The exasperated little woman darted down the cellar steps, her voice coming up from the cool depths, indistinct, but plainly disapproving: "Lemon pie an' ras'berry vinegar! If Providence hasn't given folks children, it's a sign they didn't ought to have any! An' it's jist goin' clean against nature for them to go an' adopt one, that's what I'll always say!"
The young lady with the pies glanced irresolutely toward a stout woman who had just entered the back door, carrying a crock of butter. "You put them pies in, if Hannah wants them," whispered the newcomer, looking apprehensively toward the cellar, "an' say no more about it. Half the mischief in the world's done by talking about things." She hurried out to the vehicle and planted her contribution beside the bundle of wrappings.
"That there butter's for the children at the Home, Jake. Don't forget to give it to them poor things. Like as not they give 'em lard or someth'n'."
"Davy!" she called to the young man on the front seat.
"What, maw?"
"For pity's sake don't forget to call us when the train hoots for Cameron's Crossin'. 'Cause they've jist got to start then."
The boy in the buggy opened his eyes, stretched and yawned.
"I will, if it hoots good 'n' loud," he remarked, indifferently.
The maelstrom of hurry and bustle surged around Master David Munn, leaving him placid and undisturbed, but to the rest of the gathering the affair was of no small moment. Had the Sawyers been setting out on a polar expedition it is doubtful if Elmbrook could have been more exercised. For ten years, ever since their only baby had brightened their home for one week, and then gone back to heaven, Jake and Hannah Sawyer had wanted to adopt a child. That they had not done so long before was not their fault, but because the village in general, and Mrs. Winters in particular, who ruled the village, could never be brought to consent. For already the Sawyers were about as great a burden as Elmbrook could shoulder. They were the orphan children of the village themselves, and needed to be perpetually adopted. They were as good-hearted and lovable a pair as it was possible for man and woman to be; all the stray dogs and hungry cats and needy tramps found their way to the Sawyer house by unerring instinct, and Jake was never to be seen on his way to or from his mill without a troop of children climbing all over him. Nevertheless, he and his wife were a great care to their neighbors. Not once had Hannah Sawyer got through her spring house-cleaning or her fall pickling and preserving without help. Never yet had the two arrived in time at church or prayer-meeting, and they could not even go to town of a Saturday to do a half day's marketing without Mrs. Winters' eye on them. As for Jake's flour mill, if his partner, Spectacle John Cross, hadn't been a capable man, and an honest one, every one declared it would have gone up in smoke long ago.
So, naturally, the village was reluctant about adopting a third orphan; but Jake and Hannah had pleaded so, that the minister had advised Mrs. Winters to yield. And so the day had arrived when they were to take the train to a neighboring town, near which was an orphan home, and there they were to secure their long-yearned-for prize.