uch butter on it, Nell? It isn't right to
waste nice good butter, is it?"

"Oh, Polly, how dreadful you are?" said Fly.

"What do you mean?" said Polly, fiercely.

She dropped her meek manners, gave one quick glare at the small speaker,
and then half turning her back on her, said in the gentlest of voices,
"What would you like me to do this morning, Helen? Shall I look over my
history lesson for an hour, and then practise scales on the piano?"

"You may do just as you please, as far as I am concerned," replied
Helen, who felt that this sort of obedience was far worse for the others
than open rebellion. "I thought you wanted to see father, Polly. He has
just gone into his study, and perhaps he will give you ten minutes, if
you go to him at once."

This speech of Helen's caused Polly to forget her role of the meek,
obedient martyr. Her brow cleared.

"Thank you for reminding me, Nell," she said, in her natural voice, and
for a moment later she was knocking at the Doctor's study door.

"Come in," he said. And when the untidy head and somewhat neglected
person of his second daughter appeared, Dr. Maybright walked towards
her.

"I am going out, Polly, do you want me?" he said.

"Yes, it won't take a minute," said Polly, eagerly. "May I housekeep
every second week instead of Nell? Will you give me the money instead of
her, and let me pay for everything, and buy the food. I am awfully
interested in eggs and butter, and I'll give you splendid puddings and
cakes. Please say yes, father--Nell is quite willing, if you are."

"How old are you, Polly?" said Dr. Maybright.

He put his hand under Polly's chin and raised her childish face to
scrutinize it closely.

"What matter about my age," she replied; "I'm fourteen in body--I'm
twenty in mind--and as to housekeeping, I'm thirty, if not forty."

"That head looks very like thirty, if not forty," responded the Doctor
significantly. "And that dress," glancing at where the hem was torn, and
where the body gaped open for want of sufficient hooks, "looks just the
costume I should recommend for the matron of a large establishment. Do
you know what it means to housekeep for this family, Polly?"

"Buy the bread and butter, and the meat, and the poultry, and the tea,
and the sugar, and the citron, and raisins, and allspice, and nutmegs,
and currants, and flour, and brick-bat, and hearthstone,
and--and----"

Dr. Maybright put his fingers to his ears. "Spare me any more," said