Cradle to Grave by Eleanor Kuhns Read Free Book Online

angry,” Jerusha warned. “The syrup was a gift. We aren’t supposed to eat it.”
    â€œJoseph must eat,” Lydia said with a snap. When Jerusha, blinking anxiously, looked at Lydia, she clamped her mouth shut so she wouldn’t express her opinions about Mama, all of them unkind.
    â€œYou must be hungry, too,” Rees said, giving the child a little push toward the table. Tossing her shawl on the peg, she hurried forward. Lydia glanced at the child, noticing Rees’s socks upon those small feet. When she looked up, he shrugged. “Her feet were bare.”
    â€œYou are a good man, Will Rees,” Lydia said, the approval in her smile warming him all the way through.
    Bobbing his head self-consciously, Rees turned to pour the water into the oak bucket.
    In a moment of quiet after the children had eaten, Lydia went to the copper boiling over the fire and stirred it. “I couldn’t find soap,” she said, “so I hope hot water will be enough.” She swung the crane away so that the water in the copper could begin to cool.
    She dipped a corner of a rag into the hot water and then into the cold. After testing it upon the soft skin inside her wrist and judging it the proper temperature, she brought it to the table and began wiping faces and hands. Rees watched her in amazement. Did women just instinctively know how to do these things?
    All of the children fought the rag save Jerusha. Joseph screamed until Jerusha picked him up, her slight frame bowing with the effort. The baby relaxed into Jerusha’s shoulder, snuffling wearily. “He’s tired,” she said. Lydia stretched out her arms to take the baby from the girl but suddenly paused.
    â€œHe’ll settle with you,” she said. “Why don’t you lie down next to him and maybe he’ll fall asleep. Judah, too.” She looked at Nancy, who was rubbing her eyes. “And Nancy.” She didn’t comment on Jerusha but Rees knew Lydia saw the same exhaustion in the child’s face as he did himself.
    â€œI’m not tired,” Nancy proclaimed.
    Jerusha followed Lydia’s gaze and nodded. “We’ll all lie down for a moment,” she said. “None of us slept well last night. Mama was … upset.”
    She shepherded the younger children to the pile of rags and arranged the tattered cover over them. Then, exhaling a weary sigh, she lay down in the middle, curving her body around the baby. Nancy and Judah rolled closer to Jerusha and in a few moments all was quiet. Lydia looked at the nest of children, huddled together under rags, and took her cloak down from the peg to spread over them.
    â€œI suppose I’ll have to wash my cloak immediately,” she said, as though tears of pity did not shine in her eyes.
    Rees smiled at her. “I know. I’ll get some wood,” he said.
    Since the children had collected all the sticks nearby, he was forced to cross the road and collect the deadfalls. As he gathered as many of the downed branches as he could, he reflected that the gentler weather in New York was a blessing to these children. In Maine, or in a harsher winter, they might very well have frozen to death.
    By the time he had made several trips for wood, hewn it into pieces, and stacked it outside the horse’s lean-to, Lydia had gotten most of the diapers wrung out and hanging on the rope. The dripping water pattered on the hearth, hissing when it fell among the burning logs. She took the stick with which she was lifting the sodden cloths from the copper and laid it upon the floor. “I want to show you something,” she said, breathing hard. She crossed to the shelves and pulled down a large canister. “Empty.” Another came down. “Empty.” She pushed the lid off a barrel on the floor. “Empty. There is no food at all in this house. But I did find this.” From the back corner of the topmost shelf, behind a large Bible with a