“It shall be as you say, Polly,” said Mrs. Pepper quietly. Meantime the stage-driver had drawn off into a corner, the three children surrounding him.
“O dear me!” began Polly, with a long breath and twisting her hands; then she burst out, “Mamsie, I’m awfully wicked—but I don’t want you to go.”
“Very well,” said Mrs. Pepper, “then I will tell Mr. Tisbett that I cannot go,” and she began to get out of her chair.
“But supposing,” said Polly, with a little gasp, seizing her mother’s arm, “nobody had come to help you when my eyes were bad?”
“Yes, just supposing,” said Mother Pepper, sitting quite still.
“And now it’s worse, for she’s an old, old woman.”
“Yes, Polly.”
“Then,” said Polly, feeling sure she was going to cry, “I think you ought to go, Mamsie. O dear!”
“Are you quite sure, Polly child?”
“Yes-es—yes, Mamsie!” and Polly swallowed her sob. When she found that she could do that, she threw her arms around Mrs. Pepper’s neck. “Oh, Mamsie, I do want you to go—really and truly, I do, Mamsie—and I’ll take care of the children.”