," cried Polly in distress.

Joel gave an inaudible reply, and Polly ran off, carrying a face on
which the sunshine struggled to get back to its accustomed place.

"Beg pardon for troubling you," said a tall young man, getting off from
the divan to meet her, as she hurried into the reception room, "but you
were good enough to say that I might talk with you about my sister, and
really I am very much at sea to know what to do with her, Miss Pepper."

It was a long speech, and at the end of it, Polly and the caller were
seated, she in a big chair, and he back on the divan opposite to her.

"I am glad to see you, Mr. Loughead," said Polly brightly, "and I hope I
can help you, for I am very fond of Amy."

"It's good of you to say so," said Jack Loughead, "for she's a trying
little minx enough, I suspect; and Miss Salisbury tells me you've had no
end of trouble with her."

"Miss Salisbury shouldn't say that," cried Polly involuntarily. Then she
stopped with a blush. "I mean, I don't think she quite understands it.
Amy does really try hard to study."

"Oh!" said Jack Loughead. Then he tapped his boot with his
walking-stick.

"So you really think my sister will amount to something, Miss Pepper?"
He looked at her keenly.

Polly started. "Oh, yes, indeed! Why, she must, Mr. Loughead."

He laughed, and bit his moustache.

"And really, I don't think that Amy is quite understood," said Polly
warmly, and forgetting herself; "if people believe in her, it makes her
want to do things to please them."

"She says herself she has bothered you dreadfully," said Jack, with a
vicious thrust of the walking-stick at his boot.

"She has a little," confessed Polly, "but not dreadfully. And I do
think, Mr. Loughead, now that you have come, and that she sees how much
you want her to study and practice, she will really do better. I do,
indeed," said Polly earnestly.

Outside she could hear the "two boys," as she still called them, and
Grandpapa's voice in animated consultation over the ways and means, she
knew as well as if she were there, of spending the holidays, and it
seemed as if she could never sit in the reception room another moment
longer, but that she must fly out to them.

[Illustration: "OH!" SAID JACK LOUGHEAD. THEN HE TAPPED HIS BOOT WITH
HIS WALKING STICK.]

"Amy has no mother," said Jack Loughead after a moment, and he turned
away his head, and pretended to look out of the window.

"I know it." Polly's heart leaped guiltily. Oh! how could she think of
holidays and good times, while this poor little girl, but fifteen, had
only a dreary sense of boarding-school life to mean home to her. "And
oh! I do think," Polly hastened to say, and she clasped her hands as
Phronsie would have done, "it has made all the difference in the world
to her. And she does just lovely--so much better, I mean, than other
girls would in her place. I do really, Mr. Loughead," repeated Polly.

"And no sister," added Jack, as if to himself. "How is a fellow like
me--why, I am twenty-five, Miss Pepper, and I've been knocking about the
world ever since I was her age; my uncle took me then to Australia, into
his business--how am I ever to 'understand,' as you call it, that girl?"

It was impossible not to see his distress, and Polly, with a deaf ear to
the chatter out in the library, now bent all her energies to helping
him.

"Mr. Loughead," she said, and the color deserted her round cheek, and
she leaned forward from the depths of the big chair, "I am afraid you
won't like what I am going to say."

"Go on, please," said Jack, his eyes on her face.

"I think if you want to understand Amy," said Polly, holding her hands
very tightly together, to keep her courage up, "you must love her
first."

"Hey? I don't understand," said Jack, quite bewildered.

"You must love her, and believe she's going to do nice things, and be
proud of her," went on Polly steadily.

"How can I? She's such a little beggar," exclaimed Jack, "won't study,
and all that."

"And you must make her the very best friend you have in all this world,
and let her see that you are glad that she is your sister, and tell her
things, and never, never scold." Then Polly stopped, and the color flew
up to the waves of brown hair on her brow.

"I wish you'd go on," said Jack Loughead, as she paused.

"Oh! I've said enough," said Polly, with a gasp, and beginning to wish
she could be anywhere out of the range of those great black eyes. "Do
forgive me," she begged; "I didn't mean to say anything to hurt you."

Jack Loughead got up and straightened himself. "I'm much obliged to you,
Miss Pepper," he said. "I think I'm more to blame than Amy, poor child."

"No, no," cried Polly, getting out of her chair, "I didn't mean so,
indeed I didn't, Mr. Loughead. Oh! what have I said? I think you have
done beautifully. How could you help things when you were not here? Oh!
Mr. Loughead, I do hope you will forgive me. I have only made matters
worse, I'm afraid," and poor Polly's face drooped.

