Anne ran on and jumped into the wagon, with all a child’s joy at the prospect of going anywhere. Polly’s back was turned, but she could not disappear entirely within the tent without causing Mrs. Winship surprise; and she went through a lifetime of misery and self-reproach in that minute of shame and fear, when she dared neither to advance nor retreat.
‘I don’t quite like to let you go alone, Laura, without consulting the doctor, and I can’t find him,’ said Mrs. Winship. ‘Why, you are nervous and trembling! Hadn’t you better wait until to-morrow?’
‘No, thank you, Mrs. Winship. I am all ready now, and would prefer to go. I think perhaps I have stayed quite long enough, as Polly has just told me that everybody is glad to see the last of me, and that I’ve made you all miserable since I came.
This was the climax to Polly’s misery; for she was already so overcome by the thought of her rudeness that she was on the point of begging Laura’s pardon for that particular speech then and there, and she had only to hear her exact words repeated to feel how they would sound in Mrs. Winship’s ears.
Mrs. Winship was so entirely taken aback by Laura’s remark, that she could only ejaculate, ‘Polly—said—that! What do you mean?’
‘Oh, I am quite ready to think she said more than she intended, but those were her words.’
‘Polly!’
Polly turned. Alas! it was plain enough that this was no false accusation. Her downcast eyes, flushed, tear-stained cheeks, quivering lips, and the silent shame of her whole figure, spoke too clearly.
‘Can it be possible, Polly, that you spoke in such a way to a guest who was about to leave my house?’
‘Yes.’
The word was wrung from Polly’s trembling lips. What could she say but ‘Yes,’—it was true,—and how could she repeat the taunts that had provoked her to retort? They were not a sufficient excuse; and for that matter, nothing could be a sufficient excuse for her language. Now that she was confronted with her own fault, Laura’s seemed so small beside it that she would have been ashamed to offer it as any justification.
Mrs. Winship grew pale, and for a moment was quite at a loss as to the treatment of such a situation.
‘Don’t say any more about it, Mrs. Winship,’ said Laura; ‘we were both angry, or we should never have forgotten ourselves, and I shall think no more of it.’ Laura spoke with such an air of modest virtue, and seemed so ready to forgive and forget, that Polly in her silence and confusion appeared worse than ever.
‘But I want you to remember that you are my guest, not Pauline’s; that I asked you to come and ask you to remain. I cannot allow you to go simply because you do not chance to be a favourite with another of my guests.’ (Oh! the pang these words gave Polly’s faulty, tender little heart!)
‘I am only going because I feel so ill,—not a bit because of what Polly said; I was in the wrong, too, perhaps, but I promise not to let anybody nor anything make me quarrel when I visit you again. Good-bye!’ and Laura stepped into the wagon.
‘I trust you will not mention this to your mother, since I hope it is the only unpleasant incident of your visit; and it is no fault of mine that you go away with an unhappy impression of our hospitality.’ Here Mrs. Winship reached up and kissed little Anne, and as the horses were restive, and no one seemed to have anything further to say, Pancho drove off.
‘I don’t care to talk with you any more at present, Polly,’ said Mrs. Winship. ‘I am too hurt and too indignant to speak of your conduct quietly. I know the struggles you have with your temper, and I am quite willing to sympathise with you even when you do not come off victorious; but this is something quite different. I can’t conceive how any amount of provocation or dislike could have led you into such disloyalty to me’; and with this she walked away.
Polly staggered into a little play-room tent of Dicky’s, where she knew that she could be alone, pinned the curtains together so that no one could peep in, and threw herself down upon the long cushioned seat where Dicky was wont to take his afternoon nap. There, in grief and despair, she sobbed the afternoon through, dreading to be disturbed and dreading to be questioned.
‘My beautiful birthday spoiled,’ she moaned, ‘and all my own fault! I was so happy this morning, but now was ever anybody so miserable as I? And even if I tell Aunt Truth what Laura said, she will think it no excuse, and it isn’t!’
As it neared supper-time she made an opening in the back of the tent, and after long watching caught sight of Gin on his way to the brook for water, signalled him, and gave him this despairing little note for Mrs. Winship:—
Dear Aunt Truth,—I don’t ask you to forgive me—I don’t deserve to be forgiven—but I ask you to do me just one more of your dear little kindnesses. Let me stay alone in Dicky’s tent till morning, and please don’t let any one come near me. You can tell everybody the whole story to-night, if you think best, though I should be glad if only Dr. Paul and Bell need know; but I do not mind anything after displeasing you—nothing can be so bad as that. Perhaps you think I ought to come out and confess it to them myself, as a punishment; but oh, Aunt Truth, I am punishing myself in here alone worse than any one else can do it. I will go back to Santa Barbara any time that you can send me to the stage station, and I will never ask you to love me again until I have learned how to control my temper.
Your wretched, wretched
Polly.
P.S.—I remember that it is my birthday, and all that you have done for me, to-day and all the other days. It looks as if I were ungrateful, but in spite of what I did I am not. The words just blazed out, and I never knew that they were going to be said till I heard them falling from my mouth. It seems to me that if I ever atone for this I will have a slate and pencil hanging to my belt, and only write what I have to say.
Polly.
The moisture came to Mrs. Winship’s eyes as she read this tear-stained little note. ‘There’s something here I don’t quite understand,’ she thought; ‘and yet Polly confessed that Laura told the truth. Poor child!—but she has got to learn patience and self-control through suffering. However, I’ll keep the matter a secret from everybody at present, and stand between her and my inquisitive brood of youngsters,’ and she slipped the note into her pocket.
At six o’clock the members of the family came into camp from various directions, and gathered about the supper-table. All were surprised at Laura’s sudden departure, but no one seemed especially grief-stricken. Dicky announced confidentially to Philip that Laura was a ‘norful ’fraid-cat of frogs,’ and Jack ventured the opinion that Miss Laura hadn’t ‘boy’ enough in her for camp-life.
‘But where is Polly?’ asked Bell, looking round the table, as she pinned up her riding-skirt and sat down in her usual seat.
‘She has a bad headache, and is lying down,’ said Mrs. Winship, quietly; ‘she’ll be all right in the morning.’
‘Headache!’ ejaculated four or five people at once, dropping their napkins and looking at each other in dismay.
‘I’ll go and rub her head with Cologne,’ said Margery.
‘Let me go and sit with her,’ said Elsie.
‘Have you been teasing her, Jack?’
