"Grandma."
"What is it, child?"
"You goin' to put that cup-cake into the pan to bake it now, grandma?"
"Yes; I guess so. It's beat 'bout enough."
"You ain't put in a mite of nutmeg, grandma."
The grandmother turned around to Ann Mary. "Don't you be quite so
anxious," said she, with sarcastic emphasis. "I allers put the nutmeg in
cup-cake the very last thing. I ruther guess I shouldn't have put this
cake into the oven without nutmeg!"
The old woman beat fiercely on the cake. She used her hand instead of a
spoon, and she held the yellow mixing-bowl poised on her hip under her
arm. She was stout and rosy-faced. She had crinkly white hair, and she
always wore a string of gold beads around her creasy neck. She never
took off the gold beads except to put them under her pillow at night,
she was so afraid of their being stolen. Old Mrs. Little had always been
nervous about thieves, although none had ever troubled her.
"You may go into the pantry, an' bring out the nutmeg now, Ann Mary,"
said she presently, with dignity.
Ann Mary soberly slipped down from her chair and went. She realized that
she had made a mistake. It was quite an understood thing for Ann Mary to
have an eye upon her grandmother while she was cooking, to be sure that
she put in everything that she should, and nothing that she should not,
for the old woman was absent-minded. But it had to be managed with great
delicacy, and the corrections had to be quite irrefutable, or Ann Mary
was reprimanded for her pains.
When Ann Mary had deposited the nutmeg-box and the grater at her
grandmother's elbow, she took up her station again. She sat at a corner
of the table in one of the high kitchen-chairs. Her feet could not touch
the floor, and they dangled uneasily in their stout leather shoes, but
she never rested them on the chair round, nor even swung them by way of
solace. Ann Mary's grandmother did not like to have her chair rounds
all marked up by shoes, and swinging feet disturbed her while she was
cooking. Ann Mary sat up, grave and straight. She was a delicate,
slender little girl, but she never stooped. She had an odd resemblance
to her grandmother; a resemblance more of manner than of feature. She
held back her narrow shoulders in the same determined way in which the
old woman held her broad ones; she walked as she did, and spoke as she
did.
Mrs. Little was very proud of Ann Mary Evans; Ann Mary was her only
daughter's child, and had lived with her grandmother ever since she was
a baby. The child could not remember either her father or mother, she
was so little when they died.
Ann Mary was delicate, so she did not go to the village to the public
school. Miss Loretta Adams, a young lady who lived in the neighborhood,
gave her lessons. Loretta had graduated in a beautiful white muslin
dress at the high-school over in the village, and Ann Mary had a great
respect and admiration for her. Loretta had a parlor-organ, and could
play on it, and she was going to give Ann Mary lessons after
Thanksgiving. Just now there was a vacation. Loretta had gone to Boston
to spend two weeks with her cousin.
Ann Mary was all in brown, a brown calico dress and a brown calico,
long-sleeved apron; and her brown hair was braided in two tight little
tails that were tied with some old brown bonnet-strings of Mrs.
Little's, and flared out stiffly behind the ears. Once, when Ann Mary
was at her house, Loretta Adams had taken it upon herself to comb out
the tight braids and set the hair flowing in a fluffy mass over the
shoulders; but when Ann Mary came home her grandmother was properly
indignant. She seized her and re-braided the tails with stout and
painful jerks. "I ain't goin' to have Loretty Adams meddlin' with your
hair," said she, "an' she can jest understand it. If she wants to have
her own hair all in a frowzle, an' look like a wild Injun, she can; you
sha'n't!"
And Ann Mary, standing before her grandmother with head meekly bent and
watery eyes, decided that she would have to tell Loretta that she
mustn't touch the braids, if she proposed it again.