Jack Loughead turned with a sudden gesture. "Perhaps you'll believe me
when I say I've never had anything do me so much good in all my life, as
what you said."

"What are those two talking about all this unconscionable time," Joel
was now exclaiming in the library, as he glanced up at the clock. "I
could finish that Amy Loughead in the sixteenth of a minute."

Old Mr. King turned uneasily in his chair. "Who is this young Loughead?"
he asked of Jasper.

Jasper, seeing that an answer was expected of him, drew himself up, and
said quickly, "Oh! he's the brother of that girl at the Salisbury
School, father. You know Polly goes over there to help her practice."

"Ah!" said his father, "well, what is he doing here this morning, pray
tell?"

"That's what I should like to know," chimed in Joel.

"Well, last evening," said Jasper, with an effort to make things right
for Polly, "he was there when they were playing, and he seemed quite put
out at his sister."

"Don't wonder," said Joel; "everybody says she's a silly."

"And Polly tried to help Amy, and make the best of her. And the brother
asked if he might have a talk some time about his sister. Polly couldn't
help telling him 'yes,'" said Jasper, but with a pang at the handsome
stranger's delight as she said it.

"A bad business," said the old gentleman irritably. "We do not want your
Lougheads coming here and taking up our time."

"Of course not," declared Joel.

"And I suppose he is an idle creature. Polly said something about his
traveling a good deal. It's a very bad business," repeated Mr. King.

"Oh! he's all right in a business way," said Jasper, feeling angry
enough at himself that he was sorry at Jack Loughead's success. "He has
to travel; he's a member of the Bradbury and Graeme Company."

"The Sydney, Australia, house?" asked Mr. King in a surprised tone. "So
you've looked him up, have you, Jasper?"

"Oh! I happened to run across Hibbard Crane yesterday," said Jasper
carelessly, "and he gave me a few facts. That's about all I know,
father."

And in came Polly, looking like a rose; and following her a tall young
man, with large, black eyes, whom she immediately led up to Mr. King's
chair. "Grandpapa," she said, "this is Mr. Loughead, Amy's brother, you
know"--

And Jasper went forward and put out his hand, as an old acquaintance of
the evening before, and Joel was introduced, and mumbled something about
"Glad to know you," immediately retreating into the corner, and then
there was a pause, which Polly broke by crying: "O, Grandpapa! I am
going to ask Amy to play at Dunraven for Phronsie's poor children. Why,
where is Phronsie?" looking around the room.

"Oh! she went out a little while after Baby's exit," said Jasper, trying
to speak lightly.

"Mr. Loughead thinks she'd do it, if I asked her," Polly went on in her
brightest way. "Now, that will be lovely, and the children will enjoy it
so much."

"Isn't there anything I could do?" asked Jack Loughead, after the
Dunraven entertainment had been a bit discussed.

Mr. King bowed his courtly old head. "I don't believe there is anything.
You are very kind, I'm sure."

"Don't speak of kindness, sir," he said. "My time hangs heavy on my
hands just now."

"He would like to be with his sister," said Jasper, after a glance at
Polly's face, and guilty of an aside to his father.

"Oh!--yes," said Mr. King, "to be sure. Well, Mr. Loughead, and what
would you like to do for these poor children of Phronsie's Christmas
Day? We shall be very glad of your assistance."

"I could bring out a stereopticon," said Jack; "no very new idea, but
I've a few pictures of places I've seen, and maybe the children would
like it for a half-hour or so."

"Capital, capital," pronounced the old gentleman quite as if he had
proposed it. And before any one knew how it had come about, there was
Jack Loughead talking over the run down to Bedford with them all on
Christmas morning, as a matter of course, and as if it had been the
annual affair to him, that it was to all the others.

"Quite a fine young man," said Mr. King, when Jack had at last run off
with a bright smile and word for all, "and Phronsie will be so pleased
to think of his doing all this for her poor children. Bless her! Well,
David, my man, are you back so soon?"

"So soon, Grandpapa?" cried David, hurrying in from a morning down town
with another "Harvard Fresh," also home for the holidays. "Why, it is
luncheon time."

"Impossible!" exclaimed old Mr. King, pulling out his watch. "Er--bless
me! the boy is right. Now, Polly, my child, you and I must put off our
engagement till afternoon. Then we'll have our Christmasing!"

CHAPTER III.

CHRISTMAS AT DUNRAVEN.

"Grandpapa," cried Phronsie, flying down the platform, "the box of dolls
isn't here!"

"Goodness me!" exclaimed old Mr. King, whirling around, "'tisn't
possible, child, that we've come off without that. It must be with the
other luggage."

