"That's right, Davie," said Polly, smiling brightly at him, as the little fellow ran out into the woodshed. Then she began to sing, without looking at Joel.
"A whole hour," shouted Joel. But Polly kept a cold shoulder toward him, running up and down in a merry song till a little bird outside the window trilled away as hard as he could, to keep her company.
"A whole hour--" Joel ran up and pulled her dress. "It's as mean as it can be to make me work a whole hour, Polly Pepper!"
"Chee--chee--chee," called the little bird, and away Polly sang, splashing the dishes up and down in the hot soap-suds, till the old kitchen seemed full of merry bustle. Joel regarded her closely for two or three minutes, and then went slowly out.
David was up on top of the wood bin in the shed, and tugging at the box of nails that Ben had put on one of the beams.
"I can't get it down," he said. "Come help me, Joel, do."
But Joel kicked his feet on the woodshed floor. So little David gave another pull at the box, wavered, and clutched wildly at the air, and before Joel could speak, came tumbling down, and after him, the heavy box, spilling the nails as it fell. He lay quite still, and Joel only stopped to take one look.
"Oh, Polly, Dave's killed, I guess," he screamed, rushing into the kitchen, his face working fearfully.
Polly stopped her song in mid-air, and turned quite white. "Oh, no, I guess not," she said with a gasp, as she saw his face. Then she remembered Phronsie. "Come out here, Joe," and she gently pushed him out into the little entry.
"I guess I'll go, too," said Phronsie, who had been humming a soft refrain to Polly's song, and laying down the snarl carefully in Mamsie's big work-basket she went softly out after them.