These Happy Golden Years (25 page)

The window beside the front door let still more sunny light into that pleasant room.

Two closed doors were in the other long wall. Laura opened the one nearest her, and saw the bedroom. Her Dove-in-the-Window quilt was spread upon the wide bed, and her two feather pillows stood plumply at the head of it. At its foot, across the whole length of the partition was a wide shelf higher than Laura's head, and from its edge a prettily flowered calico curtain hung to the floor. It made a perfect clothes closet. Against the wall under the front window stood Laura's trunk.

She had seen all this quickly. Now she took off her poke bonnet and laid it on the shelf. She opened her trunk and took out a calico dress and apron. Taking off her black cashmere, she hung it carefully in the curtain closet, then slipped into the blue calico dress and tied on the crisply ruffled, pink apron. She went into the front room as Almanzo came into it through the door by the drop-leaf table.

“All ready for work, I see!” he said gaily, as he set Ma's basket on the chair near him. “Guess I'd better get ready for my work, too.” He turned at the bedroom door to say, “Your Ma told me to open your bundle and spread things around.”

She looked through the door by the table. There was the lean-to. Almanzo's bachelor cook-stove was set up there, and pots and frying pans hung on the walls. There was a window, and a back door that looked out at the stable beyond some little trees.

Laura returned to the front room. She took up Ma's basket, and opened the last door. She knew it must be the pantry door, but she stood in surprise and then in delight, looking at that pantry. All one wall was covered with shelves and drawers, and a broad shelf was under a large window at the pantry's far end.

She took Ma's basket to that shelf, and opened it.

There was a loaf of Ma's good bread, a ball of butter, and what had been left of the wedding cake. She left it all on the shelf while she investigated the pantry.

One whole long wall was shelved from the ceiling halfway down. The upper shelves were empty, but on the lowest was a glass lamp, Almanzo's bachelor dishes, and two pans of milk, with empty pans near. At the end, where this shelf was above the window shelf in the corner, stood a row of cans of spices.

Beneath this shelf were many drawers of different sizes. Directly below the spices, and above the window shelf, were two rather narrow drawers. Laura found that 286

one was almost full of white sugar, the other of brown sugar. How handy!

Next, a deep drawer was full of flour, and smaller ones held graham flour and corn meal. You could stand at the window shelf and mix up anything, without stirring a step. Outside the window was the great, blue sky, and the leafy little trees.

Another deep drawer was filled with towels and tea towels. Another held two tablecloths and some napkins.

A shallow one held knives and forks and spoons.

Beneath all these drawers there was space for a tall, stoneware churn and dasher, and empty space for other things as they should come.

In a wide drawer of the bottom row was only a crust of bread and half a pie. Here Laura put Ma's loaf of bread and the wedding cake. She cut a piece from the ball of butter, put it on a small plate, and placed it beside the bread. Then she pushed the drawer shut.

By the iron ring fastened in the pantry floor, she knew there was a trap door. She straightened the ring up, and pulled. The trap door rose, and rested against the pantry wall opposite the shelves. There, beneath where it had been, the cellar stairs went down.

Carefully covering the ball of butter, Laura carried it town the stairs into the cool, dark cellar, and set it on a hanging shelf that swung from the ceiling. She heard steps overhead, and as she came up the cellar stairs she heard Almanzo calling her name.

“I thought you were lost in this big house!” he said.

“I was putting the butter down cellar so it would keep cool,” Laura said.

“Like your pantry?” he asked her, and she thought how many hours he must have worked, to put up all those shelves and to make and fit those many drawers.

“Yes,” she said.

“Then let's go look at Lady's big little colt. I want you to see the horses in their stalls, and the place I have fixed for your cow. She's picketed out to grass now, just out of reach of the young trees.” Almanzo led the way through the lean-to and outdoors.

They explored the long stable and the yard beyond it.

Almanzo showed her the new haystacks on the north, to shelter the yard and stable when the winter winds came.

Laura petted the horses and the colt, and Shep as he followed close at their heels. They looked at the little maples and box elders and willows and cottonwoods.

Quickly, the afternoon was gone. It was time for chores and supper.

“Don't build a fire,” Almanzo told her. “Set out that bread and butter your mother gave us; I'll milk Fawn, and we'll have bread and new milk for supper.”

“And cake,” Laura reminded him.

When they had eaten supper and washed the few dishes, they sat on the front doorstep as evening came.

They heard Prince blow out his breath, whoof! as he lay down on his bed of clean hay in the stable. They saw the dim bulk of Fawn on the grass, where she lay chewing 288

her cud and resting. Shep lay at their feet; already he was half Laura's dog.

Laura's heart was full of happiness. She knew she need never be homesick for the old home. It was so near that she could go to it whenever she wished, while she and Almanzo made the new home in their own little house.

All this was theirs; their own horses, their own cow, their own claim. The many leaves of their little trees rustled softly in the gentle breeze.

Twilight faded as the little stars went out and the moon rose and floated upward. Its silvery light flooded the sky and the prairie. The winds that had blown whispering over the grasses all the summer day now lay sleeping, and quietness brooded over the moon-drenched land.

“It is a wonderful night,” Almanzo said.

“It is a beautiful world,” Laura answered, and in memory she heard the voice of Pa's fiddle and the echo of a song,

"Golden years are passing by

These happy, golden years.'