Should n't have a crimp left if I went out such a day as this; and I want to look nice when Polly comes."
"Now, don't be cross; and I 'll get mamma to let you have that horrid Ned Miller, that you are so fond of, come and make you a visit after Polly 's gone," said Fanny, hoping to soothe his ruffled feelings.
"Do go along, or you 'll be too late; and then, what will Polly think of me?" cried Fanny, with the impatient poke which is peculiarly aggravating to masculine dignity.
"I say, if you please, is your name Polly Milton?" meekly asked Tom, pausing before the breezy stranger.
"Oh, Fan told me you 'd got curly hair, and a funny nose, and kept whistling, and wore a gray cap pulled over your eyes; so I knew you directly." And Polly nodded at him in the most friendly manner, having politely refrained from calling the hair "red," the nose "a pug," and the cap "old," all of which facts Fanny had carefully impressed upon her memory.
"Father told me not to wait for any one, else I 'd lose my chance of a hack; so I gave my check to a man, and there he is with my trunk;" and Polly walked off after her one modest piece of baggage, followed by Tom, who felt a trifle depressed by his own remissness in polite attentions.
Miss Polly Harrington entered her kitchen a little hurriedly this June morning.
Nancy had been working in Miss Polly's kitchen only two months, but already she knew that her mistress did not usually hurry.
"Nancy,"--Miss Polly's voice was very stern now--"when I'm talking to you, I wish you to stop your work and listen to what I have to say."
Nancy had never "worked out" before; but a sick mother suddenly widowed and left with three younger children besides Nancy herself, had forced the girl into doing something toward their support, and she had been so pleased when she found a place in the kitchen of the great house on the hill--Nancy had come from "The Corners," six miles away, and she knew Miss Polly Harrington only as the mistress of the old Harrington homestead, and one of the wealthiest residents of the town.
"When you've finished your morning work, Nancy," Miss Polly was saying now, "you may clear the little room at the head of the stairs in the attic, and make up the cot bed.
"In the front attic." Miss Polly hesitated, then went on: "I suppose I may as well tell you now, Nancy.