Five Little Peppers Midway

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Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team.

FIVE LITTLE PEPPERS MIDWAY

By MARGARET SIDNEY

To
MY LITTLE MARGARET
Who Is Phronsie Pepper to All
Who Know Her
This Book Is Lovingly Inscribed

CONTENTS

1 Phronsie's Pie
2 Cousin Eunice Chatterton
3 The Rehearsal
4 Welcome Home!
5 After the Play
6 The Little Brown House
7 Old Times Again
8 Some Badgertown Calls
9 A Sudden Blow
10 The Party Separates
11 Poor Polly!
12 New Work for Polly
13 A Piece of News
14 Mamsie's Wedding
15 Mrs. Chatterton Has a New Plan
16 Where Is Phronsie?
17 Phronsie Is Found
18 The Girls Have Polly Again
19 Phronsie Is Well Again
20 The Secret
21 The Whitneys' Little Plan
22 Joel
23 Of Many Things
24 Away

I

PHRONSIE'S PIE

"Jefferson," said Phronsie, with a grave uplifting of her eyebrows, "I
think I will go down into the kitchen and bake a pie; a very little
pie, Jefferson."

"Bless you, Miss," replied the cook, showing his white teeth in glee,
"it is the making of the kitchen when you come it."

"Yes, Jefferson," said Phronsie slowly, "I think I will go down make
one. It must be very, very full of plums, you know," looking up at him
anxiously, "for Polly dearly loves plums."

"It shall be that plummy," said Jefferson convincingly, "that you'd
think you never saw such a one for richness. Oh, my! what a pie that
shall be!" exclaimed the cook, shutting up one eye to look through the
other in a spasm of delight at an imaginary pie; "so it's for Miss Mary,
is it?"

"Yes," said Phronsie, "it is. Oh, Jefferson, I'm so glad you like to
have me make one," she clasped her hands in silent rapture, and sat down
on the lowest stair to think it over a bit, Jefferson looking at her,
forgetful that the under cook was fuming in the deserted domains over
his delay to return. At last he said, bowing respectfully, "If you
please, Miss, it's about time to begin. Such a pie ain't done without a
deal of care, and we'd best have it a-baking as soon as may be."

"Yes," said Phronsie, getting off from her stair, and surrendering her
hand to his big black palm, "we ought to go right this very minute. But
I must get my apron on;" she stopped and looked down at her red dress.

"Oh! you can take one of my aprons," said the cook, "they're as fine,
and big, and white, and I'll just put you in one of 'em and tie you up
as snug; you'll come out as clean and sweet when we're through, as you
are now, Miss."

"Tie me up?" laughed Phronsie in glee. "Oh! how nice, Jefferson. Do you
know I love you very much, Jefferson, you're so very good to me?"

The big fellow drew a long breath. "No, Miss, I'm big and black, and
just fit to stay downstairs," he managed to say.

"But I love you better because you are black, Jefferson," insisted
Phronsie, "a great deal better. You are not like everybody else, but you
are just yourself," clinging to his hand.

"Well, Miss, I ain't just fit for a lily to touch and that's the truth,"
looking down at his palm that the small white hand grasped closely.
"It's clean, Miss," he added with pardonable pride, "but it's awful
black."

"I like it better black, Jefferson," said Phronsie again, "really and
truly I do, because then it's your very, very own," in a tone that
thrilled him much as if a queen had knighted him on the spot.

This important declaration over, the two set forth on their way toward
the kitchen, Phronsie clinging to his hand, and chatting merrily over
the particular pie in prospect, with varied remarks on pies in general,
that by and by would be ventured upon if this present one were a
success--and very soon tied up in one of the cook's whitest aprons she
was seated with due solemnity at the end of the baking table, the proper
utensils and materials in delightful confusion before her, and the lower
order of kitchen satellites revolving around her, and Jefferson the
lesser sphere.

"Now all go back to your work," said that functionary when he considered
the staring and muttered admiration had been indulged in long enough,
"and leave us."

