Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher (iphone ebook reader .TXT) đź“–
- Author: Dorothy Canfield Fisher
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Elizabeth Ann got down from her chair, poured some milk into the saucer,
and called: “Here, Eleanor! Here, Eleanor!”
Aunt Abigail looked at her sharply out of the corner of her eye and her
lips twitched, but a moment later her face was immovably grave as she
carried the last plate of pancakes to the table.
Elizabeth Ann sat on her heels for a long time, watching the kitten lap
the milk, and she was surprised, when she stood up, to see that Cousin
Ann and Uncle Henry had come in, very red-cheeked from the cold air.
“Well, folks,” said Aunt Abigail, “don’t you think we’ve done some
lively stepping around, Betsy and I, to get supper all on the table for
you?”
Elizabeth Ann stared. What did Aunt Abigail mean? She hadn’t done a
thing about getting supper! But nobody made any comment, and they all
took their seats and began to eat. Elizabeth Ann was astonishingly
hungry, and she thought she could never get enough of the creamed
potatoes, cold ham, hot cocoa, and pancakes. She was very much relieved
that her refusal of beans caused no comment. Aunt Frances had always
tried very hard to make her eat beans because they have so much protein
in them, and growing children need protein. Elizabeth Ann had heard this
said so many times she could have repeated it backward, but it had never
made her hate beans any the less. However, nobody here seemed to know
this, and Elizabeth Ann kept her knowledge to herself. They had also
evidently never heard how delicate her digestion was, for she never saw
anything like the number of pancakes they let her eat. ALL SHE WANTED!
She had never heard of such a thing!
They still did not ask her how she had “stood the trip.” They did not
indeed ask her much of anything or pay very much attention to her beyond
filling her plate as fast as she emptied it. In the middle of the meal
Eleanor came, jumped into her lap, and curled down, purring. After this
Elizabeth Ann kept one hand on the little soft ball, handling her fork
with the other.
After supper—well, Elizabeth Ann never knew what did happen after
supper until she felt somebody lifting her and carrying her upstairs. It
was Cousin Ann, who carried her as lightly as though she were a baby,
and who said, as she sat down on the floor in a slant-ceilinged bedroom,
“You went right to sleep with your head on the table. I guess you’re
pretty tired.”
Aunt Abigail was sitting on the edge of a great wide bed with four
posts, and a curtain around the top. She was partly undressed, and was
undoing her hair and brushing it out. It was very curly and all fluffed
out in a shining white fuzz around her fat, pink face, full of soft
wrinkles; but in a moment she was braiding it up again and putting on a
tight white nightcap, which she tied under her chin.
“We got the word about your coming so late,” said Cousin Ann, “that we
didn’t have time to fix you up a bedroom that can be warmed. So you’re
going to sleep in here for a while. The bed’s big enough for two, I
guess, even if they are as big as you and Mother.”
Elizabeth Ann stared again. What queer things they said here. She wasn’t
NEARLY as big as Aunt Abigail!
“Mother, did you put Shep out?” asked Cousin Ann; and when Aunt Abigail
said, “No! There! I forgot to!” Cousin Ann went away; and that was the
last of HER. They certainly believed in being saving of their words at
Putney Farm.
Elizabeth Ann began to undress. She was only half-awake; and that made
her feel only about half her age, which wasn’t very great, the whole of
it, and she felt like just crooking her arm over her eyes and giving up!
She was too forlorn! She had never slept with anybody before, and she
had heard ever so many times how bad it was for children to sleep with
grown-ups. An icy wind rattled the windows and puffed in around the
loose old casings. On the window-sill lay a little wreath of snow.
Elizabeth Ann shivered and shook on her thin legs, undressed in a hurry,
and slipped into her night-dress. She felt just as cold inside as out,
and never was more utterly miserable than in that strange, ugly little
room, with that strange, queer, fat old woman. She was even too
miserable to cry, and that is saying a great deal for Elizabeth Ann!
She got into bed first, because Aunt Abigail said she was going to keep
the candle lighted for a while and read. “And anyhow,” she said, “I’d
better sleep on the outside to keep you from rolling out.”
Elizabeth Ann and Aunt Abigail lay very still for a long time, Aunt
Abigail reading out of a small, worn old book. Elizabeth Ann could see
its title, “Essays of Emerson.” A book with, that name had always laid
on the center table in Aunt Harriet’s house, but that copy was all new
and shiny, and Elizabeth Ann had never seen anybody look inside it. It
was a very dull-looking book, with no pictures and no conversation. The
little girl lay on her back, looking up at the cracks in the plaster
ceiling and watching the shadows sway and dance as the candle flickered
in the gusts of cold air. She herself began to feel a soft, pervasive
warmth. Aunt Abigail’s great body was like a stove.
