Tabithas Vacation | Page 9

to have known more than to stick the baby's dirty
hands into the molasses pail and butter crock."
"Not dirty!" screamed the outraged Janie, striking the face above her
with a dripping fist. "On'y burned! Ve pan was--" Her sentence
unfinished, she found herself ruthlessly shaken and dumped into the
middle of the floor, while angry Tabitha rushed out of the door into the
cool dusk of early evening, leaving a dismayed family staring aghast at
each other in the hot kitchen. Even the amazed baby forgot to voice her
protest at such treatment, but stood where she had landed, staring with
round, scared eyes after the fleeing figure.
Down the mountainside sped Tabitha to the big boulder, wheeled about
and rushed back to the house as swiftly as she had left it, and before the

astounded children had recovered their breath, she cried, "I am sorry I
was cross. I reckon I'm a little tired and everything has gone upside
down and--suppose we have supper now. I know you are all hungry.
Susie, while I am tying up Janie's hands, you might put the potatoes on
in the frying pan; Irene, set the table; Inez, fetch the water; and Mercy,
cut the bread. Is the gingerbread done, Gloriana?"
"Yes," responded the junior housekeeper proudly, "and already sliced
for the table. Shall I bring in the pie?"
"The pies!" shouted the six McKittricks.
"I had forgotten all about them," confessed the older girl. "Yes, you
better get them right away. One will be enough for supper,--the tins are
so large."
While Tabitha was speaking, Gloriana had stepped briskly out of the
door into the summer night and disappeared around the corner of the
house; but immediately a terrified scream pierced the air, there was a
loud snort and the sound of startled, scampering feet, and Gloriana
burst into the room again bearing an empty plate in one hand and a
dilapidated looking pie, minus all its frosting, in the other.
"Oh, our lovely pies!" wailed the children in chorus.
"The burros!" gasped Tabitha.
Gloriana nodded. "One had his nose right in the middle of this pie. The
other beast had upset the second tin and was licking up the crumbs
from the gravel."
"Oh, dear, I want some pie!" whimpered Rosslyn, puckering his face to
cry.
"Ain't that the worst luck?" Susie burst out.
"If you had put the pies in the window to cool, like mamma does--"
began Inez.

"It's too late to make any more to-night," Gloriana hastily interrupted,
seeing a wrathful sparkle in Tabitha's black eyes; "but if you don't
make any more fuss about it this time, we'll bake some to-morrow."
"And if you want any supper at all, you'd better come now," advised
Mercedes, from her post by the stove, where she was vigorously
making hash of the sliced potatoes. "This stuff is beginning to burn."
Gloriana rescued the frying pan, and the disappointed children gathered
about the table, trying to look cheerful, but failing dismally.
"Don't want any 'tato," objected Janie, scorning the proffered dish.
"Dingerbread!"
"Potato and beans first," insisted Tabitha.
"Dingerbread!" stubbornly repeated the child, so sleepy and cross that
the weary older girl said no more, but slid a large slice of the savory
cake into the little plate, and proceeded to help the other children in the
same liberal manner. No one wanted beans and potato, but at the first
mouthful of the tempting-looking gingerbread, everyone paused,
looked inquiringly at her neighbor, chewed cautiously a time or two,
and then eight hands went to eight pair of lips.
"I thought we stoned raisins for this cake," cried Susie, half
indignantly.
"So you did," replied Gloriana, her face flushed crimson as she bent
over her plate, intently examining her slice of cake.
"Oh, and put the stones in the cake! What did you do with the raisins?"
demanded Inez.
Before Glory could frame a reply, or offer any excuse for the accident,
Irene slid hurriedly off her chair, flew through the doorway and down
the path toward town, but she was back in a moment, and in her hand
she held a cup of raisins.

"Why, Irene McKittrick!" cried Mercedes, lifting her hands in horror.
"What made you hide them?"
"I didn't hide them," the twin indignantly protested. "The cup was in
my lap when Rosslyn called that Janie was lost, and I forgot to put it
down when I ran out-doors. I remembered it by the time we reached
our playhouse, so I set it down there and that's where I found it now."
"Janie wasn't lost," interrupted that small maiden in drowsy tones. "Me
went to get a letter."
"To get a letter!" chorused her sisters. "Where?"
"To the store where Mercy goes. A man dave me one, too," she
finished triumphantly,