"I want you," said his assistant, touching his elbow.

"Clear out," said Jefferson angrily, his face turned quite from
Phronsie.

But she caught the tone and immediately laid down the bit of dough she
was moulding.

"Do go," she begged, "and come back quickly," smiling up into his face.
"See, I'm going to pat and pat and pat, oh! ever so much before you come
back."

So Jefferson followed the under cook, the scullery boy went back to
cleaning the knives, Susan, the parlor maid who was going through the
kitchen with her dustpan and broom, hurried off with a backward glance
or two, and Phronsie was left quite alone to hum her way along in her
blissful culinary attempt.

"Bless me!" exclaimed a voice close to her small ear, as she was
attempting for the fifth time to roll out the paste quite as thin as she
had seen Jefferson do, "what is this? Bless my soul! it's Phronsie!"

Phronsie set down the heavy rolling-pin and turned in her chair with a
gleeful laugh.

"Dear, dear Grandpapa!" she cried, clasping her floury hands, "oh! I'm
so glad you've come to see me make a pie all by myself. It's for Polly,
and it's to be full of plums; Jefferson let me make it."

"Jefferson? And where is he, pray?" cried Mr. King irately. "Pretty
fellow, to bring you down to these apartments, and then go off and
forget you. Jefferson!" he called sharply, "here, where are you?"

"Oh, Grandpapa!" exclaimed Phronsie in dire distress, "I sent him;
Jefferson didn't want to go, Grandpapa dear, really and truly, he went
because I asked him."

"If you please, sir," began Jefferson, hurrying up, "I only stepped off
a bit to the cellar. Bassett sent down a lot of turnips, they ain't
first-rate, and"--

"All right," said Mr. King, cutting him short with a wave of his hand,
"if Miss Phronsie sent you off, it's all right; I don't want to hear any
more elaborate explanations."

"Little Miss hasn't been alone but a few minutes," said Jefferson in a
worried way.

"And see," said Phronsie, turning back to her efforts, while one hand
grasped the old gentleman's palm, "I've almost got it to look like
Jefferson's. Almost, haven't I?" she asked, regarding it anxiously.

"It will be the most beautiful pie," cried Mr. King, a hearty enthusiasm
succeeding his irritability, "that ever was baked. I wish you'd make me
one sometime, Phronsie."

"Do you?" she cried in a tremor of delight, "and will you really have it
on the table, and cut it with Aunt Whitney's big silver knife?"

"That I will," declared Mr. King solemnly.

"Then some day I'll come down here again, Jefferson," cried Phronsie in
a transport, "and bake one for my dear Grandpapa. That is, if this one
is good. Oh! you do suppose it will be good, don't you?" appealingly at
him.

"It shall," said Jefferson stoutly, and seizing the rolling-pin with
extreme determination. "You want a bit more butter worked in, here," a
dab with skillful fingers, and a little manipulation with the flour, a
roll now and then most deftly, and the paste was laid out before
Phronsie. "Now, Miss, you can put it in the dish."

"But is isn't my pie," said Phronsie, and, big girl as she felt herself
to be, she sat back in her chair, her lower lip quivering.

"Not your pie?" repeated the cook, bringing himself up straight to gaze
at her.

"No," said Phronsie, shaking her yellow head gravely, "it isn't my pie
now, Jefferson. You put in the things, and rolled it."

"Leave your fingers off from it, can't you?" cried Mr. King sharply.
"Goodness! this pie isn't to have a professional touch about it. Get
some more flour and stuff, whatever it is you make a pie of, and let her
begin again. There, I'll sit down and watch you; then there'll be some
chance of having things straight." So he drew up a chair to the side of
the table, first calling off Pete, the scullery boy, from his knives to
come and wipe it off for him, and Mrs. Tucker who was in kitchen dialect
"Tucker," to see that the boy did his work well.

"Lor' bless you, sir," said Tucker, bestowing a final polish with her
apron, "'twas like satin before, sir--not a wisp of dust."

