Five Little Peppers Abroad Part 5

Polly gave a quick glance at Phronsie. "Phronsie dear," she said, "let us go up to our deck now, dear. Shall we?"

"Oh, no, Polly, please don't go yet," begged Phronsie, in alarm, and patting the baby softly with a gentle little hand. Polly looked off at Grandpapa. He was placidly surveying the water, his eyes occasionally roving over the novel and interesting sights around. On the other side of the deck a returning immigrant was bringing out a jew's-harp, and two or three of his fellow-pa.s.sengers were preparing to pitch quoits.

Old Mr. King was actually smiling at it all. Polly hadn't seen him so contented since they sailed.

"I guess I'll tell another one, Jasper," she said. "Oh, about a dog, you wanted, did you?" nodding at the biggest boy.

"Yes," said the boy, bobbing his tow head, "I did;" and he unfolded and folded his hands back again, then waited patiently.

So Polly flew off on a gay little story about a dog that bade fair to rival Grandma Bascom's cat for cleverness. He belonged to Mr. Atkins who kept store in Badgertown, and the Pepper children used to see a good deal of him, when they took home the sacks and coats that Mamsie sewed for the storekeeper. And in the midst of the story, when the stolid steerage children were actually laughing over the antics of that remarkable dog, Jasper glanced up toward the promenade deck, took a long look, and started to his feet. "Why, Polly Pepper, see!" He pointed upward. There, on the curve, were old Mr. Selwyn and Tom walking arm in arm.

IV

STEAMER LIFE

And after that, it was "My grandson, Thomas," on all occasions, the old gentleman introducing the boy to the right and to the left, as he paraded the deck, his old arm within the younger one. And the little, sharp black eyes snapped proudly and the white head was held up, as he laughed and chattered away sociably to the pa.s.sengers and the ship's crew, at every good opportunity.

"Yes, my grandson, Thomas, is going back to school. We've been running about in your country a bit, and the boy's mother went home first with the other children--" Polly heard him say as the two paused in front of her steamer chair.

"Indeed!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs. Vanderburgh, as he addressed her, and raising her eyebrows with a supercilious glance for his plain, unprepossessing appearance. "Yes, Madam, and glad shall I be to set my foot on Old England again Hey, Tom, my boy, don't you say so?"

Tom looked off over the sea, but did not speak.

Neither did Mrs. Vanderburgh answer, but turned her face away in disdain that was very plainly marked.

"Home is the best place, Madam," declared old Mr. Selwyn emphatically.

"Well, Old England is our home, and nothing will induce me to leave it again, I can a.s.sure you."

Again Mrs. Vanderburgh did not reply, but looked him up and down in cold silence. Old Mr. Selwyn, not appearing to notice, chattered on. At last she deliberately turned her back on him.

"Isn't he common and horrid?" whispered f.a.n.n.y Vanderburgh, in the steamer chair next to Polly, thrusting her face in between her and her book. And she gave a little giggle.

"Hush!" said Polly, warningly, "he will hear you."

"Nonsense--it's impossible; he is rattling on so; and do look at Mamma's face!"

He didn't hear, but Tom did; and he flashed a glance--dark and wrathful--over at the two girls, and started forward, abruptly pulling his Grandfather along.

"O dear me!" exclaimed Polly, in distress, dropping her book in her lap; "now he _has_ heard."

"Oh, that dreadful boy," said f.a.n.n.y, carelessly, stretching out in her steamer chair comfortably; "well, who cares? he's worse than his Grandfather."

"Yes, he has heard," repeated Polly, sorrowfully looking after the two, Tom still propelling the old gentleman along the deck at a lively rate; "now, what shall we do?"

"It isn't of the least consequence if he has heard," reiterated f.a.n.n.y, "and Mamma has been frightfully bored, I know. Do tell us, Mamma," she called.

Mrs. Vanderburgh turned away from the rail, where she had paused in her const.i.tutional when addressed by the old gentleman, and came up to the girls.

"Do sit down, Mamma, in your steamer chair," begged f.a.n.n.y; "I'll tuck you up in your rug." And she jumped lightly out of her own chair.

