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Page 50
Such disappointments only gave greater zest to the nights when we acted
charades, or had a costume ball in the back parlour, with Sally always
dressed like a boy. Frances taught us to dance that winter, and she said,
from the first lesson, that Antonia would make the best dancer among us.
On Saturday nights, Mrs. Harling used to play the old operas for
us--'Martha,' `Norma,' `Rigoletto'--telling us the story while she played.
Every Saturday night was like a party. The parlour, the back parlour, and
the dining-room were warm and brightly lighted, with comfortable chairs and
sofas, and gay pictures on the walls. One always felt at ease there.
Antonia brought her sewing and sat with us--she was already beginning to
make pretty clothes for herself. After the long winter evenings on the
prairie, with Ambrosch's sullen silences and her mother's complaints, the
Harlings' house seemed, as she said, `like Heaven' to her. She was never
too tired to make taffy or chocolate cookies for us. If Sally whispered in
her ear, or Charley gave her three winks, Tony would rush into the kitchen
and build a fire in the range on which she had already cooked three meals
that day.
While we sat in the kitchen waiting for the cookies to bake or the taffy to
cool, Nina used to coax Antonia to tell her stories--about the calf that
broke its leg, or how Yulka saved her little turkeys from drowning in the
freshet, or about old Christmases and weddings in Bohemia. Nina
interpreted the stories about the creche fancifully, and in spite of our
derision she cherished a belief that Christ was born in Bohemia a short
time before the Shimerdas left that country. We all liked Tony's stories.
Her voice had a peculiarly engaging quality; it was deep, a little husky,
and one always heard the breath vibrating behind it. Everything she said
seemed to come right out of her heart.
One evening when we were picking out kernels for walnut taffy, Tony told us
a new story.
`Mrs. Harling, did you ever hear about what happened up in the Norwegian
settlement last summer, when I was threshing there? We were at Iversons',
and I was driving one of the grain-wagons.'
Mrs. Harling came out and sat down among us. `Could you throw the wheat
into the bin yourself, Tony?' She knew what heavy work it was.
`Yes, ma'm, I did. I could shovel just as fast as that fat Andern boy that
drove the other wagon. One day it was just awful hot. When we got back to
the field from dinner, we took things kind of easy. The men put in the
horses and got the machine going, and Ole Iverson was up on the deck,
cutting bands. I was sitting against a straw-stack, trying to get some
shade. My wagon wasn't going out first, and somehow I felt the heat awful
that day. The sun was so hot like it was going to burn the world up.
After a while I see a man coming across the stubble, and when he got close
I see it was a tramp. His toes stuck out of his shoes, and he hadn't
shaved for a long while, and his eyes was awful red and wild, like he had
some sickness. He comes right up and begins to talk like he knows me
already. He says: `The ponds in this country is done got so low a man
couldn't drownd himself in one of 'em.'
`I told him nobody wanted to drownd themselves, but if we didn't have rain
soon we'd have to pump water for the cattle.
`"Oh, cattle," he says, "you'll all take care of your cattle! Ain't you
got no beer here?" I told him he'd have to go to the Bohemians for beer;
the Norwegians didn't have none when they threshed. "My God!" he says, "so
it's Norwegians now, is it? I thought this was Americy."
`Then he goes up to the machine and yells out to Ole Iverson, "Hello,
partner, let me up there. I can cut bands, and I'm tired of trampin'. I
won't go no farther."
`I tried to make signs to Ole, 'cause I thought that man was crazy and
might get the machine stopped up. But Ole, he was glad to get down out of
the sun and chaff-- it gets down your neck and sticks to you something
awful when it's hot like that. So Ole jumped down and crawled under one of
the wagons for shade, and the tramp got on the machine. He cut bands all
right for a few minutes, and then, Mrs. Harling, he waved his hand to me
and jumped head-first right into the threshing machine after the wheat.
`I begun to scream, and the men run to stop the horses, but the belt had
sucked him down, and by the time they got her stopped, he was all beat and
cut to pieces. He was wedged in so tight it was a hard job to get him out,
and the machine ain't never worked right since.'
`Was he clear dead, Tony?' we cried.
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