Five Little Peppers and How They Grew Part 14

"Well, I wasn't only nine when I knit a stocking; and I had sore eyes, too; you see I was a very little girl, and--"

"Was you ever little?" interrupted Joel, in extreme incredulity, drawing near, and looking over the big square figure.

"Hey?" said Miss Jerusha; so Joel repeated his question before Polly could stop him.

"Of course," answered Miss Jerusha; and then she added, tartly, "little boys shouldn't speak unless they're spoken to. Now," and she turned back to Polly again, "didn't you ever knit a stocking?"

"No, ma'am," said Polly, "not a whole one."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Miss Jerusha; "did I ever!" And she raised her black mitts in intense disdain. "A big girl like you never to knit a stocking! to think your mother should bring you up so! and--"

"She didn't bring us up," screamed Joel, in indignation, facing her with blazing eyes.

"Joel," said Polly, "be still."

"And you're very impertinent, too," said Miss Jerusha; "a good child never is impertinent."

Polly sat quite still; and Miss Jerusha continued:

"Now, I hope you will learn to be industrious; and when I come again, I will see what you have done."

"You aren't ever coming again," said Joel, defiantly; "no, never!"

"Joel!" implored Polly, and in her distress she pulled up her bandage as she looked at him; "you know mammy'll be so sorry at you! Oh, ma'am, and" she turned to Miss Jerusha, who was now thoroughly aroused to the duty she saw before her of doing these children good, "I don't know what is the reason, ma'am; Joel never talks so; he's real good; and--"

"It only shows," said the lady, seeing her way quite clear for a little exhortation, "that you've all had your own way from infancy; and that you don't do what you might to make your mother's life a happy one."

"Oh, ma'am," cried Polly, and she burst into a flood of tears, "please, please don't say that!"

"And I say," screamed Joel, stamping his small foot, "if you make Polly cry you'll kill her! Don't Polly, don't!" and the boy put both arms around her neck, and soothed and comforted her in every way he could think of. And Miss Jerusha, seeing no way to make herself heard, disappeared feeling pity for children who would turn away from good advice.

But still Polly cried on; all the pent-up feelings that had been so long controlled had free vent now. She really couldn't stop! Joel, frightened to death, at last said, "I'm going to wake up Ben."

That brought Polly to; and she sobbed out, "Oh, no, Jo--ey--I'll stop."

"I will," said Joel, seeing his advantage; "I'm going, Polly," and he started to the foot of the stairs.

"No, I'm done now, Joe," said Polly, wiping her eyes, and choking back her thoughts--"oh, Joe! I must scream! my eyes aches so!" and poor Polly fairly writhed all over the chair.

"What'll I do?" said Joel, at his wits' end, running back, "do you want some water?"

"Oh, no," gasped Polly; "doctor wouldn't let me; oh! I wish mammy'd come!"

"I'll go and look for her," suggested Joel, feeling as if he must do something; and he'd rather be out at the gate, than to see Polly suffer.

"That won't bring her," said Polly; trying to keep still; "I'll try to wait."

"Here she is now!" cried Joel, peeping out of the window; "oh! goody!"

JOEL'S TURN

"Well," Mrs. Pepper's tone was unusually blithe as she stepped into the kitchen--"you've had a nice time, I suppose--what in the world!" and she stopped at the bedroom door.

"Oh, mammy, if you'd been here!" said Joel, while Polly sat still, only holding on to her eyes as if they were going to fly out; "there's been a big woman here; she came right in--and she talked awfully! and Polly's been a-cryin', and her eyes ache dreadfully--and--"

"Been crying!" repeated Mrs. Pepper, coming up to poor Polly. "Polly been crying!" she still repeated.

"Oh, mammy, I couldn't help it," said Polly; "she said--" and in spite of all she could do, the rain of tears began again, which bade fair to be as uncontrolled as before. But Mrs. Pepper took her up firmly in her arms, as if she were Phronsie, and sat down in the old rocking-chair and just patted her back.

"There, there," she whispered, soothingly, "don't think of it, Polly; mother's got home."

"Oh, mammy," said Polly, crawling up to the comfortable neck for protection, "I ought not to mind; but 'twas Miss Jerusha Henderson; and she said--"

"What did she say?" asked Mrs. Pepper, thinking perhaps it to be the wiser thing to let Polly free her mind.

"Oh, she said that we ought to be doing something; and I ought to knit, and--"

"Go on," said her mother.

"And then Joel got naughty; oh, mammy, he never did so before; and I couldn't stop him," cried Polly, in great distress; "I really couldn't, mammy--and he talked to her; and he told her she wasn't ever coming here again."

"Joel shouldn't have said that," said Mrs. Pepper, and under her breath something was added that Polly even failed to hear--"but no more she isn't!"

"And, mammy," cried Polly--and she flung her arms around her mother's neck and gave her a grasp that nearly choked Mrs. Pepper, "ain't I helpin' you some, mammy? Oh! I wish I could do something big for you?

Ain't you happy, mammy?"

"For the land's sakes!" cried Mrs. Pepper, straining Polly to her heart, "whatever has that woman--whatever could she have said to you? Such a girl as you are, too!" cried Mrs. Pepper, hugging Polly, and covering her with kisses so tender, that Polly, warmed and cuddled up to her heart's content, was comforted to the full.

"Well," said Mrs. Pepper, when at last she thought she had formed between Polly and Joel about the right idea of the visit, "well, now we won't think of it, ever any more; 'tisn't worth it, Polly, you know."

But poor Polly! and poor mother! They both were obliged to think of it.

Nothing could avert the suffering of the next few days, caused by that long flow of burning tears.

"Nothing feels good on 'em, mammy," said Polly, at last, twisting her hands in the vain attempt to keep from rubbing the aching, inflamed eyes that drove her nearly wild with their itching, "there isn't any use in trying anything."

"There will be use," energetically protested Mrs. Pepper, bringing another cool bandage, "as long as you've got an eye in your head, Polly Pepper!"

Dr. Fisher's face, when he first saw the change that the fateful visit had wrought, and heard the accounts, was very grave indeed. Everything had been so encouraging on his last visit, that he had come very near promising Polly speedy freedom from the hateful bandage.

But the little Pepper household soon had something else to think of more important even than Polly's eyes, for now the heartiest, the jolliest of all the little group was down--Joel. How he fell sick, they scarcely knew, it all came so suddenly. The poor, bewildered family had hardly time to think, before delirium and, perhaps, death stared them in the face.

When Polly first heard it, by Phronsie's pattering downstairs and screaming: "Oh, Polly, Joey's dre-ad-ful sick, he is!" she jumped right up, and tore off the bandage.

"Now, I will help mother! I will, so there!" and in another minute she would have been up in the sick room. But the first thing she knew, a gentle but firm hand was laid upon hers; and she found herself back again in the old rocking-chair, and listening to the Doctor's words which were quite stern and decisive.