That morning, while Mrs. Little was making the pies, and the cake, and
the pudding, Ann Mary was sitting idle, for her part of the Thanksgiving
cooking was done. She had worked so fast the day before and early that
morning that she had the raisins all picked over and seeded, and the
apples pared and sliced; and that was about all that her grandmother
thought she could do. Ann Mary herself was of a different opinion; she
was twelve years old, if she _was_ small for her age, and she considered
herself quite capable of making pies and cup-cake.
However, it was something to sit there at the table and have that covert
sense of superintending her grandmother, and to be reasonably sure that
some of the food would have a strange flavor were it not for her
vigilance.
Mrs. Little's mince-pies had all been baked the day before; to-day, as
she said, she was "making apple and squash." While the apple-pies were
in progress, Ann Mary watched her narrowly. Her small folded hands
twitched and her little neck seemed to elongate above her apron; but she
waited until her grandmother took up an upper crust, and was just about
to lay it over a pie. Then she spoke up suddenly. Her voice had a timid
yet assertive chirp like a bird's.
"Grandma!"
"Well, what is it, child?"
"You goin' to put that crust on that pie now, grandma?"
Mrs. Little stood uneasily reflective. She eyed the pie sharply. "Yes, I
be. Why?" she returned, in a doubtful yet defiant manner.
"You haven't put one bit of sugar in."
"For the land sakes!" Mrs. Little did not take correction of this kind
happily, but when she was made to fairly acknowledge the need of it, she
showed no resentment. She laid the upper crust back on the board and
sweetened the pie. Ann Mary watched her gravely, but she was inwardly
complacent. After she had rescued the pudding from being baked without
the plums, and it was nearly dinner-time, her grandfather came home. He
had been over to the village to buy the Thanksgiving turkey. Ann Mary
looked out with delight when he drove past the windows on his way to the
barn.
"Grandpa's got home," said she.
It was snowing quite hard, and she saw the old man and the steadily
tramping white horse and the tilting wagon through a thick mist of
falling snow-flakes.
Before Mr. Little came into the kitchen, his wife warned him to be sure
to wipe all the snow from his feet, and not to track in any, so he
stamped vigorously out in the shed. Then he entered with an air of
pride. "There!" said he, "what do ye think of that for a turkey?" Mr.
Little was generally slow and gentle in his ways, but to-day he was
quite excited over the turkey. He held it up with considerable
difficulty. He was a small old man, and the cords on his lean hands
knotted. "It weighs a good fifteen pound'," said he, "an' there wasn't a
better one in the store. Adkins didn't have a very big lot on hand."
[Illustration: MR. LITTLE SELECTS THE THANKSGIVING TURKEY]
"I should think that was queer, the day before Thanksgivin'," said Mrs.
Little. She was examining the turkey critically. "I guess it'll do," she
declared finally. That was her highest expression of approbation. "Well,
I rayther thought you'd think so," rejoined the old man, beaming. "I
guess it's about as good a one as can be got--they said 'twas, down
there. Sam White he was in there, and he said 'twas; he said I was goin'
to get it in pretty good season for Thanksgivin', he thought."
"I don't think it's such very extra season, the day before
Thanksgivin'," said Mrs. Little.
"Well, I don't think 'twas, nuther. I didn't see jest what Sam meant by
it."
Ann Mary was dumb with admiration. When the turkey was laid on the broad
shelf in the pantry, she went and gazed upon it. In the afternoon there
was great enjoyment seeing it stuffed and made ready for the oven.
Indeed, this day was throughout one of great enjoyment, being full of
the very aroma of festivity and good cheer and gala times, and even
sweeter than the occasion which it preceded. Ann Mary had only one
damper all day, and that was the non-arrival of a letter. Mrs. Little
had invited her son and his family to spend Thanksgiving, but now they
probably were not coming, since not a word in reply had been received.
When Mr. Little said there was no letter in the post-office, Ann Mary's
face fell. "Oh, dear," said she, "don't you suppose Lucy will come,
grandma?"
