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Page 6
"There is no doubt of that," said Mrs. Oliver meekly.
Polly's brain continued to teem with sinister ideas.
"I shall make Mr. Talbot's bed so that the clothes will come off at the
foot every night. He will remonstrate. I shall tell him that he kicks
them off, and intimate that his conscience troubles him, or he would
never be so restless. He will glare. I shall promise to do better,
yet the clothes will come off worse and worse, and at last, perfectly
disheartened, he will go. I shall tell Mr. Greenwood at the
breakfast-table, what I have been longing for months to tell him, that
we can hear him snore, distinctly, through the partition. He will go.
I shall put cold milk in Mrs. Caldwell's coffee every morning. I shall
mean well, you know, but I shall forget. She will know that I mean
well, and that it is only girlish absent-mindedness, but she will not
endure it very long; she will go. And so, by the exercise of a little
ingenuity, they will depart one by one, remarking that Mrs. Oliver's
boarding-house is not what it used to be; that Pauline is growing a
little 'slack.'"
"Polly!" and Mrs. Oliver half rose from the sofa, "I will not allow you
to call this a boarding-house in that tone of voice."
"A boarding-house, as I take it," argued Polly, "is a house where the
detestable human vipers known as boarders are 'taken in and done for.'"
"But we have always prided ourselves on having it exactly like a
family," said her mother plaintively. "You know we have not omitted a
single refinement of the daintiest home-life, no matter at what cost of
labor and thought."
"Certainly, that's the point,--and there you are, a sofa-invalid, and
here am I with my disposition ruined for life; such a wreck in temper
that I could blow up the boarders with dynamite and sleep peacefully
after it."
"Now be reasonable, little daughter. Think how kind and grateful the
boarders have been (at least almost always), how appreciative of
everything we have done for them."
"Of course; it is n't every day they can secure an--an--elderly Juno
like you to carve meat for them, or a--well, just for the sake of
completing the figure of speech--a blooming Hebe like me (I 've always
wondered why it was n't _She_be!) to dispense their tea and coffee; to
say nothing of broma for Mr. Talbot, cocoa for Mr. Greenwood, cambric
tea for Mrs. Hastings, and hot water for the Darlings. I have to keep
a schedule, and refer to it three times a day. This alone shows that
boarders are n't my vocation."
A bit of conversation gives the clue to character so easily that Mrs.
Oliver and her daughter need little more description. You can see the
pretty, fragile mother resting among her pillows, and I need only tell
you that her dress is always black, her smile patient, her eyes full of
peace, and her hands never idle save in this one daily resting-hour
prescribed by the determined Miss Polly, who mounts guard during the
appointed time like a jailer who expects his prisoner to escape if he
removes his eagle eye for an instant.
The aforesaid impetuous Miss Polly has also told you something of
herself in this brief interview. She is evidently a person who feels
matters rather strongly, and who is wont to state them in the strongest
terms she knows. Every word she utters shows you that, young as she
looks, she is the real head of the family, and that her vigorous
independence of thought and speech must be the result of more care and
responsibility than ordinarily fall to the lot of a girl of sixteen.
Certain of her remarks must be taken with a grain of salt. Her
assertion of willingness to blow up innocent boarders in their beds
would seem, for instance, to indicate a vixenish and vindictive sort of
temper quite unwarranted by the circumstances; but a glance at the girl
herself contradicts the thought.
_Item_: A firm chin. She will take her own way if she can possibly get
it; but _item_; a sweet, lovable mouth framed in dimples; a mouth that
breaks into smiles at the slightest provocation, no matter how dreary
the outlook; a mouth that quivers at the first tender word, and so the
best of all correctives to the determined little chin below.
_Item_: A distinctly saucy nose; an aggressive, impertinent, spirited
little nose, with a few freckles on it; a nose that probably leads its
possessor into trouble occasionally.
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