When they bring that baby in here, and unwrap him, he
looks like a little prince; Martha takes care of him so beautiful. I'm
reconciled to her being away from me now, but at first I cried like I was
putting her into her coffin.'
We were alone in the kitchen, except for Anna, who was pouring cream into
the churn. She looked up at me. `Yes, she did. We were just ashamed of
mother. She went round crying, when Martha was so happy, and the rest of
us were all glad. Joe certainly was patient with you, mother.'
Antonia nodded and smiled at herself. `I know it was silly, but I couldn't
help it. I wanted her right here. She'd never been away from me a night
since she was born. If Anton had made trouble about her when she was a
baby, or wanted me to leave her with my mother, I wouldn't have married
him. I couldn't. But he always loved her like she was his own.'
`I didn't even know Martha wasn't my full sister until after she was
engaged to Joe,' Anna told me.
Toward the middle of the afternoon, the wagon drove in, with the father and
the eldest son. I was smoking in the orchard, and as I went out to meet
them, Antonia came running down from the house and hugged the two men as if
they had been away for months.
`Papa,' interested me, from my first glimpse of him.
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