"No," replied her grandmother, "I don't. Edward never did such a thing
as not to send me word when he was comin', in his life, nor Maria
neither. I ain't no idee they'll come."
"Oh, dear!" said Ann Mary again.
"Well, you'll have to make up your mind to it," returned her
grandmother. She was sore over her own disappointment, and so was
irascible towards Ann Mary's. "It's no worse for you than for the rest
of us. I guess you can keep one Thanksgivin' without Lucy."
For a while it almost seemed to Ann Mary that she could not. Lucy was
her only cousin. She loved Lucy dearly, and she was lonesome for another
little girl; nobody knew how she had counted upon seeing her cousin. Ann
Mary herself had a forlorn hope that Lucy still might come, even if
Uncle Edward _was_ always so particular about sending word, and no word
had been received. On Thanksgiving morning she kept running to the
window and looking down the road. But when the stage from the village
came, it passed right by the house without slackening its speed.
Then there was no hope left at all.
"You might jest as well be easy," said her grandmother. "I guess you can
have a good Thanksgivin' if Lucy _ain't_ here. This evenin' you can ask
Loretty to come over a little while, if you want to, an' you can make
some nut-candy."
"Loretta ain't at home."
"She'll come home for Thanksgivin', I guess. It ain't very likely she's
stayed away over that. When I get the dinner ready to take up, you can
carry a plateful down to Sarah Bean's, an' that'll be somethin' for you
to do, too. I guess you can manage."
Thanksgiving Day was a very pleasant day, although there was
considerable snow on the ground, for it had snowed all the day before.
Mr. Little and Ann Mary did not go to church as usual, on that account.
The old man did not like to drive to the village before the roads were
beaten out. Mrs. Little lamented not a little over it. It was the custom
for her husband and granddaughter to attend church Thanksgiving
morning, while she stayed at home and cooked the dinner. "It does seem
dreadful heathenish for nobody to go to meetin' Thanksgivin' Day," said
she; "an' we ain't even heard the proclamation read, neither. It rained
so hard last Sabbath that we couldn't go."
The season was unusually wintry and severe, and lately the family had
been prevented from church-going. It was two Sundays since any of the
family had gone. The village was three miles away, and the road was
rough. Mr. Little was too old to drive over it in very bad weather.
When Ann Mary went to carry the plate of Thanksgiving dinner to Sarah
Bean, she wore a pair of her grandfather's blue woollen socks drawn over
her shoes to keep out the snow. The snow was rather deep for easy
walking, but she did not mind that. She carried the dinner with great
care; there was a large plate well filled, and a tin dish was turned
over it to keep it warm. Sarah Bean was an old woman who lived alone.
Her house was about a quarter of a mile from the Littles'.
When Ann Mary reached the house, she found the old woman making a cup of
tea. There did not seem to be much of anything but tea and
bread-and-butter for her dinner. She was very deaf and infirm, all her
joints shook when she tried to use them, and her voice quavered when she
talked. She took the plate, and her hands trembled so that the tin dish
played on the plate like a clapper. "Why," said she, overjoyed, "this
looks just like Thanksgiving Day, tell your grandma!"
"Why, it _is_ Thanksgiving Day," declared Ann Mary, with some wonder.
"What?" asked Sarah Bean.
"_It is Thanksgiving Day, you know._" But it was of no use, the old
woman could not hear a word. Ann Mary's voice was too low.
Ann Mary could not walk very fast on account of the snow. She was absent
some three-quarters of an hour; her grandmother had told her that dinner
would be all on the table when she returned. She was enjoying the nice
things in anticipation all the way; when she came near the house, she
could smell roasted turkey, and there was also a sweet spicy odor in the
air.
She noticed with surprise that a sleigh had been in the yard. "I wonder
who's come," she said to herself. She thought of Lucy, and whether they
_could_ have driven over from the village. She ran in. "Why, who's
come?" she cried out.
