Elizabeth Ann

“ Elizabeth Ann thought she went to get a hot iron and Lyn did, but she also brought back a plate of cookies and put it down on the top step beside Elizabeth Ann.
“M-m-m,” mumbled Elizabeth Ann, taking a delicious bite. “My, you make good cookies, Lyn. We have to go home, you know. Uncle Doctor has to cure sick people and I have to go to school. Couldn’t you go and live with Cousin Nellie?” ”

“ Oh, that was Catherine Gould—Elizabeth Ann had no doubt of it.
“We want to march!” called Aunt Nan, when everyone had come up and spoken to her—as they weren’t expected to find the real hostess till the time to unmask came.
By the time Elizabeth Ann and Doris had reached Aunt Nan and had shaken hands with her, the fairy princess had disappeared. Now Elizabeth Ann looked around expectantly, for of course Catherine could play the piano. She talked about her music lessons all the time.
“Is there anyone here who will play for us?” ”

“ So she listened patiently while the little girl told her all about the fearful dreams she had, the great dogs with huge red mouths that ran after her, the Indians who scalped her, her schoolhouse on fire so that she had to jump from a third-story window and was all broken to bits—once in a while Elizabeth Ann got so interested in all this that she went on and made up more awful things even than she had dreamed, and told long stories which showed her to be a child of great imagination. ”

“ Elizabeth Ann declared, kissing Aunt Grace good-by.
“Do you like living in that funny place?” asked Catherine, as the three little girls walked down the lane which led to the road they were to take.
“Why, it’s the nicest house I ever lived in!” Elizabeth Ann said enthusiastically. “Doris is crazy about it—aren’t you, Doris? We go up and down ladders instead of stairs, and we sleep in bunks instead of beds. And the roof is a deck, and it’s the nicest place to play you ever saw.” ”

“ She was especially anxious to share all the little girl’s thoughts, because she felt that the trouble with most children is that they are not understood, and she was determined that she would thoroughly understand Elizabeth Ann down to the bottom of her little mind. Aunt Frances (down in the bottom of her own mind) thought that her mother had never really understood her, and she meant to do better by Elizabeth Ann. She also loved the little girl with all her heart, and longed, above everything in the world, to protect her from all harm and to keep her happy and strong and well. ”

“ Elizabeth Ann replied. “Couldn’t Roger play the piano beautifully? He told me he plays by ear.”
“What’s by ear?” asked Doris, looking as though she rather suspected Elizabeth Ann might be teasing her.
“He hears people play, and he can play what they do,” Elizabeth Ann explained. “He can’t read music—not the way Catherine157 can, when she practices her music lesson.”
Aunt Grace came to the door and opened it.
“Catherine just telephoned,” she said. “She is coming over to see you; if you get too cold outdoors, you must bring her in. There is a nice fire in the fireplace in the parlor.” ”

“ Now if Elizabeth Ann had been all alone, or if Doris had been alone, each little girl might have felt a bit homesick at that moment—riding away in a strange car with a strange uncle. But two little girls can’t feel forlorn when they have each other; and besides, as Elizabeth Ann wrote to Uncle Doctor later, it took a great deal of time to understand what Uncle Hiram was saying. Because he talked like a sailor, and neither Elizabeth Ann nor Doris understood sailor talk. ”

“ She sat beside her mother and drank her milk when she saw Uncle Doctor looking at her, but she didn’t touch her plate and Elizabeth Ann was surprised to see that she didn’t eat her dessert either when Emmy brought that in. Elizabeth Ann was never allowed to have dessert if she didn’t eat her dinner; but here was Doris, who could have apparently what she wanted, refusing to eat a chocolate éclair. ”

“ This time Elizabeth Ann didn’t answer, because she herself didn’t know what the matter was. But I do, and I’ll tell you. The matter was that never before had she known what she was doing in school. She had always thought she was there to pass from one grade to another, and she was ever so startled to get a little glimpse of the fact that she was there to learn how to read and write and cipher and generally use her mind, so she could take care of herself when she came to be grown-up. ”

