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The little boys brought their Christmas-present sleds to school. Sometimes the big boys borrowed them, and took the girls sled-riding. The boys pulled the sleds, for there were no hills to slide down, and this winter no blizzards made big, hard snowdrifts.
Then Cap and Ben made a hand-bobsled, big enough for all four girls to crowd into. The four boys pulled it. At recess they raced at great speed, far out onto the prairie road and back. At noon they had time to go even farther.
At last Nellie Oleson could not bear standing alone at the window and watching this. She had always disdained to play outdoors in the cold that might roughen her delicate complexion and chap her hands, but one day at noon she declared that she would go for a sled ride.
The sled was not large enough for five, but the boys would not agree to let any one of the other girls stay behind. They coaxed all five girls into the sled. The girls’ feet stuck out from the sides, their skirts had to be gathered in till their woolen stockings showed above their high shoetops. Away they went, out on the snowy road.
They were windblown, disheveled, red-faced from cold and wind and laughter and excitement as the boys swung in a circle over the prairie and ran toward town, drawing the sled behind them. They whisked past the schoolhouse and Cap shouted, “Let’s go up and down Main Street!”
With laughter and shouts the other boys agreed, running even faster.
Nellie shrieked, “Stop this minute! Stop! Stop, I tell you!”
Ida called, “Oh boys, you mustn’t!” but she could not stop laughing. Laura was laughing, too, for they were such a funny sight, heels kicking helplessly, skirts blowing, fascinators and mufflers and hair whipping in the wind. Nellie’s screaming only added to the boys’ merriment as they ran the faster. Surely, Laura thought, they wouldn’t go onto Main Street. Surely they would turn back any minute.
“No! No! Arthur, no!” Minnie was screaming, and Mary Power was begging, “Don’t! Oh, please don’t!”
Laura saw the brown Morgan horses standing blanketed at the hitching posts. Almanzo Wilder, in a big fur coat, was untying them. He turned to see what caused the girls’ screaming, and at the same instant Laura knew that the boys meant to take them all past him, past all the eyes on Main Street. This was not funny at all.
The other girls were making such a commotion that Laura had to speak low, to be heard.
“Cap!” she said. “Please make them stop. Mary doesn’t want to go on Main Street.”
Cap began to turn at once. The other boys pulled against him, but Cap said, “Aw, come on,” and swung the sled.
They were on their way back to the schoolhouse and the bell was ringing. At the schoolhouse door they scrambled out of the sled good-naturedly, all but Nellie. Nellie was furious.
“You boys think you’re smart!” she raged. “You— you—you ignorant westerners!”
The boys looked at her, sober and silent. They could not say what they wanted to, because she was a girl. Then Cap glanced anxiously at Mary Power, and she smiled at him.
“Thank you, boys, for the ride,” Laura said.
“Yes, thank you all, it was such fun!” Ida chimed in.
“Thank you,” Mary Power said, smiling at Cap, and his flashing smile lighted up his whole face.
“We’ll go again at recess,” he promised, as they all trooped into the schoolhouse.
In March the snow was melting, and final examinations were near. Still Laura did not study as she should. All the talk now was about the last Literary of that winter. What it would be was a secret that everyone was trying to guess. Even Nellie’s family was coming to it, and Nellie was going to wear a new dress.
At home, instead of studying, Laura sponged and pressed her blue cashmere and freshened its lace frill. She so wanted a hat to wear instead of her hood that Ma bought for her half a yard of beautiful brown velvet.
“I know you’ll take the very best care of the hat,” Ma made excuse to herself, “and it will be perfectly good to wear for some winters to come.”
So on Saturdays Mary Power and Laura made their hats. Mary’s was of dark blue cloth, trimmed with a twist of black velvet and blue, all from her father’s scrap bag. Laura’s was of that lovely brown velvet, so soft to touch, and with a tawny-golden sheen to its silkiness. She wore it for the first time to the Literary.
In the schoolhouse no preparation was to be seen, except that the teacher’s desk had been moved from the platform. People crowded three in a seat, and every inch of standing room was jammed. Even on the teacher’s desk, boys stood tightly crowded. Mr. Bradley and Lawyer Barnes pressed back the mass of people, to keep the center aisle clear. No one knew why, and no one knew what was happening when a great shout went up from the people outside who were trying to get in.
Then up the center aisle came marching five black-faced men in raggedy-taggedy uniforms. White circles were around their eyes and their mouths were wide and red. Up onto the platform they marched, then facing forward in a row suddenly they all advanced, singing,
“Oh, talk about your Mulligan Guards!
These darkies can’t be beat!”
Backward, forward and backward and forward they marched, back and forth, back and forth.
“Oh TALK aBOUT your MULLigan GUARDS!
