Miss Parrott shut the door after Mrs. Pepper, feeling extraordinarily light of heart. “I wish I were going to the circus, too,” she said. Then she brought herself up, “What has come over me at my time of life? How I act!”
Mrs. Skinner, down on Fletcher Road, had just lighted her oil lamp. It gave out a pleasant twinkle through the window, as Mrs. Pepper knocked at the door.
“I was just a-packin’ up th’ wash for them boarders over to the Hill,” she said, lifting a flushed face from the basket at her feet. “An’ Jimmy is goin’ to carry it over.” A proud smile ran up to her eyes that she turned on the big awkward boy.
“That’s fine,” said Mrs. Pepper. Then without more ado, she gave Miss Parrott’s invitation. It had two different effects. It sent Mrs. Skinner down on a pile of clothes waiting in a chair to be sorted and washed. She raised both red toil-worn hands. “Glory!” was all she was able to utter. Jimmy stood perfectly still, but his eyes burned into Mrs. Pepper’s face.
“And now be at the little brown house to-morrow, Jimmy, by eleven o’clock,” Mrs. Pepper made speedy work of it, and got herself out to carry the joyful news home.
Could it really be true that her children were to see a circus at last, or was she dreaming?
CHAPTER XXVI
THE CIRCUS
WHEN they were all packed in to the big Parrott coach, ready to start for the day at Cherryville, things couldn’t have been better for a beginning. There was Mrs. Pepper with Phronsie on her lap, then Davie next, and in the corner, Jimmy fixed up in the jacket his mother had worked on as to patches, up to the last moment.
And over on the other seat were Polly and Joel and Ben—just a good half-dozen and one of Badgertown folks going to their first circus.
For once Joel could say nothing. The wonderful expedition had stunned him, and he sat with folded hands, and eyes big with suppressed excitement. Ben was the one who did the talking, and he bubbled over in the most unusual fashion, so that Polly kept bobbing her smiles and delighted appreciation over Joel’s head, at intervals all through the ride. It was so good to see Ben merry, and to know that he was going to have a good time for once in his life.