Polly Oliver's Problem by Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

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"She ought not to be allowed to paint," said Margery decisively.

"Of course she ought n't! That's just what I say; and I ought not to
be allowed to keep boarders, and I won't!"

"I must say you have wonderful courage, Polly. It seems so natural and
easy for you to strike out for yourself in a new line that it must be
you feel a sense of power, and that you will be successful."

Polly's manner changed abruptly as she glanced in at her mother's empty
chair before she replied.

"Courage! Sometimes I think I have n't a morsel. I am a gilded sham.
My knees tremble whenever I think of my future 'career,' as I call it.
Mamma thinks me filled with a burning desire for a wider sphere of
action, and so I am, but chiefly for her sake. Courage! There 's
nothing like having a blessed, tired little mother to take care of,--a
mother whom you want to snatch from the jaws of a horrible fate. That
's a trifle strong, but it's dramatic! You see, Margery, a woman like
my mother is not going to remain forever in her present rank in her
profession,--she is too superior; she is bound to rise. Now, what
would become of her if she rose? Why, first, she would keep a country
hotel, and sit on the front piazza in a red rocker, and chat with the
commercial travelers; and then she would become the head of a summer
resort, with a billiard-room and a bowling-alley. I must be
self-supporting, and 'I will never desert Mr. Micawber,' so I should
make beds and dust in Hotel Number One, and in Hotel Number Two
entertain the guests with my music and my 'sprightly manners,'--that's
what Mr. Greenwood calls them, and the only reason I am sorry we live
in a republic is that I can't have him guillotined for doing it, but
must swallow my wrath because he pays twenty dollars a week and seldom
dines at home. Finally, in Hotel Number Three I should probably marry
the ninepin-man or the head clerk, so as to consolidate the management
and save salaries, and there would end the annals of the Olivers! No,
Margery!" cried Polly, waving the scissors in the air, "everybody is
down on the beach, and I can make the welkin ring if I like, so hear
me: The boarders must go! How, when, and where they shall go are
three problems I have n't yet solved; and what I shall find to take the
place of them when they do go is a fourth problem, and the knottiest
one of all!"

CHAPTER III.

THE DOCTOR GIVES POLLY A PRESCRIPTION.

As the summer wore away, Mrs. Oliver daily grew more and more languid,
until at length she was forced to ask a widowed neighbor, Mrs.
Chadwick, to come and take the housekeeping cares until she should feel
stronger. But beef-tea and drives, salt-water bathing and tonics,
seemed to do no good, and at length there came a day when she had not
sufficient strength to sit up.

The sight of her mother actually in bed in the daytime gave Polly a
sensation as of a cold hand clutching at her heart, and she ran for Dr.
Edgerton in an agony of fear. But good "Dr. George" (as he was always
called, because he began practice when his father, the old doctor, was
still living) came home with her, cheered her by his hopeful view of
the case, and asked her to call at his office that afternoon for some
remedies.

After dinner was over, Polly kissed her sleeping mother, laid a rose on
her pillow for good-by, and stole out of the room.

Her heart was heavy as she walked into the office where the doctor sat
alone at his desk.

"Good-day, my dear!" he said cordially, as he looked up, for she was
one of his prime favorites. "Bless my soul, how you do grow, child!
Why you are almost a woman!"

"I am quite a woman," said Polly, with a choking sensation in her
throat; "and you have something to say to me, Dr. George, or you would
n't have asked me to leave mamma and come here this stifling day; you
would have sent the medicine by your office-boy."

Dr. George laid down his pen in mild, amazement. "You are a woman, in
every sense of the word, my dear! Bless my soul, how you do hit it
occasionally, you sprig of a girl! Now, sit by that window, and we 'll
talk. What I wanted to say to you is this, Polly. Your mother must
have an entire change. Six months ago I tried to send her to a
rest-cure, but she refused to go anywhere without you, saying that you
were her best tonic."

Two tears ran down Polly's cheeks.

"Tell me that again, please," she said softly, looking out of the
window.

"She said--if you will have the very words, and all of them--that you
were sun and stimulant, fresh air, medicine, and nourishment, and that
she could not exist without those indispensables, even in a rest-cure."

Polly's head went down on the windowsill in a sudden passion of tears.

"Hoity-toity! that 's a queer way of receiving a compliment, young
woman!"

She tried to smile through her April shower.

"It makes me so happy, yet so unhappy, Dr. George. Mamma has been
working her strength away so many years, and I 've been too young to
realize it, and too young to prevent it, and now that I am grown up I
am afraid it is too late."