Her voice sounded like a shout in her own ears; it seemed to awaken
echoes. She fairly startled herself, for there was no one in the room.
There was absolute quiet through all the house. There was even no
sizzling from the kettles on the stove, for everything had been dished
up. The vegetables, all salted and peppered and buttered, were on the
table--but the turkey was not there. In the great vacant place where the
turkey should have been was a piece of white paper. Ann Mary spied it in
a moment. She caught it up and looked at it. It was a note from her
grandmother:
We have had word that Aunt Betsey has had a bad turn. Lizz wants us
to come. The dinner is all ready for you. If we ain't home
to-night, you can get Loretty to stay with you. Be a good girl.
GRANDMA.
Ann Mary read the note and stood reflecting, her mouth drooping at the
corners. Aunt Betsey was Mrs. Little's sister; Lizz was her daughter who
lived with her and took care of her. They lived in Derby, and Derby was
fourteen miles away. It seemed a long distance to Ann Mary, and she felt
sure that her grandparents could not come home that night. She looked
around the empty room and sighed. After a while she sat down and pulled
off the snowy socks; she thought she might as well eat her dinner,
although she did not feel so hungry as she had expected. Everything was
on the table but the turkey and plum-pudding. Ann Mary supposed these
were in the oven keeping warm; the door was ajar. But, when she looked,
they were not there. She went into the pantry; they were not there
either. It was very strange; there was the dripping-pan in which the
turkey had been baked, on the back of the stove, with some gravy in it;
and there was the empty pudding-dish on the hearth.
"What has grandma done with the turkey and the plum-pudding?" said Ann
Mary, aloud.
She looked again in the pantry; then she went down to the cellar--there
seemed to be so few places in the house in which it was reasonable to
search for a turkey and a plum-pudding!
Finally she gave it up, and sat down to dinner. There was plenty of
squash and potatoes and turnips and onions and beets and cranberry-sauce
and pies; but it was no Thanksgiving dinner without turkey and
plum-pudding. It was like a great flourish of accompaniment without any
song.
Ann Mary did as well as she could; she put some turkey-gravy on her
potato and filled up her plate with vegetables; but she did not enjoy
the dinner. She felt more and more lonely, too. She resolved that after
she had washed up the dinner dishes and changed her dress, she would go
over to Loretta Adams's. It was quite a piece of work, washing the
dinner dishes, there were so many pans and kettles; it was the middle of
the afternoon when she finished. Then Ann Mary put on her best plaid
dress, and tied her best red ribbons on her braids, and it was four
o'clock before she started for Loretta's.
Loretta lived in a white cottage about half a mile away towards the
village. The front yard had many bushes in it, and the front path was
bordered with box; the bushes were now mounds of snow, and the box was
indicated by two snowy ridges.
The house had a shut-up look; the sitting-room curtains were down. Ann
Mary went around to the side door; but it was locked. Then she went up
the front walk between the snowy ridges of box, and tried the front
door; that also was locked. The Adamses had gone away. Ann Mary did not
know what to do. The tears stood in her eyes, and she choked a little.
She went back and forth between the two doors, and shook and pounded;
she peeked around the corner of the curtain into the sitting-room. She
could see Loretta's organ, with the music-book, and all the familiar
furniture, but the room wore an utterly deserted air.
Finally, Ann Mary sat down on the front door-step, after she had brushed
off the snow a little. She had made up her mind to wait a little while,
and see if the folks would not come home. She had on her red hood, and
her grandmother's old plaid shawl. She pulled the shawl tightly around
her, and muffled her face in it; it was extremely cold weather for
sitting on a door-step. Just across the road was a low clump of birches;
through and above the birches the sky showed red and clear where the sun
was setting. Everything looked cold and bare and desolate to the little
girl who was trying to keep Thanksgiving. Suddenly she heard a little
cry, and Loretta's white cat came around the corner of the house.
