CHAPTER V.
POLLY’S CULINARY DIFFICULTIES.
Polly had no time to devote to self-adornment on this occasion. She had given her attention to her mother instead, and it had warmed her heart with pleasure to see how the news of Hubert’s coming seemed to rouse her mother, and to bring back a little of the old light and pretty expression to the pale, tired, sad face.
“I am going to perk you up ever so smart, you love!” Polly informed her mother, after she had made her announcement. Polly had little words and sayings that were peculiarly her own. “You must wear,” she said, after a moment’s deep reflection, “you must wear your heliotrope teagown. You do look such a duck in it, and I want Hubert to admire you more than ever to-night.”
Mrs. Pennington submitted to the offices of this tender little handmaiden almost unconsciously, so great was the pressure of anxious care on her mind.
“But Polly, you are not dressed yourself,” she said once, waking from this heavy train of thought and realizing the situation at a glance. “My darling, leave me now; I can finish by myself. But, oh, Polly”—Mrs. Pennington was her whole self in this moment—“we are forgetting. What shall we give Hubert for dinner? He must be hungry, and now cook has gone——”
“And a good riddance,” interpolated Polly, with a pin between her teeth.
She was working busily with the arrangement of the teagown, one of poor Mrs. Pennington’s best pieces of finery, which, like all else she possessed, needed certain manipulation.
“Just leave all to me, mother dear,” Polly went on hurriedly, as she took the pin from between her teeth and fixed it in a knot of lace. “As a matter of fact, Hubert will have a magnificent dinner, quite as good as he gets in Ireland, I’ll bet anything. Besides, Hubert is not a guest, he is one of us, and that means he must take what he can get, and be thankful he gets it. Now, my sweetheart, you look like an angel; run along. I heard Winnie bringing Hubert upstairs in the drawing room. Martha shall sound the gong when dinner is ready.”
Polly flitted away.
A tired sigh escaped her lips as she went, for she had been on her legs all the day, and though she had dismissed the difficulties so cheerfully, the fact remained that the dinner was meager, and she hardly knew how she was going to alter this at so short a notice.