"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; today, 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 today 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."
"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.
Millionaire
Mike's Thanksgiving A Thanksgiving story to enjoy with your
children, in which a millionaire learns an important lesson from a young, needy
boy. To read online or print.
Ann Mary -
Her Two Thanksgivings
Brave Ann Mary has a lonely Thanksgiving - but all is well in the end! To read
online or print.
