Five Little Peppers at School Part 7

Mamsie said "yes," for she well knew that Mrs. Horne was a careful person, and when she promised anything it was always well done. "But brush your hair, Polly," she said, "it looks very untidy flying all over your head."

So Polly rushed off to her own room; Alexia, who didn't dare to trust her out of her sight, at her heels, to get in the way, and hinder dreadfully by teasing Polly every minute to "hurry--we'll lose the train."

"Where are you going, Polly?" asked Phronsie, hearing Alexia's voice; and laying down her doll, she went into the blue and white room that was Polly's very own. "Oh, may I go too?" as Polly ran to the closet to get out her second-best hat.

"Oh dear me!" began Alexia.

"No, Pet," said Polly, her head in the closet. "Oh my goodness! where _is_ that hat?"

"Oh dear!" exclaimed Alexia, wringing her hands, "we'll be late and miss the train. Do hurry, Polly Pepper."

"I'll find it, Polly," said Phronsie, going to the closet and getting down on her knees, to peer around.

"Oh, it wouldn't be on the floor, Phronsie," began Polly. "Oh dear me!

where _can_ it be?"

"Here it is," cried Alexia, "behind the bed." And running off, she picked it up, and swung it over to Polly.

"Goodness me!" said Polly with a little laugh, "I remember now, I tossed it on the bed, I thought. Well, I'm ready now, thank fortune," pinning on her hat. "Good-bye, Pet."

"I am so very glad it is found, Polly," said Phronsie, getting up on tiptoe to pull Polly's hat straight and get another kiss.

"Come on, Polly," called Alexia, flying over the stairs. "Yes, yes, girls, she's coming! Oh dear me, Polly, we'll be late!"

V AT SILVIA HORNE'S

But they weren't--not a bit of it--and had ten minutes to spare as they came rushing up to the station platform.

"Oh, look--look, girls." Polly Pepper pointed up to the clock, pushing back the damp rings of hair from her forehead. "Oh dear me--I'm so hot!"

"And so am I," panted the other girls, dashing up. One of them sank down on the upper step, and fanned herself in angry little puffs with her hat, which she twitched off for that purpose.

"Just like you, Alexia," cried one when she could get her breath, "you're always scaring us to death."

"Well, I'm sure I was scared myself, Clem," retorted Alexia, propping herself against the wall. "Oh dear! I can't breathe; I guess I'm going to die--whew, whew!"

As Alexia made this statement quite often on similar occasions, the girls heard it with the air of an old acquaintance, and straightened their coats and hats, and pulled themselves into shape generally.

"Oh my goodness, how you look, Sally! Your hat is all over your left eye." Alexia deserted her wall, and ran over to pull it straight.

"You let me be," cried Sally crossly, and twitching away. "If it hadn't been for you, my hat would have staid where I put it. I'll fix it myself." She pulled out the long pin.

"Oh dear me! now the head has come off," she mourned.

"Oh my goodness! Your face looks the worst--isn't it sweet!" cried Alexia coolly, who hadn't heard this last.

"Don't, Alexia," cried Polly, "she's lost her pin."

"Misery!" exclaimed Alexia, starting forward, "oh, where, where--"

"It isn't the pin," said Sally, holding that out, "but the head has flown off." She jumped off from the step and began to peer anxiously around in the dirt, all the girls crowding around and getting dreadfully in the way.

"What pin was it, Sally?" asked Polly, poking into a tuft of gra.s.s beneath the steps, "your blue one?"

"No; it was my best one--oh dear me!" Sally looked ready to cry, and turned away so that the girls couldn't see her face.

"Not the one your aunt gave you, Sally!" exclaimed Clem.

"Yes--yes." Sally sniffed outright now. "Oh dear! I put it in because--because--we were going to Silvia's--oh dear me!"

She gave up now, and sobbed outright.

"Don't cry, Sally," begged Polly, deserting her gra.s.s-tuft, to run over to her. "We'll find it." Alexia was alternately picking frantically in all the dust-heaps, and wringing her hands, one eye on the clock all the while.

"Oh, no, you won't," whimpered Sally. "It flew right out of my hand, and it's gone way off--I know it has--oh dear!" and she sobbed worse than ever.

"Perhaps one of those old hens will pick it up," suggested Lucy Bennett, pointing across the way to the station master's garden, where four or five fowl were busily scratching.

"Oh--oh!" Sally gave a little scream at that, and threw herself into Polly Pepper's arms. "My aunt's pin--and she told me--to be careful, and she won't--won't ever give me anything else, and now those old hens will eat it. Oh _dear_ me! what shall I do?"

"How can you, Lucy, say such perfectly dreadful things?" cried Polly.

"Don't cry, Sally. Girls, do keep on looking for it as hard as you can.

Sally, do stop."

But Sally was beyond stopping. "She told--told me only to wear it Sundays, and with my best--best dress. Oh, do give me your handkerchief, Polly. I've left mine home."

So Polly pulled out her clean handkerchief from her coat pocket, and Sally wiped up her face, and cried all over it, till it was a damp little wad; and the girls poked around, and searched frantically, and Alexia, one eye on the clock, exclaimed, "Oh, girls, it's time for the train. Oh misery me! what _shall_ we do?"

"And here it comes!" Lucy Bennett screamed.

"Stick on your hat, Sally, you've the pin part. Come, hurry up!" cried the others. And they all huddled around her.

"Oh, I can't go," began Sally.

"You must," said Clem; "we've telephoned back to Mrs. Horne we're coming. Do stick on your hat, Sally Moore."

Alexia was spinning around, saying over and over to herself, "I won't stay back--I won't." Then, as the train slowly rounded the long curve and the pa.s.sengers emerged from the waiting-room, she rushed up to the knot of girls. "Go along, Sally Moore, and I'll stay and hunt for your old pin," just as some one twitched Sally's hat from her fingers and clapped it on her head.

"Oh my goodness me!" Alexia gave a little scream, and nearly fell backward. "Look--it's on your own head! Oh, girls, I shall die." She pointed tragically up to the hat, then gave a sudden nip with her long fingers, and brought out of a knot of ribbon, a gilt, twisted affair with pink stones. "You had it all the time, Sally Moore," and she went into peals of laughter.

"Well, do stop; everybody's looking," cried the rest of the girls, as they raced off to the train, now at a dead stop. Sally, with her hat crammed on her head at a worse angle than ever, only realized that she had the ornament safely clutched in her hand.

"Oh, I can't help it," exclaimed Alexia gustily, and hurrying off to get next to Polly. "Oh dear me!--whee--_whee_!" as they all plunged into the train.

When they arrived at Edgewood, there was a carriage and a wagonette drawn up by the little station, and out of the first jumped Silvia, and following her, a tall, thin girl who seemed to have a good many bracelets and jingling things.