"I don't want any observations from you," said the old gentleman,
depositing himself in the chair. "There, you can go back to your work,
Mrs. Tucker, and you too, Pete. Now I'll see that this pie is to your
liking, Phronsie."

But Phronsie still sat back in her chair, thoughtfully surveying
Jefferson.

"Grandpapa," she said at last slowly, "I think I'd rather have the first
pie, I really would, Grandpapa, may I?" She brought her yellow head
forward by a sudden movement, and looked deep into his keen eyes.

"Bless my soul! Rather have the first pie?" repeated the old gentleman
in astonishment, "why, I thought you wanted to make one all yourself."

"I think I'd rather do part of it," said Phronsie with great
deliberateness, "then Polly'll like it, and eat it, and I'll do yours,
Grandpapa dear, just as Jefferson fixed mine, all alone. Please let me."
She held him fast with her eyes, and waited for his answer.

"So you shall!" cried Mr. King in great satisfaction, "make mine all
alone. This one would better go as it is. Put away the flour and things,
Jefferson; Miss Phronsie doesn't want them."

Phronsie gave a relieved little sigh. "And, Jefferson, if you hadn't
showed me how, I couldn't ever in all this world make Grandpapa's. Now
give me the little plate, do."

"Here 'tis, Miss," said the cook, all his tremor over the blunder he had
made, disappearing, since, after all, things were quite satisfactory.
And the little plate forthcoming, Phronsie tucked away the paste
lovingly in its depths, and began the important work of concocting the
mixture with which the pie was to be filled, Mr. King sitting by with
the gravity of a statue, even to the deliberate placing of each plum.

"Where's Phronsie?" called a voice above in one of the upper halls.

"Oh! she's coming, Polly is!" cried Phronsie, deserting a plum thrust in
endwise in the middle of the pie, to throw her little sticky fingers
around Jefferson's neck; "oh! do take off my apron; and let me go.
She'll see my pie!"

"Stop!" cried Mr. King, getting up somewhat stiffly to his feet, "I'll
take off the apron myself. There, Phronsie, there you are. Whew! how hot
you keep your kitchen, Jefferson," and he wiped his face.

"Now we'll run," said Phronsie softly, "and not make a bit of noise,
Grandpapa dear, and, Jefferson, please put on my top to the pie, and
don't let it burn, and I'll come down very, very soon again, and bake
one all alone by myself for Grandpapa."

The old gentleman kept up very well with the soft patter of her feet
till they reached the foot of the staircase. "There, there, child," he
said, "there's not the least need of hurry now."

"But she will come down," said Phronsie, in gentle haste pulling at his
hand, "then if she should see it, Grandpapa!"

"To be sure; that would indeed be dreadful," said Mr. King, getting over
the stairs very creditably. "There, here we are now. Whew! it's terribly
warm in this house!"

But there was no danger from Polly; she was at this very instant, not
being able to find Phronsie, hurrying off toward the library in search
of Mrs. Whitney.

"We want to do the very loveliest thing!" she cried, rushing in, her
cheeks aflame. "Oh! pray excuse me." She stopped short, blushing
scarlet.

"Don't feel badly, Polly dear," said Mrs. Whitney, over in the dim
light, where the divan was drawn up in the east window, and she held out
her hand and smiled; the other lady whose tete-a-tete was thus summarily
disturbed was elderly and very tall and angular. She put up her eyeglass
at the intrusion and murmured "Ah?"

"This is Polly Pepper," said Mrs. Whitney, as Polly, feeling unusually
awkward and shy, stumbled across the library to get within the kind arms
awaiting her.

"One of the children that your kindness received in this house?" said
the tall lady, making good use of the eyeglass. The color mounted
steadily on Polly's already rosy cheek, at the scrutiny now going on
with the greatest freedom.

"One of the dear children who make this house a sunny place for us all."
said Mrs. Whitney distinctly.