"There, that's nice," as Mrs. Vanderburgh sank gracefully down, and f.a.n.n.y patted and pulled the rug into shape. "Now tell us, wasn't he the most horrible old bore?"

As she cuddled back into her own nest, Mrs. Vanderburgh laughed in a very high-bred manner. "He was very amusing," she said.

"Amusing! I should say so!" cried f.a.n.n.y. "I suppose he would have told you all his family history if he had stayed. O dear me, he is such a common, odious old person."

Polly twisted uneasily under her rug.

Mrs. Vanderburgh glanced into the steamer chair on the other side. It had several books on top of the rug. "I don't believe he can take that seat," she said; "still, f.a.n.n.y, I think it would be well for you to change into it, for that old man may take it into his head, when he makes the turn of the deck, to drop into it and give us the whole of his family history."

"Horrors!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed f.a.n.n.y, hopping out of her chair again. "I'll make sure that he doesn't. And yet I did so want to sit next to Polly Pepper," she mourned, ensconcing herself under the neighbouring rug, and putting the books on the floor by her side.

"Don't do that; give them to me," said her mother; "I'll put them in your chair unless Miss Polly will take that place, only I don't like to disturb you, dear," she said with a sweet smile at Polly.

"Why, that would make matters' worse, Mamma," said f.a.n.n.y. "Don't you see, then, that old bore would put himself into Polly's chair, for he likes her, anyway. Do leave it as it is."

So Mrs. Vanderburgh smiled again. "I don't know but that you are right," she said, and leaned back her head restfully. "Dear me, yes, he _is_ amusing."

"They are terribly common people," said f.a.n.n.y, her aristocratic nose well in the air, "aren't they, Mamma? And did you ever see such a clumsy thing as that dreadful boy, and such big hands and feet?" She held up her own hands as she spoke, and played with her rings, and let the jingling bracelets run up and down her wrists.

"f.a.n.n.y, how often must I tell you to wear gloves on shipboard?" said her mother, in a tone of reproof. "Nothing spoils the hands so much as a trip at sea. They won't get over it all summer; they're coa.r.s.ened already," and she cast an alarmed glance at the long, slender fingers.

"I'm so tired of gloves, Mamma." f.a.n.n.y gave a restful yawn. "Polly Pepper doesn't wear them," she cried triumphantly, peering past her mother to point to Polly's hands.

Mrs. Vanderburgh hesitated. It wouldn't do to say anything that would reflect against the Peppers--manners, or customs, or bringing up generally. So she leaned over and touched Polly's fingers with her own gloved ones.

"You don't wear gloves, do you, my dear?" she said, in gentle surprise, quite as if the idea had just struck her for the first time.

"No, Mrs. Vanderburgh, I don't," said Polly, "at least not on shipboard, unless it is cold."

"There, now, Mamma," laughed f.a.n.n.y, in a pleased way; "you'll stop teasing me about wearing them, I'm sure."

Mrs. Vanderburgh turned and surveyed her daughter; but she didn't smile, and f.a.n.n.y thought it as well to begin again on the old topic.

"They're awfully common people, aren't they, Mamma,--those Selwyns?"

"They are, indeed," replied Mrs. Vanderburgh, "quite commonplace, and exceedingly tiresome; be sure and not speak to them, f.a.n.n.y."

"Trust me for that," said f.a.n.n.y, with a wise little nod. "The old man stopped me and asked me something this morning, as I was coming out of the dining room, after breakfast, but I pretended I didn't hear, and I skipped upstairs and almost fell on my nose."

"You were fortunate to escape," said her mother, with a little laugh.

"Well, let us drop the subject and talk of something else much more important. Polly, my dear." She turned again and surveyed the young girl at her side. "You are coming home this autumn, aren't you?"

"Oh, no," said Polly, "Grandpapa expects to stay over in Europe a year."

"Is that so?" said Mrs. Vanderburgh, and her face fell; "I regret it exceedingly, for I should be glad if you would visit f.a.n.n.y this winter in New York."