There was another pause, a long one this time. Polly broke it, for she saw that both Molly and Alan were on the point of laughing.

"It is a beautiful day," she began. "We were going to ride this morning with Job, but--" She paused abruptly. Job had done conspicuous duty in Mrs. Baxter's funeral procession, in fact, he had helped to bear the disconsolate widower and his children to her grave. Polly felt that further mention of him would be ill- timed. Mr. Baxter appeared to be pursuing his own train of thought. "Is Miss Roberts well?" he asked, after another interval.

"Very," answered Polly.

"Not given to being sick much?"

"No, she is very strong."

"Well," said Mr. Baxter, rising with an air of relief, "I must be going. Just tell your aunt, sissy, that I called on her. Where's my hat?"

He had mislaid it somewhere, and while he charged up and down the parlor looking for it, Alan and Molly prudently withdrew, to laugh unseen. At length he discovered it in the hall, and went away, leaving the children to speculate vainly on the cause of his visit.

"Sissy!" exclaimed Polly violently. "Sissy! I wonder how he'd like me to call him bubby! I'll try it, the next time he comes. But he stayed so forever that we shan't have time to cook any potatoes for dinner."

They surely would not, for the fire was out and the stove was cold.

"Your poor father!" groaned Molly. "And we weren't going to let him know that anything was wrong."

"Never mind," said Polly; "we'll give him just meat and pudding.

That's enough for any man."

They cheered up at that, and, with Alan's help, they went to work to build a fire, making many discoveries during the operation about dampers and grates and their uses. But time, always unaccommodating, refused to wait for them, and six o'clock came far too soon, and brought the doctor in its train.

Dr. Adams was rather perplexed when he went into the house and was met by no one at the door. Polly and her mother usually greeted him, but to-night the front of the house was deserted.

"The girls must be off somewhere," he said to himself. "Well, I'll go out and tell Mary to give me my dinner now, without waiting for them."

He made his way to the kitchen, noting to his surprise, as he pa.s.sed through the dining-room, that the table was only half set for the meal, and that the few articles on it had a little the appearance of having been thrown at it from a distance. Dr. Adams was an orderly, methodical man, and his wife's careful housekeeping was quite to his liking. However, he reflected that, during her absence, there must and would be irregularities, and pa.s.sed on to the kitchen. As he opened the door, he was met by a cloud of dense, bluish white smoke which brought the quick tears to his eyes. Through the thick air he could see, not the ample proportions of his usual cook, but three small figures that were hurrying to and fro with a purposeless, ineffectual bustle which yet accomplished nothing. One of the figures hailed him in disconsolate tones,--

"Oh, papa! are you home so soon?"

"So soon?" he answered, as well as he could for coughing; "it's six o'clock now. Is dinner ready? What are you doing out here?"

It took but a moment to explain the matter, and then the doctor showed that it was not without reason that Polly called him the best father in the world. He was just back from a long drive out into the country with a fellow doctor, to pa.s.s judgment upon a critical case; he must visit a man in the hospital before his evening office hour; he was tired, hungry, and in a hurry, and there was no immediate prospect of dinner. But the three weary, heated, crocky faces before him moved him to pity, and he threw open the outer door, saying briskly,--

"Let's have a little air here, and see what's the matter."

"The fire won't seem to burn," said Alan. "It just smokes and goes out."

"So I see," said the doctor laughing. "Perhaps it would go better, my boy, if the dampers were not shut up tight. All it needs is a little draught,--see?" And in a moment there was a comfortable crackling sound going on inside the stove.

Before his marriage, the doctor had been in the habit of camping out every summer, and his old experiences came to his aid in the present crisis. While the girls flew in to set the table, he quickly brought the fire into order, and cooked the meat as handily as a woman. Thanks to him, the supper proved a merry one in spite of the smoky dining-room, the meagre bill of fare, and the great white blister on the side of Alan's hand, which the lad was doing his best to keep out of the doctor's sight. Molly raised her eyebrows and darted a comical glance at Polly when the doctor asked for a second plate of the pudding, and it was not until long afterwards that the girls knew of the manful effort he had made to swallow the sticky compound.

