"You see it was just this way," Jasper was rapidly telling off. "I was
going down by the Madeleine, and I thought I would bring Phronsie some
flowers; so I stopped at the market, and I couldn't find a little pot
of primroses I wanted, though I went the whole length; and at last,
when I had given up, I saw just one in front of a woman who sat at the
very end."
"Do hurry, Jasper, and get to the conclusion," said his father,
impatiently.
Polly dearly loved to have the story go on in just this way, as she
leaned forward, her eyes on Jasper's face, but she said nothing, only
sighed.
"Well," said Jasper, "I'll tell it as quickly as I can, father. And
there were a lot of children, father, all round the woman where she sat
on a box, and she was tying in a bunch some flowers that were huddled
in her lap, and the children were picking out the good ones for her;
and just then a man, who was bending over back of them all, breaking
off some little branches from a big green one, straightened up
suddenly, and, father, as true as you live," cried Jasper, in intense
excitement, "it was your poor man!"
"The children?" asked Mr. King, as soon as he could be heard for the
excitement.
"Are all his," cried Jasper, "and he took the money you gave him, and
set his wife up in the flower business down in front of the Madeleine.
Oh! and Phronsie, the doll you gave him was sitting up on another box,
and every once in a while the littlest girl would stop picking out the
flowers in her mother's lap, and would run over and wipe its face with
her apron.
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