The Moffats by Eleanor Estes Page A

to a different position. Then you can watch the others in the kitchen and besides, you'll get a better view out of this window onto the porch. The frost is beginning to thaw a little and soon you'll be able to see out altogether. There! How's that now?" she asked, puffing a little from the exertion.
    "All right, but I wish I could get up," said Rufus.

8. The Coal Barge

    Jane was sitting with her feet in the oven, warming them. She had gotten them wet building a snowman with Rufus. It was good to have Rufus to play with again. For now Rufus was all over the scarlet fever. He was back at school. They were all back at school. Several colonies had been settled in Janey's absence. Hard words like
squirrel
and
school
had been taken up in Rufus's class; and Washington had crossed the Delaware in Joe's. Sylvie was back at choir rehearsals. And now the children could go anywhere they liked in the whole block, in the whole town, in fact. Most important of all the Scarlet Fever sign was off the door. If only they had taken that old For Sale sign down, too, thought Jane.
    "Mama, do you think, now that we're not contagious anymore, that someone will come and buy our house?"
    "Someone might, but let's hope not until the cold weather is over anyway," replied Mama.
    "Well, why couldn't we have left the Scarlet Fever sign on the door so no one would want to buy this house?" asked Jane.
    "You couldn't have gone to school then. Not as long as the Scarlet Fever sign was on the door. Would you like that?"
    "No-o-o, I s'pose not," answered Jane thoughtfully. She felt her toes. They seemed to be quite dry, so she went into the Grape Room to cut out a cardboard sole to fit in her shoes, which had worn a hole right through to the ground.
    The Moffats were feeling the pinch of hard times this winter. The quarter meter ate up the quarters for gas so quickly—and coal! "A lump of coal is
as
valuable as a gold nugget," Mama said. Joe had to sift the ashes and resift them for possible good coals.
    "Are we poverty-stricken, Mama?" Jane asked, returning to the kitchen with her new sole comfortably in place.
    "No, Janey. Not poverty-stricken," said Mama soberly, and stroking Janey's cheek, "not poverty-stricken, just..."
    "Rich, then?" asked Jane.

    "No. Not rich, either, nor well-to-do, just poor..." answered Mama.
    This satisfied Jane, for she thought if they were poverty-stricken she would have to go out into the cold and into the streets and sell matches like the little match girl. But she knew from the way the silver coins left Mama's hands when she was paying for the potatoes that fingers and coins parted company reluctantly. And the truth is, Mama was having to be a very careful manager to make ends meet. She had not been able to do any sewing while Rufus had scarlet fever. Moreover, the ladies in the town of Cranbury decided they would have to do without new dresses since times were so bad. They said, "Why have a gown made by hand when you can really pick them up so inexpensively in the shops nowadays?" There were many days when Mama and Madame had no sewing to do at all. Miss Chichester was the only steady customer and that was because there was that arrangement about the dancing lessons.
    But finally, thank goodness, someone had decided that the little boys in town should organize into a Naval Reserve Corps. Joe was in it, and Mama was to make all the white sailor suits. This was a job! Fifty of them! For days and weeks Madame had looked altogether ridiculous with white middy blouses on her shoulders.
    "Here," said Mama to Joe when he came in from school that afternoon. "Take this five-dollar bill and buy a bushel of coal. Count the change very carefully. That's the last bill we'll have until these sailor suits are ready."
    Jane said she would go with Joe. Rufus wanted to go, too, but Mama said he couldn't. He had played outdoors enough for one day, as he didn't have all his strength back yet after his illness.
    Joe dragged Jane over the hard icy