Then, of course, it was time to go home, and Elizabeth Ann and Doris couldn’t talk about Catherine in the car for not only would Uncle Hiram and Aunt Grace hear them, but Roger, who was going to have supper at their house before he went to the Bostwick farm. Uncle Hiram had arranged that with Mr. Bostwick, and it was a real treat for Roger who seldom visited anywhere.
“Don’t you wish you had a piano of your own?” Doris asked him, when they were almost home.
“Yes, I’d like one,” said Roger, “but the only way I’ll ever get it will be to earn the money; and if people keep on saying I leave doors open and kill cows, it will take me all my life to pay them. I never will get any money saved for a piano.”
“Avast there,” Uncle Hiram mumbled over his shoulder. “The wind can blow in the east only so long; your east wind is about blown out and you ought to be looking for clear weather.”
“I hope you’ll get a nice west wind soon, Roger,” said gentle Aunt Grace. “I’m having waffles for supper—maybe they will help.”
They couldn’t help laughing a little at the idea of waffles being a west wind, but Roger told Aunt Grace that hot waffles were as good as a spell of clear weather to him; a west wind, he explained to Elizabeth Ann, always brought clear weather.
Elizabeth Ann looked at Doris and Doris looked at Elizabeth Ann. But they couldn’t make up their minds what they ought to do.
Roger had his golden brown waffles and went home, whistling cheerily as though he had forgotten such unpleasant things as corncrib doors, and perhaps he had. Aunt Grace went out into the kitchen—excuse us, the galley—to set her bread. And Elizabeth Ann and Doris sat on the floor of their bedroom and talked about Catherine Gould until Uncle Hiram called to them that it was high time sailors their age were fast asleep.
In the morning, on the way to school, Elizabeth Ann and Doris were still talking about Catherine.
“I don’t want Roger to have to work Saturdays for Mr. Gould,” said Elizabeth Ann. “It isn’t fair; he used to have two hours to himself every Saturday and he could go over to Mrs. Weber’s and play on her piano, he told me. Now he can’t do anything because Mr. Bostwick says he must help him every minute to make up for the time he has to give Catherine’s father.”