We consulted one another’s look, and shifted. We knew how thirsty that would be. Already we were thirsty, in thinking about it.
“If I were in your places,” Grandmother said, “I’m not sure those reasons would keep me. I rather think they wouldn’t,—always.”
We stared at her. It was true that they didn’t always keep us. Were not two of us “in our rooms” even now?
Grandmother leaned forward—I know how the shadows of the apple leaves fell on her black lace cap and how the pink sweet-peas were reflected in her delicate face.
“Suppose,” she said, “that instead of any of those reasons, somebody gave you this reason: That the earth is a great flower—a flower that has never really blossomed yet. And that when it blossoms, life is going to be more beautiful than we have ever dreamed, or than fairy stories have ever pretended. And suppose our doing one way, and not another, makes the flower come a little nearer to blossoming. But our doing the other way puts back the time when it can blossom. Then which would you want to do?”
Oh, make it grow, make it grow, we all cried—and I felt a secret relief: Grandmother was playing a game with us, after all.
“And suppose that everything made a difference to it,” she went on, “every little thing—from telling a lie, on down to going to get a drink for somebody and drinking first yourself out in the kitchen. Suppose that everything made a difference, from hurting somebody on purpose, down to making up the bed and pulling the bed-spread tight so that the wrinkles in the blanket won’t show....”
At this we looked at one another in some consternation. How did Grandmother know....
“Until after a while,” she said, “you should find out that everything—loving, going to school, playing, working, bathing, sleeping, were all just to make this flower grow. Wouldn’t it be fun to help?”
Yes. Oh, yes, we were all agreed about that. It would be great fun to help.