LITTLE CHRIS
Polly dreaded the next meeting with her Cousin Floyd, for she anticipated his disappointment at her decision. But he took the news cheerfully.
“Just wait till we get you down to our house!” he laughed. “We’ll give you so good a time you’ll forget there ever was a Fair Harbor.”
Polly smiled contentedly. This was so much pleasanter than her uncle’s insistence.
Yet when his eyes were free to look upon her, his gayety vanished.
“So like my mother!” he murmured. “Not the eyes,—hers were blue,—but the mouth and the expression of the face—yes, and the forehead!—they are mother’s right over again!” His lips drooped sorrowfully. “You bring her back to me better than a picture. It is a shame,” he regretted, “when you belong to us, that we can’t have you under our roof!”
“I’m sorry,” Polly sighed. “I wish I could be in two places.”
“One would be quite enough,” laughed Floyd, “if only that were New York. Oh, come on, Polly! We’ll have no end of a good time.”
She shook her head slowly, the red fluttering on her cheeks. “I can’t,” she told him; “truly I can’t!”