"Not too late, at all," said Dr. George cheerily; "only we must begin
at once and attend to the matter thoroughly. Your mother has been in
this southern climate too long, for one thing; she needs a change of
air and scene. San Francisco will do, though it 's not what I should
choose. She must be taken entirely away from her care, and from
everything that will remind her of it; and she must live quietly, where
she will not have to make a continual effort to smile and talk to
people three times a day. Being agreeable, polite, and good-tempered
for fifteen years, without a single lapse, will send anybody into a
decline. You 'll never go that way, my Polly! Now, pardon me, but how
much ready money have you laid away?"

"Three hundred and twelve dollars."

"Whew!"

"It is a good deal," said Polly, with modest pride; "and it would have
been more yet if we had not just painted the house."

"'A good deal!' my poor lambkin! I hoped it was $1012, at least; but,
however, you have the house, and that is as good as money. The house
must be rented, at once, furniture, boarders, and all, as it stands.
It ought to bring $85 or $95 a month, in these times, and you can
manage on that, with the $312 as a reserve."

"What if the tenant should give up the house as soon as we are fairly
settled in San Francisco?" asked Polly, with an absolutely new gleam of
caution and business in her eye.

"Brava! Why do I attempt to advise such a capable little person?
Well, in the first place, there are such things as leases; and in the
second place, if your tenant should move out, the agent must find you
another in short order, and you will live, meanwhile, on the reserve
fund. But, joking aside, there is very little risk. It is going to be
a great winter for Santa Barbara, and your house is attractive,
convenient, and excellently located. If we can get your affairs into
such shape that your mother will not be anxious, I hope, and think,
that the entire change and rest, together with the bracing air, will
work wonders. I shall give you a letter to a physician, a friend of
mine, and fortunately I shall come up once a month during the winter to
see an old patient who insists on retaining me just from force of
habit."

"And in another year, Dr. George, I shall be ready to take care of
mamma myself; and then--

"She shall sit on a cushion, and sew a fine seam,
And feast upon strawberries, sugar, and cream."

"Assuredly, my Polly, assuredly." The doctor was pacing up and down
the office now, hands in pockets, eyes on floor. "The world is your
oyster; open it, my dear,--open it. By the way," with a sharp turn,
"with what do you propose to open it?"

"I don't know yet, but not with boarders, Dr. George."

"Tut, tut, child; must n't despise small things!"

"Such as Mr. Greenwood," said Polly irrepressibly, "weight two hundred
and ninety pounds; and Mrs. Darling, height six feet one inch; no, I
'll try not to despise small things, thank you!"

"Well, if there 's a vocation, it will 'call,' you know, Polly. I 'd
rather like you for an assistant, to drive my horse and amuse my
convalescents. Bless my soul! you 'd make a superb nurse, except"--

"Except what, sir?"

"You 're not in equilibrium yet, my child; you are either up or down,
generally up. You bounce, so to speak. Now, a nurse must n't bounce;
she must be poised, as it were, or suspended, betwixt and between, like
Mahomet's coffin. But thank Heaven for your high spirits, all the
same! They will tide you over many a hard place, and the years will
bring the 'inevitable yoke' soon enough, Polly," and here Dr. George
passed behind the girl's chair and put his two kind hands on her
shoulders. "Polly, can you be really a woman? Can you put the
little-girl days bravely behind you?"

"I can, Dr. George." This in a very trembling voice.

"Can you settle all these details for your mother, and assume
responsibilities? Can you take her away, as if she were the child and
you the mother, all at once?"

"I can!" This more firmly.

"Can you deny yourself for her, as she has for you? Can you keep
cheerful and sunny? Can you hide your fears, if there should be cause
for any, in your own heart? Can you be calm and strong, if"--

"No, no!" gasped Polly, dropping her head on the back of the chair and
shivering like a leaf. "No, no; don't talk about fears, Dr. George.
She will be better. She will be better very soon. I could not live"--

"It is n't so easy to die, my child, with plenty of warm young blood
running pell-mell through your veins, and a sixteen-year-old heart that
beats like a chronometer."

"I could not bear life without mamma, Dr. George!"

"A human being, made in the image of God, can bear anything, child; but
I hope you won't have to meet that sorrow for many a long year yet. I
will come in to-morrow and coax your mother into a full assent to my
plans; meanwhile, fly home with your medicines. There was a time when
you used to give my tonics at night and my sleeping-draught in the
morning; but I believe in you absolutely from this day."