It was very, very quiet, quieter than any place Elizabeth Ann had ever
known, except church, because a trolley-line ran past Aunt Harriet’s
house and even at night there were always more or less hangings and
rattlings. Here there was not a single sound except the soft, whispery
noise when Aunt Abigail turned over a page as she read steadily and
silently forward in her book. Elizabeth Ann turned her head so that she
could see the round, rosy old face, full of soft wrinkles, and the calm,
steady old eyes which were fixed on the page. And as she lay there in
the warm bed, watching that quiet face, something very queer began to
happen to Elizabeth Ann. She felt as though a tight knot inside her were
slowly being untied. She felt—what was it she felt? There are no words
for it. From deep within her something rose up softly … she drew one or
two long, half-sobbing breaths … .
[Illustration: “Do you know,” said Aunt Abigail, “I think it’s going to
be real nice, having a little girl in the house again.”]
Aunt Abigail laid down her book and looked over at the child. “Do you
know,” she said, in a conversational tone, “do you know, I think it’s
going to be real nice, having a little girl in the house again.”
Oh, then the tight knot in the little unwanted girl’s heart was loosened
indeed! It all gave way at once, and Elizabeth Ann burst suddenly into
hot tears—yes, I know I said I would not tell you any more about her
crying; but these tears were very different from any she had ever shed
before. And they were the last, too, for a long, long time.
Aunt Abigail said, “Well, well!” and moving over in bed took the little
weeping girl into her arms. She did not say another word then, but she
put her soft, withered old cheek close against Elizabeth Ann’s, till the
sobs began to grow less, and then she said: “I hear your kitty crying
outside the door. Shall I let her in? I expect she’d like to sleep with
you. I guess there’s room for three of us.”
She got out of bed as she spoke and walked across the room to the door.
The floor shook under her great bulk, and the peak of her nightcap made
a long, grotesque shadow. But as she came back with the kitten in her
arms Elizabeth Ann saw nothing funny in her looks. She gave Eleanor to
the little girl and got into bed again. “There, now, I guess we’re ready
for the night,” she said. “You put the kitty on the other side of you so
she won’t fall out of bed.”
She blew the light out and moved over a little closer to Elizabeth. Ann,
who immediately was enveloped in that delicious warmth. The kitten
curled up under the little girl’s chin. Between her and the terrors of
the dark room loomed the rampart of Aunt Abigail’s great body.
Elizabeth Ann drew a long, long breath … and when she opened her eyes
the sun was shining in at the window.
A SHORT MORNING
Aunt Abigail was gone, Eleanor was gone. The room was quite empty except
for the bright sunshine pouring in through the small-paned windows.
Elizabeth Ann stretched and yawned and looked about her. What funny
wall-paper it was—so old-fashioned looking! The picture was of a blue
river and a brown mill, with green willow-trees over it, and a man with
sacks on his horse’s back stood in front of the mill. This picture was
repeated a great many times, all over the paper; and in the corner,
where it hadn’t come out even, they had had to cut it right down the
middle of the horse. It was very curious-looking. She stared at it a
long time, waiting for somebody to tell her when to get up. At home Aunt
Frances always told her, and helped her get dressed. But here nobody
came. She discovered that the heat came from a hole in the floor near
the bed, which opened down into the room below. From it came a warm
breath of baking bread and a muffled thump once in a while.
The sun rose higher and higher, and Elizabeth Ann grew hungrier and
hungrier. Finally it occurred to her that it was not absolutely
necessary to have somebody tell her to get up. She reached for her
clothes and began to dress. When she had finished she went out into the
hall, and with a return of her aggrieved, abandoned feeling (you must
remember that her stomach was very empty) she began to try to find her
way downstairs. She soon found the steps, went down them one at a time,
and pushed open the door at the foot. Cousin Ann, the brown-haired one,
was ironing near the stove. She nodded and smiled as the child came into
the room, and said, “Well, you must feel rested!”
“Oh, I haven’t been asleep!” explained Elizabeth Ann. “I was waiting for
somebody to tell me to get up.”
“Oh,” said Cousin Ann, opening her black eyes a little. “WERE you?” She
said no more than this, but Elizabeth Ann decided hastily that she would
not add, as she had been about to, that she was also waiting for
somebody to help her dress and do her hair. As a matter of fact, she had
greatly enjoyed doing her own hair—the first time she had ever tried
it. It had never occurred to Aunt Frances that her little baby-girl had
grown up enough to be her own hairdresser, nor had it occurred to
Elizabeth Ann that this might be possible. But as she struggled with the
snarls she had had a sudden wild idea of doing it a different way from
the pretty fashion Aunt Frances always followed. Elizabeth Ann had
always secretly envied a girl in her class whose hair was all tied back
from her face, with one big
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