The Macready Family
Abby Macready opened the front door of the cottage she shared with her husband and three daughters. The whole family shared one room with a fireplace at the far end for cooking and warmth. Her girls looked up at the sound of the door. On the only bed in the house lay their father, Mr. Macready, who did not move. Shrugging off her shawl and taking her kerchief off her head, Abbey hung them on hooks next to the door and went to kneel next to the bed.
"Abby," the sick man whispered in his delirium rather than to acknowledge her presence.
Even though she knew he could not hear her, she said in a comforting tone, "I have found a job, John, in the big house a few miles away."
John groaned in his sleep.
His wife continued. "Soon I shall earn enough money to buy medicine to make you well."
Silence. Except for John's raspy breathing.
Abbey pushed his damp hair out of his sweaty face and got up to face her daughters. Ivy sat on a three-legged stool next to the fire to tend it. Margaret was knitting in a chair in the corner quietly except for the click-clack of the needles. Betty knelt by the foot of the bed nervously biting her fingernails, a habit that her mother deplored and tried to get her to stop. Both of them were now too distraught to notice.
"Tomorrow I will start to work for Professor Kirke," Abby announced. "You will all have to take care of your father by yourselves while I am gone."
John Macready coughed two times.
"Mrs. McInnis next door has kindly said that she will help in any way she can and you only have to ask," continued Abby. "Go to bed now. Tomorrow will be a hard day for us all and we will need all the rest we can get."
Obediently, each girl put down what she was doing and prepared a place on the floor to sleep.
