Esther shook her head. She did not seem much interested. But she asked eagerly: “Are the pumpkin cakes sweet?”
“Yes, indeed. You shall have one as soon as they are baked; may she not, mother dear?”
“Why, yes; only if Esther is not well it may not be wise for her to eat between meals,” responded Mrs. Carew.
“Oh! But I eat cakes whenever I want them,” declared Esther, “and I love sweets. I had a fine cake when I left home and I ate it all before we got to Lake Dunmore.”
Mrs. Carew thought to herself that she did not wonder Esther was always tired and not strong. Esther did not say that the “fine cake” had been sent as a gift to Faith. But her face flushed a little, and she added, “I meant to bring the cake as a present; but I was hungry.”
“Of course you were,” agreed Faith quickly. “Is not the pumpkin cool enough to cut, mother dear?” asked Faith.
“Yes,” replied her mother, setting the yellow pumpkin on the table.
“Come and see me do it, Esther,” said Faith, and Esther, with a little sigh, left the comfortable chair and came and leaned against the table.
With a sharp knife Faith cut a circle about the stem of the pumpkin and took it off, a little round, with the stem in the center. “That will be the work-box cover,” she explained, laying it carefully on a wooden plate. Then she removed the seeds and the pulp, putting the pulp in a big yellow bowl, and scraping the inside of the pumpkin shell. “There! Now when it dries a bit ’twill be a fine work-box, and it is for you, Esther,” she said; but Esther was watching Mrs. Carew, who was beating up eggs with the pumpkin pulp.
“Do you put spices in the cakes?” she questioned eagerly. “How long before they will be baked?”