"They've gone. Mrs. Wiggins and old Mrs. Wiggins were dreadful mad. Oh,
Ruth, you didn't do it on purpose, did you?"
"Do what on purpose?" said Ruth, pushing into the house, and looking
around the empty kitchen in a bewildered way. "I don't know what you
mean."
"Don't you know what you put into that parsnip stew?"
"No; I don't know of anything I put in but some salt, just before I went
to school; mother told me to. Why?"
"Oh, Ruth, you put in--saleratus!"
"I don't believe it."
Ruth flew into the pantry, and came out with a cracked blue cup. "Here,"
said she--"here's the salt-cup, and this is the one I got it out of, I
know."
"Taste of it," said Serena, solemnly.
Ruth tasted. "It _is_ saleratus," said she, looking at her sister in
horror. "Did it spoil the stew?"
"It was--dreadful."
"I don't see how it happened," Ruth said, slowly, puckering her
forehead, "unless mother dipped out some saleratus in the salt-cup to
bring out in the kitchen when she mixed the sour-milk cakes for
breakfast. I don't know anything about it, true's I live and breathe. I
hope they didn't think I did such a mean thing as that on purpose."
"Well, I don't know as they really thought you did, but you know you did
kind of jerk round, Ruth, and the Wigginses saw it."
"What did they say?"
"Well," said Serena, "we all sat down to the table, and mother had put
on the bread and apple-sauce for the rest of us, and she helped the
Wigginses to the stew. There wasn't more'n enough to go around, but she
kept the cover over the dish so they shouldn't suspect, and all the
rest of us said we wouldn't take any.
"Well, Mrs. Wiggins she tasted, and old Mrs. Wiggins she tasted. Then
they looked at mother. Mother she didn't know what it meant, and she
kept getting redder and redder. Finally she spoke up. 'Is there anything
the matter with the stew?' says she.
"Then Mrs. Wiggins she pushed over her plate for mother to taste of the
stew, and the first thing we knew they were all talking at once. Old
Mrs. Wiggins said she'd noticed how we acted kind of stiff, and as if we
wasn't glad to see them, the minute she come, and Mrs. Wiggins said she
had, too, and she'd seen you put the saleratus into the stew, and she
thought from the way you switched around you were up to something.
Mother she tried to excuse it off, but they wouldn't hear a word. They
said it didn't look very likely that it was an accident, and they
noticed none of us took any of it, and mother wouldn't tell them the
reason for that. So they just got up and put on their things, and Mr.
Wiggins backed out the horse, and they went home. Mother asked them to
come again, and she'd try and have a better dinner, but they said they'd
never set foot in the house again if they knew it."
"Didn't anybody eat the stew?"
"Nobody but Sammy Wiggins; he ate his whole plateful, saleratus and all,
before anybody spoke."
"Oh dear!" said Ruth; "I suppose mother feels dreadfully. Where is she?"
"She's gone over to Lucy Ann's to help her take care of the baby; he was
real sick last night. I don't believe she'll come home till after
supper. She felt dreadful."
"The Wigginses are dreadful touchy folks, anyhow."
"Course they are. It don't seem as if anybody with any sense would get
mad at such a thing. But they're always suspecting folks of meaning
something."
Ruth looked sternly reflective. She took off her thick dingy shawl, and
got from its peg a bright red and green plaid one that she wore in
pleasant weather.
"Where are you going?" asked Serena.
"I'm going over to the Wigginses'."
"What for?"
"I'm going to ask them to come over here to-morrow and spend the day."
"Why, Ruth Whitman, ain't you afraid to?"
"No, I ain't afraid. I'm going to carry over a jar of the honey--mother
'll be willing--and I'm going to tell Mrs. Wiggins just how it was."
"She won't hear a word you say."
"I'll make her hear."
"They won't come a step."
"You see."
The Whitmans kept bees, and their honey was the celebrated luxury of the
neighborhood. Ruth got a jar of clear white honey out of the closet, put
it under her shawl, and was off. First, though, she instructed Serena to
go out in the garden and dig a good supply of parsnips and clean them
for the next day's dinner.
It was a mile to the Wigginses', and it took Ruth over an hour to
accomplish her errand and return. When she got home she found Serena
getting supper, and her father was washing his hands out in the shed;
her mother had not returned. On the kitchen sink lay a tin pan with four
or five muddy parsnips. Serena looked up eagerly when her sister
entered. "They coming?" said she.
"Yes, they are," replied Ruth, with a triumphant smile.
But Serena walked over to the sink and extended her arm with a tragical
gesture towards the parsnips. "Well, you've gone and done it now, Ruth
Whitman," said she. "There's every single parsnip that's fit to eat that
I could find in the garden."
"H'm! I guess I can find some."
"No, you can't; they've rotted. I heard mother say to-day she was afraid
they had. More'n half those father brought in this morning weren't good
for anything. When mother finds out that all the Wigginses are coming,
and there's just five parsnips for dinner, I don't know what she will
do; I don't know but it will kill her. And she's asked Uncle Caleb and
Uncle Silas over, too."
Ruth gave a desperate glance at the parsnips. "I said we were going to
have parsnip stew," said she, "Mrs. Wiggins had been crying; she looked
dreadful tired out; and Sammy had just bumped his head, and there was a
great lump over one eye. She took the honey, and said she'd be real
happy to come if they could have the horse, and old Mrs. Wiggins acted
dreadful tickled."
"The Wigginses have got parsnips," said Serena. "I heard Mrs. Wiggins
say they'd got a splendid lot, she expected, but they hadn't dug any
yet."