By The Shores Of Silver Lake (18 page)

Then no one can lift the latch and open the door. I want the door to be locked. Don't come down till I call you tomorrow morning."

In the morning, Laura and Mary and Carrie lay in bed after the sun was up. Downstairs they heard the strangers talking, and breakfast dishes clattering.

“Ma said not to come till she called us,” Laura insisted.

“I wish they'd go away,” said Carrie. “I don't like strangers.”

“I don't either, and neither does Ma, ” Laura said.

“It takes them a long time to get started, because they're greenhorns.”

At last they were gone, and at dinner Pa said he would go to Brookings tomorrow. “No use starting unless I start early,” he said. “It's a long day's trip, and there's no sense in starting after sun-up and having to camp out overnight in this cold.”

That night more strangers came. Thenext night there were more. Ma said, “Mercy on us, aren't we to have one night in peace by ourselves?”

“I can't help it, Caroline,” said Pa. “We can't refuse folks shelter, when there's nowhere else they can stay.”

“We can charge them for it, Charles,” Ma said firmly.

Pa did not like to charge folks for shelter and a meal, but he knew that Ma was right. So he charged twenty-five cents a meal, and twenty-five cents for shelter overnight, for man or horse.

There was no more singing, no more comfortable suppers or cosy evenings. Every day more strangers crowded around the supper table and every night as soon as all the dishes were washed, Laura and Mary and Carrie had to go up to the attic and fasten the door behind them.

The strangers came from Iowa, from Ohio, from Illi-nois and Michigan, from Wisconsin and Minnesota and even from faraway New York and Vermont. They were going to Huron or to Fort Pierre or even farther west, looking for homesteads.

One morning Laura sat up in bed, listening.

“Where's Pa, I wonder?” she said. “I don't hear Pa's voice. That's Mr. Boast talking.”

“Maybe he's gone to get the homestead,” Mary guessed.

When at last the loaded wagons went away to the west and Ma called the girls downstairs, she said that Pa had started before sun-up. “He didn't want to go and leave us in this rush,” she said, "but he had to.

Someone else will get the homestead if he doesn't hurry. We had no idea that people would rush in here like this, and March hardly begun."

This was the first week in March. The door was open, and the air felt like spring.

“When March comes in like a lamb, it goes out like a lion,” said Ma. “Come, girls, there's work to be done. Let's get this house in order before more travelers come.”

“I wish nobody'd come till Pa gets back,” Laura said while she and Carrie washed the stacks of dishes.

“Maybe nobody will,” Carrie hoped.

“Mr. Boast is going to look after things while your Pa's gone,” Ma said. “He asked Mr. and Mrs. Boast to stay here. They'll sleep in the bedroom, and Grace and I'll go upstairs with you girls.”

Mrs. Boast came to help. That day they cleaned the whole house and moved the beds. They were all very tired, when in the last of the sunset they saw a wagon coming from the east. There were five men in it.

Mr. Boast helped them put their horses in the stable. Mrs. Boast helped Ma cook their suppers. They had not finished eating, when another wagon brought four men. Laura cleared the table, washed the dishes, and helped put supper on the table for them. While they were eating, a third wagon brought six men.

Mary had gone upstairs to be away from the crowd.

Carrie sang Grace to sleep in the bedroom with the door shut. Laura cleared the table again and washed the dishes again.

“This is the worst yet,” Ma said to Mrs. Boast when they met in the pantry. “There isn't room for fifteen on the floor, we'll have to put some beds in the lean-to. And they'll have to use their robes and blankets and coats for bedding.”

“Rob will tend to it, I'll speak to him,” said Mrs.

Boast. “Mercy me, that's not another wagon?”

Laura had to wash the dishes again and reset the table again. The house was so full of strange men, strange eyes, and strange voices and bulky coats and muddy boots, that she could hardly get through the crowd.

At last they were all fed, and for the last time the last dish was washed. Ma with Grace in her arms followed Laura and Carrie to the stairs, and carefully fastened the door behind them. Mary was sleeping in bed, and Laura could not keep her eyes open while she undressed. But as soon as she lay down, she was awakened by the noise downstairs.

There was loud talking and walking. Ma sat up to listen. The downstairs bedroom was still, so Mr. Boast must think that the noise was all right. Ma lay down again. Thenoise grew louder. Sometimes it almost stopped, then suddenly it burst out. A crash shook the house, and Laura sat straight up, crying out, "Ma!