"Ah? I see. You are extremely good to put it in that way." A low, well-
bred laugh followed this speech. Its sound irritated the young girl's
ear unspeakably, and the brown eyes flashed, and though there was really
no occasion to feel what was not addressed to her, Polly was quite sure
she utterly disliked the lady before her.

"My dear Mrs. Chatterton," said Mrs. Whitney in the gentlest of accents,
"you do not comprehend; it is not possible for you to understand how
very happy we all are here. The house is quite another place, I assure
you, from the abode you saw last before you went abroad."

Mrs. Chatterton gave another low, unpleasant laugh, and this time
shrugged her shoulders.

"Polly dear," said Mrs. Whitney with a smile, "say good-morning to Mrs.
Chatterton, and then run away. I will hear your wonderful plan by and
by. I shall be glad to, child," she was guilty of whispering in the
small ear.

"Good-morning, Mrs. Chatterton," said Polly slowly, the brown eyes
looking steadily into the traveled and somewhat seamed countenance
before her.

"Good-morning," and Polly found herself once more across the floor, and
safely out in the hall, the door closed between them.

"Who is she?" she cried in an indignant spasm to Jasper, who ran up, and
she lifted her eyes brimming over with something quite new to him. He
stopped aghast.

"Who?" he cried. "Oh, Polly! what has happened?"

"Mrs. Chatterton. And she looked at me--oh! I can't tell you how she
looked; as if I were a bug, or a hateful worm beneath her," cried Polly,
quite as much aghast at herself. "It makes me feel horridly, Jasper--you
can't think." Oh! that old"--He stopped, pulling himself up with quite
an effort. "Has she come back--what brought her, pray tell, so soon?"

"I don't know, I am sure," said Polly, laughing at his face. "I was only
in the room a moment, I think, but it seemed an age with that eyeglass,
and that hateful little laugh."

"Oh! she always sticks up that thing in her eye," said Jasper coolly,
"and she's everlastingly ventilating that laugh on everybody. She thinks
it high-bred and elegant, but it makes people want to kill her for it."
He looked and spoke annoyed. "To think you fell into her clutches!" he
added.

"Well, who is she?" cried Polly, smoothing down her ruffled feathers,
when she saw the effect of her news on him. "I should dearly love to
know."

"Cousin Algernon's wife," said Jasper briefly.

"And who is he?" cried Polly, again experiencing a shock that this
dreadful person was a relative to whom due respect must be shown.

"Oh! a cousin of father's," said Jasper. "He was nice, but he's dead."

"Oh!" said Polly.

"She's been abroad for a good half-dozen years, and why she doesn't stay
there when everybody supposed she was going to, astonishes me," said
Jasper, after a moment. "Well, it will not be for long, I presume, that
we shall have the honor; she'll be easily tired of America, and take
herself off again."

"She doesn't stay in this house, does she, Jasper?" cried Polly in a
tone of horror.

"No; that is, unless she chooses to, then we can't turn her off. She's a
relative, you know."

"Hasn't she any home?" asked Polly, "or any children?"

"Home? Yes, an estate down in Bedford County?-Dunraven Lodge; but it's
all shut up, and in the hands of agents who have been trying for the
half-dozen years she was abroad, to sell it for her. She may have come
back to settle down there again, there's no telling what she will do. In
the meantime, I fancy she'll make her headquarters here," he said
gloomily.

"Oh, Jasper!" exclaimed Polly, seizing his arm, feeling that here was
need of comfort indeed, "how very dreadful! Don't you suppose something
will happen to take her away?"

"I don't see what can," said Jasper, prolonging the gloom to feel the
comfort it brought. "You see she has nobody who wants her, to step in
and relieve us. She has two nephews, but oh! you ought to see them
fight!"

"Fight?" repeated Polly aghast.

"Yes; you can't dignify their skirmishes by any other name," said
Jasper, in disgust. "So you see our chances for keeping her as long as
she condescends to stay are really very good."

Polly clung to his arm in speechless dismay. Meanwhile conversation fast
and brisk was going on between the two shut up in the library.