"O, no, Grandpapa dear!" declared Phronsie in great distress, and
clasping her hands to keep the tears back, "it really, surely hasn't
come; Polly says so."

"Well, then, if Polly says so, it must have been left at home," said the
old gentleman, "and there's no use in my going to look over the
luggage," he groaned.

"What's the matter?" cried Joel, rushing up, his jolly face aglow.

"The worst thing that could possibly happen," said Mr. King irritably;
"Phronsie's box of dolls is left behind." Then he began to fume up and
down the platform, wholly lost to everything but his indignation.

"Whew!" ejaculated Joel, "that is a miss!" and he looked down at
Phronsie, but her broad hat had drooped, the brown eyes seeking the
platform floor. "See here, Phronsie."

Phronsie didn't speak for a breathing-space. "What is it, Joey?" then
she said, not looking up.

"I'll go back after it; don't you worry, child."

"Oh, but you can't," cried Phronsie, throwing her head back quickly,
"the train will come, and then you won't be here."

"I'll take the next train; of course I can't get back for this," said
Joel, swallowing hard. "I'll bring the box all right," and he dashed
off.

"Joel--oh, Joel!" cried Phronsie, running after him, "don't go!" she
implored.

"Here! here! what's the matter?" cried old Mr. King, forgetting his
indignation to hurry after her. "Phronsie, wait; what is it, dear?"

"Joel's gone," panted Phronsie, flying back, her broad hat falling off
to her shoulders, "oh, do stop him, Grandpapa dear! I'd rather not take
the dolls than to have Joel left."

"Stop him? I can't. Bless me, here--somebody!" turning off to the little
knots of his party scattered over the platform, "where are you all?"

Polly came running up at this, with a pale face. "Oh, Grandpapa!" she
began at sight of him.

"Joel's gone home," announced Phronsie, clasping her hands in distress,
"after the box of dolls, and"--

"Joel's gone home!" echoed Polly, standing quite still.

"Yes," said Phronsie, "oh, Polly, do stop him and bring him back."

"She can't," cried the old gentleman; "that boy's legs have carried him
half over the town by this time. Nobody could stop him, child."

And then, most of the little knots heard the commotion, and came
hurrying up with "What is it?" and "Oh dear, what's the matter?" in time
to hear Polly groan, "And Joe thought so much of going down to Dunraven
with us!"

[Illustration: "JOEL'S GONE," PANTED PHRONSIE, FLYING BACK.]

"Well, where is he?" cried Jasper, whirling around to look in all
directions; while Ben took a few long strides to peer around the
station, and David and the other "Harvard Fresh." who had been invited
to keep him company, ran, one up, and the other down, the long platform.

"See here now," shouted old Mr. King so sharply that all the flying feet
were arrested at once, "every one of you come back! Goodness me, the
idea of the Bedford party being scattered to the four winds in this
fashion!"

"I'd help if I could," said Mr. Hamilton Dyce, "but I really don't know
what it's all about yet."

"Oh dear--dear!" Polly was yet wailing. Then she remembered, and threw
her arms around Phronsie who was standing quite still by her side.
"Phronsie, precious pet," and she picked up her pretty stuff gown to
kneel on the platform-floor to look into the little face, "don't feel
badly, dear. Joel will come on the next train."

"But he won't be with us," said Phronsie slowly, and turning her brown
eyes piteously to Polly.

"I know it," Polly smothered a sigh, "but we can't help it now.
Grandpapa is feeling dreadfully; oh, Phronsie, you wouldn't make him
sick, dear, for all the world!"

Phronsie unclasped her hands, and went unsteadily over to the old
gentleman. "Joel will come on the next train, Grandpapa," she said.

"Bless me, yes, of course," said Mr. King, seizing her hand; "I don't
see what we are making such a fuss for. He'll come on the next train."

"What's the riot?" asked Livingston Bayley, sauntering up, and whirling
his walking-stick, "eh?"

"Joel's absconded," said Mr. Dyce briefly.

"Eh?"

"Gone back after Phronsie's box of dolls," explained somebody else.

"Oh dear me," cried Alexia Rhys, trying to get near Polly, "just like
that boy." She still called him that, in spite of his being a Harvard
man, "He's always making some sort of a fuss."

"Perhaps the train will be late," suggested Mrs. Dyce, who, as Mary
Taylor, never could bear to see Phronsie unhappy. "Hamilton, if you
don't do something to help that child, I shall be sorry I married you,"
she whispered in her husband's ear.

"Late? it's late already," said Ben, pulling out his watch, "it's five
minutes past time."