What's that?"

Ma's voice was so low that it seemed louder than all the shouting downstairs. “Be quiet, Laura,” she said.

“Lie down.”

Laura thought she could not sleep. She was so tired that the noise tormented her. But another crash woke her out of a sound sleep. Ma said, "It's all right, Laura.

Mr. Boast is there." Laura slept again.

In the morning Ma gently shook her awake, and whispered, "Come Laura, it's time to get breakfast.

Let the others sleep."

They went downstairs together. Mr. Boast had taken up the beds. Tousled, sleepy and red-eyed, the men were getting into their boots and coats. Ma and Mrs. Boast hurried breakfast. The table was small, there were not dishes enough, so that Laura set the table and washed the dishes three times.

At last the men were gone, and Ma called Mary, while she and Mrs. Boast cooked more breakfast and Laura washed dishes and set the table once more.

“My, such a night!” Mrs. Boast exclaimed.

“What was the matter?” Mary wondered.

“I think they were drunk,” Ma said, tight-lipped.

“I should say they were!” Mr. Boast told her. “They brought bottles and a jug of whisky. I thought once I would have to interfere, but what could I do against a crowd of fifteen drunks? I decided to let them fight it out, unless they set the house afire.”

“I'm thankful they didn't,” said Ma.

That day a young man drove up to the house with a load of lumber. He had hauled the boards from Brookings, to build a store on the townsite. Pleasantly he urged Ma to board him while he was building, and Ma could not refuse because there was no other place where he could eat.

Next came a man and his son from Sioux Falls.

They had brought lumber to build a grocery store.

They begged Ma to board them, and after she had agreed she said to Laura, "Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb."

“If Ingalls doesn't hurry back, we'll have a town here before he comes,” said Mr. Boast.

“I only hope he's not too late to file on the homestead,” Ma replied anxiously.

T hat day did not seem real. Laura's eyelids felt sandy and she yawned all the time, yet she did not feel sleepy. At noon young Mr. Hinz and the two Mr. Harthorns came to dinner. In the afternoon their hammers could be heard pounding on the framework of the new buildings. It seemed a long time since Pa had gone.

He did not come that night. All the next day he did not come. That night he did not come. And now Laura was sure that he was having a hard time to get the homestead. Perhaps he might not get it. If he did not get it, perhaps they would go west to Oregon.

Ma would not let any more strangers sleep in the house. Only Mr. Hinz and the two Harthorns bunked down on the floor by the stove. The weather was not so cold that men would freeze, sleeping in their wagons. Ma charged twenty-five cents just for supper, and far into the night she and Mrs. Boast cooked and Laura washed dishes. So many men came to eat that she did not try to count them.

Late in the afternoon of the fourth day Pa came home. He waved as he drove by to put the tired team in the stable, and he walked smiling into the house.

“Well, Caroline! Girls!” he said. “We've got the claim.”

“You got it!” Ma exclaimed joyfully.

“I went after it, didn't I?” Pa laughed. “Brrr! It's chilly, riding. Let me get to the stove and warm myself.”

Ma shook down the fire and set the kettle boiling for tea. “Did you have any trouble, Charles?” she asked.

“You wouldn't believe it,” said Pa. “I never saw such a jam. It looks like the whole country's trying to file on land. I got to Brookings all right the first night, and next morning when I showed up at the Land Office I couldn't get anywheres near the door. Every man had to stand in line and wait his turn. So many were ahead of me that my turn didn't come that day.”

“You didn't stand there all day, Pa?” Laura cried.

“Yep, Flutterbudget. All day.”

“Without anything to eat? Oh, no, Pa!” said Carrie.

"Pshaw, that didn't worry me. What worried me was the crowds. I kept thinking maybe somebody ahead of me is getting my quarter section. Caroline, you never saw such crowds. But my worry then wasn't a patch to what came later."

“What, Pa?” Laura asked.

"Let a fellow get his breath, Flutterbudget! Well, when the Land Office closed I went along in the jam to get supper at the hotel, and I heard a couple of men talking. One had filed on a claim near Huron. The other said De Smet was going to be a better town than Huron, and then he mentioned the very piece I picked out last winter. He told the numbers. He was going to file on it first thing next morning. He said it was the only piece left vacant anywhere near this townsite. So he was going to have it, though he'd never seen it.

