There was to be apple-sauce, as is the custom with roast pork, but Mother had also made cranberry sauce because Father and Uncle Dan were fond of it.
Everybody would want apple-sauce, so Lucy took a spoon and filled seven glass dishes. She placed one at each plate. The cranberry sauce was in a large dish. It was to go in front of Olive, with a spoon and more glass saucers. Dora brought the dish from the pantry, holding it carefully in both hands.
What possessed Timothy just then? He liked to weave himself in and about people’s feet when he was hungry, but Timmy had eaten his dinner. If he had not been fed, there would be no peace for anybody in the Merrill kitchen. Timothy was not hungry and he should have been washing his face before the parlor fire, not walking in front of Dora.
Dora tripped over him. She held on to the dish, but spilled the cranberry on the table, all over Mother’s clean Thanksgiving cloth!
“Now, see what you’ve done!” cried Lucy, perfectly horrified.
Poor Dora picked herself up. What cranberry wasn’t on the table-cloth was on her pretty white dress.
What a dreadful thing to happen! But the worst was that Lucy spoke as though she thought Dora meant to do it. Would Mother think the same?
Mrs. Merrill came out of the pantry and for a moment she looked as though she didn’t know what to do any more than the children. Dora stood with her lip quivering and her eyes full of tears.
“Well, that is too bad,” said Mrs. Merrill. “Stop crying, Dora; it doesn’t mend matters. Of course you didn’t mean to do it.”