This monthly letter was the only pleasure and stimulant in her life . Existence would have been , so Sidney thought , a dreary , unbearable blank without it . She cast aside her milking-dress with a thrill of distaste that tingled to her rosy fingertips . As she slipped into her blue-print afternoon dress her aunt called to her from below . Sidney ran out to the dark little entry and leaned over the stair railing . Below in the kitchen there was a hubbub of laughing , crying , quarrelling children , and a reek of bad tobacco smoke drifted up to the girl 's disgusted nostrils . Aunt Jane was standing at the foot of the stairs with a lamp in one hand and a year-old baby clinging to the other . She was a big shapeless woman with a round good-natured face -- cheerful and vulgar as a sunflower was Aunt Jane at all times and occasions . `` I want to run over and see how Mrs. Brixby is this evening , Siddy , and you must take care of the baby till I get back . '' Sidney sighed and went downstairs for the baby . It never would have occurred to her to protest or be petulant about it . She had all her aunt 's sweetness of disposition , if she resembled her in nothing else . She had not grumbled because she had to rise at four that morning , get breakfast , milk the cows , bake bread , prepare seven children for school , get dinner , preserve twenty quarts of strawberries , get tea , and milk the cows again . All her days were alike as far as hard work and dullness went , but she accepted them cheerfully and uncomplainingly . But she did resent having to look after the baby when she wanted to write her letter . She carried the baby to her room , spread a quilt on the floor for him to sit on , and gave him a box of empty spools to play with . Fortunately he was a phlegmatic infant , fond of staying in one place , and not given to roaming about in search of adventures ; but Sidney knew she would have to keep an eye on him , and it would be distracting to literary effort . She got out her box of paper and sat down by the little table at the window with a small kerosene lamp at her elbow . The room was small -- a mere box above the kitchen which Sidney shared with two small cousins . Her bed and the cot where the little girls slept filled up almost all the available space .
The furniture was poor , but everything was neat -- it was the only neat room in the house , indeed , XXXXX tidiness was no besetting virtue of Aunt Jane 's .
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