Mary paused. For a long moment, she scrutinised the three girls and their father. Then, she relaxed her features. "All right," she says with a soft smile. "They can stay with us for a bit."
Mr. Jones smiled, and so does the tallest of the three girls. "You'll take care of them, then? Just for a little while?"
"Until you've saved enough money to take care of them on your own." Mary told him. Emma and Anne cheered. Mr. Jones tuned to his girls.
"Alright, girls" he said sadly. "I've got to leave you here. But don't worry. I'll be back. Lizzie"-the oldest looked up mournfully -"take care of your sisters and do any chores you can to help. Jane"-the middle one glanced his way, tears streaming down her face- "Help them however they ask you to and look after Maria." He drew a deep breath and the youngest girl looked at him. "Maria, please, just be good." He gathered them around him, holding them close, Lizzie and Jane sobbing, while little Maria didn't really understand. "Goodbye," he bid them. "I'll be back as soon as I can. I love you. Be good girls." Detaching the two older ones from him, he wiped a tear from their cheeks and his, and then slowly turned and walked away. He turned back to Mary. "Thank you," he wept. "Thank you." No one could control their tears, especially not the Jones girls.
As he trudged away, Mary looked at Anne. "Take them inside," she told her quietly, almost mournfully. Anne did so, motioning for the three girls to follow her.
"You must be famished," she acknowledged. "Come in." The smell of baking bread enveloped them as they opened the door to the cottage. Anne sighed. "It's not much," she said," but it's home. When our brother comes home, we'll be putting in a loft for sleeping." She walked to the fireplace oven and checked the bread. It was almost ready, so she motioned the girls to sit down. "Remind me of your names and your ages, if you'd please."
"I'm Lizzie," whispered the oldest one. "I'm ten on the thirteenth of March."
"Just a few days away!" exclaimed Anne. "We'll be having a celebration for you, I can say that."
Lizzie smiled faintly. The middle one stood up. "I'm Jane," she announced," and I'm seven."
"Almost a young lady," smiled Anne. Jane gave Anne a big grin, showing a missing tooth in front.
"Where's Pa?" whined the littlest girl. She looked at Anne. "I'm Maria, I'm five, and I want my pa!" She burst into tears. Lizzie cradled Maria's head as Anne took the bread out of the fire. Setting it down on a towel, she went to the little girl.
"Maria, your pa will be back. Do you know how lucky you are to have him love you so much? My father would never do that." Wiping a tear off the rosy cheeks, she looked at the other girls. "Would you all like some bread with a little butter? We don't have much, but you should have some." The three girls vigorously nodded.
"We never had butter except on birthdays and Christmas," whispered Lizzie in awe as Anne cut the bread and spread the yellow butter on it.
"I can get it from the neighbors," Anne told them as they eagerly ate the warm, fragrant bread. "Soon, though, we'll get our own cow."
"Do you pay for it?" inquired Jane around a mouthful of her bread.
"Not with money," was the reply as Anne cut and buttered more bread. She opened the window and stuck out her head. "Bread's here if you want any!" she called to Mary and Emma. As she pulled her head back inside, she sat down with her own bread.
"How do you mean, you don't pay with money?" asked Lizzie. Emma walked in, sitting down at the table and taking some food.
"Sometimes, we give them eggs laid by our chickens," replied Anne.
"What're we talking about?" Emma questioned.
"Paying the neighbors for milk and butter." explained Anne as the door was opened and Mary went to the water barrel in the corner and wet a cloth, wiping the sweat from her face. "How are the chickens faring?" she asked Emma. "Mary, that's not ladylike."
"Fine, but one hen has stopped laying. It's been a month since she did." Emma went and filled a cup with water from the barrel and took a sip. " Also, we should be getting chicks soon."
After attempting to steal Emma's, Mary took her own slice of bread. "We have enough ladies in this house," she told Anne. "And no lady ever worked in the field. You'd have no food if it weren't for me."
Anne gave a sigh. "Well, just don't be such a tomboy in the house."
Emma eyed Mary. "And don't be such one outside, either," she added with a giggle. To Anne she said "She was eyeing one of the ditch-diggers in the neighbors' field today." Anne stared open mouthed at her older sister. "Thomas, was that his name?"
As the five other girls giggled (including Maria, who laughed because her sisters were laughing), Mary's cheeks flushed a magnificent beet colour that clashed horribly with her deep red hair. "It... it was nothing. Nothing! Truly!" she stammered. She tried desperately to change the subject. "Where will everyone sleep tonight?" she asked.
Now it was Anne's turn to stammer. " I must admit, I hadn't given that a thought. I suppose that Emma and I can share the fold out bed, as we have always done, and you can share the mattress with one girl, and we'll make up a bed somewhere else for the other two... oh, somewhere."
Emma looked around. "There's a heavy quilt here, and an extra pillow," she observed. She glanced at the Jones girls. "Would you be all right on a mattress made from the quilt there?" As the three dark heads bobbed their agreement, Emma went and made the quilt into a makeshift mattress in the space by the fire, placing a pillow on the top.
"What about to cover them?" Mary asked impatiently.
"Patience, Mary," warned Anne. " There's another blanket- just a crocheted one, but it'll do. The lasses will be by the fire in any case. They won't freeze."
"There," finished Emma, placing the said blanket on the bed. "Will it work?" she inquired of the girls, who ceased to lick every smudge of butter from their fingers and sat on the heavy blue quilt's makeshift purpose. Maria lay down in the spot nearest the embers of the dying fire and yawned. After stretching out once, the little girl promptly fell asleep. Her sisters followed the example, drifting to dreamland in the warm cottage that day as Mary softly laid another log in the fireplace, and Emma sang a lullaby while Anne sewed and the cool breeze blew outside.
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