When the fox cub had bitten Maude’s thumb almost through, she had not made nearly as much noise as this. When Jane had broken her collarbone, she had allowed Hannah Herb-Woman to set it without a single cry.
Mamma said quietly, “Eat, girls.”
It was hard to swallow even the sweet berries with all that crying filling the room. But when Jane tried to put down her spoon, Mamma looked at her the way a herd dog looks at a sheep that is moving away from the flock, and she forced herself to finish.
The sobs finally dwindled into whimpers, and Harry stood up, cradling his daughter. “Margaret,” he said, “where does Ella sleep?”
“The girls’ room is through there.” Mamma moved toward the door to the hallway. “Jane has a big bed and Isabella can share it with her.”
“No, that’s all right,” Jane said hastily. “Isabella can have her own bed. Maude will share with me. Won’t you, Maude?”
“Oh, yes,” Maude said.
“No,” Isabella said. They all looked at her.
“What is it, darling?” her father asked.
“I won’t share a room.” Her words were thick. “I have never shared a room, and I won’t share one now with someone who deliberately—” and her voice became ragged “—who deliberately put a bee in my berries.”
“What?” Maude said. “You think that I—”
“I saw you.” Isabella started to cry again, sobs shaking her thin chest. “I saw you poking in the berries. You put that bee in there so it would sting me.”
Jane half rose from her seat as Maude’s mouth gaped open. “She didn’t!” Jane almost shouted. “She wouldn’t! You know she wouldn’t, Mamma!”
“Of course she didn’t,” Mamma said. “Isabella is tired, and her mouth hurts. She doesn’t mean it, do you, Isabella?” The girl didn’t answer. Mamma squatted next to her. “Look at me,” she instructed. Isabella didn’t move.
“Young lady,” Mamma said in the tone that neither Jane nor Maude had ever ignored, “in this house the children do as the adults say. And I am telling you to look at me.”
“Margaret—” Harry started, but Mamma must have turned that herd-dog look on him, too, because he settled back. After a moment, Isabella raised her eyes to Mamma’s.
“You will answer politely when you are spoken to,” Mamma said. “We are making allowances tonight because you are tired and your mouth hurts. In the future, I expect you to behave like a young lady.” She stood up. “Now, Harry, Isabella has the choice of sleeping in the girls’ room with them, or in here by herself. She will tell us her decision when supper has been tidied up.”
Maude and Jane put the dishes in water to soak, and then Jane went out to coax the goats and Baby back into the barn. When she returned, Maude made tea and served it to Mamma and the man. Isabella didn’t even look up when Maude offered her a cup, so Maude shrugged and drank it herself. When Jane hung the dishcloths near the fire she sneaked a peek at the big chair, where the man was still soothing the girl. She heard a murmur from Harry and a word or two from Isabella in a quavering voice, but she couldn’t make out what they were saying.
Mamma wiped her hands on her apron and turned to Harry. “Well?”
“Isabella will sleep in here.”
“Good,” Jane said to Maude, and hoped that Mamma hadn’t heard.
“Very well,” Mamma answered. “Girls, take Isabella to the necessary room.”
In silence, Jane and Maude left for the privy in the yard behind the kitchen. Isabella followed, keeping several paces behind. They went and returned without exchanging a word.
In their absence, the pillows from the big chair had been put on the floor and a cloth had been smoothed over them. “This is your bed,” Mamma said.
Jane and Maude stood awkwardly. The last thing every day, they sat and talked, and Mamma told them tales of parties and young men, of hunts and horses, of balls at the palace in the days when the old king was a prince, of fairies and sprites and the people of the woods. Obviously that could not happen tonight. They kissed Mamma, then stood in front of Harry and hesitated. Did one kiss stepfathers? Fortunately he made no move to kiss them, merely saying, “Good night, girls. We’ll get better acquainted tomorrow.” They murmured “Good night” and escaped to their room, closing the door behind them. They undressed in the dark, said hasty prayers, and slid into bed.
A half-moon shone through their window. Jane heard Maude moving restlessly. Finally, Maude whispered, “Jane?”
“What?”
“Can I come into bed with you?”
The bedclothes rustled as Jane made room, and Maude slid next to her sister. As she drifted into sleep, Jane heard singing in the distance. She listened as a new voice joined in and another fell silent.
“The fairy singers are back,” she whispered to Maude, but her sister grunted without replying, so Jane lay still while the sounds faded, as they always did. She didn’t believe what Mamma told her—that it was just the wind. She wished the haunting melody would continue all night, reassuring her that she was not the only thing awake in the world.
After what seemed like hours, Jane was sleeping as soundly as her sister.
Jane woke to the sound of someone moving in the South Parlor and stretched happily. Mamma was home—but then she bumped into the sleeping Maude, and the memories of last night flooded back.
Jane’s dress lay crumpled on the floor. She pulled it on and stared down at herself. The dress was stained and wrinkled and a rip was starting under one armpit. She hadn’t noticed before how grimy it was. She tried to comb her hair with her fingers, but they stuck in a knot, so she gave up.
In the South Parlor, Mamma was drinking a cup of tea. “Good morning,” Jane said, and stepped around the sleeping Isabella, who looked even more angelic than when she was awake. Rummaging in the chest, Jane found her best dress, the blue one with dingy lace around the neck and cuffs. Normally, she wore it only when the priest came to St. Cuthbert’s, the village church, on his irregular rounds. It was getting small, but at least it was clean and not too much mended.
“What are you doing with your Sunday dress?” Mamma asked. Wordlessly, Jane pointed at the worn elbows on the one she was wearing. She poked her finger through a hole near the hem and waggled it at Mamma. “A true lady always looks well, no matter what she wears,” Mamma said, as Jane had been afraid she would.
Jane sighed and put the blue dress back. It didn’t really matter, she supposed. Her best dress would still look like rags next to Isabella’s clothes. Even the girl’s nightgown was fastened at the neck with a shiny pink ribbon. “In any case,” Mamma went on, “we won’t be going to church again until next spring. Father Albert is getting too old to come all the way out here in bad weather, and autumn storms will be starting before long.” After the hot and dry summer, when the crops withered in the fields and rabbits and deer left their forest homes and appeared in the drive in search of water, the thought of a cool rain shower didn’t seem like bad weather.
Jane picked up a basket of grain in the pantry and stepped outside. She strolled through the bare patch between the house and the barn, tossing the feed by handfuls to the chickens. The early-morning dust was cool and dry under her toes. She threw some grain in front of the hen with the sore foot, who pecked it up quickly before her swifter sisters could steal it. Mamma appeared in the doorway, looking off to the horizon—to prevent herself, Jane thought, from seeing her daughter working like a farm girl.
“Mamma?”