Elizabeth Ann stared.  What did Aunt Abigail mean?  She hadn’t done a thing about getting supper!  But nobody made any comment, and they all took their seats and began to eat.  Elizabeth Ann was astonishingly hungry, and she thought she could never get enough of the creamed potatoes, cold ham, hot cocoa, and pancakes.  She was very much relieved that her refusal of beans caused no comment.  Aunt Frances had always tried very hard to make her eat beans because they have so much protein in them, and growing children need protein.  Elizabeth Ann had heard this said so many times she could have repeated it backward, but it had never made her hate beans any the less.  However, nobody here seemed to know this, and Elizabeth Ann kept her knowledge to herself.  They had also evidently never heard how delicate her digestion was, for she never saw anything like the number of pancakes they let her eat.  All she wanted!  She had never heard of such a thing!

They still did not ask her how she had “stood the trip.”  They did not indeed ask her much of anything or pay very much attention to her beyond filling her plate as fast as she emptied it.  In the middle of the meal Eleanor came, jumped into her lap, and curled down, purring.  After this Elizabeth Ann kept one hand on the little soft ball, handling her fork with the other.

After supper—­well, Elizabeth Ann never knew what did happen after supper until she felt somebody lifting her and carrying her upstairs.  It was Cousin Ann, who carried her as lightly as though she were a baby, and who said, as she sat down on the floor in a slant-ceilinged bedroom, “You went right to sleep with your head on the table.  I guess you’re pretty tired.”

Aunt Abigail was sitting on the edge of a great wide bed with four posts, and a curtain around the top.  She was partly undressed, and was undoing her hair and brushing it out.  It was very curly and all fluffed out in a shining white fuzz around her fat, pink face, full of soft wrinkles; but in a moment she was braiding it up again and putting on a tight white nightcap, which she tied under her chin.

“We got the word about your coming so late,” said Cousin Ann, “that we didn’t have time to fix you up a bedroom that can be warmed.  So you’re going to sleep in here for a while.  The bed’s big enough for two, I guess, even if they are as big as you and Mother.”

Elizabeth Ann stared again.  What queer things they said here.  She wasn’t nearly as big as Aunt Abigail!

“Mother, did you put Shep out?” asked Cousin Ann; and when Aunt Abigail said, “No!  There!  I forgot to!” Cousin Ann went away; and that was the last of her.  They certainly believed in being saving of their words at Putney Farm.