“O Polly!” exclaimed Van, “Lucy Ann couldn’t cry quarts of tears—no one could.”
“Lucy Ann isn’t like anybody else in the world,” said Polly stoutly; “and I’m making up a girl who could cry quarts of tears, so she cried them every time she came home and found one of those chickens killed.”
“Now, it’s hard enough to have to tell stories by the dozen as Polly Pepper does, and be called to account for every word,” said Jasper. “Polly has a right to say anything in her stories she has a mind to.”
“And do make it quarts,” begged Joel, glowering at Van. “Make it gallons, Polly.”
“No,” said Polly decidedly. “Lucy Ann cried quarts of tears. Well, so when she sat down on the grass and cried, her father fell into a tremble, and he shook so the big axe in his hand went every way, for he couldn’t hold it straight; and he looked at Lucy Ann, and he said, ‘Daughter, I wish you would stop crying.’
“‘I can’t,’ said Lucy Ann, crying worse than ever, till her tears ran into the grass and off, a little stream trickling away like a tiny, wee river.
“‘Oh, dear me!’ exclaimed her father in despair, ‘this is something very dreadful.’ Then he set his axe carefully up against the first tree he was going to cut off, and he went to Lucy Ann. ‘Daughter,’ he said, ‘if you’ll stop crying this very minute by my watch, I’ll give you this first tree I was going to cut down.’ So Lucy Ann took her face up,—for she was bending over to sob,—and she wiped the tears that were coming out of her eyes away with her hand; and her father ran cheerfully back, and picked up his axe again. ‘Now, that is good, my daughter,’ he said in a gleeful voice; and he hurried to the next tree, and raised the axe just like this.” Here Polly swung an imaginary axe over her shoulder, “‘Now, then’—but he didn’t bring it down, for Lucy Ann squealed right out, ‘O father, don’t! Now I’ve got to cry some more;’ and away she went to sobbing, just as much worse than at first as you could think; and the tears got bigger and rounder, and they raced through the grass so fast that they wet her feet till she began to sneeze like everything.”
“Oh, dear me!” exclaimed little Dick in dismay.
“Well, Lucy Ann’s father, when he saw that, set down the axe again, and he pulled his hair in distress. I forgot to tell you that he always pulled his hair when he felt troubled about anything”—