“Not so much, wife. Not so much. The coal wagons will be the first astir, and they’ll break the roads nicely with their heavy wheels. The bakers and butchers and milkmen will follow mighty soon. The boys that want a bit of money for Christmas will all be out with any sort of broom, or shovel, or even a stick, they can pick up. It’ll give work for idle men, clearing the streets, and the liverymen will make a lot of money as soon as it settles a little. Oh! a rousing snow-storm is a good thing once in a while.”
“I declare, John, you are the cheerfullest soul. Nothing is ever wrong with you, and Molly is as like you as two peas! But I must say, I wish you wouldn’t go to work to-day. I’ll worry lest you get overcome or frozen, or something.”
“That so? Glad to hear it. Makes a man feel happy inside to know his folks’ll worry about him when he’s in danger. But isn’t it an odd fact that a soft little thing like a snowflake can stop the traffic of a whole city! Hello there, Molly! Got my coat and mittens ready? Well, you don’t look as if the storm had kept you awake much. Give the father a kiss, lass, to sort of sweeten his breakfast. Are the Jays awake? Hunt them up a spade or a shovel and set them digging their neighbors out. And, Mary wife, if I were you I’d keep a pot of coffee on the range all day. There’s maybe a poor teamster or huckster passing who’ll be the better for a warm cup of drink, and the coffee’ll keep him from thinking of beer or whiskey.”
“That might cost a good bit, all day so.”
“Never mind; never mind. What they drink we’ll go without. We’re hale and hearty folks, who’ll thrive well enough on cold water, if need be. Thank the Lord for all His mercies, say I.”
“Well, breakfast is ready. I’ll dish it up while you two have your own morning talk,” said the mother, patting Molly’s sturdy shoulder as she passed tableward. For the girl and her father were the closest of friends, which isn’t always the case between parent and child. But Molly’s day would have seemed imperfect without that few minutes’ chat with the cheery plumber at its beginning; and he managed always to leave a bit of his wisdom or philosophy in the girl’s thoughts.
The three brothers, Jim, Joe, and Jack, known in the household as the “three Jays,” came tumbling down the short flight of stairs from the bedroom above to the little first-floor kitchen, which they immediately seemed to fill with their noisy presence. They were so nearly of one size that strangers often mistook one for another, and they were all as ruddy and round as boys could be. Yet their noise was happy noise and disturbed nobody; and they good-naturedly made room for Sarah Jane, their “sister next youngest but the twins,” as they commonly mentioned her.
Those twins! My! but weren’t they the pride of everybody’s heart, with their fair little faces, like a pair of dolls; and their round blue eyes which were always watching out for mischief to be done. Their names had been selected “right out of a story book” that their mother had once read, and expressed about the only “foolishness” of which the busy woman had ever been guilty.
“Ivanora! Idelia! Truck and dicker! Why, Mary wife, such names will handicap the babies from the start. Who can imagine an Ivanora making bread? or an Idelia scrubbing a floor? But, however, if it pleases you, all right, though I do think a sensible Susan or Hannah would be more useful to girls of our walk in life.”