“ I went to sea when I was a young lad and I can’t pick up land ways. But we each do our way and get along splendidly. There’s more than one way of doing a thing and I haven’t much use for any man who thinks his is the only possible one.”
Elizabeth Ann thought that was very nice. If she learned to tell time by the bells that would be fine—she could surprise Lansing and Ted. But if she didn’t learn, Uncle Hiram wouldn’t be annoyed—he thought that the old way of telling time—by the old way, Elizabeth Ann meant the way she had been taught—was good, too. ”

“ Gould was a careful farmer, and he wouldn’t have any candles in his barn. There were no chairs, but heaps of sofa cushions, covered with gingham covers so that no one need be afraid to use them—the covers would wash. There was the piano in one corner, just as Catherine had promised, too.
137 “Where’s Catherine?” asked Elizabeth Ann, staring around her.
There were pirates and sailors and gypsy girls and American Indians and fairy princesses flitting about. Elizabeth Ann thought she recognized several of the girls in her class, but she couldn’t be sure, because they wore masks. ”

“ Or if it thundered and lightened, Aunt Frances always dropped everything she might be doing and held Elizabeth Ann tightly in her arms until it was all over. And at night—Elizabeth Ann did not sleep very well—when the little girl woke up screaming with a bad dream, it was always dear Aunt Frances who came to her bedside, a warm wrapper over her nightgown so that she need not hurry back to her own room, a candle lighting up her tired, kind face. She always took the little girl into her thin arms and held her close against her thin breast. ”

“ And the kitchen was called a galley, and there were no beds in the bedrooms, but bunks, built against the wall. A bunk is like a box and Elizabeth Ann for once in her life was eager to have bed-time come, so she could have the experience of sleeping in a bunk.
There was so much to see that neither Elizabeth Ann or Doris thought especially about supper, though they had been hungry an hour ago. But as soon as Uncle Hiram came64 in, after putting the car in the garage—which was a barn Elizabeth Ann discovered the next day—he asked Aunt Grace if supper was ready. ”

“ But Elizabeth Ann liked to do her own thinking, and she remembered what Uncle Hiram had said about Roger.
“I think he is a nice boy,” said Elizabeth Ann, “and I mean to speak to him. He lives on the farm next to us; Uncle Hiram said so.”
“He only lives with the Bostwicks who own the farm,” said Catherine scornfully. “Roger is a taken boy—didn’t you hear me tell you that yesterday? He used to live at the poor farm, until the Bostwicks took him. He works for them, and the only reason they send him to school is because the Board of Education makes them.” ”

“ And, as a normal two-and-a-half does not require many weeks to regain lost baby plumpness and pink cheeks, soon Elizabeth Ann was opening sparkling eyes in the morning and closing play-tired ones at night. Elizabeth and I would stand over her crib. We needed not the spoken word to read the great relief and gratitude in each other’s eyes.
74
When I was a child, even before I had reached the age of ten, my flights of imagination in picturing my future self always took one of two directions—toward being an actress or a writer. ”

“ He’s gone to ask the man who owns the restaurant if he can go down in the cellar and hunt for you.”
And just then Uncle Hiram parted the curtains and looked in at the two girls. He saw Elizabeth Ann and he said to her, exactly as Doris had, “Where have you been?” Only he added, “I thought I asked you to wait till I came back.”
“I went to look for Tony,” said Elizabeth Ann. “I thought he might have gone down cellar to hunt for mice. And a lady thought I was Esther stealing jam and she told me to put out my hand and she hit me three times with her ruler.” ”

“ Elizabeth Ann went with the boys and they found Uncle Doctor and Muffins having a grand time. Jerry and Rodney had already gone into the city, to their offices, and as soon as Elizabeth Ann and Ted and Lansing brought Uncle Doctor back to the house, they had breakfast.
“Now I’ll go up and see Doris,” announced Uncle Doctor, when breakfast was over. “You run out and play, Elizabeth Ann; I want to start for home before lunch time, if possible.” ”

“ Elizabeth Ann liked to walk and Doris didn’t. But everyone did as Uncle Doctor directed, always.
“Then we can take our lunch to school, can’t we?” suggested Elizabeth Ann.
“Why you’ll have to take your lunch,”72 Aunt Grace replied. “I believe some of the teachers make hot soup in the winter, but there is no place where you can buy anything to eat. ”

