Farmer Boy (14 page)

“Be careful you don't spill the polish,” she said, busily dusting.

Almanzo guessed he knew enough not to spill stove polish. But he didn't say anything. .

“Use less water, Almanzo. And, mercy! rub harder than that!” He didn't say anything.

Eliza Jane went into the parlor to dust it. She called: “Almanzo, that stove done now?”

“No,” said Almanzo.

“Goodness! don't dawdle so!”

Almanzo muttered, “Whose boss are you?”

Eliza Jane asked, “What's that you say?”

“Nothing,” Almanzo said.

Eliza Jane came to the door. 'You did so say something."

Almanzo straightened up and shouted:

“I say, WHOSE BOSS ARE YOU?”

Eliza Jane gasped. Then she cried out:

“You just wait, Almanzo James Wilder! You just wait till I tell Moth—”

Almanzo didn't mean to throw the blacking-brush. It flew right out of his hand. It sailed past Eliza Jane's head. Smack! it hit the parlor wall.

A great splash and smear of blacking appeared on the white-and-gold wall-paper.

Alice screamed. Almanzo turned around and ran all the way to the barn. He climbed into the haymow and crawled far back in the hay. He did not cry, but he would have cried if he hadn't been almost ten years old.

Mother would come home and find he had ruined her beautiful parlor. Father would take him into the woodshed and whip him with the blacksnake whip. He didn't want ever to come out of the haymow. He wished he could stay there forever.

After a long while Royal came into the haymow and called him. He crawled out of the hay, and he saw that Royal knew.

“Mannie, you'll get an awful whipping,” Royal said. Royal was sorry, but he couldn't do anything.

They both knew that Almanzo deserved whipping, and there was no way to keep Father from knowing it. So Almanzo said:

“I don'tcare.”

He helped do the chores, and he ate supper. He wasn't hungry, but he ate to show Eliza Jane he didn't care. Then he went to bed. The parlor door was shut, but he knew how the black splotch looked on the white-and-gold wall.

Next day Father and Mother came driving into the yard. Almanzo had to go out to meet them with the others. Alice whispered to him:

“Don't feel bad. Maybe they won't care.” But she looked anxious, too.

Father said, cheerfully: "Well, here we are.

Been getting along all right?"

“Yes, Father,” Royal answered. Almanzo didn't go to help unhitch the driving-horses; he stayed in the house.

Mother hurried about, looking at everything while she untied her bonnet strings.

“I declare, Eliza Jane and Alice,” she said “you've kept the house as well as I'd have done myself.”

“Mother,” Alice said, in a small voice.

“Mother—”

“Well, child, what is it?”

“Mother,” Alice said, bravely, “you told us not to eat all the sugar. Mother, we—we ate almost all of it.”

Mother laughed. “You've all been so good,” she said, “I won't scold about the sugar.”

She did not know that the black splotch was on the parlor wall. The parlor door was shut. She did not know it that day, nor all the next day. Almanzo could hardly choke down his food at mealtimes, and Mother looked worried. She took him to the pantry and made him swallow a big spoonful of horrible black medicine she had made of roots and herbs.

He did not want her to know about the black splotch, and yet he wished she did know. When the worst was over he could stop dreading it.

That second evening they heard a buggy driving into the yard. Mr. and Mrs. Webb were in it.

Father and Mother went out to meet them and in a minute they all came into the dining-room.

Almanzo heard Mother saying:

“Come right into the parlor!”

• f He couldn't move. He could not speak. This was worse than anything he had thought of.

Mother was so proud of her beautiful parlor. She was so proud of keeping it always nice. She didn't know he had ruined it, and now she was taking company in. They would see that big black splotch on the wall.

Mother opened the parlor door and went in.

Mrs. Webb went in, and Mr. Webb and Father.

Almanzo saw only their backs, but he heard the window-shades going up. He saw that the parlor was full of light. It seemed to him a long time before anybody said anything.

Then Mother said:

"Take this big chair, Mr. Webb, and make yourself comfortable. Sit right here on the sofa, Mrs.

Webb."

Almanzo couldn't believe his ears. Mrs. Webb said:

“You have such a beautiful parlor, I declare it's almost too fine to sit in.”

