“Fairies can do anything!” declared Millicent. “Caroline knows all about them. Let’s go out in the yard where she is sitting with her sewing and get her to tell us a fairy story.”
“Run along,” said Mrs. Freeman. “You see you need not stay in to sew, since the seams are stitched.”
Anne actually forgot “Martha Stoddard,” so that when she jumped up to follow Millicent the wooden doll fell to the floor without either Anne or Millicent heeding it.
Rose smiled as she picked it up. “Fairies are useful little people sometimes,” she said to her mother.
The days went very rapidly. Every morning Anne helped Rose with the household work, and sewed on the garments Mrs. Freeman basted for her. Every day, too, she wrote in the book for Aunt Martha. Rose made tiny sketches on many pages: of a wasp’s nest, of Anne riding “Range,” of Aunt Anne Rose; and here and there were little landscapes. Anne had made up her mind to let Millicent keep the wooden doll, but she sometimes wished that she had left “Martha Stoddard” safe at home in Province Town.
Beside the work there were games of bowls on the green back of the house, and pleasant walks about the town. Rose and Anne had made several visits to Mistress Mason, and Anne had already purchased a fine pewter pitcher to take home to Aunt Martha, and was knitting a warm scarf for Uncle Enos. She had not spent all of her money, and planned to buy a wonderful blue silk sash, which Mistress Mason had shown the girls on one of their visits, as a gift for Amanda. She had sent a letter to Aunt Martha Stoddard by a Province Town fisherman known to the Freemans, and the time was near when “The Yankee Hero,” of which Anne’s father was first mate, was due in Boston.
“Like as not your father’s vessel will bring a fine prize into harbor,” Frederick said one morning as he and Anne were teaching Millicent to bowl, “unless some English frigate has captured her,” he added.
All up and down the coast English vessels were on the alert to seize American ships; but the American vessels were also on the outlook and had captured many of the enemy’s ships.
“They’ll not capture ‘The Yankee Hero,’” declared Anne. “She’s sailed by Province Town sailors,” and Anne gave her head a little toss, as if to say that Province Town sailors were the best in the world, as she indeed thought they were.
Frederick laughed pleasantly. “You think a good deal of that old sand heap,” he replied.