"Kitty, kitty, kitty," called Ann Mary. She was very fond of Loretta's
cat; she had none of her own.
The cat came close and brushed around Ann Mary so she took it up in her
lap; and wrapped the shawl around it, and felt a little comforted.
She sat there on the door-step and held the cat until it was quite
dusky, and she was very stiff with the cold. Then she put down the cat
and prepared to go home. But she had not gone far along the road when
she found out that the cat was following her. The little white creature
floundered through the snow at her heels, and mewed constantly.
Sometimes it darted ahead and waited until she came up, but it did not
seem willing to be carried in her arms.
When Ann Mary reached her own house the lonesome look of it sent a chill
all over her; she was afraid to go in. She made up her mind to go down
to Sarah Bean's and ask whether she could not stay all night there.
So she kept on, and Loretta's white cat still followed her. There was no
light in Sarah Bean's house. Ann Mary knocked and pounded, but it was of
no use; the old woman had gone to bed, and she could not make her hear.
Ann Mary turned about and went home; the tears were running down her
cold red cheeks. The cat mewed louder than ever. When she got home she
took the cat up and carried it into the house. She determined to keep it
for company, anyway. She was sure, now, that she would have to stay
alone all night; the Adamses and Sarah Bean were the only neighbors, and
it was so late now that she had no hope of her grandparents' return. Ann
Mary was timid and nervous, but she had a vein of philosophy, and she
generally grasped the situation with all the strength she had, when she
became convinced that she must. She had laid her plans while walking
home through the keen winter air, even as the tears were streaming over
her cheeks, and she proceeded to carry them into execution. She gave
Loretta's cat its supper, and she ate a piece of mince-pie herself; then
she fixed the kitchen and the sitting-room fires, and locked up the
house very thoroughly. Next, she took the cat and the lamp and went into
the dark bedroom and locked the door; then she and the cat were as safe
as she knew how to make them. The dark bedroom was in the very middle of
the house, the centre of a nest of rooms. It was small and square, had
no windows, and only one door. It was a sort of fastness. Ann Mary made
up her mind that she would not undress herself, and that she would keep
the lamp burning all night. She climbed into the big yellow-posted
bedstead, and the cat cuddled up to her and purred.
Ann Mary lay in bed and stared at the white satin scrolls on the
wall-paper, and listened for noises. She heard a great many, but they
were all mysterious and indefinable, till about ten o'clock. Then she
sat straight up in bed and her heart beat fast. She certainly heard
sleigh-bells; the sound penetrated even to the dark bedroom. Then came a
jarring pounding on the side door. Ann Mary got up, unfastened the
bedroom door, took the lamp, and stepped out into the sitting-room. The
pounding came again. "Ann Mary, Ann Mary!" cried a voice. It was her
grandmother's.
"I'm comin', I'm comin', grandma!" shouted Ann Mary. She had never felt
so happy in her life. She pushed back the bolt of the side door with
trembling haste. There stood her grandmother all muffled up, with a
shawl over her head; and out in the yard were her grandfather and
another man, with a horse and sleigh. The men were turning the sleigh
around.
"Put the lamp in the window, Ann Mary," called Mr. Little, and Ann Mary
obeyed. Her grandmother sank into a chair. "I'm jest about tuckered
out," she groaned. "If I don't ketch my death with this day's work, I'm
lucky. There ain't any more feelin' in my feet than as if they was lumps
of stone."
Ann Mary stood at her grandmother's elbow, and her face was all beaming.
"I thought you weren't coming," said she.
"Well, I shouldn't have come a step to-night, if it hadn't been for
you--and the cow," said her grandmother, in an indignant voice. "I was
kind of uneasy about you, an' we knew the cow wouldn't be milked unless
you got Mr. Adams to come over."
"Was Aunt Betsey very sick?" inquired Ann Mary.
