“If I were a thimble, where would I be,” Becky whispered to
herself. She spied the grandfather clock resting on a pedestal with four feet
holding up the base. How smartly a
thimble could fit under that pedestal. The
height of each foot looks to be equal to the size of a thimble. Dropping to
her knees, she peered beneath the clock.
Drat, it’s dark and
dusty. She pulled the pencil out that was holding her hair in a bun, her
tresses falling over her shoulders, and swept the pencil in the space between
the base of the clock and the floor.
A spider scurried out and she heard something rolling about,
but only farther back beyond the reach of her thimble-chaser. She laid down
flat on her belly and cocked her head. “Burdee, grab the flashlight for me,”
she called. “It’s in the buffet drawer on the right side,” she added.
Eager to help her big sister, Burdee Erdmann scrambled for
the silver flashlight. “Let me shine it for you, Becksey,” the little girl
pleaded as she slid the metal switch up along the flashlight canister. Ten
years separated the two girls in age with one sibling, Harold, between the two.
Becky was smack-dab in the middle of her
sisters and brothers as she also had two older siblings.
“Okay, Burdee, liegen down here with me and point it along
the floor under the clock.”
“Liegen? Becky, sometimes you still use the wrong words,” Burdee
said.
“Oh, it’s not wrong, just not English. Lie down here, Burdee
and help me look.”
Light illuminated more dust, but Becky also saw a walnut
shell, a marble, a paper doll’s bonnet, and in the way back, a thimble. “I
wonder whose job it is to clean under this clock,” she mused.
“Since you’re down there looking, the job’s yours,” she
heard her mother say, “but don’t get up, I’ll get a duster for you.”
“We’re a cleaning team, Becksey!” Burdee exclaimed, feeling
more grown up to be helping with a novel chore like cleaning under the
grandfather clock.
Becky said, “Burdee, whatever we find under this clock, you
can have…except for the thimble. I need that to finish my sewing.”
Mrs. Erdmann handed Becky the feather duster and the older
girl ran it under the pedestal, knocking out the dusty treasures for her sister
to collect. “Mutti, do you want me to dust the mopboards, too?”
“No, I’d like to use soap and water on those, but you could
come over here and dust under the buffet. There’s the long rail that’s hard to
clean.”
Becky turned to Burdee, “See how I handled the duster on the
clock? You do that with the buffet, okay?”
“Yes, yes, I will!” she happily said.
“Mutti, I can wipe down the floor and paneling with a soapy
cloth, but I’d like to finish my sewing first.” Becky stood up and moved over
to the sewing cabinet.
“That’s a fine idea, Rebecca. What are you working on?”
The girl held up some fabric and said, “Sören Markusson said
he’d buy me a root beer at the church Octoberfest and I was making an apron to
wear over my skirt. It feels like a new dress that way.”
“Markusson…his father is a farmer north of town here, isn’t
he?”
“Yes, they live on a farm. Sören has a sister, Sonja, and he
and I are in the same class at school. But he’s just buying me a root beer,
Mutti. He’s not courting me or anything like that.”
“I should hope not. You’re too young to be serious about a
boy.”
Becky kept her eyes on her unfinished apron and said, “Sharon,
Ruth, Shirley, and I are all going together. I don’t know about the boys. I
suppose some of them will be there, too. Are you and Papa going?”
“Ja, ja. Ich denke, I mean, I think we will go and take the
little ones.”
Burdee had been lining up her trinkets on the table and
said, “Where are we going?”
“Shortly, we’re going to make supper, little mausi. Clean
your hands and put those dusty things away.”
Burdee laughed and ran in a circle, “I’m a little mousie, I’m
a little mousie, squeak, squeak, squeak!” Her mother laughed with her and
shooed her with her hands.
Becky
sat down to hem her apron.
No comments:
Post a Comment