Chapter Eight
Two weeks later, Sallywas once again outside planting her June crops.This time she was planting cabbage, kale, carrots, and lettuce.
Belle brought lunch every day, but Maggie was out foraging for rhubarb.It was peak season for the wild rhubarb that would make delicious pies.Sally planned on using some of the rhubarb she got to bake two or three pies for the store, as well as several for her and Tom.Her mother had taught her to make a perfect rhubarb pie, and her mouth watered every time she thought about it.
The first day of planting, Sally was relieved to see Belle approaching with the baby.“Is Maggie coming for lunch?”Sally asked.
“Yes, she is planning to meet me here.Hopefully, she’ll have enough rhubarb for some pies.Rhubarb isn’t my favorite, but Everett loves it, so I’ll make him a pie every day until it’s gone.”
“Do you enjoy baking pies?”Sally asked, holding the door open for Belle to carry the baby and the basket with the meal she’d prepared.
“I do.I like to be creative with desserts, and Maggie prefers to bake bread most days.Occasionally, we’ll swap what we make for the store, but not too often.”Belle set the sleeping baby on a chair and removed the towel covering their lunch.“I made sandwiches today.Bertie was fussy, and anything more than that would be too much.Just think...in a year when we have sandwiches, we can have ham from your piglets!How are they doing?”
“Herbert is gaining weight quickly, which is what we want to see in a boar.Sometimes I let him out of his pen, and he follows me around the farm.The sows are more timid.I haven’t even named them all yet because I haven’t seen their personalities.”Sally washed her hands and put plates on the table.“Milk or tea?”
“Milk.Katie tells me it helps me produce more milk, and Bertie needs all the milk he can get.”Belle put the sandwiches on the plates.“I’m going to wait for Maggie to eat, but you can eat now if you’re in a hurry to get back to your planting.”
“No, I’ll wait.Would you like to meet Herbert and the ladies?”
Belle laughed.“That sounds like the title to a terrible dime novel.Herbert and the Ladies.”
Sally grinned.“It does!”
“Let’s go meet them while we wait for Maggie.I feel like they’re all partially mine.”
“I do as well.Everett insisted on using his lumber to build a sturdier pen, and you’ve given me plenty of table scraps to feed them.Your chickens would love table scraps as well, you know.They love when you chop up eggshells into their feed.”
“I didn’t know you could do that.You’d think they’d feel like it was cannibalism.”
“I don’t think they see things the way we do,” Sally said, leading the way outside toward the pen they’d built.They’d put it a fair distance from the cabin so the smell wouldn’t bother them, but Sally knew it would soon be bad anyway.It was the nature of the beast.
As they approached the pigpen, Herbert ran to the fence to receive pats from Sally.He nudged her hand through the wooden slats, obviously happy to see his favorite person.
“I can’t wait to have vegetables that aren’t quite right from the garden.I know he’ll love me more when he gets a bigger variety of food.”
Belle watched him for a moment.“I had no idea pigs were so affectionate.”
“They really are.I won’t get as attached to their babies, as I know they’ll be butchered.But these will be my breeders for a few years at least.”Sally scratched Herbert under his chin once more before heading back to the house.“If I decide to keep any of the gilts from the first litters, I’ll need to get another male in here to replace Herbert.We don’t want a boar to reproduce with his daughters.”
“That makes sense.It’s all really interesting.I have no knowledge of pigs, but I’m happy to learn!”
Maggie was approaching the house as they returned.“How goes rhubarb hunting?”Sally asked.
“I had a good morning!Were you out looking at the piglets?”
“We were.I can take you out and show them to you as well.”
Maggie shook her head.“If I get to know the pigs, I won’t be able to eat their babies.It’s best I stay away.”
Belle laughed.“She won’t hunt either.She doesn’t want to see the animal she’s going to eat while it’s still alive.”
“I guess we grew up differently,” Sally said, heading back inside and washing her hands again after petting Herbert.
Maggie put her baskets on the floor and washed up as well, then they all met at the table for their lunch.As they ate, Maggie talked about how much rhubarb she’d found.“I hope the men like rhubarb pies,” she said.“I’m not much of a rhubarb eater.”
Sally smiled.“My mother made the perfect rhubarb pie.Let me make one for us to share, and if you love it as much as I do, I’ll share the receipt.”
“That sounds like a good plan,” Maggie said.“And it would be good to have your receipt if it’s really that good.I’ve never made rhubarb pie before.”
