Nancy and Plum Read Free Page A

the granary stealing the grain. They were friendly, comforting sounds, and Nancy said, “Even in the dark, the barn isn’t nearly as lonely as the house.”
    Plum said, “I should say it isn’t. I think I just grabbed hold of a mouse. Oh, here we are. Here’s an old candle stub and some matches.”
    She struck a match and lit the candle. As the candle flame reached up and cast a circle of light, a black mother cat and three black kittens filed out of Buttercup’s stall and came over to the little girls. “Mrooow,” said the mother cat and the kittens squeaked, “Mrrow.” Plum knelt down and stroked the mother, who rubbed against her legs and purred. Nancy went over and scratched Buttercup behind her horns and she licked Nancy’s hand with her sandpaper tongue. Clover leaned outof her stall to see what was going on and as Nancy scratched her head, she stuck her tongue out about a foot and searched with the tip of it in the corners of her feed box for stray oats. Then Plum called out, “I found the lantern and it’s full of coal oil. Here, hold the candle while I light it.”
    Both girls knelt down and worked with the lantern until they finally got the wick adjusted and the smoky chimney wiped off. The lantern gave quite a lot of light and they hung it on a nail while they patted the horses, poked the pigs and played with the kittens. Then Plum had an idea. She said, “Let’s go in the harness room. There’s a stove in there and we can build a fire and roast potatoes.”
    Nancy said, “Where’ll we get the potatoes?”
    Plum said, “From the root cellar. I know where it is and it’s not locked because I helped Old Tom get apples one time!”
    Nancy, who was shaking with the cold and very hungry, thought this sounded like a wonderful idea until they went into the harness room and found it tight against the storm but very harnessy smelling and quite chilly. “It’s really nicer in the barn,” she said.
    But Plum, who had already opened up the door of the big black stove and was busily poking around in the ashes, said, “You just wait until I get this fire going. Oh, boy, here’s some hot coals from Old Tom’s milking-time fire. Hand me some of those shavings, will you, Nancy?”
    Nancy did and Plum threw them in, tossed in some kindling and some lumps of coal and in no time had a brightcrackling fire that blew its warm breath into the little girls’ eager faces.
    “Now that the fire’s going,” Plum said, rubbing her cold hands together, “let’s go out to the root cellar.”
    “And,” Nancy said, “then we can go to the milk room and get some milk and butter. Oh, this is going to be fun, Plum, and I’m so hungry.”
    “So am I,” Plum said. “I’m starving and freezing. Let’s hurry.”
    So, carefully shutting the door on the cat and her kittens, who had followed them into the harness room and intended to follow them everywhere they went, they ran through the barn and across the snowy barnyard to the root cellar. The root cellar, a little low house built into a bank by the back of the house, had a thick heavy door that was very hard to open but finally, after both girls had almost pulled their arms out of the sockets, they were able to squeeze through. It was very dark until Plum lit her candle stub and the air was pungent with the smells of the apples, carrots, potatoes, cabbages, squashes and rutabagas that were stored in the bins and shelves that lined the walls. The girls filled their aprons with four big potatoes, four dark red apples, some pears and a jar of peaches.
    As she reached up to the high shelf where the canned fruit was kept, Nancy said, “I don’t feel that it’s wrong to take these peaches without asking because it is Christmas and everybody should have something special for Christmas dinner.”
    Plum said, “Of course Mrs. Monday’s idea of somethingspecial is fried mush or boiled beans with rocks in them. Say, let’s take some carrots and apples for the animals.