Mrs. Dudley looked with favor on the invitation, although saying she should allow Polly to do as she chose. The Doctor, too, welcomed the plan as a good one, thinking it would be just the change needed for the little girl, who was growing thin and pale. Still Polly held out against them all, and felt actually homesick to hear so much talk about it. If it had been going with Mrs. Collins and David, why, she would have considered the question. She loved David’s sweet, girlish little mother; but of Mrs. Illingworth she had never been fond, and she wondered that her father and mother should wish her to go.
“I’d rather stay here and live on crackers—’thout any butter,” she said miserably to herself, and she began to curtail her meals as much as discreetness and her appetite would allow.
It was only a week to the end of school, and Patricia had been urging her claims, to which Polly had paid small attention, having heard the same talk, with variations, for the last fortnight. But all at once the half-listener grew interested. What was Patricia saying?
“If you’ll only go for just one month I’ll give you fifty dollars!”
“Your mother wouldn’t let you,” argued Polly.
“She would, too!” Patricia declared. “Guess I can do what I want to with my own money! Oh, say, will you go? Will you?”
“Maybe,” yielded Polly. “I don’t know. I’ve got to think it over. I do want some money, and I was wishing I could earn some—”
“Oh, then you will! you will! you will!” cried Patricia gleefully. “This is just your chance! Why didn’t you tell me before? Oh, I’m so glad I want to stand on my head!”
“I haven’t said yet that I’d go,” laughed Polly; “only maybe I would.”