Pretty Polly Perkins

by Ethel Calvert Phillips

So down before the stove sat Ailie with Polly in her lap. First of all she unfastened the pink-and-blue coverlet that had been pinned about Polly’s shoulders as a shawl. And then, oh! how Ailie admired Polly’s pretty pink dress with the pockets, and her neat brown slippers, and her soft glossy curls.

‘Once I had a blue dress like yours,’ murmured Ailie to Polly, as she settled her in her lap and gave her a little hug, ‘but it was a long while ago before Granny and I were alone. It may have been that my mither made it for me, but I cannot just remember how it was.’

Of course Polly didn’t answer. But there was a look in her brown eyes that did almost as well as if she had spoken, and Ailie did not ask for anything more.

‘My Aunt Elspeth is coming soon,’ went on Ailie in such a low voice that it did not disturb Granny in the least. ‘My Aunt Elspeth is coming to take care of Granny and me. She is coming in a big ship from Scotland. She wrote Granny a letter to tell her so. And when she comes she will cure Granny’s cough and make a new dress for me, maybe, just like yours.’

It was such a comfort to talk, and to talk to some one who really seemed to care as Polly did, that Ailie couldn’t and didn’t think of stopping.

‘This is what I would like best of all,’ she went on, her sandy curls standing out all round her head and her honest Scotch blue eyes growing bright as she talked. ‘It is a secret, but I will tell it to you. I would like a mither, a pretty mither all my own, and she would wear a real silk dress every day. And I would like a father who would put his hand in his pocket and pull me out a penny just as if it were nothing at all. And I would like four little brothers and four little sisters to play with me, and we would be happy all day long. Aye, I would like that fine, wouldn’t you?’

It really seemed as if Polly Perkins answered ‘yes.’ At any rate, Ailie was so delighted with the dolly that she fell asleep at night with a smile on her face, a smile that cheered Granny greatly and almost made her feel better as she turned and tossed and coughed the long night through.

But in the morning Granny was not so well, and Mrs. McFarland, who lived downstairs, put a shawl over her head and stepped out for the doctor.

‘You need good food and rest, Mrs. McNabb, and take this medicine that will cure your cough in a wink,’ said the cheerful doctor.

So Ailie, with Polly in her arms, ran for the medicine.