Polly put her two slim hands in the kind doctor's, and looking up with
brimming eyes into his genial face said, "Dear Dr. George, you may
believe in me; indeed, indeed you may!"

Dr. George looked out of his office window, and mused as his eyes
followed Polly up the shaded walk under the pepper-trees.

"Oh, these young things, these young things, how one's heart yearns
over them!" he sighed. "There she goes, full tilt, notwithstanding the
heat; hat swinging in her hand instead of being on her pretty head; her
heart bursting with fond schemes to keep that precious mother alive.
It's a splendid nature, that girl's; one that is in danger of being
wrecked by its own impetuosity, but one so full and rich that it is
capable of bubbling over and enriching all the dull and sterile ones
about it. Now, if all the money I can rake and scrape together need
not go to those languid, boneless children of my languid, boneless
sister-in-law, I could put that brave little girl on her feet. I think
she will be able to do battle with the world so long as she has her
mother for a motive-power. The question is, how will she do it
without?"

CHAPTER IV.

THE BOARDERS STAY, AND THE OLIVERS GO.

Dr. George found Mrs. Oliver too ill to be anything but reasonable.
After a long talk about her own condition and Polly's future, she gave
a somewhat tearful assent to all his plans for their welfare, and
agreed to make the change when a suitable tenant was found for the
house.

So Polly eased the anxiety that gnawed at her heart by incredible
energy in the direction of house-cleaning; superintending all sorts of
scrubbings, polishings, and renovating of carpets with the aid of an
extra Chinaman, who was fresh from his native rice-fields and stupid
enough to occupy any one's mind to the exclusion of other matters.

Each boarder in turn was asked to make a trip to the country on a
certain day, and on his return found his room in spotless order; while
all this time the tired mother lay quietly in her bed, knowing little
or nothing of her daughter's superhuman efforts to be "good." But a
month of rest worked wonders, and Mrs. Oliver finally became so like
her usual delicate but energetic self that Polly almost forgot her
fears, although she remitted none of her nursing and fond but rigid
discipline.

At length something happened; and one glorious Saturday morning in
October, Polly saddled Blanquita, the white mare which Bell Winship had
left in Polly's care during her European trip, and galloped over to the
Nobles' ranch in a breathless state of excitement.

Blanquita was happy too, for Polly had a light hand on the rein and a
light seat in the saddle. She knew there would be a long rest at the
journey's end, and that, too, under a particularly shady pepper-tree;
so both horse and rider were in a golden humor as they loped over the
dusty road, the blue Pacific on the one hand, and the brown hills,
thirsty for rain, on the other.

Polly tied Blanquita to the pepper-tree, caught her habit in one hand,
and ran up the walnut-tree avenue to the Nobles' house. There was no
one in; but that was nothing unusual, since a house is chiefly useful
for sleeping purposes in that lovely climate. No one on the verandas,
no one in the hammocks; after seeking for some little time she came
upon Margery and her mother at work in their orange-tree sitting-room,
Mrs. Noble with her mending-basket, Margery painting as usual.

The orange-tree sitting-room was merely a platform built under the
trees, which in the season of blossoms shed a heavy fragrance in the
warm air, and later on hung their branches of golden fruit almost into
your very lap.

"Here you are!" cried Polly, plunging through the trees as she caught
sight of Margery's pink dress. "You have n't any hats to swing, so
please give three rousing cheers! The house is rented and a lease
signed for a year!"

"That is good news, indeed!" exclaimed Mrs. Noble, laying down her
needle. "And who is the tenant?"

"Whom do you suppose? Mrs. Chadwick herself! She has been getting on
very nicely with the housekeeping (part of the credit belongs to me,
but no one would ever believe it), and the boarders have been gradually
weaned from mamma and accustomed to the new order of things, so they
are tolerably content. Ah Foy also has agreed to stay, and that makes
matters still more serene, since he is the best cook in Santa Barbara.
Mrs. Chadwick will pay eighty-five dollars a month. Dr. George thinks
we ought to get more, but mamma is so glad to have somebody whom she
knows, and so relieved to feel that there will be no general breaking
up of the 'sweet, sweet home,' that she is glad to accept the
eighty-five dollars; and I am sure that we can live in modest penury on
that sum. Of course Mrs. Chadwick may weary in well-doing; or she may
die; or she may even get married,--though that's very unlikely, unless
one of the boarders can't pay his board and wants to make it up to her
in some way. Heigho! I feel like a princess, like a capitalist, like
a gilded society lady!" sighed Polly, fanning herself with her hat.

