Polly | Page 6

feel much better if you have a good cry. Come upstairs now to Nurse and baby."
"Oh, no, I can't--I really can't see baby!"
"Why not?--She is a dear little child, and when your mother went away she left her to you all, to take care of, and cherish and love. I think she thought specially of you, Polly, for you always have been specially fond of little children. Come to the nursery now with me. I want you to take care of baby for an hour, while Nurse is at her supper."
Polly did not say another word. The doctor and she went together into the old nursery, and a moment or two afterwards she found herself sitting in Nurse's little straw arm-chair, holding a tiny red mite of a baby on her knee. Mother was gone, and this--this was left in her place! Oh, what did God mean? thought the woe-begone, broken-hearted child.
The doctor did not leave the room. He was looking through some books, a pile of old MS. books in one corner by the window, and had apparently forgotten all about Polly and the baby. She held the wee bundle without clasping it to her, or bestowing upon it any endearing or comforting little touch, and as she looked the tears which had frozen round her heart flowed faster and faster, dropping on the baby's dress, and even splashing on her tiny face.
Baby did not like this treatment, and began to expostulate in a fretful, complaining way. Instantly Polly's motherly instincts awoke; she wiped her own tears from the baby's face, and raising it in her arms, pressed its little soft velvet cheek to her own. As she did so, a thrill of warm comfort stole into her heart.
"Polly," said her father, coming suddenly up to her, "please take good care of baby till Nurse returns. I must go out now, I have some patients to see, but I am going to prescribe a special little supper for you, which Helen is to see you eat before you go to bed. Good-night, dear. Please ask Nurse, too, if you can do anything in the morning to help her with baby. Good-night, good-night, both of you. Why the little creature is quite taking to you, Polly!"
Dr. Maybright was about to leave the room when Polly called him back.
"Father, I must say one thing. I have been in a dreadful, dreadful dream since mother died. The most dreadful part of my dream, the blackest part, was about you."
"Yes, Polly, yes, dear."
"You were there, father, and you let her die."
Dr. Maybright put his arm round the trembling child, and drew her and the baby too close to him.
"Not willingly," he said, in a voice which Polly had never heard him use before. "Not willingly, my child. It was with anguish I let your mother go away. But Polly, there was another physician there, greater than I."
"Another?" said Polly.
"Yes, another--and He prescribed Rest, for evermore."
All her life afterwards Polly remembered these words of her father's. They calmed her great sorrow, and in many ways left her a different child.
CHAPTER IV.
QUITE A NEW SORT OF SCHEME.
On a certain sunny morning in August, four or five weeks after Mrs. Maybright's death, six girls stood round Dr. Maybright in his study. They were all dressed in deep mourning, but it was badly made and unbecoming, and one and all looked untidy, and a little run to seed. Their ages were as varied as their faces. Helen, aged sixteen, had a slightly plump figure, a calm, smooth, oval face, and pretty gentle blue eyes. Her hair was fair and wavy; she was the tidiest of the group, and notwithstanding the heavy make of her ugly frock, had a very sweet and womanly expression. Polly, all angles and awkwardness, came next in years; she was tall and very slim. Her face was small, her hair nearly black and very untidy, and her big, dark, restless eyes reflected each emotion of her mind.
Polly was lolling against the mantelpiece, and restlessly changing her position from one leg to another; Katie, aged eleven, was something in Helen's style; then came the twins, Dolly and Mabel, and then a rather pale child, with a somewhat queer expression, commonly known in the family as "Firefly." Her real name was Lucy, but no one ever dreamt of calling her by this gentle title. "Firefly" was almost always in some sort of disgrace, and scarcely knew what it was not to live in a state of perpetual mental hot water. It was privately whispered in the family circle that Polly encouraged her in her naughtiness. Whether that was the case or not, these two had a kind of quaint, elfish friendship between them, Firefly in her heart of hearts worshipping Polly, and obeying her slightest