Tea was ready in the kitchen when they went downstairs.  A small fire had been lighted to boil the water.  It was almost out, but the room felt stiflingly warm, and the butter was so nearly melted that Mrs. Worrett had to help it with a tea-spoon.  Buzzing flies hovered above the table, and gathered thick on the plate of cake.  The bread was excellent, and so were the cottage cheeses and the stewed quinces; but Elsie could eat nothing.  She was in a fever of heat.  Mrs. Worrett was distressed at this want of appetite; and so was Mr. Worrett, to whom the children had just been introduced.  He was a kindly-looking old man, with a bald head, who came to supper in his shirt-sleeves, and was a thin as his wife was fat.

“I’m afraid the little girl don’t like her supper, Lucinda,” he said.  “You must see about getting her something different for to-morrow.”

“Oh! it isn’t that.  Every thing is very nice, only, I’m not hungry,” pleaded Elsie, feeling as if she should like to cry.  She did cry a little after tea, as they sat in the dusk; Mr. Worrett smoking his pipe and slapping mosquitoes outside the door, and Mrs. Worrett sleeping rather noisily in a big rocking-chair.  But not even Johnnie found out that she was crying; for Elsie felt that she was the naughtiest child in the world to behave so badly when everybody was so kind to her.  She repeated this to herself many times, but it didn’t do much good.  As often as the thought of home and Katy and papa came, a wild longing to get back to them would rush over her, and her eyes would fill again with sudden tears.

The night was very uncomfortable.  Not a breath of wind was stirring, or none found its way to the stifling bed where the little sisters lay.  John slept pretty well, in spite of heat and mosquitoes, but Elsie hardly closed her eyes.  Once she got up and went to the window, but the blue paper shade had become unfastened, and rattled down upon her head with a sudden bump, which startled her very much.  She could find no pins in the dark, so she left it hanging; whereupon it rustled and flapped through the rest of the night, and did its share toward keeping her awake.  About three o’clock she fell into a doze; and it seemed only a minute after that before she waked up to find bright sunshine in the room, and half a dozen roosters crowing and calling under the windows.  Her head ached violently.  She longed to stay in bed, but was afraid it would be thought impolite, so she dressed and went down with Johnnie; but she looked so pale and ate so little breakfast that Mrs. Worrett was quite troubled, and said she had better not try to go out, but just lie on the lounge in the best room, and amuse herself with a book.