“Wonder how it would do to show Mag Sinton a frill or two,” she murmured.

She went to her room, knelt before a big black-walnut chest and hunted through its contents until she found an old-fashioned cook book.  She tended the fire as she read and presently was in action.  She first sawed an end from a fragrant, juicy, sugar-cured ham and put it to cook.  Then she set a couple of eggs boiling, and after long hesitation began creaming butter and sugar in a crock.  An hour later the odour of the ham, mingled with some of the richest spices of “happy Araby,” in a combination that could mean nothing save spice cake, crept up to Elnora so strongly that she lifted her head and sniffed amazedly.  She would have given all her precious money to have gone down and thrown her arms around her mother’s neck, but she did not dare move.

Mrs. Comstock was up early, and without a word handed Elnora the case as she left the next morning.

“Thank you, mother,” said Elnora, and went on her way.

She walked down the road looking straight ahead until she came to the corner, where she usually entered the swamp.  She paused, glanced that way and smiled.  Then she turned and looked back.  There was no one coming in any direction.  She followed the road until well around the corner, then she stopped and sat on a grassy spot, laid her books beside her and opened the lunch box.  Last night’s odours had in a measure prepared her for what she would see, but not quite.  She scarcely could believe her senses.  Half the bread compartment was filled with dainty sandwiches of bread and butter sprinkled with the yolk of egg and the remainder with three large slices of the most fragrant spice cake imaginable.  The meat dish contained shaved cold ham, of which she knew the quality, the salad was tomatoes and celery, and the cup held preserved pear, clear as amber.  There was milk in the bottle, two tissue-wrapped cucumber pickles in the folding drinking-cup, and a fresh napkin in the ring.  No lunch was ever daintier or more palatable; of that Elnora was perfectly sure.  And her mother had prepared it for her!  “She does love me!” cried the happy girl.  “Sure as you’re born she loves me; only she hasn’t found it out yet!”

She touched the papers daintily, and smiled at the box as if it were a living thing.  As she began closing it a breath of air swept by, lifting the covering of the cake.  It was like an invitation, and breakfast was several hours away.  Elnora picked up a piece and ate it.  That cake tasted even better than it looked.  Then she tried a sandwich.  How did her mother come to think of making them that way.  They never had any at home.  She slipped out the fork, sampled the salad, and one-quarter of pear.  Then she closed the box and started down the road nibbling one of the pickles and trying to decide exactly how happy she was, but she could find no standard high enough for a measure.