Nobody replied to this tirade. The hired man picked up the basin, Margaret handed a towel, Rachel brought the water, and soon the family were gathered around the well-spread table.
"I tell you," said Mr. Stillman, after a few mouthfuls of the savory food had apparently put him in a better humor, "I think we'll have fine weather for hog-killin' next week, and I never did have a finer lot of hogs."
"Oh, father," said Margaret, "don't butcher next week. Friday is Christmas day and--"
"Christmas!" interrupted her father. "Well, we always butcher Christmas week, don't we?"
"Yes, I know," she said, her lips trembling in spite of her effort to control herself. "But we never have enjoyed the holidays, and I thought maybe this year you--"
"We will do this year as we always have," broke in the father, angrily. "I suppose", with a look at his wife from which she shrank as from a blow, "this is one of your plans to have your girls gadding over the country."
"Mother never said anything about it," said Margaret, her temper getting the better of her; "but nobody else takes Christmas times to do their hardest and dirtiest work."
"Will you hush?" thundered the father. "What do I care what anybody else does? I am master here."
No one spoke again. The assertion could not be denied. He was master, and well his wife and daughters knew it.
Poor Mrs. Stillman! Two fortunate baby girls had died a few weeks after their birth, and the tears that fell over the little coffins were not half so bitter as those she shed when first she held their innocent faces to her heart. When on this evening the father had shown his authority, the two elder daughters rose from the table, and taking a couple of large buckets, went quietly out to the barnyard, and proceeded to milk the half dozen cows awaiting them.
It was nearly dark and very cold; but no word was spoken except to the animals, as the girls hurried through the work and hastened back to the kitchen, where Rachel and the mother were clearing away the supper-table and making the needful preparations for the early breakfast.
When all was finished the mother and daughters entered the large room adjoining the kitchen, which served as sitting-room for the family and bed-room for the parents, Mr. Stillman not permitting a fire kept in any other room in the house. Mrs. Stillman sat down with her knitting-work as close in the corner as possible; Elizabeth brought in a large basket of rags, and she and Margaret were soon busy sewing strips and winding balls for a carpet. The younger children were absorbed in their lessons at the table, where the father sat reading his newspaper.