Now Almanzo could see where the blacking-brush had hit the wall, and he could not believe his eyes. The wall-paper was pure white and gold.

There was no black splotch.

Mother caught sight of him and said:

“Come in, Almanzo.”

Almanzo went in. He sat up straight on a haircloth chair and pushed his toes against the floor to keep from sliding off. Father and Mother were telling all about the visit to Uncle Andrew's.

There was no black splotch anywhere on the wall.

“Didn't you worry, leaving the children alone here and you so far away?” Mrs. Webb asked.

“No,” Mother said, proudly. “I knew the children would take care of everything as well as if James and I were home.”

Almanzo minded his manners and did not say a word.

Next day, when no one was looking, he stole into the parlor. He looked carefully at the place where the black splotch had been. The wall-paper was patched. The patch had been cut out carefully around the gold scrolls, and the pattern was fitted perfectly and the edges of the patch scraped so thin that he could hardly find them.

He waited until he could speak to Eliza Jane alone, and then he asked:

“Eliza Jane, did you patch the parlor wall-paper for me?”

“Yes,” she said. “I got the scraps of wall-paper that were saved in the attic, and cut out the patch and put it on with flour-paste.”

Almanzo said, gruffly:

« T ' .

'I'm sorry I threw that brush at you. Honest, I didn't mean to, Eliza Jane."

“I guess I was aggravating,” she said. “But I didn't mean to be. You're the only little brother I've got.”

Almanzo had never known before how much he liked Eliza Jane.

They never, never told about the black splotch on the parlor wall, and Mother never knew.

Now it was haying-time. Father brought out the scythes, and Almanzo turned the grindstone with one hand and poured a little stream of water on it with the other hand, while Father held the steel edges delicately against the whirring stone. The water kept the scythes from getting too hot, while the stone ground their edges thin and sharp.

Then Almanzo went through the woods to the little French cabins, and told French Joe and Lazy John to come to work next morning.

As soon as the sun dried the dew on the meadows, Father and Joe and John began cutting the hay. They walked side by side, swinging their scythes into the tall grass, and the plumed timothy fell in great swathes.

Swish! swish! swish! went the scythes, while Almanzo and Pierre and Louis followed behind them, spreading out the heavy swathes with pitchforks so that they would dry evenly in the sunshine. The stubble was soft and cool under their bare feet. Birds flew up before the mowers, now and then a rabbit jumped and bounded away.

High up in the air the meadowlarks sang.

The sun grew hotter. The smell of the hay grew stronger and sweeter. Then waves of heat began to come up from the ground. Almanzo's brown arms burned browner, and sweat trickled on his forehead. The men stopped to put green leaves in the crowns of their hats, and so did the boys. For a little while the leaves were cool on top of their heads.

In the middle of the morning, Mother blew the dinner horn. Almanzo knew what that meant. He stuck his pitchfork in the ground, and went running and skipping down across the meadows to the house. Mother met him on the back porch with the milk-pail, brimming full of cold egg-nog.

The egg-nog was made of milk and cream, with plenty of eggs and sugar. Its foamy top was freckled with spices, and pieces of ice floated in it.

The sides of the pail were misty with cold.

Almanzo trudged slowly toward the hayfield with the heavy pail and a dipper. He thought to himself that the pail was too full, he might spill some of the egg-nog. Mother said waste was sinful. He was sure it would be sinful to waste a drop of that egg-nog. He should do something to save it. So he set down the pail, he dipped the dipper full, and he drank. T h e cold egg-nog slid smoothly down his throat, and it made him cool inside.

When he reached the hayfield, everyone stopped work. They stood in the shade of an oak and pushed back their hats, and passed the dipper from hand to hand till all the egg-nog was gone.

Almanzo drank his full share. The breeze seemed cool now, and Lazy John said, wiping the foam from his mustache:

“Ah! That puts heart into a man!”

Now the men whetted their scythes, making the whetstones ring gaily on the steel blades. And they went back to work with a will. Father always maintained that a man could do more work in his twelve hours, if he had a rest and all the egg-nog he could drink, morning and afternoon.