"And now you and your mother will come to us for a week or two, as you
promised, won't you?" asked Mrs. Noble. "That will give you time to
make your preparations comfortably."

Polly took a note from her pocket and handed it to Mrs. Noble: "Mrs.
Oliver presents her compliments to Mrs. Noble, and says in this letter
that we accept with pleasure Mrs. Noble's kind invitation to visit her.
Said letter was not to be delivered, in case Mrs. Noble omitted to
renew the invitation; but as all is right, I don't mind announcing that
we are coming the day after to-morrow."

"Oh, Polly, Polly! How am I ever to live without you!" sighed Margery.
"First Elsie, then Bell, now you!"

"Live for your Art with a big A, Peggy, but it's not forever. By and
by, when you are a successful artist and I am a successful something,
in short, when we are both 'careering,' which is my verb to express
earning one's living by the exercise of some splendid talent, we will
'career' together in some great metropolis. Our mothers shall dress in
Lyons velvet and point-lace. Their delicate fingers, no longer sullied
by the vulgar dishcloth and duster, shall glitter with priceless gems,
while you and I, the humble authors of their greatness, will heap dimes
on dimes until we satisfy ambition."

Mrs. Noble smiled. "I hope your 'career,' as you call it, will be one
in which imagination will be of use, Polly."

"I don't really imagine all the imaginations you imagine I imagine,"
said Polly soberly, as she gave Mrs. Noble's hand an affectionate
squeeze. "A good deal of it is 'whistling to keep my courage up.' But
everything looks hopeful just now. Mamma is so much better, everybody
is so kind, and do you know, I don't loathe the boarders half so much
since we have rented them with the house?

"They grow in beauty side by side,
They fill our home with glee.

"Now that I can look upon them as personal property, part of our goods
and chattels, they have ceased to be disagreeable. Even Mr.
Greenwood--you remember him, Margery?"

"The fat old man who calls you sprightly?"

"The very same; but he has done worse since that. To be called
sprightly is bad enough, but yesterday he said that he shouldn't be
surprised _if I married well--in--course--of--time_!"

Nothing but italics would convey the biting sarcasm of Polly's
inflections, and no capitals in a printer's case could picture her
flashing eyes, or the vigor with which she prodded the earth with her
riding-whip.

"I agree with him, that it is not impossible," said Mrs. Noble
teasingly, after a moment of silence.

"Now, dearest aunty Meg, don't take sides with that odious man! If, in
the distant years, you ever see me on the point of marrying well,
simply mention Mr. Greenwood's name to me, and I 'll draw back even if
I am walking up the middle aisle with an ivory prayer-book in my hand!"

"Just to spite Mr. Greenwood; that would be sensible," said Margery.

"You could n't be so calm if you had to sit at the same table with him
day after day. He belongs at the second table by--by every law of his
nature! But, as I was saying, now that we have rented him to Mrs.
Chadwick with the rest of the furniture, and will have a percentage on
him just as we do on the piano which is far more valuable, I have been
able to look at him pleasantly."

"You ought to be glad that the boarders like you," said Margery
reprovingly.

"They don't, as a rule; only the horrors and the elderly gentlemen
approve of me. But good-by for to-day, aunty Meg. Come to the gate,
Peggy dear!"

The two friends walked through the orange-grove, their arms wound about
each other, girl-fashion. They were silent, for each was sorry to lose
the other, and a remembrance of the dear old times, the unbroken
circle, the peaceful schooldays and merry vacations, stole into their
young hearts, together with visions of the unknown future.

As Polly untied Blanquita and gave a heroic cinch to the saddle, she
gave a last searching look at Margery, and said finally, "Peggy dear, I
am very sure you are blue this morning; tell your faithful old
Pollykins all about it."

One word was enough for Margery in her present mood, and she burst into
tears on Polly's shoulder.

"Is it Edgar again?" whispered Polly.

"Yes," she sobbed. "Father has given him three months more to stay in
the university, and unless he does better he is to come home and live
on the cattle-ranch. Mother is heart-broken over it; for you know,
Polly, that Edgar will never endure such a life; and yet, dearly as he
loves books, he is n't doing well with his studies. The president has
written father that he is very indolent this term and often absent from
recitations; and one of the Santa Barbara boys, a senior, writes Philip
that he is not choosing good friends, nor taking any rank in his class.
Mother has written him such a letter this morning! If he can read it
without turning his back upon his temptations, whatever they may he, I
shall never have any pride in him again; and oh, Polly, I have been so
proud of him, my brilliant, handsome, charming brother!"

