CHAPTER XVI AT GRANDMA BASCOM’S
“DAVIE must go over and sit with Grandma Bascom,” said Mrs. Pepper slowly. She looked worried
as she glanced up from her sewing by the window; then she smiled brightly over to him.
“Oh, Mamsie,” began Polly in dismay.
Davie laid down his slate¹ carefully on the table, and ran over to Mother Pepper’s chair.
“You see, Davie,” said Mrs. Pepper, snipping² off a little thread hanging from the sleeve to the coat
she was trying to finish, “no one else can be spared, and Grandma mustn’t be left alone, now that she
is sick.”
Polly took two or three quick little stitches in the other sleeve, then she threw down the needle. “But
Davie was going to help Mr. Atkins, you know, Mamsie,” she cried.
“Mr. Atkins told Davie he was only to come when not wanted for anything else, you know,” said
Mrs. Pepper, not pausing in her work.
“But, Mamsie,” began Polly again, at sight of Davie’s face.
“No, no, Polly,” said Mother Pepper firmly. “Davie must go to Grandma Bascom. And hurry now,
child, for work as we may, it will be much as ever we finish the coat in time.” She said no more to
Davie, who stood silently by her chair, and the kitchen became very quiet except for the ticking of the
old clock on the shelf.
“I’ll—I’ll go—Mamsie,” said Davie, swallowing hard.
“That’s Mother’s boy,” said Mrs. Pepper, beaming at him.
Davie wanted dreadfully to take his precious red-bordered slate along so that he could practise his
writing, but since no one said anything about it, he didn’t like to ask. So he took it off from the table,
and going over to the shelf, he stood up on his tiptoes and deposited it behind the old clock. Then he
went out and down the lane to Grandma Bascom’s.
Polly looked up a few minutes after and saw that the table was bare. “Well, I’m glad, anyway,” she
said, as she stopped to bite off a thread, “that Davie took his slate. Now he can practise on his
writing.”
“Don’t do that, Polly,” said Mother Pepper reprovingly; “never bite your thread. It’s bad for the teeth,
child.”
“My teeth are awfully³ strong, Mamsie,” laughed Polly, snapping her two rows of little white ones

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