"Hold yer jaw! Get out! Shiver my timbers! What the"—
"You disgraceful old thing!" cried Miss Prue, snatching up the cage and rushing indoors, where she set it down with a thump on the hall-table; and, dragging off her black silk wrap, proceeded to muffle the profane creature in its shiny folds; then, turning to Sara with a distressed look, she implored,—
"Will you tell me what makes her so wicked? I've tried my best to teach her nice little moral axioms from Ben Franklin and Socrates, and bits of poetry from Tupper, but whenever she wants to show off, she goes back to that dreadful old sailor-talk she learned on shipboard, nobody knows how many years ago; it's discouraging!"
"It is, indeed!" laughed Sara, while Molly furtively lifted a corner of the wrap, in hopes to start Polly off again. "But never mind Polly's capers, dear Miss Prue, we know what a respectable old bird she is, in spite of her lapses. Come into the library, where it's nice and cool, and tell me everything you can think of about dear old Killamet. Oh, how good, how good, it is to see you again, you blessed woman!" throwing an arm about her, and hugging her up rapturously, as they passed into the opposite apartment.
"What a paradise!" cried the elder maiden, stopping short on the threshold. "Do you tell me that is a window, in the middle of the chimney, or only some wonderful picture? I didn't know a room could be made so beautiful, could express so perfectly the refinement of work"— then breaking loose from Sara's embrace, she faced the young girl, and, taking her by the shoulders, held her at arm's length, and gazed at her critically. "Let me look at you," she said, sweeping her glance slowly from the proud little head, with its earnest, refined face, down over the lissome figure in its sheer, white gown, even to the daintily-shod feet peeping from beneath it, "let me see whether this is the niche you were intended for. Yes," slowly and reverently, "yes, I see. You fit in here; you are content, satisfied. It isn't the luxury, either, Sara; that you could do without; it is that better part one can hardly name, only feel; and your Maker has been slow in shaping you that you might fit the more perfectly. Kiss me, dear, I am glad you are my daughter!"
Sara kissed her tenderly, her eyes wet with tears of happiness; and Molly and Morton entering just then, with questions as to where Polly should be suspended, turned the talk into lighter channels.
The latter soon found herself chained to a perch of Sam's contriving, out on the deep veranda, and for the rest of her stay had a string of admirers ranged along the sidewalk at nearly all hours of the day, bandying words with her ladyship. As for Sam, he furtively admired her as much as the street-boys, and would be seen to slap his thighs and double over with silent merriment, when she was a little more wicked than usual; not that Sam was an encourager of vice; by no means; but as he confided to Hetty,—
"It do beat all nater to see that pious old gurrl so fond of a haythen creetur that's enough to disgrace a pirate hisself; an' the quareness of it just gets me, it do."
As to the "pious old girl," (according to Sam's disrespectful characterization of Miss Prue) she had quite given up in despair.
"Really, Sara," she remarked with deep melancholy, "it must be the city atmosphere" (Dartmoor was a town of perhaps fifteen thousand inhabitants), "for, you know, she never was so perverse in Killamet. I'm afraid she'll disgrace us all!" Upon which Sara would comfort her by saying that, as most parrots were trained by rough people, nothing better could be expected, and she was sure nobody would blame them; while Molly, the naughty little elf, would shake her curls with a solemn air, and exclaim,—