“Well, we can go on the veranda,” said Joel; but he came reluctantly back and sat down again.
“Well, so Sally ran ’cross lots,” said Polly, picking up the narrative again; “she told us all about it, you know; and she says she never saw the old gray goose till just as she ran into the lane, down by Grandma Bascom’s. And the first thing she heard was a ‘Hiss—hiss!’” exclaimed Polly, suddenly stretching up her neck as much like a goose as possible, so that every one of her auditors jumped; and the Whitney boys looked at the door involuntarily, as if expecting to see an old gray goose walking in, at which they all laughed right merrily, so that old Mr. King popped his head in the door to see what it all meant.
“[Sally Brown] is biting [the old gray goose],” piped out Phronsie, flying to him, at which they all laughed worse than ever; so that it really seemed as if Polly never would finish that story in the world.
[Sally Brown and the old gray goose.]
At last everything quieted down, and Polly was under way again in the midst of the narration. “So just as she turned into the lane down by Grandma Bascom’s, ‘Hiss—hiss!’ came something after her; and looking over her shoulder, she saw our old gray goose running on its sticks of legs as fast as it could, with its long neck stuck out straight at her, and screaming and hissing like everything. Oh, dear me! and Sally was so frightened she couldn’t run another step; and so she just sat down on the grass, and covered up her eyes with her two hands.”
“She always was a silly,” declared Joel in scorn; “why didn’t she just turn and stare at that old goose? That’s the way I’d done, and then, says I, I’d taken a stick and run after her, and whacked her over the head.”
“And what did the old gray goose do then?” demanded Van Whitney, with one ear out for what Joel would have done.
“Why, that dreadful old bird just climbed up into Sally Brown’s lap, and nipped a little bit of her arm into her bill, and bit it. And Sally squealed perfectly awfully; and Grandma Bascom heard her, and she came out of her door, and shook her broom at the old gray goose, so then she went away”—