“I thought they’d laugh; but not a sound! So I peeped in. There they sat, solemn as little owls. Nobody had seen anything funny about that!”
The days flew swiftly over Sunrise Chalet. Sardis Merrifield had been cook in the commodious kitchen for more than a week and had treated the family to an astonishing variety of fancy dishes and plain. At first the White Nurse had worried for fear the children were having too rich food; but the cook assured her that the richness was mostly in the unfamiliar names, and as nobody became ill, she soon settled down, with everybody else, to the enjoyment of the novel viands with which the table greeted them, meal after meal.
Early one afternoon Benedicta appeared at the kitchen door with Grocer Jack, and the welcome that she received would have turned any head which was not as well-balanced as hers.
“Well, now stop talkin’, all of you,” she laughed finally, “and leave me the kitchen to myself! I can’t concoct cookies or doughnuts to such a tintinnabulation as this!”
“But you don’t need to,” cried Lilith. “Mr. Merrifield keeps us beautifully cooked up.”
“Oh!” scoffed Benedicta, turning merry eyes towards the minister, “I know what a man’s cooking is—I’ve had it! It’s bacon and eggs, bacon and eggs, ham and griddles, and bacon and eggs—that’s what it is! I warrant you haven’t got a cooky or a doughnut in the house—have you, now?” Her challenging eyes swept the group.
“Show her into the storeroom, Merrifield!” laughed Dr. Abbe.
“There’s Fruit Wheels and Buttercups!” piped Clementina.
“Parrots and pans! what hifalutings are those?”
“Oh, they’re little—” began the child; but two of her audience were disappearing in the hallway that led to the storeroom and she speeded after.