XIV.—Strawberries
“Here are yer strawberries, ma’m.”
Juliet, alone in her little kitchen, ran to the door in dismay. She looked down at a freckle-faced boy carrying a big basket filled with strawberry-boxes.
“But my order was for next Wednesday,” she said.
“Well, Pa said he cal’lated you’d ruther have ’em when they was at the best, an’ that’s now. This hot weather’s a dryin’ ’em up. May not be any good ones by Wednesday.”
Every housekeeper knows that if there is one thing particularly liable to happen it is the arrival of fruit for preserving at the most inopportune moment of the week. It matters little what the excuse of the sender may be—there is always a sufficient reason why the original date set by the buyer has been ignored. In this case the strawberries had been engaged from a neighbour, and Juliet understood at once that she must not refuse to take them.
She stood looking at the rows of baskets upon the table, when the boy had placed them there and gone whistling away. She was in the midst of a flurry of work. It was Saturday, and she was cooking and baking, putting together various dishes to be used upon the morrow. Mr. Horatio Marcy had lately returned from abroad. He and Mrs. Dingley were to spend the coming Sabbath with Juliet and Anthony—the first occasion on which Juliet’s father should be entertained in the house. It was an event of importance, and his daughter meant to show him several things concerning her fitness for her present position.
Rachel Redding was not available upon this Saturday morning. Her mother had been taken seriously ill the night before, and Rachel had sent word that she could not leave her. Juliet had not minded much, although it was a day when Rachel’s help would have been especially acceptable. As it was, she had reached a point where her housewifely marshalling of the day’s work was at a critical stage. A cake had been put into the oven. A large bowl of soup stock had been brought from a cool retreat to have the smooth coating of fat removed from its surface. Various other dishes, in process of construction, awaited the skilled touch of the cook.
“I shall have to do them, I suppose,” said Mrs. Robeson to herself, regarding the strawberries with a disapproving eye. “But why they had to come to-day——”