That whole day, Mrs. Penn spent in bed. We tiptoed about the house, making sure not to wake her. Frank, although he left to do whatever officers do in the daytime when they’re not irritating the heck out of people like me, popped in for lunch and returned again at dinnertime.
I was in the kitchen, putting the last touches on the green beans and mashing the already cooked potatoes when I heard a heavy knock at the door. Dr. Stevens, I thought to myself, recognizing the door basher.
Frank called out that he’d let the doctor in. I was glad, because I had a pot roast to get out of the oven, and I still wanted to fix a green salad, although I knew the boys wouldn’t be enthusiastic about it. They weren’t vegetable fans. Frances, in particular, always tried to hide anything green under the unfinished leftovers on his plate. I’d already warned him about stomach aches and that the failure to eat vegetables might stunt his growth. I hoped that wasn’t a lie. I’d have to ask the doctor privately.
“But he wants to look like Frank,” Carlo had said when I’d told Frances that needing vegetables to grow tall. Carlo looked worried about that. “Will Frances get muscles if he doesn’t eat vegetables?”
Frank snorted, but backed me up. He pretended to like vegetables, but I was pretty sure that he felt more or less the way the boys did. Perhaps it was a male thing, I surmised, reflecting back on some of the fathers back in the village who had also frowned at the pile of greens on their plate. I’d had to start frying bacon and mixing it in the greens to get them interested in vegetables. I wondered if that would improve Frances’ reception to them.
I had the full dinner on the table when Dr. Green sat down by the plate I’d laid out for him. Before sitting next to the boys, I asked the doctor if we should assist Mrs. Penn to the table, but he shook his head. “She’s better off resting. After dinner, we can take her something, but I’d rather she kept to her bed.”
So, we sat down to partake. I had my usual salad, which the doctor frowned at. “You need meat, young lady,” he said, looking like he was ready to give me a full lecture on nutrition.
“She never eats meat,” Frances said. “And she never gets sick. She told us that.”
“Yeah, and she rides like she’s part horse,” Carlo said.
It was hard not to chuckle over that. It was a strange thing to say, but Carlo’s meaning was clear. I rode well, not that I looked like a horse (I hoped.)
Anyway, the doctor got caught up in his eating and forgot his lecture. His preoccupation with his meal meant that I was free to enjoy my salad. (It didn’t have meat, but it did have peas, cheese, and a sprinkling of walnuts, so my protein sources were well supplied.)
Willow, who almost always sat on the floor beside me, eyed the doctor with a suspicious eye, but remained in her place, patiently waiting for my leftovers. (Yes, one would assume that a cat would not eat salad, but Willow had odd eating habits. Only rarely did she take a piece of meat from one of the boys, and then only to be friendly, not with great eagerness. I worried that cats were naturally carnivores and needed meat for their sustenance, but cats are cats, which means they can’t be argued with. Obstinacy and self-reliance are in their persona.)