"No, no, Phronsie," said Jasper, as she was flying off; "it isn't any place for you to go to. I shall get one at the hotel—the Allibone. I'll be back in a trice, Polly."
Polly went out, and sat down in one of the big oaken chairs in the hall to seize it as it came, and Phronsie deposited herself in an opposite chair, and watched Polly. And presently in came Jasper, waving the desired journal. Polly, with a beaming face, grasped it and rushed off upstairs.
"Polly," called the boy, looking after her, "it isn't too late now for you to go with them. Lucy Bennett met me at the corner and she said they will take the twelve o'clock train, instead of the eleven, and she wanted me to beg you to come."
"No, no," tossed back Polly, rushing on, "I am quite determined to stay at home." Then she went into Mrs. Chatterton's room, and closed the door. But she couldn't so easily shut out the longings that would rise in her heart for the Saturday outing that the other girls were to have. How lovely it would be! the run out to Silvia Horne's charming house some ten miles distant; the elegant luncheon they would have, followed by games, and a dance in the ball-room upstairs, that Silvia's older sisters used for their beautiful parties. Then the merry return before dusk, of the twelve girls, all capital friends at school! Oh—oh!
"You've been an unconscionable time," exclaimed Mrs. Chatterton in a sharp, high key, "just to get a paper. Well, do sit down; I am quite tired waiting for you."
Polly sat down, and resolutely plunged into the column where the news items promised the most plentiful yield but in between the lines ran the doings of the girls: how they were all assembling by this time at Lucy Bennett's; how they were hurrying off to the train, and all the other delightful movements of the "outing" flashed before her eyes, as she finished item after item of her dreary task. But how Mrs. Chatterton gloated over it!
At last Polly, feeling as if she could not endure another five minutes of it, glanced up to see the old lady's eyes actually sparkling; her mouth had fallen into contented curves, and the jeweled hand resting on the chair-arm was playing with the fringe, while she leaned forward that she might not lose a word.
"Read that again, Polly," she said, "the list of presents exhibited at
Arabella Granger's wedding. I didn't hear any mention of the
Archibalds. It can't be that they have fallen out; and read more
slowly."
So Polly began once more the long lists of gifts that ushered in the matrimonial happiness of Mrs. John Westover nee Miss Arabella Granger; this time, however, stimulated by the pleasure she was giving, to find it an endurable task.
It seemed to Polly as if Mrs. John Westover had everything on earth given to her that could possibly be presented at a wedding; nevertheless the list was gone through again bravely, Polly retracing her steps two or three times to read the items over for her listener's slow digestion.