"It is greatly to your discredit, Marian," said Mrs. Chatterton in a
high, cold voice, "that you didn't stop all this nonsense on your
father's part, before the thing got to such a pass as to install them in
this house."

"On the contrary," said Mrs. Whitney with a little laugh, "I did
everything I could to further the plan that father wisely made."

"Wisely!" cried Mrs. Chatterton in scorn. "Oh, you silly child! don't
you see what it will all tend to?"

"I see that it has made us all very happy for five years," said Mrs.
Whitney, preserving her composure, "so I presume the future doesn't hold
much to dread on that score."

"The future is all you have to dread," declared Mrs. Chatterton harshly.
"The present may be well enough; though I should think existence with
that low, underbred family here, would be a"?

"You may pause just where you are, Mrs. Chatterton," said Marian, still
with the gentlest of accents, but with a determination that made the
other look down at her in astonishment, "not another word shall you
utter in that strain, nor will I listen to it." And with fine temper
undisturbed in her blue eyes, she regarded her relative.

"Dear me, Marian! I begin to notice your age more now. You shouldn't fly
into such rages; they wear on one fearfully; and especially for a
stranger too, and against your own people--how can you?"

Mrs. Chatterton drew out a vinaigrette, then a fan from a silken bag,
with clasps that she was always glad to reflect were heirlooms. "It's
trying, I must confess," she declared, alternately applying the
invigorating salts and waving the combination of gauze and sandalwood,
"to come home to such a reception. But," and a heavy sigh, "I must bear
it."

"You ought to see father," cried Mrs. Whitney, rising. "I must go at
once and tell him of your arrival."

"Oh! I don't know that I care about seeing Cousin Horatio yet," said
Mrs. Chatterton carelessly. "He will probably fall into one of his
rages, and my nerves have been upset quite enough by you. I think I'll
go directly to my apartments." She rose also.

"Father must at once be informed of your arrival," repeated Marian
quietly. "I'll send him in to see you."

"And I shall go to my apartments," declared Mrs. Chatterton
determinedly.

"Hoity-toity!" exclaimed Mr. King's voice, and in he came, with
Phronsie, fresh from the kitchen, clinging to his hand.

II

COUSIN EUNICE CHATTERTON

Phronsie dropped one small hand by her side, and stood quite still
regarding the visitor.

"Oh, my goodness me," ejaculated Mrs. Chatterton, startled out of her
elegance, and not pausing to adjust the glass, but using her two good
eyes to the best advantage.

"Hoity-toity! So you are back again!" exclaimed Mr. King by way of
welcome. "Well, and if I may ask, what brought you now, Eunice?"

Mrs. Chatterton gathered herself up and smiled in a superior way.

"Never mind my reasons, Cousin Horatio. What a fine child you have
there;" now the glass came into play; "pray tell me all about her."

"You have well said," observed Mr. King, seating himself with the utmost
deliberateness, and drawing Phronsie to her accustomed place on his
knee, where she nestled, regardless of his immaculate linen and fine
waistcoat, "Phronsie Pepper is indeed a fine child; a very fine child,
Madam."

"Oh, my, and Oh, my!" cried Mrs. Chatterton, holding up her hands, "to
think that you can so demean yourself; why, she's actually mussing your
shirt-front with her dirty little hands!"

"Phronsie Pepper's hands are never dirty, Madam," said the old gentleman
gravely. "Sit still, child," as Phronsie in a state of alarm struggled
to slip down from his lap, thrusting the two members thus referred to,
well out before her.

Mrs. Chatterton burst into a loud laugh. "To think I have come to see
Horatio King in such a state! Jasper Horatio King!" she repeated
scornfully. "I heard about it through the Bascombs' letters, but I
wouldn't believe it till I used my eyes. It's positively dreadful!"

Mr. King put back his head and laughed also; so heartily, that Phronsie
ceased to struggle, and turned to regard him in silent astonishment; and
Mrs. Whitney, charmed that the rage usually produced by conversation
with Cousin Algernon's wife was not forthcoming, began to laugh, too, so
that the amusement of the tall lady was quenched in the general
hilarity.

