Read "Worth his While" by Amy Ella Blanchard online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
It was very pleasant to be awakened in the morning by the song of / birds, and Benny felt inclined to lie still and listen to them, but he / suddenly remembered that he was not there as a picker, and could not be / quite so independent in the matter of hours and minutes. He must get up / and go down to help Mrs. Bentley. Therefore he jumped up and quickly / dressed himself, and had the fire made before Mrs. Bentley appeared. / She smiled her satisfaction. It was something, after all, to have a / small willing boy in place of a lazy, shiftless woman, and she hardly / regretted her slovenly and incompetent servant, although the work of / getting breakfast was all her own.
Benny, however, tried to make it easy for her. He brought in water, / fed the chickens, went to the dairy, and even set the table, with the / help of little Jamie, who showed him where to get dishes and knives and / forks. He had finished with satisfaction, for he had given a finishing / touch by bringing in a bunch of wild roses he had discovered on his way / to the spring, and these he had placed in a glass in the middle of the / table.