“They’re still room-mates,” Dixie told him. Then she added: “But come on, Ken, we’d better go in. Nobody’s had any breakfast, and it’s almost school-time.” The little mother sighed. “I don’t see how I can go to school this morning,” she said. “I can’t leave Carol up in the loft and Sylvia down-stairs crying her heart out, and neither of them speaking to each other.”
“I’ll go to school and take Baby Jim and tell teacher that maybe you three girls will be along in the afternoon.” Then he added, in a low voice, as they walked toward the cabin, “If I were you, Dix, I’d ask Carol to play Grandma Piggins’s game, but if Sylvia’s as horrid as I guess she is, it’ll take a lot of ’magination to play it.”
“Maybe Carol will. Anyway, I’ll ask her,” and, with a new hope in her heart, the little mother of them all entered the kitchen and began to dish up the porridge for the long-delayed breakfast.
But, try as the little mother might to be cheerful, the meal was a dismal one.
Baby Jim, usually so sunny, seemed to be affected by the doleful atmosphere, and suddenly began to sob as though his little heart would break.
“Dear me! Dear me!” poor Dixie sighed as she glanced across the room to where Sylvia sat in a miserable heap, her head hidden on her arms, silent now, except for an occasional sob that shook her frail body.
Up-stairs in the loft there was no sound, and Dixie wondered if Carol had covered her head with the quilt and was softly crying. How she longed to go up and comfort her, but she was needed just then in the kitchen.
Taking the small boy out of his high-chair, Dixie looked helplessly across the table at Ken, who was gulping down the porridge as though it were hard to swallow.
“Gee, Sis,” he said, “what can be the matter with Jim? He’s too little to understand. I don’t see why he’s crying so hard. Is there a pin pricking him, maybe?”
“No-o, that’s one thing that couldn’t happen,” the girl answered with justifiable pride. “When he pulls a button off, I stop right that minute and sew it back on, so I never have to use pins.” Then she added, “Once, when young Mrs. Jenkins spanked her baby just ’cause he was crying, Grandma Piggins said the best way to quiet a little fellow was to give him something pleasant to think about.”