"How did you ever do it?" cried Polly, for the fiftieth time, as she sorted, and hung the various garments in their proper places.
"Oh, Jasper helped me pack them, and then he got the hotel porter to bring over the trunks," answered Mother Fisher, her head in the trunk. "I've locked up our rooms, and got the keys, so I can get the rest by and by."
"But how did you first hear of the fire?" asked Polly, when they were all finally seated around the breakfast table, little Mrs. Gray—for so the white-haired old lady was called—and her granddaughter Adela being invited to join, "do tell me, Mamsie, I don't understand," she added in a puzzled way.
"No, you were talking about Marken in your sleep," said Mother Fisher, "when I went to call you, and how you would be ready in the morning."
"Marken?" repeated old Mr. King, looking up from the egg he was carefully breaking for Phronsie so that she might eat it from the shell. "So we were going there this morning. Well, we won't see that island now for a good many days; at least, till we get over this fright. Beside, we have things to settle here, and to get comfortably fixed. But we'll have that excursion all in good time, never fear."
"Well, how did you, Mamsie," Polly begged again, "first hear of the fire? Do tell me."
"Somebody made a good deal of noise down in the corridor," said Mother Fisher, "and your father went out to see what was the matter, and then he came back and told me what to do, and he took Phronsie and went for old Mr. King. But he had sent a porter to warn them in 165, and they would tell the Hendersons in the next room, before he ran upstairs to me." It was a long speech for Mother Fisher.
"Mamsie," asked Polly, suddenly, after she had leaned across her mother and beamed at the little doctor, which so delighted him that his big spectacles nearly fell off in his plate, "how did you know where the fire-escape was?"
"Oh, that was your father's doings, too," said Mother Fisher. She couldn't help but show her pride. "He told me all about it the first day we got to the hotel. He always does; he says it's better to know these things."
"Wife—wife," begged the little doctor, imploringly.