"Oh, Grandpapa!" exclaimed Phronsie in dire distress, "I sent him;
Jefferson didn't want to go, Grandpapa dear, really and truly, he went
because I asked him."

"If you please, sir," began Jefferson, hurrying up, "I only stepped off
a bit to the cellar. Bassett sent down a lot of turnips, they ain't
first-rate, and"--

"All right," said Mr. King, cutting him short with a wave of his hand,
"if Miss Phronsie sent you off, it's all right; I don't want to hear any
more elaborate explanations."

"Little Miss hasn't been alone but a few minutes," said Jefferson in a
worried way.

"And see," said Phronsie, turning back to her efforts, while one hand
grasped the old gentleman's palm, "I've almost got it to look like
Jefferson's. Almost, haven't I?" she asked, regarding it anxiously.

"It will be the most beautiful pie," cried Mr. King, a hearty enthusiasm
succeeding his irritability, "that ever was baked. I wish you'd make me
one sometime, Phronsie."

"Do you?" she cried in a tremor of delight, "and will you really have it
on the table, and cut it with Aunt Whitney's big silver knife?"

"That I will," declared Mr. King solemnly.

"Then some day I'll come down here again, Jefferson," cried Phronsie in