Mrs. Sheridan found Norma at the close of the short afternoon, moping in her unlighted house. She had been to the theatre with Wolf and a young couple from the house next door, last night, and had fallen asleep after an afternoon walk, and felt headachy, prickly with heat and cold, and stupid. Yawning and chilly, she kissed her aunt, and suggested that they move to the kitchen. It was Inga's free night and Norma was cook.
"You'll stay and surprise Wolf, he'd love it," Norma said, as the visitor's approving eyes noted the general order and warmth, the blue-checked towels and blue bowls, the white table and white walls. The little harum-scarum baby of the family was proceeding to get her husband a most satisfactory and delicious little dinner, and Aunt Kate was proud of her.
"Did you make that cake, darling?"
"Indeed I did; she can't make cake!"
"And the ham?"
"Well"—Norma eyed the cut ham fondly—"we did that together, out of the book! And I wish you'd taste it, Aunt Kate, it is perfectly delicious. I give it to Wolf every other night, but I think he'd eat it three times a day and be delighted. And last week we made bread—awfully good, too—not hard like that bread we made last summer. Rolls, we made—cinnamon rolls and plain. Harry and Rose were here. And Thanksgiving I'm going to try mincemeat."
"You're a born cook," Aunt Kate said, paying one of her highest compliments with due gravity. But Norma did not respond with her usual buoyancy. She sighed impatiently, and her face fell into lines of discontent and sadness that did not escape the watching eyes. Mrs. Sheridan changed the subject to the one of a cousin of Harry Redding, one Mrs. Barry with whose problems Norma was already dismally familiar. Mrs. Barry's husband was sick in a hospital, and she herself had to have an expensive operation, and the smallest of the four children had some trouble hideously like infantile paralysis.
Norma knew that Aunt Kate would have liked to have her offer to take at least one of the small and troublesome children for two or three days, if not to stay with the unfortunate Kitty Barry outright. She knew that there was almost no money, that all the household details of washing and cooking were piling up like a mountain about the ailing woman, but her heart was filled with sudden rebellion and impatience with the whole miserable scheme.
"My goodness, Aunt Kate, if it isn't one thing with those people it's another!" she said, impatiently. "I suppose you were there, and up with that baby all night!"
"Indeed I got some fine sleep," Mrs. Sheridan answered, innocently. "Poor things, they're very brave!"