"Can I do anything more to help you?" he asked, stopping behind Alan's chair as he was going away.

"You've done enough already, I should think," answered Molly gratefully.

"It was too bad for Mary to leave you in the lurch," he replied.

Then, as his eyes fell on Alan's hand, he added, "That's a hard burn, my boy! Why in the world didn't you say something about it?"

"What was the use?" inquired Alan calmly. "Grumbling about it wouldn't do it any good."

"No; but I could," responded the doctor. "I like your pluck, but there's no use making a martyr of yourself for nothing. Come into my den and let me put something on it." And after a moment's delay, he went striding away down the street, looking at his watch as he walked.

"How do people ever manage to keep house?" sighed Molly, an hour later.

The dishes were washed, the rooms in order, and the two girls were luxuriously settled on the sofa, which they had drawn up in front of Alan's blazing fire on the hearth. Alan himself was stretched out on the rug, with his yellow head resting against the seat of the sofa, beside Polly's hand. Too tired to talk, the children had sat there quietly watching the fire until Molly broke the silence.

"I don't see, I'm sure," returned Polly. "It never seems as if mamma did much, even when we haven't any girl; and I'm tired almost to death, with what little we've done."

"I'm slowly getting to think," said Molly reflectively; "that our mothers are wonderful women. If it takes three of us to spoil one dinner, how do they get along, to do all the housekeeping and look out for us and sew and all?"

"Perhaps they know more to start with," suggested Alan, ducking his head out of reach of Polly's threatening fingers.

"If you hadn't been and gone and burned yourself in our service, Alan," she said, laughing, "I would turn you out of the house."

But Molly was too much in earnest to heed this by-play.

"I believe I'll learn to cook," she went on. "I don't mean fancy cooking, but good, plain things that one could live on."

"Why not go to cooking school?" asked Polly.

"Yes," rejoined Molly scornfully; "and learn to make chicken salad and angel cake and chocolate creams. That's all very well, but I want to know how to do something that will help along, when we get in a tight place. Hark! what's that?" she added, as a sudden flurry of rain swept against the windows.

"That's cheerful!" said Alan, starting up. "I don't care about getting a ducking. I wish I'd gone home before this."

"No matter," urged Polly. "Stay till papa comes; he'll be in at nine, and then we'll give you an umbrella and things."

"Well." And Alan threw more wood on the fire and then settled back into his former position; "I may as well, for I don't believe it will rain any harder than it does now, and maybe it will stop. I say, Polly," he went on; "tell us a story, there's a good fellow."

"I'm too tired to-night, Alan," Polly began; "I haven't an idea in my head and--Is that you, papa?" she called, as the front door opened and shut.

"No, it's mamma," and Mrs. Adams walked into the parlor.

"Jerusalem!" and Polly sprang up with a glad cry. "Wherever did you come from?"

She was surrounded and dragged forward to the sofa, where Alan took her cloak, Molly her bonnet, and Polly pulled off her gloves.

"This is delightful to be so waited on," said Mrs. Adams. "It is worth while going away, to have the pleasure of coming back to my three children. Now come and sit down, and tell me all about it."

And with a girl at each side and a boy at her feet, she prepared to hear the story of their doings.

"First, how is Uncle Charlie?" asked Polly, sure from her mother's bright face that there was no bad news.

"It was a sudden attack of indigestion, and he was much better before we reached him; but for a little while they thought there was no chance for him. Aunt Jane is going to stay for a week or two, but I was in a hurry to come back to my baby. And that reminds me, I stopped at your house, Alan, to tell your mother I had come and that Molly would stay here till Monday; and when I found that you were here, I said I should keep you, too, till morning. But now you must tell me how you've been amusing yourselves."

"With cooking," said Polly, with a tragic groan. "Mary's gone off for a week, and the fire went out, and Alan burned himself, and we nearly starved. I'm glad you've come back; oh, you can't guess how glad!"