The children were up with the dawn, uproariously and gloriously happy over the few ten cent gimcracks that Jerry had brought home the day before and that Judith had stuffed into their stockings. She caught the infection of their happiness, laughed with them over the antics of the Jack in the box and the monkey on a stick, and beguiled them with descriptions of Santa Claus and his swift reindeer, his home built of ice far up in the frozen north, his shop where he and his wife work all year to make playthings for good little boys and girls and his long, exciting gallops over the snow on Christmas Eve.
Having done up his morning chores, Jerry, feeling leisurely and luxurious in clean overalls, stretched himself in the rocking chair and listened contentedly to the prattle of the mother and children, showed the boys how to spin the tops and fell to carving them a whistle apiece to supplement the toys that Santa Claus had brought.
Annie was happy with a doll which she hugged maternally to her bosom, then absent-mindedly dragged about the floor by one leg.
Jerry had killed a hen the day before, and there was a gala dinner of stewed chicken, hominy, sweet potatoes, and a boiled pudding with sauce. They all gorged mightily.
After dinner Jerry took up his hat and strolled out through the barnyard. Judith was left alone with the children, now grown cross and fretful, the litter of broken toys and clutter of dirty dishes.
The dinner had been late, and it was after four o'clock and already growing twilight in the room before she had washed the last greasy pan. When she had finished everything and washed the table and hung up the dishrag, she pushed the frowsy strands of hair back from her face and sank into the rocking chair. Annie began to whimper and, putting her little hand over her stomach, said that she had a pain there. She gave the child a drink of water to help dissolve the colored candy she had eaten, then took her up and rocked her, crooning a song. The boys who had been wrangling all afternoon and constantly appealing to her to settle their differences, now fell to fighting, rolling over and over on the littered floor. She got up and slapped them both smartly.
"Naow, then," she said, administering a last cuff to Billy, "you'd otta think shame to yerse'ves, the way you been a-actin'. You jes set right to work the both of you an' pick up all them things an' put 'em in the box, an' don't let me hear nary word out'n you."
They subsided from loud wails to whimpers, then set to work sullenly picking up the toys and throwing them noisily at the wooden grocery box in which she had tried to train them to keep their things. When they thought their mother was not looking, they angrily nudged and pinched each other. Then, forgetting enmity, they began to make a glorious game of it and threw the playthings in all directions, trying to hit anything but the inside of the box. She tried to tell herself that they were only children having childish fun; but to her irritable nerves they seemed like little fiends. She felt a wild impulse to turn her back on everything, even the sick baby, and flee away along the roads, into the woods, anywhere where there was quiet and peace.
She put up with the turmoil for a while, sitting with closed eyes silently rocking the little girl. To the casual eye she looked passive and acquiescent enough; but her whole body and soul were one strung up tension of screaming protest. It was not until a tin railway car hit her on the side of the head that she got up and slapped both the boys again and reduced them once more to a sullen putting away of the toys.
Jerry lurched into the house, his hat over one eye, smelling of whiskey. He shambled into a seat by the stove, and she knew by the evil looks he cast at her that he was in an ugly drunk, a strange thing for him who was usually silly and good natured under the effects of alcohol. As she caught his glowering eye the smoldering sense of injury that she had been nursing all afternoon flared into hate and fury. If it came to a test of ugliness she could be more than his match, she told herself and her lips set together in grim lines.