“Oh! will you tell us some of those stories you told in the little snow-house, Polly Pepper?” cried Van in a shout.
“Some time,” said Polly.
“Go on, Polly,” said Ben, “and tell about sitting around the stove.”
“Oh, yes!” said Polly briskly; “you see, children, we couldn’t burn our candles all day because Mamsie hadn’t such a very great many. And so after Phronsie woke up, and our work was done up, we sat around the stove, and told stories in the dark.”
“Oh! oh!” exclaimed the Whitney boys.
“Yes; and then,” said Ben, “Polly asked Mamsie if we might play Blindman’s-Buff; she said yes—and so we did.”
“Yes; and we played Puss-in-the-Corner, and all sorts of things we never had the time to play on other days; we played in our little snow-house. Oh, we had a lovely time, after all!”
“And didn’t anybody come to dig you out?” asked Percy, feeling as if the delights of such a frolic wouldn’t pay him for being shut up in a little snow-house; and he shivered as he spoke.
“No,” said Polly; “at least not till the next day. And then all of a sudden some one screamed, ‘Hallo, there!’ and don’t you think we heard Deacon Brown’s voice through the snow; they’d dug quite a piece towards us, and they were shouting to let us know they were coming.”
“And didn’t you scream back, Polly Pepper, didn’t you? didn’t you?” cried all the Whitneys together in intense excitement.