"Poor Edgar! I can't believe it is anything that will last. He is so
bright and lovable; every one thought he would take the highest honors.
Why, Margery, he is, or was, the most ambitious boy I ever knew, and
surely, surely he cannot have changed altogether! Surely he will come
to himself when he knows he may have to leave college unless he does
his best. I 'm so sorry, dear old Peggy! It seems heartless that my
brighter times should begin just when you are in trouble. Perhaps
mamma and I can do something for Edgar; we will try, you may lie sure.
Good-by, dearest; I shall see you again very soon."

Ten days later, Polly stood on the deck of the Orizaba just at dusk,
looking back on lovely Santa Barbara as it lay in the lap of the
foothills freshened by the first rains. The dull, red-tiled roofs of
the old Spanish adobes gleamed through the green of the pepper-trees,
the tips of the tall, straggling blue-gums stood out sharply against
the sky, and the twin towers of the old Mission rose in dazzling
whiteness above a wilderness of verdure. The friendly faces on the
wharf first merged themselves into a blurred mass of moving atoms, then
sank into nothingness.

Polly glanced into her stateroom. Mrs. Oliver was a good sailor, and
was lying snug and warm under her blankets. So Polly took a camp-chair
just outside the door, wrapped herself in her fur cape, crowded her
tam-o'-shanter tightly on, and sat there alone as the sunset glow paled
in the western sky and darkness fell upon the face of the deep.

The mesa faded from sight; and then the lighthouse, where she had
passed so many happy hours in her childhood. The bright disk of flame
shone clear and steady across the quiet ocean, seeming to say, _Let
your light so shine! Let your light so shine! Good luck, Polly! Keep
your own lamp filled and trimmed, like a wise little virgin!_ And her
heart answered, "Good-by, dear light! I am leaving my little-girl days
on the shore with you, and I am out on the open sea of life. I shall
know that you are shining, though I cannot see you. Good-by! Shine
on, dear light! I am going to seek my fortune!"

CHAPTER V.

TOLD IN LETTERS.

_Extracts from Polly Oliver's Correspondence._

SAN FRANCISCO, November 1, 188--.

DEAR MARGERY,--I have been able to write you only scraps of notes
heretofore, but now that we are quite settled I can tell you about our
new home. We were at a hotel for a week, as long as I, the family
banker, felt that we could, afford it. At the end of that time, by
walking the streets from morning till night, looking at every house
with a sign "To Let" on it, and taking mamma to see only the desirable
ones, we found a humble spot to lay our heads. It is a tiny upper
flat, which we rent for thirty dollars a month. The landlady calls it
furnished, but she has an imagination which takes even higher flights
than mine. Still, with the help of the pretty things we brought with
us, we are very cosy and comfortable. There is a tiny parlor, which,
with our Santa Barbara draperies, table-covers, afternoon tea-table,
grasses, and books, looks like a corner of the dear home sitting-room.
Out of this parlor is a sunny bedroom with two single brass bedsteads,
and space enough to spare for mamma's rocking-chair in front of a
window that looks out on the Golden Gate. The dining-room just holds,
by a squeeze, the extension-table and four chairs; and the dot of a
kitchen, with an enchanting gas-stove, completes the suite.

We are dining at a restaurant a short distance off, at present, and I
cook the breakfasts and luncheons; but on Monday, as mamma is so well,
I begin school from nine to twelve each day under a special
arrangement, and we are to have a little Chinese boy who will assist in
the work and go home at night to sleep. His wages will be eight
dollars a month, and the washing probably four dollars more. This,
with the rent, takes forty-two dollars from our eighty-five, and it
remains to be seen whether it is too much. I shall walk one way to
school, although it is sixteen squares and all up and down hill. . . .

The rains thus far have been mostly in the night, and we have lovely
days. Mamma and I take long rides on the cable-cars in the afternoon,
and stay out at the Cliff House on the rocks every pleasant Saturday.
Then we 've discovered nice sheltered nooks in the sand dunes beyond
the park, and there we stay for hours, mamma reading while I study. We
are so quiet and so happy; we were never alone together in our lives
before. You, dear Peggy, who have always had your family to yourself,
can hardly think how we enjoy being at table together, just we two. I
take mamma's coffee to her and kiss her on the right cheek; then
follows an egg, with another kiss on the left cheek; then a bit of
toast, with a bear-hug, and so on. We have a few pleasant friends
here, you know, and they come to see mamma without asking her to return
the calls, as they see plainly she has no strength for society. . . .
POLLY.

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