“Well, that was enough for me. I had to beat him to that claim. At first I thought I'd be up bright and early next morning, and then I figured I wouldn't take any chances. So as soon as I got some supper, I made tracks for the Land Office.”

“I thought it was closed,” said Carrie.

“It was. I settled right down on the doorstep to spend the night.”

“Surely you didn't need to do that, Charles?” said Ma, handing him a cup of tea.

“Need to do that?” Pa repeated. “I wasn't the only man who had that idea, not by a blamed sight. Lucky I got there first. Must have been forty men waiting there all night, and right next to me were those two fellows that I'd heard talking.”

He blew on the tea to cool it, and Laura said, “But they didn't know you wanted that piece, did they?”

“ They didn't know me from Adam,” said Pa, drinking the tea, "till a fellow came along and sang out 'Hello, Ingalls! So you weathered the winter on Silver Lake . Settling down at De Smet, uh?'"

“Oh, Pa!” Mary wailed.

“Yes, the fat was in the fire then,” said Pa. "I knew I wouldn't have a chance if I budged from that door.

So I didn't. By sun-up the crowd was doubled, and a couple of hundred men must have been pushing and shoving against me before the Land Office opened.

There wasn't any standing in line that day, I tell you!

It was each fellow for himself and devil take the hind-most.

“Well, girls, finally the door opened. How about some more tea, Caroline?”

“Oh, Pa, go on!” Laura cried. “Please.”

“Just as it opened,” said Pa, "the Huron man crowded me back. 'Get in! I'll hold him!' he said to the other fellow. It meant a fight, and while I fought him, the other'd get my homestead. Right then, quick as a wink, somebody landed like a ton of bricks on the Huron man. 'Go in, Ingalls!' he yelled. 'I'll fix 'im!

Yow-ee-ee!'"

Pa's long, catamount screech curled against the walls, and Ma gasped, “Mercy! Charles!”

“And you'll never guess who it was,” said Pa.

“Mr. Edwards!” Laura shouted.

Pa was astounded. “How did you guess it, Laura?”

“He yelled like that in Indian Territory. He's a wild-cat from Tennessee,” Laura remembered. “Oh, Pa, where is he? Did you bring him?”

“I couldn't get him to come home with me,” said Pa. “I tried every persuasion I could think of, but he's filed on a claim south of here and must stay with it to keep off claim jumpers. He told me to remember him to you, Caroline, and to Mary and Laura. I'd never have got the claim if it hadn't been for him. Golly, that was a fight he started!”

“Was he hurt?” Mary asked anxiously.

“Not a scratch. He just started that fight. He got out of it as quick as I ducked inside and started filing my claim. But it was some time before the crowd quieted down. They — ”

“All's well that ends well, Charles.” Ma interrupted.

“I guess so, Caroline,” Pa said. “Yes, I guess that's right. Well, girls, I've bet Uncle Sam fourteen dollars against a hundred and sixty acres of land, that we can make out to live on the claim for five years. Going to help me win the bet?”

“Oh, yes, Pa!” Carrie said eagerly, and Mary said “Yes, Pa!” gladly, and Laura promised soberly, “Yes, Pa.”

“I don't like to think of it as gambling,” Ma said in her gentle way.

“Everything's more or less a gamble, Caroline,” said Pa. “Nothing is certain but death and taxes.”

T here was no time for a good, long talk with Pa. Already the sunshine from the western window slanted far across the floor, and Ma said, “We must be getting supper. The men will be here soon.”

“What men?” Pa asked.

“Oh, wait, Ma, please, I want to show him,” Laura begged. “It's a surprise, Pa!” She hurried into the pantry, and from the almost empty sack of beans where it was hidden, she pulled out the little sack full of money. “Look, Pa, look!”

Pa felt the little sack in amazement. He looked at their faces, all shining with smiles. “Caroline! What have you girls been up to?”

“Look inside, Pa!” Laura cried. She could not wait while he untied the little sack. “Fifteen dollars and twenty-five cents!”

“I'll be jiggered!” Pa said.

Then while Laura and Ma started to get supper, they told him all that had happened while he was away. Before they had finished talking, another wagon pulled up at the door. There were seven strangers at supper that night; another dollar and seventy-five cents. And now that Pa was at home, the strangers could sleep on the floor around the stove. Laura did not care how many dishes she washed, nor how sleepy and tired she was. Pa and Ma were getting rich, and she was helping.