"Tell me, Polly, do," whispered Phronsie, going over to her.
"Phronsie," said Polly very slowly, "Mamsie doesn't want a big party in the evening to see her married, but to have a cunning little company of friends come in the morning, and"—
"Ugh!" cried Joel in disgust, coming down suddenly to both feet.
"It will please Mamsie best," went on Polly, with a cold shoulder to Joel. "And I never should be happy in all this world to remember that I helped to make my Mamsie unhappy on her wedding day."
Phronsie shivered, and her voice held a miserable little thrill as she begged, "Oh! make her be married just as she wants to be, Polly, do."
"Now that's what I call mean," cried Joel in a loud, vindictive tone back of Polly, "to work on Phronsie's feelings. You can't make me say I don't want Mamsie to have a wedding splurge, so there, Polly Pepper!"
Polly preserved a dignified silence, and presented her shoulder again to his view.
"You can't make me say it, Polly Pepper!" shouted Joel shrilly.
"Oh, Phronsie!" exclaimed Polly in a rapture, throwing her arms around the child, "Mamsie will be so pleased—you can't think. Let us go and tell her; come!"
"See here!" called Joel, edging up, "why don't you talk to me?"