Part 44

"You better set down," said the driver, an old man whom Miss Salisbury employed every year to superintend the business, "and make yourself comfortable."

"But I'm not in the least comfortable," said Alexia passionately, "and I don't want to be up here. I want to get down."

"But you can't,"--the old man seemed to fairly enjoy her dismay,--"'cause she, you know," pointing a short square thumb over his shoulder in the direction of Miss Salisbury, "told ye to set still. So ye better set."

But Alexia craned her neck yet more, and called insistently, "Polly--oh, Polly!"

Miss Anstice looked up from the bevy of girls she was settling in another barge. "Alexia Rhys," she said severely, "you must be quiet; it is impossible to get started unless all you girls are going to be tractable and obedient."

"Miss Anstice,"--Alexia formed a sudden bold resolve,--"please come here. I want you very much," she said sweetly.

Miss Anstice, pleased to be wanted very much, or indeed at all, left her work, and went over to the front barge where Alexia was raging inwardly.

"Miss Anstice, I need Polly Pepper up next to me," said Alexia, "oh, so much. She knows all about my arm, you know; her father fixed it for me. Will you please have her come up here? Then if I should feel worse, she could help me."

Miss Anstice peered here and there in her nearsighted fashion. "I don't see Polly Pepper," she said.

"There she is; there she is," cried Alexia, trembling in every limb, for her plan could not be said to be a complete success yet, and pointing eagerly to the end of her barge; "she's the fourth from the door, Miss Anstice. Oh, how lovely you are!"

Miss Anstice, quite overcome to be told she was lovely, and especially by Alexia, who had previously given her no reason to suppose that she entertained any such opinion, went with great satisfaction down the length of the barge, and standing on her tiptoes, said very importantly, "Polly Pepper, I want to place you differently."

So Polly, quite puzzled, but very obedient, crawled out from her seat, where she was wedged in between two girls not of her set, who had been perfectly radiant at their good fortune, and clambering down the steps, was, almost before she knew it, installed up on the front row, by Alexia's side.

"Oh Polly, what richness!" exclaimed that individual in smothered accents, as Miss Anstice stepped off in much importance, and hugging Polly. "I'm so glad my sling is on, for I never'd gotten you up here without the old thing," and she giggled as she told the story.

"Oh Alexia!" exclaimed Polly, quite shocked.

"Well, I may get a relapse in it, you don't know," said Alexia coolly, "so you really ought to be up here. Oh my goodness me! I forgot this man," she brought up suddenly. "Do you suppose he'll tell?" She peered around anxiously past Polly.

"Ef you'll set still, I won't tell that teacher," said the old man with a twinkle in his eye, "but ef you get to carryin' on, as I should think you could ef you set out to, I'll up an' give the whole thing to her."

"Oh, I'll sit as still as a mouse," promised Alexia. "Oh Polly, isn't he a horrible old thing!" in a stage whisper under cover of the noise going on around them.

"Hush," said Polly.

"Well, I'm not going to hush," cried Alexia recklessly; "I'm going to have a good time at the picnic to-day, and do just everything I want to, so there, Polly Pepper!"

"Very well," said Polly, "then when we get to the Glen, I shall go off with the other girls, Alexia," which had the desired effect. Alexia curled up into her corner, and hanging to Polly Pepper's arm, was just like a mouse for quiet. And off they went; the old man's whip going crack--snap! as he led the way with a grand flourish, as much better than his efforts of former years, as was possible!

The road led through winding, woodsy paths, redolent of sweet fern; the girls never tired of its delights, exclaiming at all the sights and sounds of country life at all such moments as were not filled to the brim with the songs that ran over from their happy hearts. So on and up they went to the Glen, a precipitous ravine some fifteen miles out from the city.

When the barges finally drew up with another grand flourish at the entrance, a smooth grassy plateau shaded by oaks and drooping elms, they simply poured out a stream of girls from each conveyance; the old man and his companion drivers laughing to see them tumble out. "Pretty quick work, eh, Bill?" said old man Kimball, "no screaming for first places now."

"It's the same beautiful, dear old Glen!" exclaimed Polly, with kindling eyes and dancing feet. "Oh Alexia, come on!" and seizing the well hand, they spun round and round, unable to keep still, having plenty of company, all the other girls following suit.

Polly looked at her little watch. "In five minutes we must stop. It'll be time to get the flowers."

"Oh, can we?" cried Alexia. "Misery me! I'm so tired cooped up in that barge, I feel stiff as a jointed doll, Polly Pepper."

"Well, I don't," said Polly, dancing away for dear life. "Oh Alexia, when Miss Salisbury gives the signal to explore, won't it be just fun!"

"I should say," cried Alexia, unable to find words that would just express the case.

There was always one routine to be observed in the annual picnic of the "Salisbury School," and no one thought for a moment of deviating from it. The maids collected the baskets taken from the wagons, and set them in a cool, shady place among the rocks just within the Glen. The girls ran hither and thither to collect flowers and ferns to drape Miss Salisbury's seat of honor, and one as near like it as possible for Miss Anstice. These were big crevices in the rocks, that were as comfortable as chairs, and having backs to them in the shape of boulders, they were truly luxurious. Indeed, Miss Salisbury had declared, when the seats were discovered by Polly Pepper at the first picnic after she joined the "Salisbury School," that she never sat in one more comfortable; and she was so pleased when she was led to it and inducted therein, all flower-trimmed with little vines trailing off, and arching over her head.