"Well, it may be our luck to have it late enough," said Jasper, with a
glance at Polly, "as it's Christmas day and a big train; so he may
possibly get here--he'll find a cabby that can make good time," he
added, with a forlorn attempt at comfort.

Jack Loughead sauntered up and down, on the edge of the group, longing
to be of service, but feeling himself too new a friend to offer his
sympathy.

"Who the Dickens is that cad?" asked Mr. Bayley in smothered wrath, to
Mrs. Dyce.

"Why, don't you know? He's another friend of Polly's," said Mary Taylor
Dyce, smiling up sweetly into his face, "and he's going down to help
entertain Phronsie's poor children. Isn't he nice?"

"Nice?" repeated Livingston Bayley with a black look at the tall figure
stalking on. "How do I know? Who is the fellow, any way?"

But there was no time to reply.

"Here comes the train!" cried Alexia. The warning bell struck, and the
rush of travelers from the waiting-room, began. "Oh dear me!" Then she
forgot all about her late unpleasantness with Pickering Dodge, and
running up to him, she seized his arm, "Oh, Pickering, do make the
conductor wait for that horrid boy."

"I can't," said Pickering, "the train's late, any way. There, get on,
Alexia," putting out his hand to help her up the steps.

"Oh, I forgot," she cried, drawing back, "that we'd had a fight. Tisn't
proper for you to help me, Pickering, and you oughtn't to ask it, till
you've begged my pardon."

"Then it will be a long day before you receive my assistance," said
Pickering, lifting his cap, and turning on his heel at the same time.

Jasper tried to get up to Polly's side, as she was hurrying Phronsie to
the car, old Mr. King holding fast to Phronsie's other hand, but
Livingston Bayley got there first.

"Allow me, Miss Phronsie," he was saying, with extended hand. "'Pon me
word, it's a beastly crowd going to-day, sir."

"She will do very well with my assistance," said the old gentleman,
still holding Phronsie's little glove. "And I suppose Christmas Day
belongs to everybody, eh, Bayley?" hurrying in.

Polly, her foot on the lower step, turned and sent a despairing glance
down the platform, and Jasper who saw it through the crowd, fell back a
little to give a last look for Joel.

"All aboard!" sang out the conductor, waving his hand.

"Come--oh, come!" called Polly with a frantic gesture, from the doorway
of the car, as the train moved off. "Oh, Jasper!" as he swung himself up
beside her.

"The next train runs down in an hour; don't feel badly, Polly," Jasper
had time to beg before they were drawn into the confusion of the car.

But no one could pretend, with any sort of success, that Joel wasn't
missed; and Polly had all that she could do to chase away the sorrowful
expression of Phronsie's little face. And everybody tried his and her
best to make it as festive a time as possible; and the other passengers
nudged one another, and sent many an envious glance at the merry party.

"It's Mr. King's family going down to Bedford," said the conductor to
one inquiring mind. "I take 'em every year," proudly. "He's powerful
rich; but this ain't his affair. It all b'longs to that little girl with
the big hat." Then he dashed off, and called a station; and after the
stopping and moving of the train again, he came back and sat on the arm
of the seat to finish his account.

"You see, there was an old lady, a cousin of the old gentleman's, and
she made a will in favor of this child with the big hat." The conductor
pointed his thumb at Phronsie, leaning over Mr. King's shoulder, the
better to hear a wonderful story he was concocting for her benefit.
"Why, she's got some two or three millions."

"What--that child?" cried the listeners, in amaze.

[Illustration: JOEL SWINGING A BIG BOX RUSHED INTO DUNRAVEN HALL.]

"Yes--the old lady was tough, but"--he dashed off again, called a
station, slammed the door, and was back in position in less time than it
takes to tell it--"she was took sudden, while Mr. King's folks was in
Europe, and now that child has turned a handsome old place down
yonder"--he pointed with his thumb in the direction of Bedford--
"Dunraven Lodge, the old lady always called it, into a sort of a Home,
and she's chucked it full of children, mostly those whose fathers and
mothers are dead; and every Christmas Day Mr. King takes down a big
crowd, and"--

Here somebody called him off, not to be seen again till he put his head
in the doorway, and shouted "Bedford!"

* * * * *

Joel, swinging a big box as only Joel could, rushed into the spacious
hall at Dunraven Lodge. "How are you all!"

Phronsie disentangled herself from a group around the big fire-place
where the long hickory logs snapped and blazed.

"Oh, Josey!" she cried, precipitating herself into his long arms.

"Here is the toggery," cried Joel, setting down the doll-box, while he
gathered Phronsie up in his arms.

"And you, Josey," cried Phronsie, with a happy little hum, "you are all
here yourself," as the group left the fire, and surrounded them.

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