Her grandmother gave her head a toss. "Sick! No, there wa'n't a thing
the matter with her, except she ate some sassage-meat, an' had a little
faint turn. Lizz was scart to death, the way she always is. She didn't
act as if she knew whether her head was on, all the time we were there.
She didn't act as if she knew 'twas Thanksgivin' Day; an' she didn't
have no turkey that I could see. Aunt Betsey bein' took sick seemed to
put everythin' out of her head. I never saw such a nervous thing as she
is. I was all out of patience when I got there. Betsey didn't seem to be
very bad off, an' there we'd hurried enough to break our necks. We
didn't dare to drive around to Sarah Bean's to let you know about it,
for we was afraid we'd miss the train. We jest got in with the man that
brought the word, an' he driv as fast as he could over to the village,
an' then we lost the train, an' had to sit there in the depot two mortal
hours. An' now we've come fourteen mile' in an open sleigh. The man that
lives next door to Betsey said he'd bring us home, an' I thought we'd
better come. He's goin' over to the village to-night; he's got folks
there. I told him he'd a good deal better stay here, but he won't. He's
as deaf as an adder, an' you can't make him hear anythin', anyway. We
ain't spoke a word all the way home. Where's Loretty? She came over to
stay with you, didn't she?"
Ann Mary explained that Loretta was not at home.
"That's queer, seems to me, Thanksgivin' Day," said her grandmother.
"Massy sakes, what cat's that? She came out of the settin'-room!"
Ann Mary explained about Loretta's cat. Then she burst forth with the
question that had been uppermost in her mind ever since her grandmother
came in. "Grandma," said she, "what did you do with the turkey and the
plum-pudding?"
"What?"
"What did you do with the turkey and the plum-pudding?"
"The turkey an' the plum-puddin'?"
"Yes; I couldn't find 'em anywhere."
Mrs. Little, who had removed her wraps, and was crouching over the
kitchen stove with her feet in the oven, looked at Ann Mary with a dazed
expression.
"I dunno what you mean, child," said she.
Mr. Little had helped the man with the sleigh to start, and had now come
in. He was pulling off his boots.
"Don't you remember, mother," said he, "how you run back in the house,
an' said you was goin' to set that turkey an' plum-pudding away, for you
was afraid to leave 'em settin' right out in plain sight on the table,
for fear that somebody might come in?"
"Yes; I do remember," said Mrs. Little. "I thought they looked 'most too
temptin'. I set 'em in the pantry. I thought Ann Mary could get 'em when
she came in."
"They ain't in the pantry," said Ann Mary.
Her grandmother arose and went into the pantry with a masterful air.
"Ain't in the pantry?" she repeated. "I don't s'pose you more'n gave one
look."
Ann Mary followed her grandmother. She fairly expected to see the turkey
and pudding before her eyes on the shelf and to admit that she had been
mistaken. Mr. Little also followed, and they all stood in the pantry and
looked about.
"I guess they ain't here, mother," said Mr. Little. "Can't you think
where you set 'em?"
The old woman took up the lamp and stepped out of the pantry with
dignity. "I've set 'em somewhere," said she, in a curt voice, "an' I'll
find 'em in the mornin'. You don't want any turkey or plum-puddin'
to-night, neither of you!"
But Mrs. Little did not find the turkey and the plum-pudding in the
morning. Some days went by, and their whereabouts was as much a mystery
as ever. Mrs. Little could not remember where she had put them; but it
had been in some secure hiding-place, since her own wit which had placed
them there could not find it out. She was so mortified and worried over
it that she was nearly ill. She tried to propound the theory, and
believe in it herself, that she had really set the turkey and the
pudding in the pantry, and that they had been stolen; but she was too
honest. "I've heerd of folks puttin' things in such safe places that
they couldn't find 'em, before now," said she; "but I never heerd of
losin' a turkey an' a plum-puddin' that way. I dunno but I'm losin' what
little wits I ever did have." She went about with a humble and resentful
air. She promised Ann Mary that she would cook another turkey and
pudding the first of the week, if the missing ones were not found.
