sprang from her heart to her lips, and she hummed it over and over all the three-quarters of an hour that she was at work. When the cushion was finished, she held it out in different positions, trying to decide in which it would look best when she should present it; and then she ran down-stairs, possessed with such a variety of feelings that she could scarcely speak when she opened the kitchen door.
Her mother was ironing, with her back toward her. Debby was glad that no one else was there.
"I've made you a Christmas present, mother," she said, timidly, laying it on the ironing-board.
"So that's what you have been doing in the cold so long," her mother answered, without pausing in her work. "Miss Holmes was a beautiful hand with her needle, and how she did fuss over that! But you might just as well have made it some other day; I was in no hurry for it. Put it in my bureau-drawer, and come and mend these blankets your father has just brought in. He thinks that we have so little to do that we can sew for the horses right in the midst of everything."
So Debby laid the cushion away, glad that it had met with no worse reception, and sat down in a corner near the stove to mend the coarse, dirty horse-blankets. She usually disliked it exceedingly; but her little attempt at making Christmas presents had so warmed her heart, and her head was so full of the Fair, that it did not now seem so uncongenial, and she was really surprised when the last stitch was taken.
"You are almost as handy with your needle as your mother," her father said, throwing the blankets over his shoulder to carry them to the barn.
"Now spring to, child, and set the table," her mother added, "and I'll rest a few minutes, for I feel as if every bone in my body was broken."
While Debby sewed, the bright sunlight on the green field of wheat and the brown, ridged field of corn-stubble visible through the one large window, had faded quickly away; and as she paused a moment to pick some shreds off her dress and glance out at the weather, all she could see was the dim outline of the woods, the dark forms of the hills rising behind them, and the cold, black wind-clouds piled high above them all.
Tea was ready and over at last, and then Mrs. Blanchard said, while she tried to quiet the screaming baby:
"Go and get ready for the Fair, child, and I will wash the dishes. I have a dreadful sideache, and I expect this young one will cry for an hour or two. But 'every dog must have his day,' and yours will be short enough."