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“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 Te
rritory. He’s a wildcat 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.”
Chapter 26
The Building Boom
There 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.
In the morning she was surprised. There was hardly time to talk; so many men were there for breakfast, she could hardly wash the dishes fast enough, and when at last she could empty the dishpan and hang it up there was hardly time to sweep and scrub the muddy floor before she must begin peeling potatoes for dinner. She had only a glimpse of the sunny, cold, blue-and-white-and-brown March day outdoors, while she emptied the dishpan. And she saw Pa driving a load of lumber toward the townsite.
“What on earth is Pa doing?” she asked Ma. “He’s putting up a building on the townsite,” said Ma.
“Who for?” Laura asked, beginning to sweep. Her fingers were shrunken in ridges, from being so long in the dishwater.
“‘For whom,’ Laura,” Ma corrected her. “For himself,” and she tugged through the doorway an armful of bedding that she was taking outdoors to air.
“I thought we were going to move to the claim,” Laura said when Ma came in.
“We have six months before we must build on the homestead,” said Ma. “Lots in town are going so fast your Pa thinks he can make money by building on one. He’s using the lumber from the railroad shanties and putting up a store building to sell.”
