"I know I ain't," returned Hannah. "I've been tellin' Rose we'd come
over to tea some afternoon before she was married."
"Do," said Sylvia, but the cordiality in her voice seemed to
overweigh it.
"Well, mebbe we'll come over to-morrow," said Hannah. "We've got some
pillow-slips to trim, an' we can bring them. You'd better ask Sarah
an' Charlotte, if she can stay away from Rebecca Thayer's long
enough."
"Yes, I will," said Sylvia, feebly, over her shoulder.
"We'll come early," said Hannah. Then the sisters sped apart through
the early winter darkness. Poor Sylvia fairly groaned out loud when
her sister was out of hearing and she had turned the corner of the
old road.
"What shall I do? what shall I do?" she muttered.
Her sisters to tea meant hot biscuits and plum sauce and pie and
pound-cake and tea. Sylvia had yet a little damson sauce at the
bottom of a jar, although she had not preserved last year, for lack
of sugar; but hot biscuits and pie, the pound-cake and tea would have
to be provided.
She felt again of the little money-store in her pocket; that was all
that stood between her and the poor-house; every penny was a barrier
and had its carefully calculated value. This outlay would reduce
terribly her little period of respite and independence; yet she
hesitated as little as Fouquet planning the splendid entertainment,
which would ruin him, for Louis XIII.
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