“I’ll go and rub her head with cologne,” said Margery.
“Let me go and sit with her,” said Elsie.
“Have you been teasing her, Jack?” asked Mrs. Howard.
“Too much birthday?” asked Dr. Paul. “Tell her we can spare almost anybody else better.”
“Bless the child, she wants me if she is sick. Go on with your suppers, I’ll see to her,” and Bell rose from the table.
“No, my dear, I want you all to leave her alone at present,” said Mrs. Winship, decidedly. “I’ve put her to bed in Dicky’s play-tent, and I want her to be quiet. Gin has taken her some supper, and she needs rest.”
Polly Oliver in need of rest! What an incomprehensible statement! Nobody was satisfied, but there was nothing more to be said, though Bell and Philip exchanged glances as much as to say, “Something is wrong.”
Supper ended, and they gathered round the camp-fire, but nothing was quite as usual. It was all very well to crack jokes, but where was a certain merry laugh that was wont to ring out, at the smallest provocation, in such an infectious way that everybody else followed suit? And who was there, when Polly had the headache, to make a saucy speech and look down into the fire innocently, while her dimples did everything that was required in order to point the shaft? And pray what was the use of singing when there was no alto to Bell’s treble, or of giving conundrums, since it was always Polly who thought of nonsensical answers better than the real ones? And as for Jack, why, it was folly to shoot arrows of wit into the air when there was no target. He simply stretched himself out beside Elsie, who was particularly quiet and snoozed peacefully, without taking any part in the conversation, avowing his intention to “turn in” early. “Turn in” early, forsooth! What was the matter with the boy?
“It’s no use,” said Bell, plaintively; “we can’t be anything but happy, now that we have Elsie here; but it needs only one small headache to show that Polly fills a long-felt want in this camp. You think of her as a modest spoke in the wheel till she disappears, and then you find she was the hub.”
“Yes,” said Margery, “I think every one round this fire is simply angelic, unless I except Jack; but the fact is that Polly is—well, she is—Polly, and I dare any one to contradict me.”