Sunday came and they were not discovered. It was a pleasant day, and the
Littles went to the village church. Ann Mary looked over across the
church after they were seated and saw Loretta, with the pretty brown
frizzes over her forehead, sitting between her father and mother, and
she wondered when Loretta had come home.
The choir sang and the minister prayed. Suddenly Ann Mary saw him,
standing there in the pulpit, unfold a paper. Then _the minister began
to read the Thanksgiving Proclamation_. Ann Mary cast one queer glance
at her grandmother, who returned it with one of inexpressible dignity
and severity.
As soon as meeting was done, her grandmother clutched her by the arm.
"Don't you say a word about it to anybody," she whispered. "You mind!"
When they were in the sleigh going home she charged her husband. "You
mind, you keep still, father," said she. "It'll be town-talk if you
don't."
The old man chuckled. "Don't you know, I said once that I had kind of an
idee that Thanksgivin' weren't quite so early, and you shut me up,
mother," he remarked. He looked good-naturedly malicious.
"Well, I dunno as it's anything so very queer," said Mrs. Little. "It
comes a whole week later than it did last year, and I s'posed we'd
missed hearin' the proclamation."
The next day a letter arrived saying that Lucy and her father and mother
were coming to spend Thanksgiving. "I feel jest about beat," Mrs.
Little said, when she read the letter.
Really, she did feel about at her wit's end. The turkey and pudding were
not yet found, and she had made up her mind that she would not dare wait
much longer without providing more. She knew that another turkey must be
procured, at all events. However, she waited until the last minute
Wednesday afternoon, then she went to work mixing a pudding. Mr. Little
had gone to the store for the turkey. "Sam White was over there, an' he
said he thought we was goin' right into turkeys this year," he reported
when he got home.
That night the guests arrived. Thanksgiving morning Lucy and Ann Mary
and their grandfather and Lucy's father and mother were all going to
meeting. Mrs. Little was to stay at home and cook the dinner.
Thanksgiving morning Mr. Little made a fire in the best parlor air-tight
stove, and just before they started for meeting Lucy and Ann Mary were
in the room. Lucy, in the big rocking-chair that was opposite the sofa,
was rocking to and fro and talking. Ann Mary sat near the window. Each
of the little girls had on her coat and hat.
Suddenly Lucy stopped rocking and looked intently over towards the
sofa.
"What you lookin' at, Lucy?" asked Ann Mary, curiously.
Lucy still looked. "Why--I was wondering what was under that sofa," said
she, slowly. Then she turned to Ann Mary, and her face was quite pale
and startled--she had heard the turkey and pudding story. "Oh, Ann Mary,
it does look--like--oh--"
Both little girls rushed to the sofa, and threw themselves on the floor.
"Oh, oh, oh!" they shrieked. "Grandma--mother! Come quick, come quick!"
When the others came in, there sat Ann Mary and Lucy on the floor, and
between them were the turkey and the plum-pudding, each carefully
covered with a snow-white napkin.
Mrs. Little was quite pale and trembling. "I remember now," said she,
faintly, "I run in here with 'em."
She was so overcome that the others tried to take it quietly and not to
laugh much. But every little while, after Lucy and Ann Mary were seated
in church, they would look at each other and have to put their
handkerchiefs to their faces. However, Ann Mary tried hard to listen to
the sermon, and to behave well. In the depths of her childish heart she
felt grateful and happy. There, by her side, sat her dear Lucy, whose
sweet little face peeped out from a furry winter hat. Just across the
aisle was Loretta, who was coming in the evening, and then they would
pop corn and make nut-candy. At home there was the beautiful new turkey
and unlimited pudding and good cheer, and all disappointment and mystery
were done away with.
Ann Mary felt as if all her troubles would be followed by
thanksgivings.