“We surely are both imaginative,” Nann agreed, “for I also scent a most appetizing aroma on the air. But who could be cooking? We left Miss Moore in bed and anyway, of course, it is not she.”
They had reached the kitchen door and saw that it was standing open and that the tempting odor was actually wafting therefrom. Puzzled indeed, they bounded up the steps.
A surprising sight met their gaze. Miss Jane Moore, dressed in a soft lavender gown partly covered with a fresh white apron, turned from the stove to beam upon them; her eyes were twinkling, her cheeks were rosy from the excitement and the heat.
“Aunt Jane! Miss Moore!” the girls cried in astonishment. “Ought you to be cooking? Are you strong enough?”
“Of course I am strong enough,” was the brisk reply. “Haven’t I been resting for nearly two weeks? I thought probably you girls would be hungry after your long walk.” Then, as she saw the legal envelopes, she added with apparent satisfaction: “Well, they have come at last, have they? Put them in on my dresser, Dories; then come right back. It is such a fine day I thought we would take the table out on the sheltered side porch and have a sort of picnic-party.”
It was hard for the girls to believe that this was the same old woman who had been so grouchy most of the time since they had known her. Would surprises never cease? The girls were delighted with the plan and carried the small kitchen table to the sunny, sheltered side porch and soon had it set for three.
When they returned they found the flushed old woman taking a pan of biscuits from the oven. How good they looked! Then came baked ham and sweet potatoes, and a brown Betty pudding. The elderly cook seemed to greatly enjoy the girls’ surprise and delight. They made her comfortable in an easy willowed chair at one end of the table facing the sea and, when the viands had been served, they ate with great relish. To their amazement their hostess partook of the entire menu with as evident a zest as their own. Dories could no longer remain silent. “Aunt Jane,” she blurted out, “ought you to eat so heartily after such a long fast? You haven’t had anything but tea and toast since we came.”
Nann had glanced quickly and inquiringly at the old woman, and the suspicions she had previously entertained were confirmed by the merry reply: “I’ll have to confess that I’ve been an old fraud.” Miss Moore was chuckling again. “Every time you girls went away and I was sure you were going to be gone for some time, I got up and had a good meal.”
“But, Aunt Jane,” Dories’ brow gathered in a puzzled frown, “why did you have to do that? It would have been a lot more fun all along to have had our dinners all together like this.”
Miss Moore nodded. “Yes, it would have been, but I’m an odd one. There was something I wanted to find out and I took my own queer way of going about it.”