“Now I think,” said Polly, squinting up her eyes, “that Grandma Manser is in just about the right place for the panther.”
“Mercy on us, it’s a wild beast tale,” chuckled Mrs. Ramsdell.
“Grandma Manser, can you snarl like a panther?” asked Polly, bending over the quiet knitter, whose soft eyes had been following the little girl’s movements. “It’s in Uncle Blodgett’s adventure, and I’m going to act it all out, and speak so slow and clear, you’ll hear everything.”
“My yarn’s more used to snarling than I am, dear child,” said Grandma Manser, smiling up at the earnest face, “but I’ll do my best. You let me know the right minute, someway.”
“When I point my right arm at you with this stick in my hand, it’s a gun that never missed,” explained Polly to her assistants, “that’ll be the time for you to snarl, please.”
Grandma Manser nodded cheerfully, and Polly, gun in hand, ran to her position behind Mrs. Ramsdell and Aunty Peebles.
“As I was walking slowly along,” said Polly, with her lips pouted out in imitation of Uncle Blodgett, and the gun over her shoulder, “suddenly off to the left, not more than a dozen rods from the house, what should I see, but—”
“Mary!” came a querulous voice from the foot of the garret stairs. “Mary Prentiss! Are you up there?”
“Yes’m,” answered Polly, as the gun dropped to the floor, and Grandma Manser, fearing she had mistaken the signal, gave a very mild sound, meant for a fierce snarl. “Yes’m, I’m here. Do you want me downstairs?”
“No, I’ll mount; I’m used to trouble, and they might as well hear the news at once,” said the fretful voice, drawing nearer. The stairs creaked under the slow steps; the little company in the garret waited; disappointment was on Polly’s face, but the old people looked sad and anxious.