“ Elizabeth Ann admitted, “but we can’t help that. If Catherine thinks she is going to be scolded, she will never tell. And if we can promise her no one will say a word, she won’t mind telling. We want Roger to stop working for Mr. Gould—never mind about Catherine.”
“Yes, but how can you tell Uncle Hiram when you said you wouldn’t?” asked the practical Doris.
213 “I’m going to see Catherine now and ask her to let me tell,” Elizabeth Ann explained. “You go on to the house and tell Aunt Grace where I am; I’ll come as soon as I see Catherine.” ”

“ Elizabeth Ann had no winter things to speak of, even though my sister Elizabeth had made her some pretty summer dresses. But I had to buy her winter things, from underwear to a coat, hat, galoshes and gloves. She looked adorable in them.
Under date of November 12, 1925, I replied to Miss Harding’s brief note enclosing the check, and I wrote, “It makes me feel so good inside—the knowledge that it comes from you. And I love you. You know that.” ”

“ She had a fancy lunch box, too, with all sorts of compartments, for her sandwiches and a bottle to keep her soup hot in.
Aunt Grace had packed a nice lunch for Elizabeth Ann and one just like it for Doris; she had told them that their dresses were pretty, too—Elizabeth Ann wore a blue and white gingham dress and Doris had a pink one.
“I wanted Daddy to take me as far as the cross-roads in his car every morning,” said Catherine, “but just because he walked to89 school when he was a little boy, he thinks I need exercise. I hate walking.” ”

“ Elizabeth had taken in two girls as roomers, finding it difficult even with Mr. Harding’s generous allowance to keep up the expenses in connection with the household, send Scott a specified amount monthly for his expenses abroad where he was studying, and keep her own piano lessons paid for. Both of these girls were very fond of Elizabeth Ann. I remember I was jealous of their attention to her, not wanting anyone to have her but myself, fiercely resenting references to her as my sister’s “daughter,” even with the love I bore my sister. ”

“ Part of the time you play. And when you are working away at those books with the great deal to learn in them, suppose you think of me, plugging away. I’ve a great deal to learn myself.”
Elizabeth Ann smiled a little. She knew when Lex was teasing her.
“I wouldn’t mind if I was learning to be a doctor—like you,” she said. “You like to study, because you want to hurry up and be a doctor.”
The car had come in sight of the house where Elizabeth Ann, her Uncle Doctor and Cousin Nellie had been spending the summer. ”

“ However, I despatched a letter to Elizabeth the latter part of January and she came East almost immediately. I persuaded my landlady to allow me to break my lease. I advised my family that I was leaving the captain. Mother came in from Long Island where she was teaching, and she, Elizabeth and I, talked things over. Elizabeth said her husband did not approve of sending Elizabeth Ann back and forth from Chicago to New York whenever I found it within my power to take her for a little while, nor could I really blame him for this attitude. ”

“ Then, summoning all her courage, with an apprehensive glance at Uncle Henry's arithmetical silence, she slapped the reins up and down on the horses' backs and made the best imitation she could of the grocer's boy's cluck. The horses lifted their heads, they leaned forward, they put one foot before the other . . . they were off! The color rose hot on Elizabeth Ann's happy face. If she had started a big red automobile she would not have been prouder. ”

“ He’s only trying to get out of being blamed for killing our cow.”
“If Roger says he closed the door, he did close the door,” Elizabeth Ann insisted, her face flushing.
“Would you rather take his word than mine?” asked Catherine. “Roger Calendar161 is a perfect nobody, a boy from the poor farm.”
“I don’t care, he tells the truth,” Elizabeth Ann flung out and from behind her Doris piped up, “He wouldn’t eat candy that didn’t belong to him—where’s the candy we won at your party, Catherine Gould?” ”

“ Harding in the White House he gave me every assurance that I should have ample financial assistance throughout Elizabeth Ann’s life, and, with his death, I am looking to his family to carry out his promises. And I do not mean to have her so ignored. It is highly inconceivable that you should adopt such attitude. ”