In this way she
strove to work off the impatience possessing her for the beautiful hour
to come after breakfast. "I can hardly believe it now," she thought,
and she gave herself a little pinch to see if she were really awake;
"it seems too good to be true to think that the great Professor
Bauricke is actually going to tell me how to learn to play well!"
"Say," a voice struck upon her ear, "oh, I'm in the most awful
distress."
Polly clapped her book to, and looked up.
"O dear, dear!" It was a tall, spare woman with a face that had
something about it like Grandma Bascom's. It must have been the cap-frills
flapping around her cheeks.
"What can I do for you?" asked Polly, springing up. "Oh, do take my
chair and sit down and tell me about it."
"Oh, will you help me? The land! I couldn't set when I'm in such
trouble," declared the old woman. "My senses, I should fly off the
handle!" Polly, feeling that she was in the presence of some dreadful
calamity, stood quite still. "You see, me and my sister--she's in
highstrikes now in there." The old woman tossed her head to indicate a
room further down the hall, whereat the cap-frills flapped wilder than
ever. "Bein' as it belonged to both of us, she feels as bad as I do,
but as I was the one that lost it, why it stands to reason I've got to
shake around and get it again. Say, will you help me? You've got a pair
of bright eyes as ever I see in a head; and what's the good of 'em if
you can't help in trouble like this?"
Polly, feeling that her eyes would never forgive her if she didn't let
them help on such an occasion, promised.
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