"Now you are a fairy godmother! Now you are a fairy godmother!" exclaimed Jackie, dancing around her.
"Then I will put a charm upon you at once," Lois said. "No more dancing, no more noise, no more anything, until we get the wraps all off and put away; then you and I will go and—fry chicken—and sausages—for dinner!"
The last part of the sentence was whispered in Jack's ear, and caused him to smile contentedly, and to submit without a murmur to the process of unwrapping.
After dinner,—which did great credit to Lois and her assistant,—they gathered around the Franklin in the sitting-room, with plates of "sops-of-wine" and golden pippins within easy reach, and Mr. Grier and Mr. Merrithew talked farming and politics, while Miss Prudence recounted any episodes of interest that had taken place at or near Hemlock Point during the past year.
Mrs. Merrithew, who had spent her summers here as a girl, knew every one for miles around, and loved to hear the annals of the neighbourhood, told in Miss Prudence's picturesque way, with an occasional pithy comment from Miss Alma.
Dora sat, taking in with eager eyes the view of hill and intervale, island and ice-bound river; then turning back to the cosey interior, with its home-made carpet, bright curtains, and large bookcase with glass doors.
After a little while Lois, who saw that the children were growing weary of sitting still, proposed a stroll through the house, to which they gladly consented. Katherine asked if she might go with them, and they left "the enchanted circle around the fire," and crossed the hall to the "best parlour,"—which Miss Prudence always wished to throw open in Mrs. Merrithew's honour, and which the latter always refused to sit in, because, as she frankly said, it gave her the shivers. This was not on account of any ill-taste in the furnishing, but because it was always kept dark and shut up, and Mrs. Merrithew said it could not be made cheery all of a sudden. The children, however, loved the long room, and the mysterious feeling it gave them when they first went in, and had to grope their way to the windows, draw back the curtains, and put up the yellow Venetian blinds, letting the clear, wintry light into this shadowy domain. This light brought out the rich, dark colours of the carpet, and showed the treasures of chairs and tables that would have made a collector's mouth water. There was a round table of polished mahogany in the centre of the room, a tiny butternut sewing-table in one corner, and against the wall, on opposite sides of the room, two rosewood tables, with quaint carved legs, and feet of shining brass. On the tables lay many curious shells, big lumps of coral, and rare, many-coloured seaweeds,—for there had been a sailor-uncle in the family,—annuals and beauty-books in gorgeous bindings, albums through which the children looked with never-failing delight, work-boxes and portfolios inlaid with mother-of-pearl; almost all the treasures of the family, in fact, laid away here in state, like Jean Ingelow's dead year, "shut in a sacred gloom."
When this room had been inspected and admired, they lowered the blinds, drew the curtains, and left it again to its solitude. The rest of the house was much less awe-inspiring, but it was all delightful. The loom, now seldom or never used, stood in one corner of the kitchen. Not far away was the big spinning-wheel. Miss Dean tried to teach them to spin, and when they found it was not so easy as it looked, gave them a specimen of how it should be done that seemed almost magical. There is, indeed, something that suggests magic about spinning,—the rhythmically stepping figure, the whirling brown wheel, the rolls of wool, changed by a perfectly measured twirl and pull into lengths of snow-white yarn, and the soothing, drowsy hum, the most restful sound that labour can produce.
Then there was the up-stairs to visit. The chief thing of interest there was the tiny flax-wheel which stood in the upper hall, and which certainly looked, as Jack said, as if it ought to belong to a fairy godmother. In the attic, great bunches of herbs hung drying from the rafters, and the air was sweet with the scent of them. There were sage, summer-savoury, sweet marjoram, sweet basil, mint, and many more, with names as fragrant as their leaves. On the floor, near one of the chimneys, was spread a good supply of butternuts, and strings of dried apples stretched from wall to wall at the coolest end of the one big room.