Becoming Jane

Chapter 6

 

Chapter Six

                                          

The following day was like any other for the Alcott’s after arriving at Catherine’s farm. They unpacked their trunks and began to help Catherine keep house. The girls helped her bake the bread and pies and prepare the meat and vegetables for the evening meal. The men braved the blistering storm outside to feed the livestock in the barn. It was a short distance from the house, but still someone had to be outside yelling and calling so they knew which was to go once they needed to return to the house.

Kitty remained on the settee for the day, still complaining of a horrible back ache that wouldn’t ease. William wouldn’t leave her side, she was sure, should Kitty not have been in pain, she would have berated him for hovering her again, but he needed to be with her.

Whenever Little J had a spare moment, she would steal above stairs and write a paragraph or two on her assignment. She didn’t find the heart as fascinating as the brain, but she still realised its significance to keeping people alive.

Come dinner time, Kitty professed to the family that her pain had subsided as she joined everyone at the table. A feast of mutton, boiled cabbage and carrots and gravy had been prepared and everyone ate hungrily.

“Your father,” Catherine giggled in the middle of the meal. “Detested cabbage growing up, and his father said that if he didn’t eat anything on his plate, it would be put in the larder and he would have to eat it for breakfast. He didn’t eat the cabbage for a week until he finally gave in. He then promptly brought it all back up again.” The table erupted in laughter as Sebastian quickly lifted the cabbage from his plate and put it back in the bowl in the centre of the table, his cheeks slightly reddened with embarrassment.

“I’m an adult now, mama, if I choose not to eat cabbage then I won’t,” he huffed, a hint of bashfulness in his voice.

“Papa did the same thing to me when I was young and I didn’t like beans,” Kitty recalled. “Although when forced to eat it I martyred on,” she giggled. All of a sudden though, her face dropped. Her knife and fork clattered onto her plate as she gripped her stomach, he face etched with pain.

“Kitty, what’s happening?” William asked in a panicked voice.

Her blue eyes widened as she looked up at him. “She’s coming!” she exclaimed, another wave of pain flooded her face.

Knives and forks were abandoned on plates as everyone pulled their chairs out and rushed to Kitty’s aid. Little J didn’t know whether to be panicking or excited as Kitty was helped from her chair and lifted. William and Connor lifted her into their arms and brought her around the table toward the staircase to take her above stairs.

“To my bedchamber!” Catherine called. “It is the largest.”