“And oh, they’re so good!” cried Polly, looking back from the carriage with tears in her eyes. “I can never forget, Joey dear, how good they’ve been to you.”
“If it had not been for going there, I couldn’t have made Phronsie and Grandpapa go and leave me,” said Joel. “But dear me, Polly, that good woman just nursed me up: you can’t think how good she was to me,” cried Joel affectionately.
“I love her,” broke out Barby, and patting Uncle Joel’s knee to attract his attention; “and she’s my very own Mrs. Benson, she is; and when I go again, I shall say, ‘How do you do, my very own Mrs. Benson, and pretty well I thank you mostly.’”
So in great glee they kept each other’s spirits up along the way. But as they neared Rome, Polly’s heart sank, and even Joel fidgeted about; and Jasper and the “Pepper boys” had all they could do to keep things bright and cheery. Only now and then had it been possible to hear from Phronsie and the others, and then but scraps of information: that Roslyn May was mending, although the fever was not broken up; that Grandpapa was keeping bravely all his anxiety and distress to himself; and Mamsie wrote how beautiful Phronsie was, till Joel had all he could do to keep from crying outright. He thought he loved Phronsie as much as he could before—they all did; but since that night when they both faced death, and, worse than anything that threatened themselves, knew that it hung over dear Grandpapa, Joel’s whole soul was bound up in Phronsie, and it seemed to him as if he could never wait to see her again. Over and over he beguiled the way with the story of what Phronsie had said and done on the ship all through that dreadful night, till Polly and the boys and the children, hanging on his words, knew it all by heart. And so on to Rome. At last they were there.
Little Dr. Fisher, who had received their telegram, met them. He looked worn and tired; but he mastered a cheery smile for King and for Polly and her babies, and he wrung Joel’s hand as only he could wring it; and he said, “The fever hasn’t left him, but he’s holding his own;” and that was all they could get out of him. And then they all hurried off to the hotel where Roslyn May lay fighting for his young life, and Phronsie, Grandpapa, and Mamsie were watching over him.
“Polly,” said Doctor Fisher desperately, and getting a moment with her alone. “I must tell you, I think the chances are slim unless”—
A little cry broke from Polly’s lips.
“Hush, Polly, my girl,” warned the little doctor disapprovingly, regarding her over his big spectacles, “why, that isn’t like you. It all depends on our keeping our heads, you know.”
“I won’t do it again, Papa Fisher,” said poor Polly.
“Unless we can persuade Roslyn that Phronsie and he are not to be separated again, I was going to say,” went on Father Fisher calmly. “You see, he has suffered off here alone by himself a long time—I know, because he has told me all about it; and then when he came back after Mr. King,—I don’t blame your father,” the little doctor made haste to say quickly, “but it was pretty tough on Roslyn,—and then when he came back to plunge into his work again after Mr. King’s send-off, why, he hadn’t much strength to fall back on.”