Bertha married at the age of twenty-one-not to the pleasure of Papa. He birched her when he heard of her intent, but she grew the more rebellious. Several times at night I heard him go into her room and heard the silky swishing of the birch and Berthas cries. Mama would disappear and lock her door when such occurred, sometimes with Adelaide and sometimes not. My younger sister objected and would sometimes have herself let out and take herself, not speaking, to the morning room until Bertha's cries grew softer. Then would a silence fall that seemed both fearsome and awesome to me. After Papa at last emerged, Bertha would go to bed and no one would speak to her until the morning. Even then, Mama was still put out with her, though not on account of her intended betrothal, so I felt.

Adelaide took a suitor not long after. “A weed of a man,” I heard Papa call him-speaking to Mama. He did not birch her, though, and still they took their rides together. When Bertha visited, Papa would not receive her husband but would speak with her only in his room where she would stay for half an hour or so and come down all a-bubble, for her birching days were done.

Bertha and Adelaide remained very close after their marriages, but that period between them did not last for long. Several months following Adelaide's wedding, Bertha was transported with her husband to India where he joined his regiment. “Our salad days are over.” Mama said, and wept a little. Adelaide was quieter and did not often visit us. My mother worried and, one morning, asked me to go and see her and to take a basket to her of cakes and such.

I did not want to go, fair as the morning was. It was a long ride, I said, and the basket would be difficult to carry.

“Take the pony cart, Harry, and do not be lazy,” Mama said. I kicked about the house, but then decided that I ought to go or would hear nothing else all day. From cook I took the basket and some beer to refresh myself on route. I preferred it then to wine but have no taste for it nowadays.