Five Little Peppers And How They Grew by Margaret Sidney (best free ebook reader txt) 📕

watch that poor child, whose business it is to know where she is! She's caught her death-cold, no doubt, no doubt!"

Outside, in the rain, the children revolved around and around Polly and Phronsie, hugging and kissing them, until nobody could do much more than breathe, not seeming to notice the stranger, who stood quietly waiting till such time as he could be heard.

At last, in a lull in the scramble, as they were dragging Polly and her burden up the steps, each wild for the honor of escorting her into the house, he cried out in laughing tones:

"Isn't anybody going to kiss me, I wonder!"

The two little Whitneys, who were eagerly clutching Polly's arms, turned around; and Percy rubbed his eyes in a puzzled way, as Joel said, stopping a minute to look up at the tall figure:

"We don't ever kiss strangers - mamsie's told us not to."

"For shame, Joey!" cried Polly, feeling her face grow dreadfully red in the darkness, "the gentleman's been so kind to me!"

"You're right, my boy," said the stranger, laughing and bending down to Joel's upturned, sturdy countenance, at the same instant that Mrs. Pepper flung open the big door, and a bright, warm light fell straight across his handsome face. And then - well, then Percy gave a violent bound, and upsetting Joel as he did so, wriggled his way down the steps - at the same time that Van, on Polly's other side, rushed up to the gentleman:

"Papa - oh, papa!"

Polly, half way up the steps, turned around, and then, at the rush of feeling that gathered at her heart, sat right down on the wet slippery step.

"Why, Polly Pepper!" exclaimed Joel, not minding his own upset. "You're right in all the slush - mother won't like it, I tell you!"

"Hush!" cried Polly, catching his arm, "he's come - oh, Joel - he's come!"

"Who?" cried Joel, staring around blindly, "who, Polly?" Polly had just opened her lips to explain, when Mr. King's portly, handsome figure appeared in the doorway. "Do come in, children - why - good gracious, Mason!"

"Yes," cried the stranger, lightly, dropping his big bundle and umbrella as he passed in the door, with his little sons clinging to him. "Where is Marian?"

"Why didn't you write?" asked the old gentleman, testily. "These surprises aren't the right sort of things," and he began to feel vigorously of his heart. "Here, Mrs. Pepper, be so good as to call Mrs. Whitney."

"Pepper! Pepper!" repeated Mr. Whitney, perplexedly.

"She's coming - I hear her up-stairs," cried Van Whitney. "Oh, let me tell her!" He struggled to get down from his father's arms as he said this.

"No, I shall - I heard her first!" cried Percy. "Oh, dear me! Grandpapa's going to!"

Mr. King advanced to the foot of the staircase as his daughter, all unconscious, ran down with a light step, and a smile on her face.

"Has Polly come?" she asked, seeing only her father. "Yes," replied the old gentleman, shortly, "and she's brought a big bundle, Marian!"

"A big bundle?" she repeated wonderingly, and gazing at him.

"A very big bundle," he said, and taking hold of her shoulders he turned her around on - her husband.

So Polly and Phronsie crept in unnoticed after all.

"I wish Ben was here," said little Davie, capering around the Whitney group, "an' Jappy, I do!"

"Where are they!" asked Polly.

"Don't know," said Joel, tugging at his shoe-string. "See - aren't these prime!" He held up a shining black shoe, fairly bristling with newness, for Polly to admire.

"Splendid," she cried heartily; "but where are the boys?"

"They went after you," said Davie, "after we came home with our shoes."

"No, they didn't," contradicted Joel, flatly; and sitting down on the floor he began to tie and untie his new possessions. "When we came home Ben drew us pictures - lots of 'em - don't you know?"

"Oh, yes," said Davie, nodding his head, "so he did; that was when we all cried 'cause you weren't home, Polly."

"He drawed me a be-yew-tiful one," cried Phronsie, holding up her mangy bit; "see, Polly, see!"

"That's the little brown house," said Davie, looking over her shoulder as Phronsie put it carefully into Polly's hand.

"It's all washed out," said Polly, smoothing it out, "when you staid out in the rain."

Phronsie's face grew very grave at that.

"Bad, naughty old rain," she said, and then she began to cry as hard as she could.

"Oh dear, don't!" cried Polly in dismay, trying her best to stop her, "oh, Phronsie, do stop!" she implored, pointing into the next room whence the sound of happy voices issued, "they'll all hear you!"

But Phronsie in her grief didn't care, but wailed on steadily.

"Who is it anyway?" cried Joel, tired of admiring his precious shoes, and getting up to hear them squeak, "that great big man, you know, Polly, that came in with you?"

"Why, I thought I told you," said Polly, at her wit's end over Phronsie. "It's Percy and Van's father, Joey!"

"Whockey!" cried Joel, completely stunned, "really and truly, Polly Pepper?"

"Really and truly," cried Polly, bundling Phronsie up in her arms to lay the little wet cheek against hers.

"Then I'm going to peek," cried Joel, squeaking across the floor to carry his threat into execution.

"Oh, you mustn't, Joe!" cried Polly, frightened lest he should. "Come right back, or I'll tell mamsie!"

"They're all comin' in, anyway," cried little Davie, delightedly, and scuttling over to Polly's side.

