The two girls turned silently toward the house, and Roxy’s thoughts were no longer about a doll’s party under the big tree; she could think only of her soldier father.
“It’s no use for me to watch the bridge now, is it, Polly? I don’t suppose my father will come for weeks and weeks!” she said mournfully.
“Perhaps he will come any day,” declared Polly. “Anyway you had better watch.”
Neither Mrs. Miller nor Mrs. Delfield seemed surprised by Polly’s news. In fact on the day of the surprise party Mr. Greaves had told them that a number of Antietam men were preparing to start for Alexandria where McClellan’s forces were encamped; and they now encouraged Polly to believe that her father and his friends would not be in immediate danger.
Polly could not stay long.
“Now Father is gone I’ll have to work more steadily,” she said gravely. “I am to help in the garden and look after the chickens, so I can’t come over very often.”
Roxy looked so mournful at this that Polly promptly added: “But we can signal to each other every morning, Roxy; so if I have time we can meet at the big sycamore,” and at this Roxy’s face brightened.
“Couldn’t I come over and help you, Polly?” she asked hopefully.
But Mrs. Miller declared that Roxy could not be spared.
“We must finish the quilt, and start a box of things for the soldiers and you can help a great deal,” she said; and that afternoon the quilting-frame was again set up in the dining-room, and Roxy, seated beside Grandma Miller, did her best to set every stitch evenly, and was well pleased when her mother praised her work, saying that Roxy could quilt as well as her own mother.