"Say," a voice struck upon her ear, "oh, I'm in the most awful distress."
Polly clapped her book to, and looked up.
"O dear, dear!" It was a tall, spare woman with a face that had something about it like Grandma Bascom's. It must have been the cap-frills flapping around her cheeks.
"What can I do for you?" asked Polly, springing up. "Oh, do take my chair and sit down and tell me about it."
"Oh, will you help me? The land! I couldn't set when I'm in such trouble," declared the old woman. "My senses, I should fly off the handle!" Polly, feeling that she was in the presence of some dreadful calamity, stood quite still. "You see, me and my sister—she's in highstrikes now in there." The old woman tossed her head to indicate a room further down the hall, whereat the cap-frills flapped wilder than ever. "Bein' as it belonged to both of us, she feels as bad as I do, but as I was the one that lost it, why it stands to reason I've got to shake around and get it again. Say, will you help me? You've got a pair of bright eyes as ever I see in a head; and what's the good of 'em if you can't help in trouble like this?"
Polly, feeling that her eyes would never forgive her if she didn't let them help on such an occasion, promised.
"What is it you have lost?" she asked.
"Don't you know?" cried the old woman, impatiently. "Mercy me! how many times shall I tell you? My buzzom pin; it was took of Pa when he was a young man and awful handsome, and I didn't want to leave it in the room when we went out, cause somebody might get in, and they'd be sure to want it, so I pinned it on my nightcap strings and it's gone, and I a-gallivanting round on them rocks, a-looking at the sunrise, and I can see that to home all I want to. I must have been crazy."
"Oh, I see; and you want me to go out and help you look for it," said
Polly, her brow clearing.
"Of course," assented the old woman, impatiently. "Land, your intellects ain't as bright as your eyes. My sakes!—how many times do you expect me to tell you? I've been a-looking and a-peeking everywhere, but my eyes are old, and I don't dare to tell any one to help me, for like enough they'd pick it up when I warn't seein', and slip Pa in their pocket, and I never'd see him again."