Folly by Marthe Jocelyn

was not a baby.
    "Some of you Infants have already tried this," said Tubbs. "So you know it's not as easy as it looks. They've picked me to show you because I'm best."
    "He always says that," grumbled Frederick.
    "Whatever rude thing you may be whispering," said Tubbs, "it will be a matter of blistering importance--you get that? Blistering importance"--he laughed at his own cleverness--"that you learn to darn a stocking properly. You want to know why?"
    James nodded, caught up.
    "Because all the hose goes--heh! That rhymes! All the hose goes into the same laundry tub, doesn't it? These stockings have been here since the first boys came, over one hundred years ago. They've been worn by stinking, fungusy feet, over and over and over.... So you won't necessarily be getting your own back, will you? You never know when your own ittle toesies will be inside a stocking that's been done wrong, do you? I'm here to teach you the battle cry: Hosiery need not be a misery! Now, watch carefully...."
    "He's a crackpot," whispered Frederick. "But scary."
    "He's funny," said James, setting his sights higher than mere seven-year-old Frederick.
    In his right hand, Tubbs held up a needle strung with wool. He plunged his left fist into the heel of a stocking, knuckles showing pink through threadbare patches.
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    James held his breath, not knowing what exactly he should be paying attention to. It looked complicated. Only moments later Tubbs had filled the holes with a neat latticework of white strands.
    "Now it's your turn," said Tubbs, passing around a basket of limp white stockings. "Whatever you mend today, you'll wear tomorrow. That'll teach you better than anything."
    James soon discovered he was a natural darner. Pulling the wool taut, but not so tight as to pucker what it was meant to be mending, gently weaving the blunt-tipped needle over and under, over and under ... his breathing eased, his worry faded--he could do this!
    Finished before any of the others, James couldn't help grinning as he held up the stocking. Wouldn't Mama Peevey think he was a clever boy? Tubbs's eyebrows lifted, faintly impressed.
    "Good work. What's your name?"
    "James," said James. "James Nelligan."
    "Smell-Again, eh?" said Tubbs. James blinked. Oh no, please not .
    "Excel-Again," said James, so quickly that he surprised himself. Frederick went still beside him. Tubbs snorted, but he handed another stocking to James and winked. Ha , thought James. Devil's fart, but I'm clever .
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    ELIZA 1877 Holding On to Bates
    She was a wily one, that Mary. Eliza had told her plain, hadn't she? She had set her sights on being Eliza Bates someday and Mary was to keep herself to herself as far as Bates was concerned.
    It burnt a hole in Eliza's belly the way he'd perk up when Mary come into the kitchen or bent over to tinker with the fire. She seemed to pay him no mind, but Eliza wasn't fooled. You wouldn't think a young slip like that would have many tricks up her sleeve, but what other explanation could there be for Bates's wandering eye?
    Eliza got her hopes up for a bit that Mary'd cotton on to Mr. Daniel, the letter carrier. She always jumped at his knock and prattled on so he'd have to drag himself off to finish his rounds. But wouldn't you know it? He had a wife!
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    The matter became urgent one morning when Mrs. Wiggins sent her out to the street with Bates, to help carry in a large order from the grocer. And to step lively.
    "Hey, fella," said Eliza, quiet-like, holding a crate of beer. "I'll be counting linens at half past three.... What will you be doing?" She brushed past him closer than strictly needed. The linen cupboard was small and dark, with the advantage of blankets at hand to soften whichever hard surface might get bumped against during a tumbling.
    "You'll be counting alone," said Bates, swinging a barrel of sugar up to his shoulder, jerking his chin to tell her move over .
    "I could do it earlier," said Eliza, "Right after we've got the luncheon