"I'll set something out for you," said Sallie. "Come right in.
You might leave your bundle here by the parlor door. We'll put
you in the upstairs room."
They passed the front stairway, went back through the hall,
through the big low-ceilinged living-room with its vast
fireplace now covered for the warm season by a screen of
flowered wallpaper. They were in the plain old dining-room with
its smaller fireplace and its big old-fashioned cupboards built
into the wall on either side of the projecting chimney-piece.
"There ain't much," resumed Sallie. "But I reckon you kin make out."
On the gayly patterned table cover she set an array of
substantial plates and glasses. From various cupboards in
dining-room and adjoining kitchen she assembled a glass pitcher
of sweet milk, a glass pitcher of buttermilk, a plate of cold
cornbread, a platter of cold fried chicken, a dish of golden
butter, a pan of cold fried potatoes, a jar of preserved crab
apples and another of peach butter. Susan watched with hungry
eyes. She was thinking of nothing but food now. Her aunt looked
at her and smiled.
"My, but you're shootin' up!" she exclaimed, admiring the girl's
tall, straight figure. "And you don't seem to get stringy and
bony like so many, but keep nice and round. Do set down."
"I--I think I'll wait until Uncle George comes."
"Nothing of the kind!" She pushed a wooden chair before one of
the two plates she had laid.
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