The wagon box had furnished enough lumber to make not only the door, but a bench, and a high shelf across one end of the cabin. When the children had finished breakfast, their mother put a box upon the bench. Mounting the box, she took from the shelf several small packages.
“Now, children,” she said, as she unrolled a square package, “here is all the meat we have—just enough for seven slices. We are going to have it for dinner Christmas Day, and who do you guess is going to eat the extra slice? That is my big secret.”
“I could eat all of it now,” said Henry Clay. The children eyed the piece of bacon hungrily.
“Children, what on earth has come over you to make you so gluttonous? I am ashamed of you. Now, if you can behave yourselves, I will tell you something.”
They watched her with fascinated eyes as she measured two cupfuls of sugar into a small pail. Next she took four tablespoonfuls of rice, carefully tied the little heap of white grains in a cloth, and dropped it into the pail with the sugar. Putting the lid on the pail, she again mounted the box, and put the pail beside a small jar that contained a handful of coffee.
“There,” she said, with pride in her voice, “that is my sick corner. If any of you get sick, I have some little things for you.”
“I’m sick, I’m awfully sick,” said C’listie.
“C’listie Culberson, no one would ever dream you were named for your own grandmother, C’listie Yancy. Your Grandma Yancy would never act that way.”
The children watched her intently and silently as she measured the remaining sugar.
“There is enough for a cake, and we can have a carrot pie,” she said, “and perhaps some sugar syrup for breakfast, and there will be a little left in the bowl. Don’t one of you young uns dare to touch that bowl; the sugar in the bowl is for manners; now mind that. We’ll have a nice dish of rice, and enough grease will fry out of the bacon to season the potatoes and to make the pie crust, and we can have biscuit, too,” she ended triumphantly.