"He's very anxious about Amy," said Polly, running off to the door, where she paused and looked back for sympathy toward her little protege.
"I should think he would be," grunted Joel; "she's a goose, and beside that, she doesn't know anything."
"O, Joe! she hasn't any father nor mother," cried Polly in distress.
Joel gave an inaudible reply, and Polly ran off, carrying a face on which the sunshine struggled to get back to its accustomed place.
"Beg pardon for troubling you," said a tall young man, getting off from the divan to meet her, as she hurried into the reception room, "but you were good enough to say that I might talk with you about my sister, and really I am very much at sea to know what to do with her, Miss Pepper."
It was a long speech, and at the end of it, Polly and the caller were seated, she in a big chair, and he back on the divan opposite to her.
"I am glad to see you, Mr. Loughead," said Polly brightly, "and I hope I can help you, for I am very fond of Amy."
"It's good of you to say so," said Jack Loughead, "for she's a trying little minx enough, I suspect; and Miss Salisbury tells me you've had no end of trouble with her."
"Miss Salisbury shouldn't say that," cried Polly involuntarily. Then she stopped with a blush. "I mean, I don't think she quite understands it. Amy does really try hard to study."
"Oh!" said Jack Loughead. Then he tapped his boot with his walking-stick.