Then a peculiar expression crossed the rugged old face.
“You see, I was raised on a tiny farm in Ireland and used sometimes to know what it meant to be hungry until my brother came over to the United States and made a fortune in ways I am more or less ashamed to remember. I have been telling Polly Burton that I crossed over to France because I wished to look after her and also to help her care for you girls. But that was not the whole truth. I think I came largely because I could not sleep in my bed of nights knowing how many old people and babies there were in this devil-ridden portion of France who were hungry. Oh, there are many people as well as the governments interested in keeping the soldiers well fed! Maybe it’s a crime these days for the old and for babies to require food! Yet they do need it. So if you don’t mind, Polly, I want the people in our neighborhood to feel that they can come to our farm for milk and eggs, or whatever we have to give them. I left word with the manager of my farm near Boston to ship livestock to me in France whenever the chance offers. I am hoping after a little, when these old people get back on their farms that we may be able to give each family sufficient stock to keep them going until their young men and women return home. But remember, I don’t wish to interfere with what you children are doing, nursing the sick and opening schools and starting play centers. Heaven only knows what you are not undertaking! As I said before, I’ll just look after my farm.”
Here Miss Patricia attempted to return to her usual belligerent manner, but found it difficult because Mrs. Burton had placed her arm about her. Try as Aunt Patricia might to conceal her adoration of Mrs. Burton, it was nearly always an impossible feat.
Besides Mrs. Burton was exclaiming with a little catch in her voice:
“You dear, splendid, old Irish gentlewoman! Is there anybody in the world in the least like you? Of course you were right when you announced that I never would think of the really practical things we should require for our work over here. But, although I spent as much money as I could possibly afford, I have realized every day since our arrival, that if I had expended every cent I ever hope to possess, it would have amounted to nothing. Yet I never once thought of the shipping of stock for the little farms in our neighborhood, Aunt Patricia. I am sure you will make life more worth while for every man and woman in this part of the French country before many months.”
Instead of appearing gratified by these compliments, Miss Patricia was heard to murmur something or other about Polly Burton’s fashion of exaggeration. Then, perhaps partly to conceal embarrassment, she began tearing the slats from the side of one of her crates. Afterwards, driving her travel-worn flock of chickens toward the chicken house, which she herself had made ready, and shooing them with her black skirt, Miss Patricia temporarily disappeared.
Through tears Mrs. Burton laughed at the picture.
Vera followed Miss Patricia, whom she had learned to like and admire since the afternoon of their extraordinary introduction.
“I hope to be allowed to help with the farm work, Aunt Patricia,” she urged. “You know I too was brought up on Mr. Webster’s farm in New Hampshire, besides, all my people in Russia were peasant farmers.”
Miss Patricia did not cease for an instant to continue to care for her brood. However, she did answer with unusual condescension: