When Mary's head did hit the pillow, she fell asleep as if clubbed. She woke the next morning in exactly the same position as when she'd gone to sleep. Maybe she'd shifted back into it during the night. Maybe she hadn't had the energy to roll over.

Once she crawled out of bed, the aromas of tea and frying eggs and potatoes floating up to the bedroom from the kitchen helped get her moving. She put on the same skirt and sweater with a different shirtwaist and hurried downstairs. "Good," her mother said when she made her appearance. "Another five minutes and I'd've sent Julia after you. Here you are." She used a spatula to lift a couple of eggs from the skillet and set them on Mary's plate. Potatoes fried in lard went alongside them.

"Thanks, Ma." Mary put salt on the eggs and potatoes and pepper on the eggs. She ate like a wolf. Her mother gave her a thick china mug full of tea. Mary poured in milk from a pitcher and added a couple of spoonsful of sugar. She drank the tea as hot as she could bear it.

Julia was already on her second cup. "How do the Americans stand drinking coffee all the time?" she wondered aloud. "It's so nasty."

"It's disgusting," Mary said. She honestly believed she would have thought that even if the Yankees hadn't done what they'd done. She'd tried coffee a couple of times, and found it astonishingly bitter.

To her surprise, her mother said, "Coffee's not so bad. Oh, I like tea better, but coffee's not so bad. It'll pry your eyes open even better than tea will, and that's nice of a morning."

Hearing Maude McGregor defending something Mary thought of as American and therefore automatically corrupt rocked her. She didn't quarrel, though; she had no time to quarrel. As soon as she finished breakfast, she put on rubbers and an overcoat that had belonged to Alexander. It was much too big for her, even though she'd nearly matched her mother's height, but that didn't matter. Along with earmuffs and mittens, it would keep her warm while she did the chores.