"And here are the little friends I've heard so much about!" cried Mr. Whitney coming in amongst them. "Oh, you needn't introduce me to Polly - she brought me home!"

"They're all Pepperses," said Percy, waving his hand, and doing the business up at one stroke.

"Only the best of 'em isn't here," observed Van, rather ungallantly, "he draws perfectly elegant, papa!"

"I like Polly best, I do!" cried little Dick, tumbling after. "Peppers!" again repeated Mr. Whitney in a puzzled way.

"And here is Mrs. Pepper," said old Mr. King, pompously drawing her forward, "the children's mother, and - "

But here Mrs. Pepper began to act in a very queer way, rubbing her eyes and twisting one corner of her black apron in a decidedly nervous manner that, as the old gentleman looked up, he saw with astonishment presently communicated itself to the gentleman opposite.

"Is it," said Mr. Whitney, putting out his hand and grasping the hard, toil-worn one in the folds of the apron, "is it cousin Mary?"

"And aren't you cousin John?" she asked, the tears in her bright black eyes.

"Of all things in this world!" cried the old gentleman, waving his head helplessly from one to the other. "Will somebody have the extreme goodness to tell us what all this means?"

At this the little Peppers crowded around their mother, and into all the vacant places they could find, to get near the fascinating scene.

"Well," said Mr. Whitney, sitting down and drawing his wife to his side, "it's a long story. You see, when I was a little youngster, and - "

"You were John Whitney then," put in Mrs. Pepper, slyly. "That's the reason I never knew when they were all talking of Mason Whitney."

"John Whitney I was," said Mr. Whitney, laughing, "or rather, Johnny and Jack. But Grandmother Mason, when I grew older, wanted me called by my middle name to please grandfather. But to go back - when I was a little shaver, about as big as Percy here - "

"Oh, papa!" began Percy, deprecatingly. To be called "a little shaver" before all the others!

"He means, dearie," said his mamma, reassuringly, "when he was a boy like you. Now hear what papa is going to say."

"Well, I was sent up into Vermont to stay at the old place. There was a little girl there; a bright, black-eyed little girl. She was my cousin, and her name was Mary Bartlett."

"Who's Mary Bartlett?" asked Joel, interrupting.

"There she is, sir," said Mr. Whitney, pointing to Mrs. Pepper, who was laughing and crying together.

"Where?" said Joel, utterly bewildered. "I don't see any Mary Bartlett. What does he mean, Polly?"

"I don't know," said Polly. "Wait, Joey," she whispered, "he's going to tell us all about it."

"Well, this little cousin and I went to the district school, and had many good times together. And then my parents sent for me, and I went to Germany to school; and when I came back I lost sight of her. All I could find out was that she had married an Englishman by the name of Pepper."

"Oh!" cried all the children together.

"And I always supposed she had gone to England for despite all my exertions, I could find no trace of her. Ah, Mary," he said reproachfully, "why didn't you let me know where you were?"

"I heard," said Mrs. Pepper, "that you'd grown awfully rich, and I couldn't."

"You always were a proud little thing," he said laughing. "Well, but," broke in Mr. King, unable to keep silence any longer, "I'd like to inquire, Mason, why you didn't find all this out before, in Marian's letters, when she mentioned Mrs. Pepper?"

"She didn't ever mention her," said Mr. Whitney, turning around to face his questioner, "not as Mrs. Pepper - never once by name. It was always either 'Polly's mother,' or 'Phronsie's mother.' Just like a woman," he added, with a mischievous glance at his wife, "not to be explicit."

"And just like a man," she retorted, with a happy little laugh, "not to ask for explanations."

"I hear Jappy," cried Polly, in a glad voice, "and Ben - oh, good!" as a sound of rushing footsteps was heard over the veranda steps, and down the long hall.

The door was thrown suddenly open, and Jasper plunged in, his face flushed with excitement, and after him Ben, looking a little as he did when Phronsie was lost, while Prince squeezed panting in between the two boys.

"Has Polly got - " began Jasper.

"Oh, yes, I'm here," cried Polly, springing up to them; "oh, Ben!"

"She has," cried Joel, disentangling himself from the group, "don't you see, Jappy?"

"She's all home," echoed Phronsie, flying up. "Oh, Ben, do draw me another little house!"

"And see - see!" cried the little Whitneys, pointing with jubilant fingers to their papa, "see what she brought!"

Jasper turned around at that - and then rushed forward.

"Oh, brother Mason!"

"Well, Jasper," said Mr. Whitney, a whole wealth of affection beaming on the boy, "how you have stretched up in six months!"

"Haven't I?" said Jasper, laughing, and drawing himself up to his fullest height.

"He's a-standin' on tip-toe," said Joel critically, who was hovering near. "I most know he is!" and he bent down to examine the position of Jasper's heels.

"Not a bit of it, Joe!" cried Jasper, with a merry laugh, and setting both feet with a convincing thud on the floor.

"Well, anyway, I'll be just as big," cried Joel, "when I'm thirteen, so!"

Just then a loud and quick rap on the table made all the children skip, and stopped everybody's tongue. It came from Mr. King.

"Phronsie," said he, "come here, child. I can't do anything without you," and held