"What you can find in my words to cause such an unseemly outburst, I
cannot see," she cried in a passion.

"I'm under the impression that you led off the amusement yourself," said
Mr. King, wiping his eyes. "Phronsie, it's all very funny, isn't it?"
looking down into the little wondering face.

"Is it really funny?" asked Phronsie. "Does the lady like it?"

"Not particularly, I suspect," said Mr. King carelessly.

"And that you can talk with that chit, ignoring me, your cousin's wife,
is insufferable." Mrs. Chatterton now arose speedily from the divan, and
shook out a flounce or two with great venom. "I had intended to make you
a visit. Now it is quite impossible."

"As you like," said the old gentleman, also rising, and placing Phronsie
on her feet, observing ostentatious care to keep her hand. "My house is
open to you, Eunice," with a wave of his disengaged hand in old-time
hospitality, "but of course you must suit yourself."

"It's rather hard upon a person of sensibility, to come home after a six
years' absence," said Cousin Eunice with a pathetic sniff, and once more
seeking her vinaigrette in the depths of the silken bag, "to meet only
coldness and derision. In fact, it is very hard."

"No doubt, no doubt," said the old gentleman hastily, "I can imagine
such a case, but it has nothing to do with you. Now, if you are going to
stay, Eunice, say so at once, and proceed to your room. If not, why you
must go, and understand it is no one's fault but your own."

He drew himself up and looked long and hard into the thin pale face
before him. Phronsie pulled at his hand.

"I want to ask the lady to stay, Grandpapa dear."

"She doesn't need urging," said old Mr. King quite distinctly, and not
moving a muscle.

"But, Grandpapa dear, she isn't glad about something."

"No more am I."

"Grandpapa," cried Phronsie, moving off a bit, though not deserting his
hand, and standing on her tiptoes, "I want her to stay, to see me.
Perhaps she hasn't any little girls."

"To see you?" cried Mr. King irately. "Say no more, child, say no more.
She's been abusing you right and left, like a pick-pocket."

"What is a pickpocket?" asked Phronsie, getting down from her tiptoes.

"Oh! a scoundrel who puts his hands into pockets; picks out what doesn't
belong to him, in fact."

Phronsie stood quite still, and shook her head gravely at the tall
figure. "That was not nice," she said soberly.

"Now do you want her to stay?" cried the old gentleman.

"Insufferable!" repeated Mrs. Chatterton between her teeth, "to mix me
up with that chit!"

"Yes, I do," said Phronsie decidedly, "I do, Grandpapa. Now I know she
hasn't any little girls--if she had little girls, she wouldn't say such
very unnice things; I want the poor lady to stay with me."

Mrs. Chatterton turned and went abruptly off to the door, hesitated, and
looked back.

"I see your household is in a very chaotic state, Cousin Horatio. Still
I will remain a few days," with extreme condescension, "on condition
that these Peppers are not thrust upon my attention."

"I make no conditions," said the old gentleman coolly. "If you stay, you
must accept my household as you find it."

"Come, Marian," said Mrs. Chatterton, holding out her hand to Mrs.
Whitney. "You may help me to my apartments if you like. I am quite
unstrung by all this," and she swept out without a backward glance.

"Has she gone?" cried Jasper, hurrying in with Polly running after.
"It's 'stay,' isn't it, father?" as he saw the old gentleman's face.

"Yes," said Mr. King grimly, "it is 'stay' indeed, Jasper."

"Well, now then, you've a piece of work on your hands about the biggest
you ever did yet, Polly Pepper!" cried Jasper, "to make things
comfortable in this house. I shall be just as cross as can be imagined,
to begin with."

"You cross!" cried Polly.

"Cross as a bear; Marian will fight against the prevailing ill wind, but
it will finally blow her down to a state of depression where her best
friend wouldn't recognize her, and"--

"You don't mention me, my boy," said Mr. King dryly.

Jasper looked into his father's eyes, and they both laughed.

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