They all worked in the hayfield as long as there was light enough to see what they were doing, and the chores were done by lantern-light.

Next morning the swathes had dried, and the boys raked them into windrows, with big, light, wooden rakes that Father had made. Then Joe and John went on cutting hay, and Pierre and Louis spread the swathes behind them. But Almanzo worked on the hay-rack.

Father drove it up from the barns, and Father and Royal pitched the windrows into it, while Almanzo trampled them down. Back and forth he ran, on the sweet-smelling hay, packing it down as fast as Father and Royal pitched it into the rack.

When the rack would hold no more he was high in the air, on top of the load. There he lay on his stomach and kicked up his heels, while Father drove down to the Big Barn. The load of hay barely squeezed under the top of the tall doorway, and it was a long slide to the ground.

Father and Royal pitched the hay into the haymow, while Almanzo took the water-jug to the well. He pumped, then jumped and caught the gushing cold water in his hand and drank. He carried water to Father and Royal, and he filled the jug again. Then he rode back in the empty hay-rack, and trampled down another load.

Almanzo liked haying-time. From dawn till long after dark every day he was busy, always doing different things. It was like play, and morning and afternoon there was the cold egg-nog. But after three weeks of making hay, all the haymows were crammed to bursting and the meadows were bare. Then the rush of harvest-time came.

The oats were ripe, standing thick and tall and yellow. The wheat was golden, darker than the oats. The beans were ripe, and pumpkins and carrots and turnips and potatoes were ready to gather.

There was no rest and no play for anyone now.

They all worked from candle-light to candle-light.

Mother and the girls were making cucumber pickles, green-tomato pickles, and watermelon-rind pickles; they were drying corn and apples, and making preserves. Everything must be saved, nothing wasted of all the summer's bounty. Even the apple cores were saved for making vinegar, and a bundle of oat-straw was soaking in a tub on the back porch. Whenever Mother had one minute to spare, she braided an inch or two of oat-straw braid for making next summer's hats.

The oats were not cut with scythes, but with cradles. Cradles had blades like scythes, but they also had long wooden teeth that caught the cut stalks and held them. When they had cut enough for a bundle, Joe and John slid the stalks off in neat piles. Father and Royal and Almanzo followed behind, binding them into sheaves.

Almanzo had never bound oats before. Father showed him how to knot two handfuls of stalks into a long band, then how to gather up an armful of grain, pull the band tightly around the middle, twist its ends together, and tuck them in tightly.

In a little while he could bind a sheaf pretty well, but not very fast. Father and Royal could bind oats as fast as the reapers cut them.

Just before sunset the reapers stopped reaping, and they all began shocking the sheaves. All the cut oats must be shocked before dark, because they would spoil if they lay on the ground in the dew overnight.

Almanzo could shock oats as well as anybody.

He stood ten sheaves up on their stem ends, close together with all the heads of grain upward. Then he set two more sheaves on top and spread out their stems to make a roof over the ten sheaves.

The shocks looked like little Indian wigwams, dotted all over the field of pale stubble.

The wheat-field was waiting; there was no time to lose. As soon as all the oats were in the shock, everyone hurried to cut and bind and shock the wheat. It was harder to handle because it was heavier than the oats, but Almanzo manfully did his best. Then there was the field of oats and Canada peas. T h e pea vines were tangled all through the oats, so they could not be shocked.

Almanzo raked them into long windrows.

Already it was high time to pull the navy beans. Alice had to help with them. Father hauled the bean-stakes to the field and set them up, driving them into the ground with a maul.

Then Father and Royal hauled the shocked grain to the barns, while Almanzo and Alice pulled the beans.

First they laid rocks all around the bean-stakes, to keep the beans off the ground. Then they pulled up the beans. With both hands they pulled till their hands could hold no more. They carried the beans to the stakes and laid the roots against them, spreading the long vines out on the rocks.

Layer after layer of beans they piled around each stake. The roots were bigger than the vines, so the pile grew higher and higher in the middle.

The tangled vines, full of rattling bean-pods, hung down all around.

When the roots were piled to the tops of the stakes, Almanzo and Alice laid vines over the top, making a little roof to shed rain. Then that bean-stake was done, and they began another one.