“Do you like hand-organs?” inquired Paul, gravely. “There was a very nice one playing in front of our house this morning. It played six tunes, and there was a monkey. I threw out five cents, and the monkey took off his hat. If you give an organ-man five cents, he’ll generally play for quite a long time.”
Miss Polly smiled, and said that hand-organs were sometimes rather pleasant, and then Dulcie—who had been eagerly awaiting her turn to speak—came forward with her offering.
“We’ve brought you a present,” she said. “It’s some candied fruit that Miss Leslie sent us all the way from California, and it’s delicious. We wanted you to have some, but I’m sorry we hadn’t a nicer box to put it in.”
“It’s really Dulcie’s present,” put in Daisy. “Miss Leslie sent it for her birthday, so we ought not to be thanked. We all wanted to bring you a present, but this is the first time we ever had anything we thought you would enjoy.”
Miss Polly was warm in her thanks, and at Maud’s request, consented to try a candied apricot, which she pronounced to be delicious. Then she asked some questions about the birthday, and was told the story of the family presents and “the make-believe party.”
“Make-believe things are really quite good fun sometimes, when you can’t have real ones,” remarked Daisy, cheerfully, when the story—to which Miss Polly had listened with much interest—was finished. “Once Aunt Kate wanted our old dolls to put in a missionary box, and we thought it would be selfish not to let the poor little missionary children have them. We missed them very much at first, but then we played we had a whole family of imaginary children, that nobody could see but ourselves, and it was so interesting we forgot all about the dolls. It was very nice afterwards, for the missionary’s little girl wrote us a letter, and told us how much she and her sister were enjoying our dolls. She described the log-house where they live, away out West, where the Indians are, and it was so interesting. We’ve got the letter still. Would you like to see it?”
Miss Polly said she would like it very much, and then, noticing signs of impatience on Paul’s part, she asked him if he would like to begin to sing.
“All right,” said the small boy, promptly. “I guess I’ll sing ‘The Holy City’ first. You might not understand the French songs.” And without further hesitation, he began to sing in a voice so clear and true that the little girls gazed at him in speechless surprise and admiration.
There were actually tears in Miss Polly’s eyes when the song ended, and her “Oh, my dear, that was a treat!” sounded so genuine that Paul’s bosom swelled with pride.
“I’ll sing ‘Au Claire De La Lune’ next,” he said, condescendingly, “and if you don’t understand French, I’ll translate it into English.”